Today we relight the first two candles of the Advent wreath. The candle of HOPE and the candle of PEACE. Now we light the third candle of Advent. This is the candle of JOY. As the coming of Jesus, our Savior, draws nearer, our joy builds with our anticipation of his birth. From the Book of Isaiah we read the words of our Lord: “But be glad and rejoice forever in what I am creating; for I am about to... Read more

Stir up your power, O Lord, and with great might come among us; and, because we are sorely hindered by our sins, let your bountiful grace and mercy speedily help and deliver us; through Jesus Christ our Lord, to whom, with you and the Holy Spirit, be honor and glory, now and for ever. Amen. Read more

Mark Meynell is director for Langham Preaching (part of the Langham Partnership). He is the author of various books, including A Wilderness of Mirrors. A Jesus Creed interview with Mark on that book can be found here: The following interview revolves around Mark’s latest book, When Darkness Seems My Closest Friend. David George Moore conducted the interview. Some of Dave’s teaching videos and interviews can be found at www.mooreengaging.com Moore: This was a risky book to write, especially because you... Read more

We enter this weekend into the 3d Sunday of Advent. Good for John Dickson: Well-known Australian writer, speaker, minister and apologist John Dickson has announced his decision to step down from local church ministry to focus more fully on reaching the “doubting public outside the church”. Dickson has been in part-time church ministry for two decades, and Senior Minister of St Andrew’s Anglican Church in Roseville for the past nine years. He will retire from this position at the end... Read more

By Mike Glenn Every Christmas we face the same problem. What do we do with Joseph? How do we handle that moment of theological anxiety that strikes us when we are placing Joseph in our nativity scenes? Everyone knows the drill. We unwrap the stable and place it in the center of the table. We unwrap the manger and place it in the center of the stable. We unwrap Baby Jesus, arms extended in blessing (whoever saw a baby sleep... Read more

The Apostles’ Creed has more to say about Jesus than God, the Holy Spirit, or anything else. I believe in God, the Father almighty, creator of heaven and earth. I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord. He was conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary. … I Believe in the Holy Spirit. Yet the nature of Jesus as ‘his only Son our Lord’ was the focus of much controversy in... Read more

Ross Douthat: Which is why lately I’ve become interested in books and arguments that suggest that there actually is, or might be, a genuinely post-Christian future for America — and that the term “paganism” might be reasonably revived to describe the new American religion, currently struggling to be born. A fascinating version of this argument is put forward by Steven D. Smith, a law professor at the University of San Diego, in his new book, “Pagans and Christians in the... Read more

All forms of liberation theology — Latin American, African American/Black, Feminist/Womanist — have some affinities, all emerge out of serious thinking and social rebellion in the 1960s and 1970s, and all of these movements have impacted the church today in ways many either ignore or don’t understand. Liberation theology is the most dominant voice in academic theology (other than work done in a simply historical mode), and it has gained much ground among many evangelicals. Progressive evangelicalism is often a... Read more

From Southern Seminary: SUMMARY OF FINDINGS The history of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary is intertwined with the history of American slavery and the commitment to white supremacy which supported it. Slavery left its mark on the seminary just as it did upon the American nation as a whole. The denomination that established it spoke distinctly in support of the morality of slaveholding and the justness of the Confederate effort to preserve it. The seminary’s donors and trustees advanced the... Read more

You’ve heard people recite a proverb and know — deep inside — the proverb isn’t true for you. You may well have thought it wasn’t really true for that person either. The one that comes to mind for me most often, the one that I think has been misused more often than any other proverb, is this: Train children in the right way, and when old, they will not stray (Prov 22:6). So, if you teach kids what is right... Read more