Things I have thought this year about blogging on Facebook and Patheos: 1. I suspect the fundamentalists and conservative Evangelicals (including those charismatics who fall into this camp) who today are proud of being Protestant (if they even know what that means) would have been first in line to find ways to kill off Martin Luther. Those who buy into the myth of modern Protestantism, which has become nothing more than a shattered mirror dropped from 100 stories, are up... Read more

Today I am commenting on a quote of Bill Johnson, founder of the Bethel Church in Redding, CA. “The gospel is a gospel of power and must become manifest through supernatural demonstration. Miracles are not optional. They are so important that Jesus hung the entire weight of His identity and ministry upon them saying, “If I don’t do the works of the Father, don’t believe me” (John 10:37). That is an amazing statement when you consider all the witnesses throughout... Read more

In light of today’s horrible atrocity of the killing of 145 children and adults in Pakistan by the Taliban, I reprint here a meditation from last year I wrote during Advent. A blessing on the memory of all those innocents who died today. ********* The headline was brutal, the pictures even worse. “Local Mayor Goes on Baby-Killing Rampage.” I really could not believe it. He went door to door in his small town and if there was a child that... Read more

Change is inimical (not favorable or hostile) to many in our world. It is difficult to accept change in our circumstances or our life. Moving, death, estrangement from those we previously loved and cherished, a new job, economic conditions, health issues, political situations, all of these and many more examples create fear and tension. We adapt quickly to the status quo and wish to remain there. Change is part of life, yet we seek ways to avoid it or ameliorate... Read more

I am currently teaching a five week series at our home church on Paul, the Torah and Jerusalem Christianity. Two are ‘in the can’ with three to go. For several decades I have been pondering the development of the apostolic churches. It is like a giant jigsaw puzzle and many scholars have taken their hand to this particular task. I have, after much consternation, become convinced of the older thesis of F.C. Baur that there was a deep division between... Read more

I have been reading the work of Rene Girard now for a quarter century and have been applying the insights of the mimetic theory to the Bible and Christian theology for all that time. Girard is not a theologian but he has provided us with an anthropology, a way of understanding the human and human culture that explains so much of the data from so many sciences that its insights have become conclusive for me (or at least as conclusive... Read more

I can always tell that Christmas is coming, not by the homes that are decorated but by the amount of traffic on Route 30 in Lancaster as people head to the outlet malls to do their shopping. I do everything in my power to avoid this stretch of road for five weeks. I can also tell it is Christmas when the amount of posts and blogs decrying the commercialization of Christmas begin appearing. I also seek to avoid those at... Read more

Mark 13 for America Today You want to stop violence? Stop poverty and racism America . You want to stop poverty? Stop spending so damn much money on the military. Stop spending so damn much money militarizing local police forces. Stop spending so much money on teaching people how to fight and start spending money teaching people how to change their minds, how to be peacemakers, how to be community builders. You say you don’t want the violence but every... Read more

I had no idea there were so many trolls in the world. Well, maybe not in the world but certainly on the Internet. I have decided on a strategy for dealing with trolls. I am going to just ignore them. I am going to treat them as though they are invisible. They do not contribute to a conversation, they hijack it if we let them. They do not make rational arguments, they only offer ad hominem attacks. Trolls seek to... Read more

Is a personal relationship with God really the be all and end all of the Christian faith? I have been contemplating this for some time now as I am reading Ilio Delia’s The Unbearable Wholeness of Being. I was prompted to write this blog post for two reasons: first, I have my new computer up and running (and it was rather strange to be disconnected from technology) and two, fellow blogger, Carl McColman has a helpful blog querying Tim Keller’s... Read more