Month: December 2011

Book Reviews, Theology, UncategorizedLeave a comment

A Review of “God’s Grand Design: The Theological Vision of Jonathan Edwards” by Sean Michael Lewis

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Sean Michael Lucas, God’s Grand Design: The Theological Vision of Jonathan Edwards (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2011). $17.99, 224 pages. My doctrine of salvation is Arminian, so you may wonder why I think highly of Sean Michael Lucas’s study of Jonathan Edwards, whose soteriology was Calvinist. The answer is twofold: First, Lucas has written an accessible introduction to the biblical theology and pastoral practice of “America’s greatest theologian”—as Robert Jenson described Edwards. Whatever their theological stripes may be, interested students of theology are in Lucas’s debt for this service. Edwards’s literary corpus is large and his thought complex, but Lucas ably … Continue reading A Review of “God’s Grand Design: The Theological Vision of Jonathan Edwards” by Sean Michael Lewis

UncategorizedLeave a comment

Why Do Christians Leave the Faith?

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Over at Black, White and Gray, Bradley Wright is writing a series of posts on deconversion, answering the question, “Why do Christians leave the faith?” Here are the posts so far: “The Fundamental Importance of Apologetics” In reading through these testimonies, and understanding how many of the former Christians linked their departure from the faith to these intellectual and theological concerns, I started wondering if the Church has an incomplete appreciation of the role of apologetics. Typically, the defending of Christianity encompassed by apologetics is aimed at non-Christians, helping them to understand the faith as removing their objections to it. … Continue reading Why Do Christians Leave the Faith?

Book ReviewsLeave a comment

Review of “Reading Scripture with the Reformers” by Timothy George

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Timothy George, Reading Scripture with the Reformers (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2011). $16.00, 272 pages. In the 1990s, InterVarsity Press launched the Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture (ACCS) series. ACCS aims to publish a commentary on every book of Scripture, based on representative selections from the Church Fathers. The series’ publication is a salutary event for the entire Church, of course, but especially for the evangelical wing of that Church, which often fails to wrestle with, let alone acknowledge, the history of the interpretation of the Bible. Now, InterVarsity is launching a new series: the Reformation Commentary on Scripture … Continue reading Review of “Reading Scripture with the Reformers” by Timothy George

Interesting, Politics & Culture1 Comment

National Christmas Tree Lighting Ceremony

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President Barack Obama made the following remarks at last night’s lighting of the National Christmas Tree. Remarks by the President at Lighting of the National Christmas Tree 5:31 P.M. EST THE PRESIDENT: It’s nice having your own band. Please have a seat, everyone. Merry Christmas! Merry Christmas! Thank you, Secretary Salazar, for that introduction and for your hard work to preserve and protect our land and our water and our wildlife. I also want to thank Minister Rogers for the beautiful invocation, as well as Neil Mulholland and everyone at the National Park Foundation and the National Park Service who … Continue reading National Christmas Tree Lighting Ceremony

Current Events, Interesting, Politics & Culture1 Comment

Life Under Capitalism according to Occupy Wall Street

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Two clever fellows at Occupy Wall Street–technically, Occupy Bloomington–performed this skit, titled, “Life Under Capitalism”: Screaming “work, work, work” evidently passes for insightful drama in Bloomington, and given the Fall, work is certainly burdensome. Then again, God created us to work. We often find a measure of personal satisfaction in our work. And at the level of the mundane, we must work to purchase our clothing, food, shelter–not to mention the clothing, food, and shelter of our children. And of course, we must “work, work, work” whether we’re living under capitalism, socialism, or any hybrid economic arrangement. But recognizing that … Continue reading Life Under Capitalism according to Occupy Wall Street

Book Reviews, InterestingLeave a comment

Reading Advice from Rick Warren

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From Rick Warren, “The Battle for Your Mind” in Thinking. Loving. Doing. A Call to Glorify God with Heart and Mind, ed. John Piper and David Mathis (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2011), 34: If you’re serious about growing in knowledge and growing in your mind, here’s the approach I suggest: Read 25 percent of your books from the first fifteen hundred years of church history. So many people act like nothing happened between the times of Paul and Luther. God was at work all that time, and we are dismissing the God of the church to think that he was not … Continue reading Reading Advice from Rick Warren

Book Reviews, Book Vlog, MinistryDirect, Podcasts, Politics & CultureLeave a comment

Interview with John Fea, Author of “Was America Founded as a Christian Nation?”

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In this video, I interview Prof. John Fea about his excellent book, Was America Founded as a Christian Nation? Fea is professor of history at Messiah College in Grantham, Pennsylvania. Interview with John Fea, Author of “Was America…, posted with vodpod You can read my review of Fea’s book here. If you’d like to skip ahead to a particular question, here’s the time code: 00:00 Introduction 00:56 How’s the weather today in Grantham, Pennsylvania? 01:44 Why did you find it important to write this particular book on this particular topic at this particular time? 05:08 What do historians do? How … Continue reading Interview with John Fea, Author of “Was America Founded as a Christian Nation?”