Introduction to the series Almost ten years ago, my brother, Dave, battled a fatal brain cancer for nearly eight years and died in January of 2013, as the result of a fall that was due in large part to his illness. In reaction to Dave’s quest to find a durable faith and supportive friends, I wrote a book called The Dave Test: A Raw Look at Real Faith in Hard Times. The book distills Dave’s quest into ten questions that any... Read more
My friend, David Watson describes a tension that no Christian who studies Scripture can escape: the competing claims of the church and the academy. The former believes that Scripture is “God-breathed” and that – while it is a product of specific historical settings and it cannot be applied without careful interpretation – it is a vehicle for the Holy Spirit. We read Scripture, but it reads us, as well. The latter holds that the Bible is simply library of documents... Read more
“The voice of one crying out in the wilderness: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.’” (Mt 3:3) We read this passage every year during Advent. But the language is foreign to our context. The only straight roads I have driven are in Kansas, western Colorado, southern Illinois, and a stretch across the panhandle of Texas. There is no such thing as a straight road in Tennessee, and anyone who has ever lived in Chicago (as I... Read more
In those days John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness of Judea, proclaiming, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.” This is the one of whom the prophet Isaiah spoke when he said, “The voice of one crying out in the wilderness: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.’” Now John wore clothing of camel’s hair with a leather belt around his waist, and his food was locusts and wild honey. Then the people of... Read more
And he told them a parable to the effect that they ought always to pray and not lose heart. 2 He said, “In a certain city there was a judge who neither feared God nor respected man. 3 And there was a widow in that city who kept coming to him and saying, ‘Give me justice against my adversary.’ 4 For a while he refused, but afterward he said to himself, ‘Though I neither fear God nor respect man, 5 yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will give her justice, so... Read more
We live in crazy times. In a fit of supreme arrogance, there are those who comb through history in an effort to identify the failings of our cultural heroes. How hard can that be? The answer is, not hard at all. Anyone who is honest with themselves knows that even the best of our own past selves would find it hard to live up to the best of our present selves. There are things that we know now that we... Read more
Do you remember this song from the Sunday Schools of decades ago? Zacchaeus was a wee little man And a wee little man was he He climbed up in a sycamore tree For the Lord he wanted to see And when the Savior passed that way He looked up in the tree And said, ‘Zacchaeus, you come down! For I’m going to your house today! For I’m going to your house today!’ Zacchaeus was a wee little man But a happy... Read more
Given the amount of time that I have spent in the academy, it isn’t often that I’ve been called on to preach about tithing. But I did recently, and it occurred to me that laypeople probably find the attitude of clergy toward giving something of a mystery: One: “Apart from making people feel that they should give, do clergy ever preach that message to themselves?” Two: “If they do preach those sermons to themselves, do they think, “Hey, I work... Read more
Student evaluations were based upon what appeared to be a reasonable premise: feedback from students provides a window into the strengths and weaknesses of a professor’s approach to education. To a certain extent, that premise is sound. But feedback of that kind is best used by the professor. And longitudinal feedback, evaluations gathered over a period of time is where helpful patterns surface. On the whole, those are far more useful and significant than individual evaluations gathered in a... Read more
In times of suffering, it’s natural to want to comfort others. It’s admirable, in fact. And it demonstrates a desire to help, to walk alongside of others. It’s also natural to think that drawing comparisons with our own experience is an effective way to do that. After all, it establishes a common bond. It lets people know that we know how they feel. And it says, “You are not alone.” Doesn’t it? In a word, “No”. If our own... Read more
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