Last week I was given the opportunity to preach at my church during the evening service. I don’t get to preach very often, so when I do, it is always equal parts exciting and terrifying for me. The text I was given was John 7:53-8:11 or the woman caught in adultery. It is one of…
I’m currently participating in an extracurricular reading group with students here at Bethel Seminary. We just finished reading through the first five books of St Augustine’s Confessions. It’s been a blast to read and discuss, and I thought I’d share one of my reflections so far. As I was reading the beginning of Book V, I…
It’s been seven months since I have been involved in Biblical-Academic pursuit. In that time I’ve transitioned to a fairly normal blue-collar job, taken up interest in a career path in fitness (shameless plug: if you’re looking for coaching, I do Powerlifting, Bodybuilding and General Fitness!), got engaged and started planning a wedding. My primary…
Recently my new article on Ephesians 5.18–21 was published in the Polish Catholic Theological Journal, Biblica et Patristica Thoruniensia. The article is called “Filled with the Spirit: Wine and Worship in Levitical Light (Ephesians 5.18–21).” In this piece I try to make sense of a number of intriguing issues related to Ephesians 5.18–21 in its literary context…
[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]The Museum of the Bible recently opened an exhibit entitled, “The Slave Bible: Let the Story be Told.” The centerpiece is a book called, “Parts of the Holy Bible, selected for the use of the Negro Slaves, in the British West-India Islands” published in 1808. Originally published in London in 1807, this book was apparently…
Everyone knows how the Christmas story goes. As Stanley Hudson vehemently asserted in the most recent episode of The Office (8.10 Christmas Wishes) regarding the sensitivity to celebrate everything but Christmas during the Holidays: I want Christmas! Just give me plain-baby-Jesus-lying-in-a-manger Christmas! When our culture boils down the Christmas event it looks like this: baby Jesus in a manger. We’ve seen…
We’re Getting Christmas Wrong Over the past few Christmases, I’m noticing an uptick in blog posts and essays about how Christians are “getting Christmas wrong,” that our old quaint stories about Jesus being born in an animal stable are historically implausible, and that our hymns and advent traditions are being “spoiled” by eminent historians who…
In James Cone’s revolutionary work, Black Theology & Black Power, Cone depicts a theological system that is truly black in its methodology and biblical in its exegetical foundation. Prior to his work, there was no theology by and for black people, and the prevailing theology of the day, a burgeoning evangelical theology, was decidedly white…
I had the opportunity to share about some of my research on shame on the Erasing Shame podcast with DJ Chang this past week. Check it out here: http://erasingshame.com/why-its-harder-for-filipino-americans-to-talk-about-shame/