Category Archives: Theology

Aslan at the stone table

Posted by on February 3, 2012 No comments

Aslan

The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe is the second book chronologically in the Chronicles of Narnia (although it was the first book published). It traces the discovery of the magical world of Narnia by the Pevensies not long after the beginning of World War two.

The youngest, Lucy discovers a magical Wardrobe and hides in it during a game. She discovers that it is actually a gateway to another world. Eventually her brothers and sister also enter the “country in the wardrobe”[i] and discover that Narnia has been expecting them for many long years and that are destined to rule Narnia as kings and queens. Read more »

Issues with Theistic evolution

Posted by on January 18, 2012 1 comment

Jay Richards

I’ve previously expressed my reservations about theistic evolution.  Recently, I was interested to hear some new reasoning against it in this interview with Jay Richards

Jay Richards (who co-wrote the Privileged Planet) has recently edited a book (God and Evolution) dealing explicitly with theistic evolution.  While I haven’t yet read the book (although it looks quite good), I listened to this short interview with him in which he gives a number of reasons. Read more »

Why God gave instruction to man at creation

Posted by on September 19, 2011 1 comment

From “Instruments in the redeemers hands” by Paul Tripp, p39-41 (the entire book is assigned reading for this week).

In explaining Genesis 1:26-28 Tripp makes the point that there is something unique about God stopping and actually speaking to the two humans he had just created.  He hadn’t done this with other creatures; for previous creatures he merely rested briefly and moved on.  But with man, God stops to tell man something -why? Read more »

God’s example to us of being other-centered

Posted by on September 12, 2011 1 comment

Just a quick thought from a reading I did last week for one of my courses.

Often the fact that God seeks His own glory is used as an example by unbelievers of God being less than perfectly good because he is self-seeking. However, the concept presented by the word of God is that the Trinity is a key part of this equation, and by understanding the role of each member of the trinity we can see that while the Godhead rightly seeks the glory of the Godhead, each member of the trinity is actually not self-seeking.

According to the Bible, the Father seeks the glory of the Son (Matt 17:5), the Son seeks the glory of the Father (John 17:1, 4, 6) and the Holy Spirit bears witness to the Son and seeks the Son’s glory (John 15:26, 16:14). This is given as an example to us, that is clearly explained multiple times in scripture in the form of the “one another” statements (there are at least 31 of these) of the New Testament which are applied to a wide variety of contexts from our homes and marriage to work and social engagements.

To see a few of the one anothers, take a look at Rom 12:10, 1 Cor 12:25, Eph 4:25, 32, Col 3:13, 16, 1 Thess 5:11, 13, 15, 1 Peter 4:9-10, 5:5, 14.

Sermon: James 2 – Justification by works and saving faith

Posted by on August 30, 2011 Comments Off

I’ve been doing a homiletics class over the last seven or eight weeks. I’ve preached twice during it and have received valueable feedback both times. I’m grateful for the opportunity to hone my speaking ability and how I handle the word of God.

While the first sermon wasn’t worth putting up here, the second one was better, so here it is. The title is “Justification by works is saving faith” and it is based on James 2:21–26.

Review of the NIV 2011 Translation

Posted by on August 4, 2011 Comments Off

I know there are some who watch this blog who would like to know more about how we get the Bible in English. There are also one or two who might just be interested in the latest edition of the NIV and how it has changed and how it stacks up – particularly after the TNIV issues.

Noted Translater and NT Greek expert Daniel Wallace has written up a four part series on his blog that goes through a little bit of English Bible history and then looks at the strengths and weaknesses of the NIV2011 translation.

Read more »

Why doesn’t God just show himself?

Posted by on April 12, 2011 Comments Off

AdamEveHiding

Atheists sometimes ask Christians why God doesn’t just show Himself once and for all and be done with the ambiguity?  If God would clearly and obviously reveal Himself to our senses, nobody could possibly refute His existence, and we’d all know once and for all that He is God and should be worshipped.  It would provide scientists with the final proof they need and evolution would be finally overturned for good, and we’d all live happily ever after.

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Atheisms poor theology

Posted by on March 21, 2011 2 comments

Militant Atheism.  Those calling themselves by this title not only refuse, but also openly attack religion – specifically Christianity.  However, when we examine the arguments they use to reject submission to God and vilify Christianity we find their understanding about the God they seek to refute is a straw man. The atheist understanding of God is contrary to Scripture and this makes their opposition to Christianity fallacious.  It is prudent for Christians to be aware of these theological shortcomings in order to be able to proclaim a God-exalting gospel when we have discussions with these people.

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He gave him no answer…

Posted by on June 29, 2010 Comments Off

When the Pharisees put Jesus on trial before Caiaphas, the final charge they brought against him was blasphemy. This was on the basis of Jesus claiming to be the Son of God and His sitting “at the right hand of Power and coming on the clouds of heaven” (Matt 26:63-66). But for the unbelieving Pilate, this would be a hard accusation to put a righteous man to death for.

But this is exactly why the Pharisees delivered Him to Pilate – so that he could sentence Him to death. To be sure, they heaped other accusations against Jesus to make sure that Pilate would see Him as a threat. However, Pilate could see right through this ruse, and when he questioned Jesus, he asked him “are you the king of the Jews?” to which Jesus merely said “You have said so” (Matt 27:11). Read more »

The hole in our gospel

Posted by on June 22, 2010 2 comments

Cover Image

I’ve just finished “The Hole in our Gospel” by Richard Stearns.  This was one of those books I had no idea of what I was getting into.  Last month it was the free download of the month on ChristianAudio.com, and I grabbed a copy of it.

I had no idea who Richard Stearns was, although the name seemed familiar. I had no idea whether he was a sound author or whether he would be one of those writers I’d stop listening to after a short time.  After all, those who wrote endorsements for the book were not on my “must read” list.  I was in for a surprise. Read more »