It’s Lent so it’s a good time to repent and to learn how we as Christians are to live, and we are looking at the early Christian letter from Rome to Corinth called 1 Clement. Our series on the Friday With Our Fathers (FWOF), using Michael Holmes, The Apostolic Fathers. We are looking today — and I didn’t get this post ready for last Friday (sorry) — at 21:1-23:5. The theme? “A Call to Good Behavior.” What does that look... Read more

https://soundcloud.com/user-212639123/sadducees-then-and-now-kr-84 Read more

The next chapter in Old Earth or Evolutionary Creation: Discussing Origins with Reasons to Believe and BioLogos looks at the scientific method with focus on methodological naturalism and natural theology.  J. B. (Jim) Stump (BioLogos) and Jeff Zweerink (RTB) again take the lead for their two organizations. James Dew moderates the discussion. The discussion starts with methodological naturalism in the practice of science. It will probably surprise some that Jim sees more issues with methodological naturalism than Jeff, but this... Read more

Some of you may know I have a new commentary out called The Letter to Philemon. I have never written a book more difficult to send on to the editor (Joel Green) and publisher (Eerdmans). I enjoyed it so much I wanted to keep on working on it, but I was done. #1: Slavery has immediate connections to our world. The slave Onesimus has probably run away; the slavemaster, Philemon, has probably been shamed (at least in the household); Philemon probably... Read more

The Rest of the Story Part Three: Put Rest in Your Story For the past few years, I’ve written and curated a weekly column on Scot’s blog, and I’ve done that for one main reason. Scot’s blog is read by thousands of pastors each week. And I know we pastors need all the help we can get. The Church guru, Dr. Thom Rainer, did a survey sometime back, asking church members just what their expectations were for their pastors. He... Read more

Mike Bird: First, the New Testament is part of the generated tradition of the early church, an account of its story-telling, teaching, and ministry. We find evidence in the New Testament for units of instruction being orally transmitted to the nascent churches by the apostles. In the Pauline churches, this included the story of the gospel (1 Cor 15:3–5), Jesus’s last supper with his disciples (1 Cor 11:23–26), and a general body of Christian teachings (Rom 6:17). Indeed, Paul tells... Read more

I recently received, courtesy of the publisher, a copy of a new book due for release in a week: Mere Science and Christian Faith by Greg Cootsona. Greg has BA from Berkely (overlapping with my years on campus as a Ph.D. student), an MDiv from Princeton, a Ph.D. from the Graduate Theological Union, and decades of experience working with emerging adults (defined as 18 to 30 year-old) at a number of different churches.  Currently Greg leads STEAM, (i.e. Science and... Read more

It’s Lent so it’s a good time to repent, to turn from our sins and to receive the grace of God’s transformative forgiveness. It’s also a good time to turn to 1 Clement’s call to humility, which means a good time to see the examples of humility in the Bible’s story (according to Clement of Rome). What is his focus in their good examples? Read further. Our series on the Friday With Our Fathers (FWOF), using Michael Holmes, The Apostolic... Read more

From Christian Today: An ancient mosaic that ascribes divinity to Jesus Christ is set to go on display for the first time. The ‘God Jesus Christ’ mosaic stands as one of the earliest-known testaments to early Christian belief in the divinity of Christ. It was found in 2005 through excavations completed by the Israel Antiquities Authority and the University of Tel Aviv, exploring the ancient grounds beneath the British-built Megiddo Prison in northern Israel. The writing, dated to the year... Read more

Why are there four Gospels? Why do some combine them into a single narrative, a harmony? Why do some find in minute differences a world of meaning? Why are some in the Bible and not others? If you need an introduction to such questions, and many others, here is an accessible book for you. Francis Watson is making a name for himself as an expert on the Gospels and why there were four of them. His big book was called... Read more