Recently in Gospel Category

Tuesday I began a series of posts looking at Harvey Cox's new book The Future of Faith. Today I would like to look at Chapter 3 - Ships Already Launched. Cox begins this chapter by dismissing the idea that all religions are the same. We all live with mystery, but how we cope varies.

I frequently meet people who, when they discover that I teach religion, assure me that "underneath, all religions are really the same." I used to respond that, during a lifetime of teaching religion it appeared to me that they are not. But since that usually ended the conversation on a disagreeable note, I have recently just let their opinions pass. It is true that we are all responding to the same mystery, the one that confronts us all not just as mortal beings, but as beings aware of our mortality. Still we sense it and cope with the mystery in quite disparate ways. (p. 38)

Cox then begins to describe, as he says, "the ship I found myself on" - the narrative of the Judeo-Christian tradition. And this leads me to the questions for today. 

Are all religions the same?

But a simple answer of no isn't enough.  Most of us consider ourselves Christian (certainly I do) - some will claim that this is this simply the luck of the draw and a matter of birth.  But the Christian is not willing to rest here - the whole NT especially the book of Acts is about God's mission and the proclamation and spread of the good news, inviting others to join The Way. 

Why is the gospel of Jesus Christ good news? What is there that is real, intrinsically worth proclaiming, to which we desire to invite others?

Why is Christianity not simply another way (one among many) of dealing with the mysteries of life, purpose, and mortality?

Thursday evening I flew down to Cincinnati for the National Youth Workers Convention, which everyone seems to call YS -- Youth Specialties. I love speaking to youth pastors, in part no doubt because they are just one step removed from our seniors. At least most of them are. 

Today I begin a series of posts looking at Harvey Cox's new book The Future of Faith. We'll see how long it goes - at least a couple of weeks. Cox is the Hollis Professor of Divinity emeritus at Harvard and is best known for his 1965 book The Secular City.  I first became familiar with Cox and his work through his book When Jesus Came to Harvard: Making Moral Choices Today, a very thoughtful and thought provoking book.  The new book explores the trends that Cox sees in the history of the church and his thoughts on the future of faith, including Christian faith.

In the first chapter of his book Cox describes a history of the church divided into three ages, the age of faith, the age of belief, and the age of the spirit (we will look at these in greater detail below). He then talks about his personal faith journey from a rather fundamentalist Baptist to the current day. He talks about his experiences at Penn as an undergraduate where his belief - but not his faith - was shaken.  To understand this statement it is important to understand what Cox means by faith as he now uses the term. 

As Cox describes it faith is the experience of the divine - not a set of theories about the divine, and Christianity is best understood as a way of life, not as a creed or set of proper beliefs. He notes that the confusion began to clear in his mind when an acquaintance described himself as "a practicing Christian, but not always a believing one"; when a bishop of the Catholic church welcomed an audience saying "The line between belief and unbelief ... runs through the middle of each one of us, including myself, a bishop of the church"; and as he pondered the doubts experienced by Mother Teresa. (p. 16-17) 

Does Cox's idea that faith is experience and way of life hit a resonance? Is it possible to be a practicing Christian, but not always a believing one?

A CNN.com article reports about gaccaca proceedings in Rwanda, and a book I read recently provides ample stories and illustrations of the same. After a tough history of tension with occasional bursts of violence and bloodshed, in April 1994 Rwanda broke open and for 100 days radical Hutus slaughtered Tutsis and even moderate Hutus. Somewhere between 800,000 and a million humans beings died -- and in the most gruesome of ways.

Did anyone see the PBS special or the documentary? Anyone have something to say about Rwanda?

When the smoke settled, Rwanda's challenge was to put that country together again. Catherine Claire Larson's book, As We Forgive: Stories of Reconciliation from Rwanda , is must reading by pastors, by seminary students, and by anyone who wants to know the possibilities and power of forgiveness and reconciliation. We need more preaching and teaching about forgiveness -- here is a good collection of stories. We need more Christians willing to forgive -- here is a good collection of stories to see how it works.

Larsen's book is a collection of twenty-one chapters of stories -- moving, tragic, emotive, brutal, uplifting, and gruesome all mixed into the naked realities of a social fabric ripped in half and then the attempt to put it back together again. The book maps stories inspired by the documentary of the same name.

