Doug’s Theological Thoughts

  • The Problem of Evil

    Dallas Willard is a Professor of Philosophy at the University of Southern California. Dallas is a Christian philosopher and thinker. He has written a lot of articles and books including The Divine Conspiracy: Rediscovering Our Hidden Life In God and The Spirit of the Disciplines: Understanding How God Changes Lives. Here is an article Dallas…

  • Christian Source Documents

    If you have an interest in Christian historical documents, the Internet has some wonderful web sites. If you have not been to these sites, they are impressive in the amount of source materials that they contain. The Internet Medieval Sourcebook is a vast depository of Medieval source materials. The Christian Classics Ethereal Library has a…

  • C. S. Lewis: God, Gender and Priestesses

    This is an interesting article by C. S. Lewis on God, Gender and Priestesses. Lewis wrote the article in 1948. In particular, Lewis talks about feminine language to describe God as mother, etc. This article by Lewis predates by 40-50 years the current controversies in the Episcopal church and other denominations. Here is an article…

  • Science and Sexual Orientation

    It has been stated by some that science has shown a genetic basis for sexual orientation. In other words, the claim is that abnormal behaviors are wired into people by their genetic makeup. This is now an accepted fact in some quarters which has been used to advance the agenda of certain persons. Here is…

  • Matthew as Anti-Gentile

    The Gospel of Matthew contains some blanket condemnations of Gentiles. This article considers those condemnations. This is interesting in light of the charges that The Passion of the Christ is Anti-Semitic. Food for thought.

  • Dr. Paul Carlson, Missionary Martyr

    Evangelical Covenant Church missionary Dr. Paul Carlson was arrested and killed in the Congo in 1964. Read about it here.

  • A Letter to Our Church

    Can you imagine getting a letter from Jesus to your church? That’s the situation that seven churches in Asia Minor found themselves in when the Apostle John penned the book of Revelation. The book starts out with the statement: Revelation 1:1-2 – The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave Him to show to His…

  • Abuses

    Study details school sexual misconduct.

  • The Heavens Declare….

    The Psalmist wrote, “The Heavens declare the glory of God.” Sometimes we forget that. Today we got another reminder. Check out the pictures of Saturn from the lastest JPL mission to the ringed planet. It is certainly spectacular. And yes, the Heavens do declare God’s glory. Amen.

  • Siege of Lachish (701 BC)

    The British Museum has a series of wall panels describing the siege of Lachish by Sennacherib. This is described in the Old Testament in 2 Chr 32:9. 2Ch 32:9-10 After this did Sennacherib king of Assyria send his servants to Jerusalem, (but he himself laid siege against Lachish, and all his power with him,) unto…

  • Freedom or Bondage of the Will?

    I am thinking today about libertarianism (Free Will) and determinism (Bondage of the Will). In particular, I am thinking about compatibilism. Under compatibilism there is an assertion that man is both free to choose and determined. The example of Saddam Hussein in prison comes to mind. In some very limited sense of the word free,…

  • Clay Prism of Sennacherib

    This is a neat piece of physical evidence for the historicity of the Old Testament. This clay prism describes the siege of Jerusalem by King Sennacherib. The text says “I shut up Hezekiah like a bird in a cage.” This matches the Biblical account of the siege where Sennacherib surrounded the city, but did not…

  • Heritage of Machen

    Machen fought the forces of liberalism in his day. His spiritual children ended up fighting each other. This article details the areas of battle.

  • Punting to Mystery

    Biblically, what is a true mystery? When are we justified in calling something a mystery? If there is a contradiction in our theology can we say that it is all rectified by recourse to mystery? There are things in Scripture that are called mysteries. The calling of the Gentiles was only hinted at in the…

  • Solving Alleged Bible Contradictions

    There are a number of passages in Scripture which are cited by critics of the Bible as showing the the Bible has contradictions. As an example, the infidels.org website has a long list of alleged contradictions in the Bible. They do this in an attempt to deny the Divine authorship of God’s Word. If there…

  • Scholastic Bifurcation

    The Scholastics loved their philosophy. In their philosophies, they loved to split things into categories. Then they subdivided these categories into sub categories with nearly infinite regression. Bangs points out that this was greatly aided by the invention of the printing press. With the press, they could create large fold out charts containing their categories.…

  • It’s Getting Tougher Every Day

    It’s getting tougher every day to deny that life is present in the womb at a very early stage. See this article for pictures of why this is true. There are more pictures on the site, too.

  • Open Theism

    Open theists assert that God does not know the future until it happens. One verse that is difficult for their position is: Isaiah 46:10 Declaring the end from the beginning, And from ancient times things which have not been done, Saying, ‘My purpose will be established, And I will accomplish all My good pleasure’; God…

  • The Wolfpack (Fiction)

    Any resemblance to reality in the following story is purely intentional. The herd moved along slowly across the wide open plains. There wasn’t much cover in this stretch of the plains. There were no trees for the herd to hide in if enemies attacked. They were oblivious to any attack that might happen. Sure there…

  • Internal Consistency and Truth

    It is possible for a system to be internally consistent and yet false. For instance a system might assert five truths, call them A, B, C, D and E. Suppose that someone who holds this ABCDE system is asked to prove the A. Suppose then that person says, B proves A. Suppose the proof is…

  • Free Will Defense

    Here is a good article on free will and determinism which deals with some of the common objections to the Free Will Defense; Overcoming Objections to Self-determinism (Free-will).

  • Walking on Water

    Why Walk on Water? The Gospels tell us that Jesus walked on water (Mat 14:23-32). At first glance this might seem like something that is too showy for Jesus. Why walk on water? Does this miracle story play a crucial part in the Gospel? Would it still be the Gospel without the story? The story…

  • Twenty Centuries Later – Locating the Nexus

    How Do We Understand the Bible? N. T. Wright, in his book, “The Challenge of Jesus: Rediscovering Who Jesus Was and Is” addresses the question of how we are to understand the Bible in our modern world. Wright starts with an carefully developed historical view of first century Palestine. He puts his scholarly focus on…

  • Broken Syllogisms and the Equivocation Fallacy

    A syllogism is sometimes posed in order to prove that regeneration precedes justification: 1 – It is pleasing to God for someone to repent 2 – Those who are in the flesh cannot please God 3 – Therefore those who are in the flesh cannot repent The desired conclusion of this syllogism is that a…