Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
"The faithful use of sacraments, and indeed a fully sacramental view of creation, is vital to the life of the Church. Baptism and the Lord's Supper are rites that directly shape the community and the Body, because they were given by God for that express purpose. A deficient practice of…
Weightlessness is fun. At the beginning of Gravity (2013) , we can see one astronaut dancing the Macarena and another one playing with his jetpack. They like it out there in the space. Apart from zero-gravity they can enjoy beautiful views, and even the silence is likable, although Matt Kowalski…
I recently went to a lunch that is more or less quarterly. About a dozen of us go. It is a lunch held in honor of a retired professor of religion and philosophy. I have been one of his acquaintances for more than 40 years. In his tenure as professor,…
Why Theopolis? Don't we already have seminaries and Bible colleges and other institutions for theological education? Why do we need another one? I get this question now and again. I ask myself this question even more often. What follows is a partial answer. Back in the 1990s, seminaries seemed to…
I think the logic of the Lutheran Reformation can be summarized in one sentence, attributed to Luther himself: "God does not need your good works, but your neighbor does." The first half of that statement is justification by faith . God doesn't need our works to satisfy his justice or…
If you are looking to start a fight with Christians, there is hardly a better subject to do so than the arts. Music, movies, paintings, and literature have provided no small battlegrounds for Christians to war. We are emotionally invested in the arts. A song, a book, or a film…
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The Hebrew word “half” ( chetziy ) is used over 120 times in the Old Testament. Nearly half of the uses are in two books, Exodus (20x) and Joshua (29x). The word is used another 14x in Chronicles, and 13 more in Nehemiah. In Exodus, it is mostly used in…
I explore the significance of Paul’s description of Judaizers as “troublers” at the Trinity House site .
In Comment , Jonathan Chaplin helpfully defines the decision to be made in Scotland’s referendum next week. To clarify what’s being decided, Chaplin distinguishes between “nation” and “state.” “Nations are thickly-textured, evolving, porous, morally ambiguous societal amalgams. While one nation may be more or less recognisable when set against another,…
The Atlantic is running a series of essays on Coen Brothers’ films (are they Brothers, or just brothers?), written by Christopher Orr, who is re-watching the brothers’ feature films and sharing his notes. Orr gets Hudsucker wrong , but still, it’s a worthy effort. Orr’s series took me back to…
Like most of the lists in Deuteronomy, the list describing Yahweh’s power in 11:2-7 is carefully patterned. The direct description of Yahweh’s power is constructed by fives and sevens (vv. 2-3). There are five terms: greatness, mighty hand, outstretched are, signs, works. Five represents military power, and also human power…
Stephen R. Holmes argues in his contribution to Two Views of the Doctrine of the Trinity that “the doctrine of the Trinity is not primarily an ontology, nor does it depend on a particular ontology,” though Holmes admits that it does imply a “modest” set of ontological commitments (35). The…
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