Richard Stearns is the President of World Vision. When the President of World Vision speaks, people listen. When the same person writes, people read. On our trip to South Africa I saw a man sitting in the middle of the plane on our flight from Paris to Johannesburg and I immediately recognized the book he was reading -- because I was also reading it: Richard Stearns, The Hole in Our Gospel: What does God expect of Us? The Answer that Changed my Life and Might Just Change the World .

This book belongs in every church library; every pastor needs to read it; and every adult Sunday school class in our country needs to read it and face the facts -- and think of how best to respond. That's my endorsement of this book. (Even though the book could have been shorter.)

Questions for the day: Does the biblical gospel include justice for the world? Or is justice for the world secondary to the gospel? These are the questions we need to discuss. Where do we define the gospel? From Luke 4:18-19 (gospel of kingdom) or from the message of personal salvation in Romans?

And if one thinks the gospel entails justice, how is that gospel to be preached? What does evangelism look like for a gospel without the hole?

This book has four major elements to it:

The gospel is my focus in study and research these days, and the subject of most my extra lectures I'm giving at various places, and I want to post two definitions of the gospel I've recently seen. How do you...

I want to thanks some very kind folks who collated the Gospel series we did and here is the whole thing.The Gospel by Scot McKnight 1 We begin a new biblical study on the word "gospel" today.  We will start...

Though the entire sweep of the verses below is not called "the gospel" or the "message," it unmistakably evokes 1 Corinthians 15:1-5 as a narration of the saving events of Jesus' life:16 Beyond all question, the mystery of godliness is great: He...

By the way, if anyone is collecting all this series into a MS Word document, I'd be happy to give you a bundle of credit and repost the whole series in one document. One of these days I'll learn the...

In my recent research on the meaning of "gospel," I read Ted A. Campbell's new book, The Gospel in Christian Traditions. Here is a book that needs to be read as a primer to theology in the history of the...

We will finish this series this week and we will begin [in two weeks] a series on the letter of James. But today I want to observe that Paul's gospel can be "gospeled" or "proclaimed" through the grid of several...

The "gospel" changes at Acts 1-2. One way of saying this is the proclaimer became the proclaimed one -- but this misses that John preached about Jesus, too. And Jesus' own message was self-directed. But, still, a good point to...

We can look at a slew of references for all say basically the same thing. We've had some early pushbacks here so I embolden the words that make our point: preaching/gospeling. Notice these references [where the word "kerusso"/preaching/proclaiming/gospeling appears]:1. John...

We shift now for a while from the word "gospel/gospeling" to "heralding/herald" (Greek word is kerusso/kerygma/kerux). We back up to the Gospels again, and we begin with John (Matt 3:1-2) and Jesus (4::1 In those days John the Baptist came, preaching...

Does gospel preaching matter? This is a question that Peter answers. Here are his words, from 1 Peter 4:17: 16 However, if you suffer as a Christian, do not be ashamed, but praise God that you bear that name. 17 For it...

Peter says something in chp 4 about the gospel that has perplexed many for centuries: 6 For this is the reason the gospel was preached even to those who are now dead, so that they might be judged according to men...

We continue in our series of the meaning of the word "gospel" in the New Testament with how Peter uses "gospel." Today we look 1 Peter 1:25.22 Now that you have purified yourselves by obeying the truth so that you have...

Peter, too, talks about the gospel in his first letter. We begin in chapter one:10 Concerning this salvation, the prophets, who spoke of the grace that was to come to you, searched intently and with the greatest care, 11 trying to find...

We are studying on this blog the meaning of the word "gospel" in the Bible. This is actually the 59th post in this series as we "blog" our way through the references. I am doing some writing on the "gospel,"...

Paul offers us a near-summary of the gospel in poetic terms in 2 Timothy 2:8 Remember Jesus Christ, raised from the dead, descended from David. This is my gospel, 9 for which I am suffering even to the point of being chained...

Paul's Pastoral letters, those written to Timothy and Titus, contain references to the word "gospel" and we want to dip into 1 Timothy 1 today:8 We know that the law is good if one uses it properly. 9 We also know that...

We need to string together a few texts from Paul's letter to the Philippians. 2: 22 But you know that Timothy has proved himself, because as a son with his father he has served with me in the work of the...

Take your lunch break with us today and contemplate the meaning of the word gospel. If Ephesians emphasized the word "peace," Philippians emphasizes "Christ." These are not alternatives but different ways of saying the same thing: the "peace" of Ephesians...

Our next two references to "gospel" in Philippians are found at 1:12 and 1:16. Here they are in context:12 Now I want you to know, brothers, that what has happened to me has really served to advance the gospel. 13 As a...

