Now Apocalyptics All

Last updated on: March 26, 2015 at 5:20 pm By D. G. Hart

It looks like Pope Francis and ISIS share more than most people think. Crawford Gribben, an expert in millennialism, explains how: Hailed for his apparently progressive social views, even as many of his admirers remain mystified by his repeated references to supernatural conflict, the Holy Father has given his critics and adherents a big clue to understanding his worldview: on several occasions, he has informed journalists that the best way they can understand his priorities and concerns is to read... Read more

Reading God’s Mind

Last updated on: March 20, 2015 at 5:32 pm By D. G. Hart

Today in class students and I discussed Abraham Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address and the sixteenth president got me wondering about how we interpret providence and even whether we should. At the end of the speech, Lincoln argued that the Civil War was an instance of divine judgment on the United States for slavery: If we shall suppose that American Slavery is one of those offenses which, in the providence of God, must needs come, but which, having continued through His... Read more

What If You Can’t Find a Text?

Last updated on: March 16, 2015 at 12:11 pm By D. G. Hart

In the spirit of misapplied, misquoted, and oft-misunderstood Bible passages, sometimes the problem is not so much the text cited but an assumption that the Bible actually says something about a specific subject. Take for instance the recent Christianity Today piece that found that only 1 in 10 evangelicals looked for biblical support in their understanding of U.S. immigration policy: Researchers asked evangelicals to list which factor has most influenced their beliefs about immigration. About one in 10 chose the... Read more

Tradition Depends on Scripture

Last updated on: March 14, 2015 at 10:07 am By D. G. Hart

Aaron Denlinger reminds that until the Reformation, the western church located infallibility in Scripture alone: In responding to Rome’s teaching, Calvin — interestingly — doesn’t bother defending the authority of Scripture from Scripture. Presumably that’s because he realizes that Protestants and Roman Catholics actually agree that Scripture constitutes the “Word of God” rather than the “word of man” (1 Thess. 2.13), and is therefore inspired and authoritative (cf. 2 Tim. 3.16). The Roman decree cited above, after all, acknowledges that... Read more

Channeling Hegel or Paul?

Last updated on: March 10, 2015 at 12:31 pm By D. G. Hart

If you teach the history of the West, around the time that you turn the corner to the rise of Christianity, having covered the Ancient Near East and Hebrews, the Greeks, and then the Romans, you encounter a series of hurdles that produce double vision. Christians distinguished the eternal from the temporal, ecclesiastical power from the state’s jurisdiction, knowledge that comes by faith as opposed to truths ascertained by reason, matters that may please the body but not the soul.... Read more

A Coalition or A Channel?

Last updated on: March 6, 2015 at 1:21 pm By D. G. Hart

Over at Jesus Creed, David George Moore wonders about the boundaries of The Gospel Coalition. Moore is particularly concerned about why Tim Keller gets a pass (as opposed to Marc Driscoll): I find it perplexing why John Piper has no regrets for Mark Driscoll being invited to speak for the ministry of Desiring God. To Piper’s credit, he wishes he had been a better friend to Driscoll. I continue to have questions about how the Driscoll implosion was handled by... Read more

The Crusades for Baptists?

Last updated on: February 25, 2015 at 6:29 pm By D. G. Hart

Tim Challies writes positively about David Platt’s new book, Counter Culture: [Platt] begins with the gospel. He believes that the gospel is meant to compel the Christian to take action, saying “the gospel is the lifeblood of Christianity, and it provides the foundation for countering culture. For when we truly believe the gospel, we begin to realize that the gospel not only compels Christians to confront social issues in the culture around us. The gospel actually creates confrontation with the... Read more

Forget the Crusades

Last updated on: February 23, 2015 at 5:21 pm By D. G. Hart

What’s up with the Old Testament? I’m still not up to the point in my year long encounter with the Bible, but Sunday school yesterday took me to a section of the Pentateuch that had my wife and me scratching our heads: While the people of Israel were in the wilderness, they found a man gathering sticks on the Sabbath day. And those who found him gathering sticks brought him to Moses and Aaron and to all the congregation. They... Read more

Leveraging Martyrdom

Last updated on: February 18, 2015 at 5:58 pm By D. G. Hart

Why is it that evangelicals will claim Coptic Christians as martyrs for “the faith” when those same Protestants wouldn’t recognize “the faith” as including Coptic Christianity? Bill Smith explains the question: The Coptic Christians are not Orthodox, Roman Catholic, or Protestant. They are Nicene, but not Chalcedonian, Christians. The BBC describes Coptic Christology: The Coptic belief which defined the church at an early stage is called monophytism (technically it would be better called miaphytism, but most documents use the former... Read more

One Thing Everyone Should Know about Sola Scriptura

Last updated on: February 16, 2015 at 6:18 pm By D. G. Hart

Father Dwight Longenecker takes a shot at Protestant conceptions of Scripture with his ten points on the inadequacies of sola scriptura. This is a standard critique among Protestant converts to Roman Catholicism (go here for an example — this is only PART EIGHT!!!. Here’s one sample from Longenecker’s list: 8. If the only source for teaching and moral instruction comes from the Bible how are we supposed to answer the questions that arise about things that were never heard of... Read more