The lack of clarity of the scriptures is a stumbling block to many, both believers and unbelievers alike. A few years back, I summarized the great theologian John Owen on this topic, but want to revisit this. Possible reasons for the lack of clarity in...
I was perusing the internet, and came upon a thread on PuritanBoard.com, in which various seminarians were discussing which systematic theology authors were used at their schools. I tallied up the responses and made the charts herein. Certainly, this survey is not representative, since those who...
Interestingly, all religions (except Judaism, perhaps) recognize Jesus as some sort of spiritual prophet (which can not be said of Krishna, Buddha, or Mohammed). But what is interesting about Jesus, and perhaps all prophets, is that a closer inspection of his life reveals that he...
We all know that paradoxes are two ideas that seem contradictory or mutually exclusive, yet are actually both true in a way that does not yield completely to our either/or logic. In fact, it is both/and thinking that solves these false dilemmas. Profound Truths As Paradox...
The other day, a friend mined the following quote from Rabbi Jonathan Sacks’ To Heal a Fractured World: The Ethics of Responsibility: The only force equal to a fundamentalism of hate is a counter-fundamentalism of love. (p. 8) Jonathan Sacks is an important thought leader in...
I’ve always been a bit of a seeker, and have re-examined and overturned many of my previous convictions as I gain more perspective. Beginning as a scientist agnostic, I explored many subcultures, and then did a stint in Charismatic Christianity. I then left it and...
One of the more informative podcasts I listen to regularly is Issues Etc. Recently, they interviewed Joel Heck, who’s written a very inexpensive book entitled In the Beginning, God: Creation from God’s Perspective, which examines the questions surrounding the historicity and interpretation of Genesis. I...
Rob Bell’s new book Love Wins is a modern reformulation of Christian Universalism, that is, the idea that all are saved from judgement by the works of Christ. Not a new idea, but controversial coming from a supposed evangelical. One of the questions the problem...