Of the prison epistles Paul writes, Philippians has the most references to "gospel." It is one of the central themes that hold this letter together.1:3 I thank my God every time I remember you. 4 In all my prayers for all of...

Our next "gospel" text in the New Testament comes from the closing to Ephesians, in chapter six. It's part of a longer text and I want to quote all of it:10 Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty...

We're experimenting with something for a couple of weeks: spreading our posts throughout the day instead of loading them up all at once. It was a little cleaner before but it tended to attract all the conversation to one post...

Paul adds a "wrinkle" to the word "gospel" in Ephesians and it strikes me as very close to how Jesus used his favorite expression, "the gospel of the kingdom." It is found first in Ephesians 2:17 and is also seen...

We turn now to Ephesians, a 3d letter of Paul's from prison (accepting the Pauline authorship of the traditional letters). Eph uses "gospel" six times: 1:13; 2:17; 3:6, 8; 6:15, 19. We begin with ...11 In him we were also chosen,...

Paul uses the word "gospel" one more time in Colossians (1:23) and once in Philiemon 13. Here is the context for Col 1:23:21 Once you were alienated from God and were enemies in your minds because of your evil behavior. 22 But...

We continue in our series on "gospel" and what it means by turning to the prison letters of Paul, and we begin with Colossians (1:5).3 We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you,...

Our last reference in Romans is found in Romans 16:25. Fittingly it is part of a prayer, a doxology:25 Now to him who is able to establish you by my gospel and the proclamation of Jesus Christ, according to the...

We continue our series on the meaning of the word "gospel," a word I think has been so reduced in meaning that it will take serious efforts to recover a fully biblical perspective. Romans 15:14-20 reads:...

No matter how you read it, the end of Romans 11 is tough stuff:...

We skip in Romans from Romans 2 to Romans 10 to find the next use of "gospel."  There are two uses of "gospel/gospeling" in Romans 10:15-16 and I have provided additional verses to exhibit the context:...

Undoubtedly, the one passage in Romans that doesn't seem to "fit" the standard Reformation explanations of both gospel and justification is found in Romans 2 and I am clipping a few verses to set our next use of "gospel" in...

What does a Third Way approach look like when it comes to the meaning of the "gospel." No small matter here but I enter this discussion with Adam Hamilton:Seeing Gray in a World of Black and White: Thoughts on Religion,...

Here we go. Romans 1:16-17:16 I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile. 17 For in the gospel a righteousness from...

We now turn to Romans in looking at what "gospel" means -- and one thing ought to be clear by now. This word is not very often defined. We get things like the gospel "of the kingdom" and the gospel...

Paul discusses in several places in 2 Cor 8--11 matters pertaining to supporting gospel work, gospeling itself, and striving for expanding the opportunities to gospel:...

Gospeling involves a gospeler, but the gospeler is not the gospel. In fact, the contrast between the gospel and the gospeler serves to highlight the power of God. Notice 2 Cor 4:1-7:...

We arrive today at one of the most widely-cited texts on the meaning of the word "gospel" -- to 1 Corinthians 15:1-8:1 Now, brothers, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and on...

We are looking at the meaning of "gospel" in 1 Corinthians. What does Paul mean by the word "gospel"? If we want to be faithful to the Story of the Bible it means being faithful to the whole Story of...

In our series on the meaning of the word "gospel" we are now looking at how Paul uses this great term in his letters to the Christians in Corinth. Today we look at 1 Corinthians 4:14-17:14 I am not writing this...

We are doing a series on the meaning of "gospel" -- with a view to defining the term gospel in a way that is faithful to the early Christian faith. Today we begin looking at how the term "gospel" and...

How does Paul understand the "gospel"? We've looked at Galatians, where we saw an emphasis on the gospel declaring the inclusion of Gentiles by faith in Christ into the People of God. (Paul says more than this, but this was...

The other day I was at O'Hare airport sitting at my gate sipping away on a decent cup of coffee when I noticed a pastor I met at a conference a year or so. I was jotting down some notes...

What do we mean by "gospel"? This question shapes the current Bible we are discussing on the Jesus Creed blog. We are not offering (right now) a definitive answer but looking at all the major passages and sketching observations. These...

What does the word "gospel" mean in the New Testament? My experience with good Christian folks reveals they think of the gospel in very simplistic terms. Simple is not bad. My experience also shows that many don't think of the...

