Tag: Theology
What songs should we choose for the worship service? What should we do for our fall campaign? How many minutes should the sermon be? How should we organize the chairs in the worship center?The list could go on.Pastors are constantly faced with practical questions. What to do has become the driving force of ministry, and […]
I have always been a fan of “origins” stories, and recently there has been a glut of superhero origin stories (here, here, and here). Whether or not the movies are good, we are fascinated by the origins of our favorite characters (also by apocalyptic storylines, but that’s for another post). There is something in understanding […]
I had always thought of our loving of God and neighbor as related to God’s love the way a cue ball was related to the cue. God loved me in Christ (the moving pool cue) therefore I ought to love others (the cue ball), God’s love for me was sort of hermetically sealed off from […]
This weekend I was on a mini-vacation (about which I will be posting later), and before we put our boys to sleep one night The Sandlot came on, which of course was to my great pleasure. It was one of many, Lord willing, initiatory rites my boys will experience with me on their way to […]
Mr. Strickland: I noticed your band is on the roster for the dance auditions after school today. Why even bother, McFly? You don’t have a chance. You’re too much like your old man. No McFly ever amounted to anything in the history of Hill Valley!Marty McFly: Yeah, well, history is gonna change. Back to the Future asked […]
“I know God has forgiven me but I just can’t forgive myself.” I have sat in my office or at a coffee shop with many a soul whose despondency over their oppressive guilt was literally eating at them from the inside. The above statement or something similar to it has been, from out their condition, […]
“I see men, but they look like trees, walking.” Mark 8:24 The evangelical church seems to waffle between some form of antinomianism (a rejection of God’s law as no longer binding for spiritual growth) and its equal opposite moralism (an affirmation of God’s law as the solution to spiritual growth). We struggle profoundly with knowing […]
We evangelicals tout the battle cry “its not a religion its a relationship,” eschewing institutional formality, priestly orders, and list-based self-justification. We say it as if it’s obvious what we mean. Yet it doesn’t seem at all obvious to me, sin-stained as I am, how to have a “personal relationship” with an infinite, immense, self-existing, […]
Not too long ago a blogger was criticizing contemporary evangelicalism’s obsession with the term "biblical." This blogger suggested, if I remember correctly, that seminaries should come up with a degree in Biblical Biblicalness." There is, of course, something to be lauded in this emphasis. But I would suggest the opposite is actually taking place. Terms like "biblical" often lose their meaning rather quickly. Instead, they become storehouses for other kinds of things. When I hear people use the word "biblical" today, more often than not it is a placeholder for: "what I find comfortable in light of my background."
It is usually easy to point this out, in light of the fact that these people’s claim to "be biblical in all things" is, itself, extra-biblical. The call to be biblical itself is based on theologizing. That is not to say that the inclination is somehow unbiblical, but that the content of what it means to be biblical is based on a theological development (the Bible never states, for instance, sola scriptura – Scripture alone). I say this because I find that the term biblical is usually used in an unbiblical manner. It is an elitist tendency to write off other people who stand under God’s word and to, instead, apply God’s sovereignty to themselves. Rather than standing under the judgment of Christ, they stand at his side, pointing out people they think deserve his wrath. They often mimic, in other terms, the Pharisees.
I was reading the Gospel of John today, and came across the account of Jesus’ arrest. As I was reading, I noticed, for maybe the first time, how incredibly ironic this statement it: "Then they led Jesus from Caiaphas into the Praetorium, and it was early; and they themselves did not enter into the Praetorium so thaty they would not be defiled, but might eat the Passover" (18:28). This mob, in the midst of vigilante justice, deception, self-obsession and an unhealthy self-assurance, was worried that they might be defiled. Now, it would be easy to go on a rant about Pharisaism, "religion" or whatever else, but this made me think a bit about worldliness.