Recommended Books (Autumn 2023)
Beautiful autumn days beckon us to spend our afternoons and evenings out of doors. Amid all the hustle and bustle of daily life, especially if you have children in school or are in school yourself, it can be difficult to devote time to reading. But good books bring extra light into our lives and open new vistas of understanding about the world around us. So we recommend taking a book out to the porch swing or a favorite clearing in...
Are You Ministering to Humans?
In the 1982 blockbuster Blade Runner, (or its literary precursor Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?), Rick Deckard, played by Harrison Ford, is assigned to track down bio-engineered replicates and “retire” them—that is, kill them. Of course, the duplicates and humans look and sound exactly the same. The only way to distinguish between a human person and a facsimile is to use a test, the Voight-Kampff, which focuses on their...
Anthropology for Pastors
Pastors spend a lot of time thinking about people. As much time as they invest in biblical study, planning services, and more, people are the focus of their ministry. To be sure, Christ is the ultimate object of our worship and service. Serving Him means we are shaped primarily by His Word and the Holy Spirit. However, sermons are preached to people. Struggling members are counseled. Wayward saints are confronted. Take any meaningful...
Great Is Thy Faithfulness? An Interview with Heath Thomas
One character trait that I admire in a biblical scholar is his/her willingness to tackle tough subjects. They focus on aspects of biblical literature that others avoid, and then seek to draw their students and readers into new horizons of Scripture’s spiritual landscape. Dr. Heath Thomas is one such scholar. He serves as professor of Hebrew and Old Testament at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary in Wake Forest, North Carolina....
Desire: A Missing Link In Our Theology
What happens when right beliefs don’t lead to right behavior? Using New Testament language, we might simply call this “hypocrisy.” In my previous essay, I addressed the problems with separating theology (doctrine) from ethics (practice). Because these two belong together biblically, effectively divorcing them renders Christianity incoherent. They flow in and out of one another. Once we accept this, it is only reasonable to ask, “Why...
Recent Comments