The apostle Paul had a major toe-to-toe with Peter in Antioch, a city north of the Land of Israel. Here is the passage and it reveals Paul's gospel:...

To say that we Christians have the "gospel" is to say we have "good news that resolves the bad news." So, we ask, What is the problem to which the gospel speaks this good news? What is it that Christianity...

The apostle Paul gets pushed around a bit by many who aren't willing to read him carefully. Paul stood in the line of thinkers in the Bible who might be called "liberation gospelers." We have to think of Moses and...

Galatians has three sections: autobiography (chps 1-2), theology (3-4) and praxis (5-6). Simplied of course. The opening section of the autobiographical argument for Paul's gospel has several references to "gospel" and "gospeling":...

We turn today to how Paul understands the word "gospel" and I will begin with Galatians, since I think it is the earliest letter of Paul's. The moment we enter into Paul's use of "gospel" we also enter into a...

On Jesus Creed blog we do a Bible study M-Th and our current series is on the meaning of the word "gospel." We looked at how the term is used in two Old Testament texts, then at how it is...

Gospeling, gospeling, gospeling ... that's what Paul does. And today we look at his great address on the Areopagus in Athens: Acts 17:16 While Paul was waiting for them in Athens, he was deeply distressed to see that the city...

Paul keeps on gospeling and we turn today to Acts 16 and 17. Acts 16:6 They went through the region of Phrygia and Galatia, having been forbidden by the Holy Spirit to speak the word in Asia. 7 When they...

The issue of whether or not to circumcise Gentile believers led to the first church council, establishing as I think it did a precedent for leaders to gather to discern the mind of God, and a ruling that Gentile converts...

Acts is a rich source for "gospel" and we turn today to Acts 14: Acts 14:1 The same thing occurred in Iconium, where Paul and Barnabas went into the Jewish synagogue and spoke in such a way that a great...

Acts 10 is one of the most important gospel texts in the New Testament. That text is followed by Acts 11:20 where, after rehearing the Acts 10 episode with Cornelius, Peter says: Acts 11:19 Now those who were scattered because...

Part two of Acts 10:34-48: Acts 10:34 Then Peter began to speak to them: “I truly understand that God shows no partiality, 35 but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him....

Our next text in our survey of "gospel" texts is a long one, but it needs to be read in its entirety. So here is Acts 10:34-48: Acts 10:34 Then Peter began to speak to them: “I truly understand that...

The gospel that went from Jerusalem to Samaria had the same "content," as we saw yesterday: it was about Israel's history, about Jesus as Messiah, and about the kingdom of God. We might then say it is about a Person...

The gospel moved from Jerusalem and a gospel-shaped message for Jews to the Samaritans. When it did, this is what we read in Acts 8: 4 Those who had been scattered preached the word wherever they went. 5 Philip went...

From the Gospels we move today to the Acts of the Apostles on the meaning of the word "gospel" or "preach the gospel." The first text is Acts says it all: Acts 5:41 The apostles left the Sanhedrin, rejoicing because...

Some of the texts in the Gospels about the "gospel" don't tell us enough to help us define what how the NT authors understand the "gospel." So, I'll gather together three texts (and their parallels) because each assumes we know...

One final text for this week on gospel, and it is potent one: Luke 16:16 “The Law and the Prophets were proclaimed until John. Since that time, the good news of the kingdom of God is being preached, and everyone...

The gospel of the kingdom can take on "happy" tones if we are not careful. Notice this "gospel" text: 34 Then he called the crowd to him along with his disciples and said: “If anyone would come after me, he...

In Luke 7 the following events are reported: Jesus heals the centurion's son, he raises the widow's son, he has words for John the Baptist about who he is and who John is, and Jesus is anointed by a sinful...

The passage about the gospel in Luke 4 is breathtaking; in some ways it sums up and carries through everything Jesus says about "gospel." But there are other texts that need to be discussed as we ponder the meaning of...

We come to the end of this week's series on gospel with a potent passage, one dearly loved by liberation theologians and justice workers and one of which many reducers of the gospel today are fearful. Here's my opinion on...

We look today and tomorrow at two formative texts for seeing what Jesus means by "gospel". Today we begin with Mark 1:14-15, a text that is comprehensive. Mark 1:14 Now after John was arrested, Jesus came to Galilee, proclaiming the...

Following John was Jesus, and he too was a gospeler, one who preached the gospel. Today I want to begin with some general summary passages that set up Jesus as a gospel preacher. Mark 1:1: The beginning of the good...

