Category: Blog
-
Eat the Word of God
About one year ago, I wrote an article here about an old-fashioned method of Bible study that delivers more power than most other kinds of Bible study I’ve tried. The basic idea is to focus on one book, and read it repeatedly (but there are some helpful details worth enumerating). A few months later, Joe…
-
On Division in the Church
While his Christology leaves much to be desired, the grandfather of liberal Protestant theology, Friedrich Schleiermacher (1768-1834) has some great thoughts on ecclesiology. Consider the following: [T]here are frequently also efforts at union which do not originate in the Spirit of the Church, and the success of which cannot therefore be regarded as a gain,…
-
How Did Jesus Argue? Jesus & Logic
Today there is widespread indifference to, even downright hostility towards logic and the fundamental laws that govern it. We are sometimes told that logic is a Western construction invented by DWEM’s (Dead White European Males such as Aristotle), that in a postmodern world, story and narrative have replaced a cold-hearted, logical approach to life, and…
-
Honorable Education
It is beginning of August, and I am starting to think about the coming school year. Soon students will be returning to the university with a new or renewed sense of commitment to their academic pursuits. First year students are especially interesting to watch. Not only are they trying to figure out where their dorm…
-
The Emerging Church: Evangelical Poster-Boy or Whipping-Boy?
It seems that the emerging church (hate to use that singular, but it’s convenient) scratches a couple of different itches amongst evangelicals. On the one hand, it is hailed as a fresh expression of evangelicalism’s ever-outgoing nature. It is contextualization for the sake of conversion. On the other hand, it represents the (further) watering down…
-
Nifty Graphics are Good Arguments
We usually think of charts and graphs as presenting “just the facts,” but in reality every chart is biased. Charts are based on prejudices, advance judgments about what should be represented, what should be suppressed, and how the information should be displayed. When you look at a graphical display of information, you are getting the…