Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
The resurrection stories in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John are among the strangest stories in all of the literature of the world, even among the strangest stories in the Bible. That is true of each Gospel’s accounts individually, but even more of the collection as a whole. On the one…
As a pastor, I’m interested in discipleship. Christians are called to be disciples of our Lord Jesus Christ. Discipleship has everything to do with the disciplines we walk by in our lives. Things like Bible reading, prayer, and fasting are hallmarks of standard Christian discipleship. The basic thrust is that…
Psalm 1 is justly famous among biblical texts. It opens the Psalter, it’s a paean to the life-giving power of the Law, and it beautifully describes righteous life as a stable, fruitful tree. It subtly weaves the contrasting threads of wickedness and righteousness into a succinct summary of biblical wisdom:…
No book is more quoted in Hebrews than the Psalter: there are quotations and allusions to psalms on virtually every page. And many of the quotations are not passing references but closely considered and repeatedly cited as the author of Hebrews develops his central arguments. Much of Hebrews is exposition…
Howard Bloom is a beautiful hypocrite. The author of books in as different subjects as Mohammed, scientific theory, and the cultural upheaval of the 1960s, he professes to be a “stone cold atheist.” Yet in spite of that profession, Bloom obviously writes as a Jew; that is, he writes with…
There may be some debate about who deserves the title “the King of American literature,” but, at least to my mind, there should be no debate over who deserves to be “the Queen” – let’s give the crown to Flannery O’Connor. She is, however, a very unlikely queen. Unlikely, not…
Showing page 11 of 309
Showing page 1 of 43
Baylor University Press is hosting a reception to celebrate the release of my Gratitude: An Intellectual History . It will take place at the First Things offices in Manhattan on Thursday, March 6, at 6 PM. For details, click here .
Jesus addresses seven letters to seven “angels” of the churches (Revelation 2-3). Commentators differ on whether the angels are spiritual beings, ecclesial guardian angels, or human beings, “messengers.” The letter to Ephesus seems decisive. There, Jesus charges that the angel has left his first love (Revelation 2:4), “fallen” from his…
The seven stars in Jesus’ hand are the angels of the churches, the seven lampstands are the churches (Revelation 1:20). In the temple imagery that John is drawing on, the lamps on the lampstand are the lamps themselves, the lights that make the lampstand luminous. The lampstand of the temple…
The distinction between appearance and reality is an old saw in philosophy. It appears in the letters to the churches (Revelation 2-3) as an opposition between being and saying, a (distinctively Hebraic?) emphasis on the word. Several letters describe the challenge. At Ephesus, there are “saying apostles” who are not…
In his study of the sacramental shape of Eberhard Jungel’s theology, The Interruptive Word , R. David Nelson suggests that “in many types of ecclesiology, Jesus Christ and the church . . . are conceived as identical” (167). He offers several examples, mostly Catholic: “ Lumen gentium . . .…
Andrew Wilson thinks that the Ukrainian protesters have won . But the battle for a free Ukraine is just beginning. Russian won’t make it easy. “the new government in Ukraine, however it’s made up, will be given the briefest of ritualistic honeymoons before Russia uses every instrument at its disposal…
Showing page 674 of 2212
Your weekly digest for all things Theopolis.
