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…
Showing page 131 of 309
Showing page 1 of 43
INTRODUCTION Isaiah prophesies the Babylonian exile, but also promises that Yahweh’s Servant will deliver Israel not only from Babylon but from the numbing effects of her own idolatry. THE TEXT “Where is the certificate of your mother’s divorce, whom I have put away? Or which of My creditors is it…
Colossians 2:16-17: Let no one act as your judge in regard to food or drink or in respect to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath day – things which are a shadow of what is to come, but the body of Christ. When Paul talks about regulations…
Food fads come and go, especially in America. Not so long ago, white bread was the miracle food that would perfect and purify. For many today, organic is savior. Food was an issue in the early church, and Paul gives us coordinates for navigating through. First, do not let yourself…
Peter Green writes to offer this further reflection on venomous wine: “The word for ‘serpent’ or ‘dragon’ in Deut 32 is also in Is 27:1—the Song of the Vineyard, Redux. YHWH slays the dragon who produces dragon wine, and then his vineyard is able to ‘fill the whole world with…
In Against Christianity , I made the bold, unsupported, impressionistic claim that theologians are persnickety types who avoid talking about things the Bible talks about: hair, blood, sweat, entrails, menstruation and genital emissions. Matt Jepsen was looking for something a bit more factual, and checked several theologians to see if…
In an article recently published in the Phoenix Law Review , my oldest son, Woelke, explores how the Supreme Court has deployed what William Cavanaugh has called The Myth of Religious Violence: Secular Ideology and the Roots of Modern Conflict . The Court first mentioned the “myth” in Everson v.…
Showing page 789 of 2212
Your weekly digest for all things Theopolis.
