Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
Keeping the Law Paul states just as emphatically as James that the doers of the law will be justified (Rom. 2:13; James 2:14ff). But who are these doers of the law? Is Paul speaking hypothetically of a class of sinless people who do not really exist? Or does he have…
I have entitled this super-condensed piece to capture interest, but the fact is it sets forth what I have believed and taught long before I had ever heard of the so-called “new perspective.” For example, one can look at my paper on Ephesians 2.15 , written before I had ever…
N. T. Wright and other “New Perspective on Paul” (NPP) theologians have been criticized and condemned for speaking of justification in various “tenses.” In fact, Wright typically begins discussions of justification with future justification and works his way back to the present. But this is hardly a novelty. While the…
A doctrine of “faith alone” must be explicated and lived out in the light of the larger story of faithfulness, a story that reaches its climax in Jesus, the faithful Messiah. Indeed, the idea of “faith alone,” and even Paul’s use of the OT in service of that idea, makes…
In every city in the United States there are at least a couple of Christian radio stations which broadcast preaching around the clock, seven days a week. Many areas have a Christian television station or two which broadcast worship services several hours a day. Almost any bookstore will have a…
The queston has been discussed: which is prior, faith or repentance? It is an unnecessary question and the insistence that one is prior to the other is futile. There is no priority. The faith that is unto salvation is a penitent faith and the repentance that is unto life is…
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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…
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