Source The excavators plan to keep working on the site for another week, but one of the most remarkable finds so far was a mosaic containing a Christogram, or a type of monogram of the name of Jesus. At the time, Byzantine Christians wouldn’t have put crosses on their mosaic floors so as to not step on the symbol of Christ,. The Christogram in the mosaic may look like a cross, but it’s actually more like a “chi rho” symbol,... Read more
“That He was Buried” Captured in Paul’s precise summary of the gospel he preached is this phrase, “…that he was buried” (1 Corinthians 15:1-5). We may not think much of this small fact unless we tie it to the way Jesus died—by crucifixion. Men crucified for treason against Rome forfeited the honor of burial. While Pilate suspected Jewish treachery in the Sanhedrin’s charges against Jesus, he nonetheless had Jesus crucified as “King of the Jews.” Roman law prohibited the burial... Read more
The Holy Spirit is ignored in much of the church and at least one reason the Spirit is ignored in the church is because its theologians ignore the Holy Spirit. To see that this is so compare a charismatic theologian’s Spirit sections with, well, most of the others. In Mike Bird’s Evangelical Theology the sixth section is about the “breath” of the gospel, the Holy Spirit. (36 pages, which is adequate.) How often does your church concentrate for an entire... Read more
I’ve put up a two posts on N.T. (Tom) Wright’s response to listener questions posed by Justin Brierley on the radio show Unbelievable. (The link to the show: NT Wright on Paul, Hell, Satan, Creation, Adam, Eve & more – Unbelievable? – 01 November 2013, or the entire Unbelievable audio feed with more shows and more information on each show.) The first looked at his view on evolution and Adam (yes to both), and on Tuesday we moved on to... Read more
Yes, that’s right. There is a history of socio-political theology, yea, liberation theology and social gospel, that begin in some ways with Calvin. This story has been told in remarkable detail by John Coffey, Exodus and Liberation: Deliverance Politics from John Calvin to Martin Luther King Jr (Oxford, 2014). We are dealing with how folks have read and learned to appropriate the Exodus narrative and Moses as a figure. We are dealing with how Protestants especially have read Exodus, and we... Read more
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Last week I introduced a problem that most churches were already aware of: we can’t get young people and older people to hang out together anymore. I want to do more than just identify the problem, but part of the solution is identifying the problem I’ve had to learn how to show different generations how much they need each other. So when this comes up, I find myself asking questions like: How was your Christmas? Did Phil Robertson and that... Read more
Humans look at others and assign the others a social location. Not all humans do this because there are some who like to think they don’t assign others. We may strive not to assign others but those who are successful are few indeed. The Romans did not even try; in fact, status and honor and social location was the Roman Empire. When the apostle Paul, therefore, invaded the Roman Empire with a gospel that radically subverted the quest for status... Read more
I was given the opportunity to be the lecturer at the Sunergoi Conference for leaders at Palm Beach Atlantic University, and the whole event was a string of good times: dinner the night before with my good friend Sam Lamerson and Jim Belcher (both at Knox Theological Seminary), breakfast with my friend and prof at PBAU Vic Copan (brother to Paul at PBAU and sister to my editor at Paraclete, Lil Copan), Randy Richards (whose book on how letters were... Read more
Sarah Pulliam Bailey: NEW YORK (RNS) A group of Christian leaders has set up a new campaign to emphasize that all people — gay, liberal, undocumented or otherwise — reflect the image of God. Six Christian leaders, including Focus on the Family President Jim Daly, “Touched by an Angel” star Roma Downey and her producer husband Mark Burnett, have created a coalition called “Imago Dei,” Latin for “image of God,” to encourage people to treat each other with respect. “If... Read more
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