Top Down or Bottom Up? (RJS)

Last updated on: July 24, 2017 at 2:32 pm By RJS

Chapter 13 of Alister McGrath’s book A Fine-Tuned Universe: The Quest for God in Science and Theology poses some interesting questions about evolution and the language used to describe evolutionary mechanisms. (For those paying attention – I’ve skipped Ch. 12; it is worth reading, but poses questions quite similar to those considered in our last post on the book.) There are three factors at play in much scientific writing: empirical observation, scientific interpretation, and metaphysical assumption. The first two are... Read more

Report about Seminary Education, Affordability and New Models

Last updated on: July 26, 2017 at 6:38 am By Scot McKnight

From Atlantic Post: “There is certainly a growing trend towards bi-vocational ministry in both mainline and evangelical churches,” says Kurt Fredrickson, a professor of pastoral ministry at Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, California.This trend dovetails with other recent developments that are troubling to many religious communities. Not only is church attendance in long-term decline, but financial giving by church members is at Depression-era lows. Meanwhile, seminary students are taking on ballooning debt for a career that may not exist by the time they... Read more

The Prayer (New) Heart: Prayer’s Biggest Question

Last updated on: July 23, 2017 at 10:56 am By Scot McKnight

Prayer changes in the new covenant because the Spirit of supplication is granted those in Christ. Once in Christ and in the Spirit, our heart is renewed to prayer. Thus, John Frye, Liberate Your Praying Heart. The Bible’s story moves from God forming us into a wedding/marital relationship with God (think Hosea) toward a new covenant in which the will of God is inscribed onto the heart of every child of God. The inner lives of God’s people have been altered;... Read more

A Sign of Love, a Sign of Hope (RJS)

Last updated on: July 24, 2017 at 2:10 pm By RJS

The final chapter of Justo González’s short book, [Creation] The Apple of God’s Eye, ends on a note of hope. At several places in the book González has described creation using an analogy with human parenthood. There are limitations to the comparison of course, but it also helps direct our understanding. God’s act of creation is an act of love comparable to the act of love involved in deciding to bear children. “When properly made, the decision to have children... Read more

Tomorrow Night, Regent College, Adam and the Genome

Last updated on: July 23, 2017 at 11:03 am By Scot McKnight

Since 1982 the Gallup Poll [a repost of RJS’s post because tomorrow night Dennis and I will be giving a public lecture at Regent College (Vancouver) on our project] has been asking Americans about their views on evolution and human origins. This week they released the results of their most recent survey conducted in early May of this year (here). The question posed (with the order of options randomized): Which of the following statements comes closest to your views on the... Read more

Liberate Your Praying Heart

Last updated on: July 23, 2017 at 10:41 am By Scot McKnight

Some preachers and pastors have the knack of making people feel guilty about their prayer life and others have more than a knack. Others, like Eugene Peterson and John Frye, blow fresh breezes of more biblical and sound reasoning. Today I want to begin a set of posts on John Frye’s Liberate Your Praying Heart. There is no book on prayer like this — that I have seen. I recommend it. Here is his opening and it’s the theme: You are... Read more

Is Belief in Equality Creating Narcissism?

Last updated on: July 22, 2017 at 7:58 am By Scot McKnight

By D.C. McAllister, whose lengthy article makes some good points and some others that are not so good, but at the least he is asking a question worthy of some discussion: Fair question, fair-minded responses. Thanks. Or is the question, Is being a narcissist driving the push for equality? Fair question, too. In the 2009 book The Narcissism Epidemic, Jean Twenge and Keith Campbell make a convincing case that America is becoming infected with narcissism. They say there’s a growing... Read more

Haddon Robinson

Last updated on: July 23, 2017 at 8:36 am By Scot McKnight

From Gordon Conwell’s website, author of the most influential book on preaching (for me): Biblical Preaching. Dr. Haddon W. Robinson, longtime faculty member, former President of Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary and one of the world’s foremost experts in Biblical preaching, went to be with the Lord on July 22, 2017. Originally from the Mousetown section of Harlem, New York, he received a Bachelor’s Degree from Bob Jones University, Master of Theology from Dallas Theological Seminary, Master of Arts from Southern Methodist... Read more

Almighty God, the fountain of all wisdom…

Last updated on: July 23, 2017 at 8:10 am By Scot McKnight

Almighty God, the fountain of all wisdom, you know our necessities before we ask and our ignorance in asking: Have compassion on our weakness, and mercifully give us those things which for our unworthiness we dare not, and for our blindness we cannot ask; through the worthiness of your Son Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen. BCP Read more

Weekly Meanderings, 22 July 2017

Last updated on: July 22, 2017 at 6:33 am By Scot McKnight

We begin this edition of Meanderings with this good news story from Janie Fulling: MCKINNEY, TX – An 11-year-old boy from McKinney, Texas could potentially put an end to hot car deaths. Bishop Curry is a young inventor who loves gardening and all things technology. When a baby from his neighborhood died after being left in a hot car, he never wanted something like that to happen again. Curry invented Oasis, a device that will sit on a car seat... Read more