Josephus does not tell us that Christianity is true, and Christians do not need Josephus to tell them that Christ is risen. But Christianity makes claims about things that happened in public history under identifiable rulers, priests, and governors. For that reason, testimony from outside the church matters.
Today, the longing for cultural Christianity on both the left and the right hearkens back to an older version of Christendom that was a mixed blessing for the church in the western world. The cultural mediation of Christian views on created order has certainly benefitted the civilization we’ve inherited. But the gospel itself isn’t something that can be reduced to cultural mediation either. Instead, the gospel as a message stands apart from all human accomplishments and achievements, no matter how beneficial they might be.
The student of Scripture should always have a map open next to their Bible as they read. If possible, they should also travel to Israel, not to make a pilgrimage, but to see the context of the land in which these stories took place. These are not fairy tales made up about fictional fantasy lands; these are stories about real people in real places interacting with a real God.

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In a world so wired by law and rules, judgement is everywhere.
The world doesn’t need dads who are more stressed than they already are. It needs fathers who care for their families, not in heroic ways, but in common, everyday ways.
You have suffered your son to come unto Jesus; but fathers, don’t let him die!
This coming Sunday churches around the world will celebrate the big, splashy day of Pentecost. As well they should.
Every single child we raise has a completely unique perspective, personality, strength, and weakness.
He reminds them how his love is truly marvelous and unconditional, but then, he looks them in the eyes, and says they ought to do better because of his love.
There’s some wild and untamed prayers in the psalms. But they’re fenced in by order, symmetry, predictability. They organize chaos. And they bring order and hope and stability to our chaotic lives.
Inside our heads is a courtroom where our whole lives are put on trial. And we are declared guilty of things. Big things, little things. God things, human things. True things, false things. We never can measure up.
Yes, how good it is for you to have enemies, for without them, when would you ever have the opportunity to fulfill, joyfully and willingly, the law of Christian love?
The side of God he has made known to us is Jesus. He is the one and only revelation of the Father, the one and only revelation we need.
He holds you tight and loves you even as you weep and fight in his arms. His Son suffers alongside you as your brother in the flesh.
For those of you unfamiliar with the Richter scale, our friends over at Wikipedia define it as a 1930s invention that "is a base-10 logarithmic scale, which defines magnitude as the logarithm of the ratio of the amplitude of the seismic waves to an arbitrary, minor amplitude."