A reader of this blog asked me a couple days ago if I was saying in an earlier post that I didn’t think that women should be in the position of the US Secretary of State. He referenced Condoleezza Rice and Margaret Thatcher. This is a fair and good question. I would like to respond to it now. On this matter, I take the same position that John Piper, the Minneapolis pastor, takes. In several works, including, I believe, Recovering... Read more

If you are the typical twentysomething male, then you have probably been told the following repeatedly in some form: a) testosterone is badb) guys should always be more sedatec) guys should be more like girlsd) testosterone is bad. Included somewhere in this list of propositions are the ideas that it is bad for boys to be active and squirmy, that it is bad for boys to laugh and make fun of each other and generally carry on, and that it... Read more

Manhood used to be a defined quantity, a recognizable set of traits that inhered in men. Nowadays, this definition is lost, eroded by the seas of feminist postmodernity. Over the next few days, I want to take on a few myths of modern manhood, and knock heads with ’em. Hopefully, some fruitful thought will result. Myth One: Guys Should Never Use Aggression As a young man taught in postmodern classrooms for all of my formative years, I can readily say... Read more

It can often be enticing to think of the future and its promised riches. I suppose I’m typically American in that I often have a rosy view of the future, and sometimes find myself dreaming of material comfort and even luxury. How interesting to read the occasional study not from the Christian world but from secular society that reminds us of the biblical truth that money does not buy or bring happiness. The Wall Street Journal had a piece a... Read more

Many in the Christian life seem to think that there is no room for gray areas in our lives. Everything has to be painted either black or white. This is a mistake. Such thinking robs us of the joy of freedom that God intended us to have. Christian freedom is a glorious thing. We see God’s love for uniqueness and difference in His creation of beings who look as different from one another as possible. Beyond this, the very first... Read more

One of the issues I’m most interested in is the development of masculinity in boys. Those who know anything about the cultural stance toward masculinity know that this project is not simply assaulted but has been overhauled in recent years. It’s always interesting to see even non-Christians acknowledging the ills of the culture in educating and training boys. Here’s a fascinating piece from New York’s City Journal that I found at Dr. Russ Moore’s website (props to him, or more... Read more

I want to return briefly to the matter of the biblical stance on tattoos and earrings and the like. The Old Testament speaks of the importance of men not looking like women, which I fully support. However, to take from this precept that there is one monolithic ideal of manhood is to make what is called in theological terms a “stretch.” The Old Testament does not prescribe such an ideal. Rather, it gives us a principle by which to live... Read more

Now that I’ve stirred up a hornet’s nest about tattoos and earrings, I would like to leave it. We may return to this topic at some point, but for now, please know that I have a 9Marks article up at www.9marks.org. It’s on “doing seminary well,” and even if you aren’t in seminary, I think it will make for interesting reading, because it gives readers a bit of a look into what seminary is actually like. It’s not terribly long... Read more

In my humble opinion, it’s fine for a man to wear an earring or get a tattoo. Though the Old Testament has some words for men that relate to their dress and body decoration, these principles are nowhere found in the New. The principle in the New is that we are free in the Spirit to decide for ourselves what is good, provided it accords with standards of modesty, decency, and so on. There is a strong cultural reaction against... Read more

What’s your response? This week, I want to examine the question of contextualization in evangelism. That’s a forty dollar term meaning simply, “outfitting oneself to match one’s evangelistic target group.” When you contextualize yourself in a certain setting, you adopt the non-sinful cultural habits of the group in order to connect with them. So a missionary to India might wear traditional Indian garb; an evangelist in Greenwich Village might grow stubble and wear Birkenstocks; a pastor in New Brunswick, Canada... Read more