In a 1974 radio address, Fulton Sheen raised the question of how “we in America ever get into this idea that freedom means having no boundaries and no limits?” His answer isn’t about the student movements or anything about the Sixties. It’s about Hiroshima: “I think it began on the sixth of August 1945 at 8:15 am when we dropped the bomb on Hiroshima. That blotted out boundaries. The boundary of America that was the aid of nations, and the... Read more
In the darkness, give us light. In danger, cover us with Your mighty power. In want, provide for us. From idols of power, good Lord, deliver us. From those who enact injustice by decree, good Lord, deliver us. From cruelty, slavery, and the shedding of innocent blood, good Lord, deliver us. In every peril, fill us with the calm courage of Your Spirit. Amen. Read more
In the darkness, give us light. In danger, cover us with Your mighty power. In want, provide for us. From idols of power, good Lord, deliver us. From those who enact injustice by decree, good Lord, deliver us. From cruelty, slavery, and the shedding of innocent blood, good Lord, deliver us. In every peril, fill us with the calm courage of Your Spirit. Amen. Read more
It’s common to divide atonement theories into subjective and objective theories, and to classify Calvin’s atonement theology as a slight variant from Anselm’s objective theory. Stephen Edmondson thinks otherwise (Calvin’s Christology, 110-1). He doesn’t question that Calvin stresses the objective character of the passion: “In his expiatory sacrifice, Christ has covered our sin and destroyed it. In his free offer of himself in our place, he has paid the price that we owe and satisfied our debt before God. In his judgment and... Read more
One of the most “apocalyptic” texts in the Bible is in Ecclesiastes 12. Solomon encourages his reader to remember the Creator before the world ends – before the sun, moon, and stars go dark; before the clouds return; before all civic activity grinds to a halt. Most commentators, though, recognize that Ecclesiastes 12 is not describing the collapse of a world, but old age. Those lights are not in heaven but in the head; they grow dim because the aging... Read more
Ian Hazlett (Martin Bucer, 78) observes that some Anabaptist groups taught “a radicalized Anselmian doctrine of the all-sufficiency of Calvary, by which Christ’s sacrificial death on the cross effects per se salvation for those who so believe. This reductionist externalization of Christ is then reinforced when it is also stressed that his body is now in heaven. Thereby Christ’s continuing real presence among believers on earth is endangered, or in some way diminished.” They so emphasized the sufficiency of Christ’s death that... Read more
In his contribution to Martin Bucer: Reforming Church and Community (73), Ian Hazlett calls attention to Bucer’s sense of the breadth of the issues involved in the debate over real presence: “for Bucer by now the issue of the presence of Christ in Communion goes far beyond fixing one’s attention on the elements of bread and water, and pondering on the relationship between them and the body of Christ. It is within a much wider constellation of concepts that the matter... Read more
In his contribution to Martin Bucer: Reforming Church and Community (73), Ian Hazlett calls attention to Bucer’s sense of the breadth of the issues involved in the debate over real presence: “for Bucer by now the issue of the presence of Christ in Communion goes far beyond fixing one’s attention on the elements of bread and water, and pondering on the relationship between them and the body of Christ. It is within a much wider constellation of concepts that the matter... Read more
In his contribution to Martin Bucer: Reforming Church and Community (73), Ian Hazlett calls attention to Bucer’s sense of the breadth of the issues involved in the debate over real presence: “for Bucer by now the issue of the presence of Christ in Communion goes far beyond fixing one’s attention on the elements of bread and water, and pondering on the relationship between them and the body of Christ. It is within a much wider constellation of concepts that the matter... Read more
David’s life recapitulates and predicts the history of Israel. Fleeing from Saul, he goes into exile westward among the Philistines, a repeat of the Egyptian exile. He comes out of Philistia to conquer the the land and take the throne. Later, his son Absalom rebels and drives David out of the land again, this time to the east, toward Babylon. His “Egyptian” exile is matched by a preview of the Babylonian exile. When David flees from his son, Gentiles receive... Read more
Leithart
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