Guest AuthorWhat does the Bible say about loneliness? More than you might think. Scripture’s light reveals its lies and shows us how to deal with loneliness God’s way. This excerpt is adapted from Finding God in My Loneliness by Lydia Brownback. *** Lie:...
A recent article detailed what higher education might look like after COVID-19. I agree with most of the observations in that article, if the goal is simply to return to the pre-pandemic status quo. But what if we took this disruption as an...
This post is adapted from The Bedrock of Christianity: The Unalterable Facts of Jesus’ Death and Resurrection by Justin W. Bass. *** The earliest followers of Jesus did not just claim that Jesus rose from the dead but that his resurrection was the...
"I chose intentionally to forsake the possibility of reading broadly and chose to read much more narrowly instead."
Until a few weeks ago, COVID-19 was a distant problem that many discounted as superfluous to their life; it is a global catastrophe. No one today questions the relevancy of COVID-19 to their local community. The surge of articles, blogs, and news...
By Stephen Nichols, adapted from Welcome to the Story: Reading, Living, and Loving God’s Word. *** How Dietrich Bonhoeffer came to write Life Together In 1935, the German National Church threw its support behind the Nazi party. Troubling to many in...
Mount Gerizim, Schechem, Mount Ebal in Israel Toward the end of Deuteronomy, Moses tells the Israelites that, after they cross the Jordan River into the land of Canaan, one of the first things they are to do is build an altar on Mount Ebal and renew...
By Harold L. Senkbeil I’ve been praying the sacred liturgy for 70-some years, but it never struck me before as it did this morning—the first Sunday since the coronavirus pandemic and its precautions have swept the nation. Before the service began...
by Andrew M. King, PhD Dr. Tavis Bohlinger penned a very thoughtful response to my recent FTC article on first-year language students leaving their Greek and Hebrew Bibles at home during corporate worship. I heartily commend it to you. Thanks to Dr...
By Brandon Crowe When we ask, “What does the Bible say about work?” we often find a list of verses telling us to work hard and be faithful in our labor. But when we take a broader view of the topic, we can ask: how does the great commandment shape...
I thought, “If a nonbeliever can study theology, certainly believers should be studying theology with folks of different theologies.”
If we do our job well, our song choices can provide a “sonic sanctuary” where people meet with the living God. Here are five tips for building better worship setlists.
When we receive a request for a photo for a social post, a website banner, or an event promo slide, it always seems to be urgent. There isn’t time to sift through the archive and find the perfect image. How can this hunt be simplified?
"There is a sense in which we can say that men like Gerstner, and Edwards before him, 'lost' their battles with Culture."
Today is International Holocaust Remembrance Day and the 75th anniversary of the Jewish liberation from Auschwitz. Despite the horrors that occurred at Auschwitz and other concentration camps, thousands of Jewish lives were spared because of the...
"In studying the Bible, a big part of our goal is to understand the text in its original historical and cultural context. This means we have the difficult responsibility of trying to read God’s Word with “Middle Eastern eyes” instead of our innate...
"Bernard’s brilliance is not his use of so-called critical methods but in the fact that, as a monk, he had prayed, read and studied the Sacred Scriptures so intently that his vocabulary is literally a biblical vocabulary."
One of my warmest memories with Professor Hurtado occurred in 2014 at SBL in San Diego over a meal. We went to lunch at a French café and before we began eating, he paused and said: “Let’s pray over our meal.” He thanked God for the meal, closing...
By Leland Ryken, excerpted from J. I. Packer: An Evangelical Life. *** Preachers are only half of the equation in preaching. The other half is the people who listen to preaching. Just as it is easy to think of education in terms of what...
Before I share with you how I study God’s word using the inductive Bible study method, I want to share with you why I study it this way.
"To spend such an extended time immersed so deeply in a text of Scripture was a wonderful experience, and a number of my writing weeks offered me a profound sense of being in the presence of God."
Abraham Kuyper was a pastor, journalist, theologian, politician, institution-founder and -builder, church reformer, and cultural critic. His peers regarded him as a theological genius. But it was his sustained concern for ordinary Christians and...
For 40 years, Dr. Douglas Moo has been studying, teaching, and writing about Paul and Romans. These words from theologian Johann Albrecht Bengel hang on his wall: “Apply yourself wholly to the text. Apply the text wholly to yourself.” It’s with that...
[In James 3:14–16,] James . . . told what heavenly wisdom is not, and now [in James 3:17–18,] he turns and tells what it is. . . . Purity The false wisdom is “earthly [and] unspiritual,” while this true wisdom is “first of all pure.” The four...
For all the help that Edwards has given scholars and pastors in the areas of theology, philosophy, and missions, it is probably due time that someone devote a doctoral project to Edwards’ organizational genius.
Master Journal Bundle 3.1 gives you affordable, digital access to current conversation in theological scholarship.
By John Stott, adapted from The Radical Disciple. In the introduction to his book Knowing God, Dr. J. I. Packer writes that we are “pygmy Christians because we have a pygmy God.” We could equally say that we are pygmy Christians because we have a...
This is the most thought-provoking book I have read in a long time . . . none of the weak portions undermine his general thesis that the supernatural personages envisioned in the OT are both central and coherent in the text.
Remember ERP: Estimated Relationship Potential. This is a social science theory from the field of interpersonal communication which demonstrates that when we meet someone we quickly form an estimate of the potential for a relationship. We start to...
What you need is a system that allows you to take notes easily (one that is not clunky); allows you to use your notes for drafting essays (one that allows you to find and search easily); and one that protects you from plagiarism, both now and for...