By Michelle Van Loon www.MomentsAndDays.org and www.MichelleVanLoon.com Contrary to the song lyrics, it’s not the most wonderful time of the year for many of us. The jingle bell merriness of the season is like an out-of-tune gong for those grieving the deaths of family members or friends, struggling in the wake of a divorce, suffering the effects of broken relationships, experiencing financial hardship, or dealing with the effects of physical or mental illness in themselves or their loved ones. My family has been... Read more

In the now-irreplaceable volume edited by Preston Sprinkle, Homosexuality, the Bible, and the Church, two — yea, four — views are presented, two affirming and two traditional, and each of the authors responds with admirable civility and firm difference to each of the others. The four authors are William Loader and Megan DeFranza as well as Wesley Hill and Stephen Holmes. Last week the post examined the view of Loader and this week the focus is Megan DeFranza. DeFranza has a... Read more

You go Bronson Koenig: They had traveled more than 100 miles to visit with him for just a few minutes, but he had no desire to talk, no idea what to say. Still, his mother had asked him to follow through on his commitment, so Bronson Koenig walked into a small conference room at the Holiday Inn in Lincoln, Neb., and sat across from the basketball players from Winnebago (Neb.) High. It was March 2014, and Koenig was a freshman... Read more

Merry Christmas to Northern Seminary! Read more

By John Frye Recently Scot McKnight linked an article by Ian Paul titled “Jesus was not born in a stable.” Paul’s essay jousted with the commonly accepted version of the-birth-of-Jesus story in the West. Referencing scholars like R. T. France, Kenneth Bailey, and Alfred Plummer, the main point of the essay is that Jesus was born in a typical Palestinian house surrounded more than likely by relatives of Joseph. While even the NIV translates kataluma (Luke 2:7) as “inn,” the... Read more

It might be time for these researchers to have a conversation. FIRST: In the Dallas News, David Millard Haskell writes: Those who don’t attend church regularly but are scouting for Christmas services this year might be surprised to find fewer mainline Protestant churches around these days. Across the English-speaking world the numerical decline of mainline Protestantism is accelerating. The largest mainline Protestant denominations in the United States are the United Methodist Church, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)... Read more

Though I have already sent up the flagpole my selections for the Books of the Year, I want to announce that a dictionary set is now complete, and I cannot emphasize enough how substantial and valuable this set is. Edwin M. Yamauchi and Marvin R. Wilson have chosen and co-edited the entries of a variety of experts on a variety of themes connected to the intellectual, social, and historical background of daily life in antiquity. The title: Dictionary of Daily Life in... Read more

In a popular story line the Scientific Revolution and the secularization of society moved hand in hand. A scientific society will, of course, be secular. Scientific thought eliminates the divine from the realm of rational thought. J.B. Stump in Science and Christianity explores secularization and the role of science in the process in chapter three of his new book Science and Christianity: An Introduction to the Issues. There is no denying that the Scientific Revolution and the secularization of Western... Read more

One can narrate the Bible from a host of angles, and Walter Brueggemann (Money and Possessions) has chosen to narrate it from a economic hermeneutic focusing on coveting, desire, acquisitiveness, and hoarding over against Israel’s summons to live out an alternative, counter-Pharaoh way of life that finds expression in Sabbath and abundant generosity. We might call his narrative one of “econo-meneutics.” His approach is stimulating even if much of it is his own hermeneutical construct. What do you think of... Read more

One of the most enjoyable projects I have ever had was researching and then writing up what I often call a “Protestant Biblical Theology of Mary.” I call her the real Mary, and if my Roman Catholic and Orthodox friends think I’m saying so with a wink and nod, they know what I mean. Most Protestants know what they don’t believe about Mary, and it amounts to whatever Catholics or the Orthodox do believe. But few have examined the Bible about... Read more