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.
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.
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 the last two decades U.S. Americans have given way to fear of many things: economic decline, loss of values, limits on our personal rights, to name a few. Too many of us live with some sense of threat and menace hanging over our heads and haunting our hearts.
Good communication depends on trust to make such conversation work effectively. The truth springs, first, from God's own promise and the punch put into that promise by the mysterious power of the Holy Spirit.
I have been very busy lately, trying to understand things.
I am not a good Lutheran. I have only been around reformation theology for a few years.
Would you go to the church on the corner knowing that the pastor is an ex-con?
Jesus cuts right to the chase when it comes to the evil one. He calls the devil “a liar and the father of lies,”
Hurricane Florence, or any natural disaster, can serve as a painful reminder of our own mortality, the futility of human ingenuity and strength.
For the past twenty years that I've been a Christian, I've not found any evidence in my reading of Judges 13-16 that qualifies Samson for the "book of faith" (Hebrews 11).
There was a TV show back in the ‘90s called “Dinosaurs” that I used to sneak into the living room at night to watch.
True preaching arises when the Holy Spirit steeps the proclaimer in its own cycle of judgment and mercy.
Prechers translate as a calling. Called by God, they are given a message, and for most of their hearers it is to one degree or another a message in a language from afar, with strange concepts, sometimes with a more familiar ring, sometimes with a strange sound.
The church is a home for the family of God. It’s not a mall, a café, a coffee shop, or Amazon. It’s where we usually don’t get what we want, but what we need.