Peter Berger, well-known sociologist, goes against everyone's grain and the fashionable, trendy screeds in this piece in Books and Culture. When I read Berger's ideas on the train during my commute, my jaw dropped. By the way, I'm a huge...

We live in an age that seems intent on narrowing the gospel to even singular issues. What I find in these discussions is not that the person who argues for a singular issue (as central or the most important element)...

A second glorious text about "gospel" in the Lukan infancy stories is found in Luke 2, but this one concerns Yeshua (Jesus) and not Yohanan (John). It is found in Luke 2:8-14. 8 And there were shepherds living out in...

Any searching of the meaning of "gospel" in the Bible will find rich fertile ground in the glorious infancy chapters of Luke 1--2. So, I begin with one such text in Luke 1 -- this one about Gabriel, Zechariah, Elizabeth,...

We turn today to Isaiah in our study of the word "gospel." We notice today once again that "good news" is a verbal announcement; it is announced to those who are awaiting on God for justice; and it declares such...

We begin a new biblical study on the word "gospel" today. We will start with some references in the Psalms and then tomorrow in Isaiah before we turn to the New Testament. What these text reveal is that "good news"...

A regular question I get asked goes something like this: "If you believe in a robust gospel, how then do you evangelize?" I've got two books to recommend to you: The first is from James Choung and it is called...

How have modernity and postmodernity distorted how we understand the gospel? Jon Wilson, in his Why Church Matters, asks this question in chp 7: "Discipleship as Human Flourishing." And we start with a bang: "At these times, the church behaves...

I have been corresponding with this person for most of this school year. This letter, however, seems destined for the Jesus Creed community and so I asked his permission -- and he gave it. So here it is. I will...

Last week Krista wrote to me and then I began last week's post with this: Your question is a good one, and it is one that has haunted my own academic career for more than twenty years. Here’s your question:...

Static, that's the title of Ron Martoia's new book. Ron is a former student of mine and now is a "transformational architect". I'm not quite sure what that is, but it sounds cool. As Ron's former teacher, I must admit...

A colleague of mine, Soong-Chan Rah, recently saw something, said "enough is enough," pointed to a blatant case of Christian racism, called the authors and leaders, got to the publisher (Zondervan), and ignited genuine learning that found its way to...

At times on this blog I have observed that I believe far too many Christians anchor too much of their hope in a political party and in the next election -- whether local or national. My own conviction is that...

1 Corinthians 15 connects resurrection and redemption more profoundly than anywhere else in the Bible. He became what we are so we could become what he is; our union with Christ ushers us into the resurrection. Here's a scriptural reading...

Kris and I were invited down for a Saturday event at North Point church in Alpharetta, Georgia (northside of Atlanta). I was asked to address the Starting Point leaders on Embracing Grace. Starting Point, North Point's weekly small-group conversations with...

The Story of the Eikons and The Story of the Gospel....

In my two lectures (MP3) at Grand Rapids Theological Seminary, I addressed the gospel and the church. But I must say this: GRTS, under the careful eyes of both President Doug Fagerstrom and Peter Osborn, know how to do things...

The NY Times article on Greg Boyd's church in Minneapolis is catching attention. Why? (Below.) I'd like to give some reflections, and I'm keen on your response, especially as it is timed with our series on Randall Balmer's book, Thy...

My friend Joel Green recommended that I read Ted Peters' Sin: Radical Evil in Soul and Society and I'm glad for Joel's suggestion. This is a really fine theological and soul-ish analysis of sin. There is a pastoral element to...

In 1:1 of Romans Paul tells us he is devoted to, or set apart unto, the "gospel of God." What is the gospel? It might be good today for us to look at this term in Romans. We'll look at...

The Lutheran church across the street from us has an annual Easter weekend custom: on Good Friday they station Roman soldiers outside the grave, they stay there all weekend, and then on Easter morning Jesus gets up from the grave...

Way back in November, I shut down a series on the Sermon on the Mount to get ready for Advent and Christmas. Today I want to resume that series. Today we look at Matthew 5:43-48. Most know this passage as...

Charlie Wear has posted my thoughts about the gospel at Next-Wave. And very, very nice graphics along the way....

I've spent my academic life teaching the Sermon on the Mount in one way or another. Most of those who read the Sermon the Mount (=SoM) see it as the Ethics (or Morals) of Jesus or they classify it as...

For a long time in my teaching career I have worked with these two terms (salvation vs. discipleship), especially when it came to the teachings of Jesus on ethics. It permits good discussion about both the gospel and "the bottom...

