Category: Bible

  • New Testament Uses of the Old Testament

    Some Preliminary Thoughts on How the New Testament Writers Quote the Old Testament 1 – The NT writers frequently quote OT passages. 2 – The audiences of the NT writers have varying familiarity with the OT texts. 3 – The audiences may have people that know the OT text quite well since there are probable…

  • Dead Men Can’t Respond

    It is often said that “dead men can’t respond” or “dead means unable to respond“. This is used in relation to the passages which speak of our condition before we came to Christ. It is said that since we were dead, and dead men can’t respond, then we were unable to respond to God. The…

  • Whence Cometh Faith?

    Where Does Faith Come From? The New Testament has a lot of verses on faith but not too many passages clearly identify where faith comes from. There are several Scriptural possibilities for where our faith comes from. One is that faith is from God, and the other is that faith comes from somewhere inside a…

  • Christian Apologetics

    What isn’t Christian Apologetics? Christian Apologetics is not giving an apology for the faith as if there is something deficient in the faith. The Christian faith is God’s self-revelation to mankind. There is nothing deficient in that revelation. What is Christian Apologetics? Apologetics comes from the Greek word; apologia, ap-ol-og-ee’-ah; a plea (“apology”):–answer (for self),…

  • Real or Imaginary Hypotheticals in Scripture

    Real or Imaginary Hypotheticals A hypothetical can be either a real or an imaginary hypothetical. It is important to classify the sort of hypothetical that is intended when reading an author who is using hypotheticals. For instance, “if pigs can fly” is an imaginary (not possible) hypothetical. Pigs do not normally have wings. There could…

  • N. T. Wright on the Gospel and Justification

    Anglican Bishop, N. T. Wright, writes: By “the gospel” Paul does not mean “justification by faith.” He means the announcement that the crucified and risen Jesus is Lord. To believe this message is to give believing allegiance to Jesus as Messiah and Lord” is to be justified in the present by faith (whether or not…

  • What is the Gospel?

    I have been thinking a lot lately about a question that is deceptively simple. The question is “What is the Gospel?” The answer is surprisingly evasive for a number of reasons. One of these is that there are few clear definitions of “the gospel” in Scripture. Another reason is that the word “gospel” seems to…

  • Scriptural Synthesis

    The Grammatical-Historical-Contextual (GHC) method is the method used by many people to understand Scripture. Using the GHC method a person is said to be able to come away with the original meaning of the Scripture as the author intended. There is much in the GHC method to commend itself. There are also weaknesses in the…

  • Greek Text of Eph 2:8

    Ephesians 2:8 is often quoted as evidence that faith is a gift. The Greek text makes this interpretation a difficult one, however. It may be the case that faith is a gift from God but this verse is inconclusive as proof. Greek has a concept known as gender agreement. Nouns, pronouns and adjectives share the…

  • Esau Have I Hated

    Romans 9:13 is frequently by double predestinarian advocates as Biblical evidence of individual election. The passage has: Romans 9:13 – Just as it is written, “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.” At first glance it appears that this passage is referring to the historical individuals, Jacob and Esau. The story is so familiar that…

  • Pair o’ Dimes

    Paradigms. That’s the fancy word for systems of belief. Definition #3 at dictionary.reference.com gives the definition of paradigm as: A set of assumptions, concepts, values, and practices that constitutes a way of viewing reality for the community that shares them, especially in an intellectual discipline. Everyone has a paradigm. In fact, everyone has a paradigm…

  • Eternally Secure

    I’ve been thinking quite a bit about eternal security and thought I’d lay out my own thoughts. Take them for what they are worth. There are a lot of different ways of approaching this subject and mine is not unique by any means. I need to start with a confession of humility of what I…

  • Female Angels

    Are there female angels? In the book of Genesis, the angels that visit Abraham were men. Other angels in the Bible have masculine names (Gabriel, Michael). These names describe attributes of God. Genesis 6 describes the sons of God that married the daughters of men. In all of these examples, angels are manifested as men.…

  • Baptism in the Evangelical Covenant Church

    The Evangelical Covenant Church has a fairly unique practice when it comes to baptism. Covenant Churches practice both believer and infant baptism. (The Confederation of Reformed Evangelicals also has the practice, but they are quite small.) Local churches may prefer to operate in one mode or the other but Covenant pastors are required to baptize…

  • Hating the Sin and Hating the Sinner

    At church we been learning about the Love of God for this past semester. Today, we talked about what God hates. There are a lot of passages which talk about how God hates sin. We are familiar with many of them. The Psalms are full of them. In the Psalms, sin is understood as falling…

  • Wrestling with the TULIP

    Today I am looking at the baptism of John and the TULIP of the Calvinists. These verses seem problematic to the Calvinistic position with respect to the I in the TULIP: Luke 7:29-30 And all the people that heard him, and the publicans, justified God, being baptized with the baptism of John. But the Pharisees…

  • Stanley Hauerwas

    Interesting blog on Hauerwas and the Bible Gestapo. After reading Hauerwas in seminary and in the process acquiring a critical dislike for the contents of his writing, this critique comes as a breath of fresh air. The inconsistencies of Hauerwas are equally invisible to his disciples and obvious to his critics. Hauerwas is an advocate…

  • Unilateral or Bilateral Forgiveness

    Is forgiveness contingent upon repentance? If God forgives based on repentance, should we also forgive based on repentance? Or should we forgive even where the other person refuses to repent? On first thought, the idea that we need to always forgive regardless of whether the other person repents seems right but does it stand up…

  • Love Between Members of the Trinity

    How about a discussion of the love that the members of the Trinity have for each other?

  • Resurrection of the Flesh

    I just read the first half of N. T. Wright’s book, The Resurrection of the Son of God which is a defense of the historical view of the resurrection of Christ. The book also defends the historical view of the resurrection of the believer. Wright makes a compelling case for the physicality of the resurrection…