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Reckless Love: A Response to John Piper
Read more: Reckless Love: A Response to John PiperRecently a new phenomenon has hit the Christian scene becoming a staple of most radio stations and many Sunday morning worship services, Reckless Love. No, not the Finnish Guns and Roses cover band, the worship song by Cory Asbury. This song, despite its insanely huge popularity, has taken some criticism from many high profile Christian…
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3 Simple Ways to Respond to this past Easter Weekend
Read more: 3 Simple Ways to Respond to this past Easter WeekendFor most followers of Jesus, our observance of Easter this past weekend marked a significant point in our yearly calendar that has been specifically set aside to celebrate the pinnacle of our faith, Jesus’ resurrection and life giving ministry. It’s meant to be a significant pause built into our busy schedules cementing a spiritual rhythm…
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My Failure to be Properly Educated
Read more: My Failure to be Properly EducatedIn my quest to explore the background of Philo of Alexandria’s thoughts on education, I came across one of the most influential individuals to every write on the subject, Plato. Philo was a notorious propagator of Platonic thought. In fact, many scholars consider the Jewish theologian one of the most essential voices of what has been referred…
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I need a Scholarship to be a Scholar
Read more: I need a Scholarship to be a ScholarIt’s funny to think about how expensive education is. These repositories of knowledge called Universities that provide the key to a better future. First, they require you to leverage that future in the form of student loans. 30k later and half a Masters degree (the 1st 20k was from those good old undergrad years) and…
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On Contentment and Simplicity: An Advent Reflection
Read more: On Contentment and Simplicity: An Advent ReflectionEnough for him whom cherubim, Worship night and day, A breastful of milk, And a mangerful of hay; Enough for him whom angels Fall down before, The ox and ass and camel, Which adore (A Christmas Carol, Christina Rossetti) It’s hard to imagine the King of the universe, the Word of God through which everything has been…
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The Apocalypse of Santa Claus
Read more: The Apocalypse of Santa ClausAs a scholar of the decades preceding the Great Outage of 2059, I am always intrigued when a “paper” document of such tremendous historical and cultural influence surfaces from the clutter of the past. Rumors of the cultic devotion attributed to pagan deity Santa Claus have circulated through academic circles for years. However, it wasn’t…
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Haggai and the Expectation of the Experience of God’s Presence: Part 3
Read more: Haggai and the Expectation of the Experience of God’s Presence: Part 3In my previous blog posts on Haggai, I discussed a few of the different expectations that the people of Israel held concerning the presence of Yahweh as they followed his command to rebuild the Temple in Jerusalem. Their expectation for Yahweh to show up in a powerful way upon the Temple’s completion and dedication, an…
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Haggai and the Expectation of the Experience of God’s Presence: Part 2
Read more: Haggai and the Expectation of the Experience of God’s Presence: Part 2In a previous blog post on Haggai, I discussed one of the expectations the people of Israel held concerning Yahweh’s (the personal name of God) powerful action on their behalf, an expectation that included their current state of economic affairs. Upon the obedience of his command to rebuild the Temple, they expected to participate, once again,…
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Haggai and the Expectation of the Experience of God’s Presence: Part 1
Read more: Haggai and the Expectation of the Experience of God’s Presence: Part 1The Book of Haggai tells a story of expectation, confusion, and reorientation. In this book, written by one of the 12 Old Testament minor prophets, the people of Israel, just recently returned from their Babylonian enforced exile, are admonished by Yahweh (the personal name of the God of the OT) for their complacency and misplaced…
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Baptism and a Circumcision without Hands
Read more: Baptism and a Circumcision without HandsA few weeks ago, I was asked to write a supplemental reading for our Life Group curriculum here at Fellowship Dallas. It was an awesome week at our church where we baptized over 25 people who had made a profession of faith and had decided to follow Jesus. Being the nerd that I am, I…