Our good friend Preston Sprinkle is releasing a new book with Francis Chan on July 1st called Erasing Hell: What God said about eternity, and the things we made up. This is the third part of the 3-part interview with Preston about the book and the doctrine of Hell. Read more

This is the second part of the 3 part interview with Preston Sprinkle the co-author (with Francis Chan) of the new book Erasing Hell: What God said about eternity, and the things we made up. Read more

On July 1st, Francis Chan and Preston Sprinkle will release a new book on Hell called Erasing Hell: What God said about eternity, and the things we made up. Here’s part one of a three part interview produced by Eternity Bible College where Preston is a Professor. Preston is a good friend of both Mike’s and I. Read more

Over at ABC Religion and Ethics, John Dickson socks it to atheist philosopher Tamas Pataki about a lot of things pertaining to religion, science, history, and archaeology. Quite a demolition job. Very interesting comments follow it (interesting in the sense of gauging the radical ignorance and gallant bigotry of some non-believers). Read more

In the second chapter of Nachfolge (Discipleship), Bonhoeffer has some incredible things to say about the Law and the Gospel–Incredible coming from a Lutheran. Perhaps the most thought provoking statement nugget is The call to discipleship is a commitment solely to the person of Jesus . . . It is beyond enmity between law and gospel. Christ calls; the disciple follows. That is grace and commandment in one (59). What a wonderfully beautiful way to express the unity of the... Read more

Bono and the Edge’s Broadway endeavor Spider-Man finally opened last night in Manhattan to mixed reviews. All seem to agree, however, that this version 2.0 is significantly superior to what was rolled out in February. After 183 previews and $70 million spent in production, the musical opened last night with pomp and circumstance. USA Today reviewer Elysa Gardner gives it a 3/4 stars and writes After myriad delays and hiccups, Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark (*** out of four) opened... Read more

Prof. Jim Davilla of St. Andrews Uni has fresh news about the “More Old Testament Pseudepigrapha Project” including a table of contents for the volume. Read more

The SMH reports Anglican Archbishop of Sydney Peter Jensen’s article on marriage where he claims that same-sex marriages will lead to incest and polygamy. Jensen supports legislation that extended the economic rights of married people to same-sex couples, but said religious leaders needed to defend marriage or risk losing the right to do so. My problem with same-sex marriage is twofold. First, if marriage is about “love” and not “law,” then what basis do you have for saying “no” to... Read more

Scot McKnight The Letter of James NICNT; Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2010. Available at Amazon.com Scot McKnight is Karl A. Olsson Professor in Religious Studies at North Park University and writes the award-winning Jesus Creed blog at patheos.com. McKnight recently fulfilled a lifelong dream when he wrote a volume for The New International Commentary on the New Testament series — The Letter of James. Here’s my interview with Scot. (more…) Read more

I still have many connections with Scotland folks in the Church of Scotland and Free Church of Scotland. So I’m naturally interested in news and current affairs in the Kirk there. Recent news is that Rev. Dominic Smart of Gilcomston South Church in Aberdeen is leading his congregation out of the Church of Scotland in light of recent decisions taken by the General Assembly to ordain active gay men and women. I’ve met Dominic several times and he definitely needs... Read more