Category Archives: Bible

The Coronavirus and Christian Witness

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Mark records the following narrative:

“On that day, when evening had come, he said to them, ‘Let us go across to the other side.’ And leaving the crowd, they took him with them in the boat, just as he was. And other boats were with him. And a great windstorm arose, and the waves were breaking into the boat, so that the boat was already filling. But he was in the stern, asleep on the cushion. And they woke him and said to him, ‘Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?’ And he awoke and rebuked the wind and said to the sea, ‘Peace! Be still!’ And the wind ceased, and there was a great calm. He said to them, ‘Why are you so afraid? Have you still no faith?'” Mark 4:35-40

They had just left the crowd, the roaring waves of people that were always present wherever Jesus was. He had been teaching all that day, and the evening had come upon them, when He said to them, “Let’s go to the other side”, that is, the other side of the Sea of Galilee. And so, they got in the boat, and went on their way. Continue reading →

Moral Exemplar or Holy Substitute?

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“Because our minds are so poor and frail, we rightly discuss the theories of the atonement. But we must always remember that the atonement is not a theory. It wasn’t a theory that died for us on the cross. It was a man who took our very physical nature himself in his own body.”[1] Ultimately, when discussing any theological issue, the reality that must overwhelm us is that we are contemplating truths that in their fullness are beyond us; our minds cannot grasp the depths of the Incarnation, the Trinity, etc., nor can our words completely encapsulate their reality. The God Whom we so often discuss is the living God, Whose holiness and glory and being and thoughts are beyond the reckoning of man. Continue reading →

Don’t Shoot the Wounded: 1 Corinthians 1:1-9 and the Perseverance of the Saints

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Paul, called by the will of God to be an apostle of Christ Jesus, and our brother Sosthenes,

To the church of God that is in Corinth, to those sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints together with all those who in every place call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, both their Lord and ours:

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

I give thanks to my God always for you because of the grace of God that was given you in Christ Jesus, that in every way you were enriched in him in all speech and all knowledge – even as the testimony about Christ was confirmed among you – so that you are not lacking in any gift, as you wait for the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ, who will sustain you to the end, guiltless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord. (1 Corinthians 1:1-9 ESV)

 

 

One of the greatest tragedies among orthodox evangelical Christians is our tendency to shoot the wounded. Often, whenever a brother or sister falls, instead of coming alongside them and helping them up, we have an inclination to stand over them, heaping upon them pitiless moral aphorisms and a conceptual theology that doesn’t recognize them as real human beings made in the image of the real, not-a-concept, living God. Continue reading →