7 Biblical Principles for Saving and Investing Your Money
How can you come up with a personal theology of money that balances orthodoxy with practicality
“It would be easy to think of saving as a purely selfish activity. That can indeed be the case —we need only read about the rich fool in Luke 12— but it doesn’t have to be. Saving honors God because it rightly values money as a gift that he has given to us (James 1:16–17).”... Continue Reading
The Gracious Work of the Holy Spirit
Woven into this work of grace is the unnoticed activity of the Spirit as He persuades us that the Scriptures—our ultimate source for knowing Christ—are the Word of God.
The Spirit persuades us about Jesus entirely on the basis of Jesus Himself. Yet this persuasion arises because the Father has sent Him, because Jesus gives evidence of who He is, and because the Spirit opens our blind eyes to recognize Him. As with Peter, our conviction is not a flesh-and-blood matter (Matt. 16:16–17); like... Continue Reading
The 10 Commandments of Progressive Christianity #2: Are We Born Sinners in Need of Salvation?
“Affirming people’s potential is more important than reminding them of their brokenness.”
The core issue in this second tenet is the issue of sin. Are people sinners? If so, how big of a deal is it? And, more than that, how important is that people know they are sinners? Should we tell them? And how we do balance people’s sinfulness with their potential as God’s image bearers? “At... Continue Reading
A Hidden Epidemic God Hates
During my time as a marriage counselor and pastor, I’ve seen cases of spiritual abuse in the home that would make your skin crawl.
Domestic spiritual abuse is using Scripture, biblical principles, or one’s spiritual authority to control a family member for selfish gain. The abuse may be sexual, physical, social, emotional, verbal, financial, and/or psychological in nature—but the key is that the abuser uses Christianity to justify the behavior. The hard heart of the abuser causes the mind to interpret... Continue Reading
How to feel emotions Christianly
It is the Psalms that teach us how to handle times of joy and sorrow.
Consider the words of Saint Athanasius in his Letter to Marcellinus on the Psalms: “These words become like a mirror to the person singing them, so that he might perceive himself and the emotions of his soul” (§12). When he reads the Psalms he sees himself as if looking into mirror, reflecting back to him the emotions... Continue Reading
How Does Christ “Fulfill” Historical Remarks?
What can Matthew mean by saying that Christ fulfills the Scripture when the Old Testament passage in question was a historical notice?
Matthew’s typology is not simply a question of repeating patterns, but involves the whole concept of redemptive-history. It is a very clear lesson of the fulfillment formula that God is in control of the events. And in the events of the life of Jesus, the plan of God which was adumbrated in the past experiences... Continue Reading
The Problem of “Porneia”
The Greek word that is most often translated as “sexual immorality” is porneia, the word from which derive our English term, pornography.
Every Greek lexicon or dictionary of the NT is in agreement, that porneia refers to any form of sexual activity before or outside the relationship of monogamous marriage between a man and a woman. It can refer to pre-marital sex, adultery, homosexual practice, prostitution, bestiality, and all other expressions of sexual activity outside the marital relationship between... Continue Reading
Just Forget About Marriage for a Minute!
Ephesians 5 tells a husband he must love his wife as Jesus Christ loves his church.
Christ loves his church with a sacrificial love. “Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.” Jesus’s life culminated in an act of sacrifice for the sake of his church. He sacrificed himself to all the horrors of the cross so that we would not need to endure it ourselves. He turned himself over... Continue Reading
Double the Trouble if You Ignore the Context
When you ignore the context, you don’t know what the author is talking about.
When you don’t read the text before and after a verse, you create a context vacuum that you are tempted to fill with your own life circumstances. Since context determines the meaning of the smaller unit of text, your own life situation becomes the new context that changes the meaning of the verse. Never... Continue Reading
10 Things You Should Know about the Second Coming of Christ
We must first remind ourselves that the second coming of Jesus is our sure and certain, rock-solid and immovable hope.
Careful reflection on Christ’s return, sustained meditation on what it will mean in that moment and for all eternity, has a purifying effect on the soul. It turns sin sour in our mouths and serves to conform us ever more to the image of Jesus himself. After all, who can truly set their sights on... Continue Reading