Archive for August, 2007
An Interesting Project
As I am putting off readings and a reflection paper for this afternoon, I started to gaze lustfully at The Greek New Testament over at Amazon.com.
I had the following idea for a neat multi-year project. How fun and instructional it would be to do a chronological translation of the Greek New Testament, the whole [...]
Vessels of Meaning
What is more important, the words of a sentence or the overall meaning of the sentence? For instance, what does the below passage mean?
dear John I want a man who knows what love is all about you are generous kind thoughtful people who are not like you admit to being useless and inferior you [...]
The Beauty of the Lord: New Creation and the Imago Dei
For the sake of not having a never-ending post, this will be in two parts. I want to look at how John sets up the image of God; next time, I want to see what the image of God looks like and how it is to be played out within our own lives.
History, they [...]
The Other Brother
In Matthew 5:21-22, Jesus equates hate, insult and name-calling with murder. For a long time, I just accepted the common explanation that Jesus is “reinterpreting” the Law, pushing for a “deeper” understanding of “what God really meant”. As I blogged several days ago, however, I am beginning to see that Jesus was reading [...]
Golden Oldies
As I was studying me some Attic Greek tonight I was reminded of Hank’s retranslation of John 3:16. Hank did an excellent 5-part series on this verse and went through the translation process step-by-step. I would recommend reading reading through each of the five parts (one two three four five) to get a [...]
Original Sin
Original sin is a polyvalent term. It is used in many ways and with many meanings by many Christians.
How do you define this loaded term? Please give your definition and then after your definition, please feel free to elaborate as to why you employ that definition.
The Public Spectacle (inspired by today’s sermon)
Colossians 2:15 “Jesus disarmed the rulers and authorities and made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them.”
In the ancient world, victorious armies made ‘public spectacles’ of their defeated opponents. These spectacles involved parading the defeated soldiers and generals through the main center of the town, naked and shackled, humiliated and utterly defeated, trailing [...]
One Mind, one Spirit, One Body.
I would encourage all of you to read Rose’s thoughts on being of one mind.
Rose’s Reasonings :: Will We Ever Be “Of One Mind”?
While you are at it, what does it mean to be truly tolerant? What good is diversity? Are these good things? Are these bad things? What definitions [...]
Seven Cans of Pepsi
So the title has nothing to do with the content of the post. Despite this, there are some things I want to share.
The spam filter seems to be gobbling up everything it sees. It snagged one of JR’s and two of Hank’s comments. If you are having problems with comments not showing [...]
5 Things I learned about the “Reformation”
I have been re-hashing some of my lecture notes from my class on the Reformation last semester lately. Here are five things I was surprised to learn, in no particular order of importance.
Theology in the Catholic Church was incredibly diverse and tolerant before the Council of Trent… for in house disputes
Man is born in [...]
Historical Primer
For those of you that are interested in understanding the current view of what has come to be known as “Gnosticism,” I would invite you to read several posts over at The Forbidden Gospel’s blog. DeConick is trying to answer why the Nag Hammadi texts aren’t used as must as the Dead Sea Scrolls [...]
Author Petition
I recently was looking at the upcoming semester. With the amount of research and writing I need to do on my thesis combined with my class load and TA duties, there is little time left to devote to this (or other sites).
As such, if you or if you know of anyone that [...]
The Song-Prayer
Brad, over at relevintage, discusses worship and some of the conundrums that come along with it. Good stuff. I especially like his idea of “sing-prayer,” the idea of using the signing of a song to pray to God. It bypasses the “sit-and-soak” approach to worship that people sometimes find themselves trapped in.
relevintage [...]
Ponderings for today
Came across this at Rose’s Reasonings via the Contemporary Calvinist. I thought it also pertained to Hank’s recent question about God.
Rose’s Reasonings :: Another Quote
“…free will, though it makes evil possible, is also the only thing that makes possible any love or goodness or joy worth having.”
–The Case for Christianity, C. S. Lewis
I [...]
Theology: The Central Question
Today I was reading some more of Jonathan Edwards’s “A Dissertation Concerning the End for Which God Created the Wold.” In it I read this statement in Chapter 1, Dictate 4, paragraph 38,
Hence it will follow, that the moral rectitude of the disposition, inclination, or affection of God CHIEFLY consists in a regard to HIMSELF, [...]