I will be directing a new and innovative Doctor of Ministry (DMin) program at Northern Seminary. This new DMin program is shaped to help pastors deepen their education and to provide an opportunity for them to explore how to impact the church at a new level. Tell your pastor and pastors tell your pastor friends. The applications are now arriving and we are very excited to hear about the interest in the DMin in New Testament Context. Here’s our announcement:... Read more
From The Spectator: In one respect the new atheists are right. The threat to western freedom in the 21st century is not from fascism or communism but from a religious fundamentalism combining hatred of the other, the pursuit of power and contempt for human rights. But the idea that this can be defeated by individualism and relativism is naive almost beyond belief. Humanity has been here before. The precursors of today’s scientific atheists were Epicurus in third-century BCE Greece and... Read more
What was the biggest showdown in church history? One could make an argument for the 16th Century Reformation, which impacted the church dramatically. Or the split of the Western and the Eastern church in the 11th Century, which had the same kind of impact. But perhaps the biggest showdown of them all was the battle between Arius and the proponents of what became the Nicene Creed. This is admirably sketched in Ronald Heine, Classical Christian Doctrine. The issues: the earliest Christians... Read more
To go along with my course at Northern on Women and Ministry, which begins this morning, I want to pull out a week long series on women in the world of Jesus. Much is said about “women in the Jewish world” and much of it uninformed. This entire series is rooted in Tal Ilan’s important book, Jewish Women in Greco-Roman Palestine (Hendrickson, 1996) and her second book, Integrating Women into Second Temple History (Hendrickson, 2001). There is no attempt to be complete and... Read more
By Jason Micheli, who blogs at The Tamed Cynic. Perfect, Just Perfect – Matthew 5.38 Dear Gabriel and Alexander, Another year has passed! Boys, the more I enjoy our time together the faster it seems to speed by. Even to the two of you- looking at the photos on our cork board recently, Gabriel, I mentioned how much older you look now than you do in some of the photos. And you replied: ‘Yeah, you look older too.’... Read more
Keep, O Lord, your household the Church in your steadfast faith and love, that through your grace we may proclaim your truth with boldness, and minister your justice with compassion; for the sake of our Savior Jesus Christ, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen. Read more
From The Onion: VIOLA, NY—After a government whistleblower revealed last week that the U.S. National Security Agency is collecting phone records and other data as part of an authorized domestic surveillance program, area man Michael Landler, 46, told reporters Monday that he is outraged his private information is being collected by someone other than advertisers. “I can’t express how infuriated I am that my credit history, phone activity, and online browsing habits are being systematically collected and archived without my... Read more
COMING CLEAN…I GUESS I AM NOT A CALVINIST AFTER ALL! By David George Moore Indulge me in a bit of personal background. During my ministry with Cru (formerly Campus Crusade for Christ) at Stanford, I became convinced of what is commonly called election. It was not reading books (that came later) which convinced me. Rather, it was evangelism. For example, there were times where a non-Christian said I showed them how inconsistent their beliefs were and yet they were unwilling... Read more
Diet changes in our ancestors: “High-tech tests on tooth enamel by researchers indicate that prior to about 4 million years ago, Africa’s hominids were eating essentially chimpanzee style, likely dining on fruits and some leaves. Despite the fact that grasses and sedges were readily available back then, the hominids seem to have ignored them for an extended period,” explained Prof Matt Sponheimer from the University of Colorado Boulder, lead author of the study “Diet of Australopithecus afarensis from the Pliocene Hadar... Read more
Mike Huckabee says so: In a surprising move, Christian conservative and Republican leader Mike Huckabee is encouraging churches to give up their tax exempt status. Huckabee issued the following call for churches to unilaterally give up their tax-exempt status via Twitter on June 11. “It’s time for churches to reject tax exempt status completely; freedom is more important than government financial favors,” tweeted Huckabee. Huckabee first suggested that Christians “give up tax-exempt status and tax deductions for charitable contributions” on June 10, while speaking at the... Read more
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