Of all the crosses I see on churches, I like the Methodist cross the best: a cross, an empty cross, with the sign of the Spirit surrounding it. Can it get more complete? You computer folk could do better than...

I promise not to blog (much) about the gospel in the immediate future, but it is a topic so central to what we do (and believe) that it deserved some attention. On top of its importance, I'm trying to give...

We've been visiting family in New Hampshire this weekend where we had a wonderful time. My niece attends the University of New Hampshire, and we went with her parents; we stayed in a B&B in York Village near the coast....

On my way to my doctor for an annual physical this morning I got to thinking about this "No Logo" gospel, and that some have commented back that "No Logo" is as much about "branding" as anything, and that the...

I have also been impressed of late with the thought that the final state of humans shapes what the gospel is all about. That is, the various mosaics of the final state of humans tells us a lot about what...

I have been impressed of late with this thought: how people define the gospel is determined by where they start or, even more interesting, where they end up. Put slightly differently, what is the problem being resolved by the gospel?...

Recently a fellow blogger put me on to the No Logo site, and it made my head spin with implications for understanding the gospel. Far too many of us advocate a gospel that favors our brand of the Church: Protestant,...

In resuming our discussion of what the gospel is, I thought I'd record how my own mind has developed on the meaning of the gospel. First, my childhood gospel was a personal forgiveness for eternity gospel. I was taught by...

This last post this week on "what is the gospel?" will look at the gospel as God's work in the world for us vs. the gospel as what God has done for me. The latter I will call hyper-individualism, because...

I've been asked this enough times that I'll turn it into a post on its own -- if the gospel is what I am claiming it is, then how does one evangelize? And I've been asked this one several times...

This is as good a spot as any to say something about Tom Wright's view of the gospel, and I'll take this from his fine small book, What Saint Paul Really Said. First, Tom trots out how "gospel" is understood...

Ask your average Christian, all across the map -- and I mean from the Eastern Orthodox and the Roman Catholic to the Protestant low-church evangelical, what is the gospel and you will get one of three sorts of answers? First,...

One would think a question like that would be easy to answer. What is the gospel itself? How do tracts present the gospel? How do churches present the gospel? How do you understand the gospel? Over the next week or...

If you embrace a kingdom vision of the gospel itself, racism is nothing short of disgusting. If you embrace a judicial perception of sin, the Cross, and the gospel, racism is more tolerable. I'm sorry to put in such bold...

In this the fifth in a five-part set of posts on the Four Spiritual Laws, I will look at the fourth spiritual law of Campus Crusade's influential evangelistic tract.We must individually receive Christ; then we can know and experience God's...

In this the fourth in a five-part set of posts on the Four Spiritual Laws, I will look at the 3d spiritual law:Jesus Christ is God's ONLY provision for Man's sin. Through Him you can know and experience God's love...

The 2d spiritual law of the classic Four Spiritual Laws is this: Man is sinful and separated from God. Therefore, he cannot know and experience God's love and plan for his life. Here the law appeals to Romans 3:23 for...

Here is the First Spiritual Law of Bill Bright's famous Four Spiritual Laws tract, just in case you haven't used it or heard it:Just as there are physical laws that govern the physical universe, so are there spiritual laws which...

In this and a few more posts, I want to enter with you into a conversation about how Jesus would evaluate the Four Spiritual Laws of Bill Bright and Campus Crusade for Christ. The conversation should be back and forth...

For a long while I have been teaching and preaching that all the Church really has to offer to anyone (and everyone) is Jesus Christ. That is all it has to offer. Nothing else, nothing less. Once the Church separates...

Because of a few very kind e-mails and the blog there seems to be some reason to discuss the meaning of Image of God.First, I like to use "Eikon of God" instead of Imago dei or Image of God. Eikon...

Recently I've been reading and writing about how we present the gospel, and I've considered these "five" gospels that are preached: a gospel of Genesis 1, which focuses on our common humanity and our inherent capacities; a gospel of Genesis...

Most Christians have always thought that at the Fall we fell comprehensively, though many don't like the category of "total depravity." But, as Cornelius Plantinga put it in his brilliant Not the Way It's Supposed to Be, is there any...

I have been skipping through some of Leo Tolstoy of late, and came upon William Shirer's incredibly insightful study, Love and Hatred, which details the turbulent relationship of Leo and Sonya Tolstoy. For years and years they fought and warred...