“Repenting people, typically, are zealous about casting off their sin. That’s what God’s Spirit does inside of them. When this happens, one can expect to see a willingness to accept outside counsel. A willingness to inconvenience their schedules. A willingness to confess embarrassing things. A willingness to make financial sacrifices or lose friends or end... Continue Reading

“Richard John Neuhaus rightly argued years ago that it’s a mistake to see the two clauses of the First Amendment’s religious liberty guarantee—no establishment of a religion by the state and no restriction on free exercise of religion—as too sharply divided. They are two sides of the same coin. A government that sets up a... Continue Reading

“Recently we’ve been discovering that celebrity pastors understand that they have a similar conundrum. Having built megachurches with budgets in the tens of millions and generous salaries to match, they can’t really spend all the money they’re earning. Unless they’re fully certified prosperity preachers, there’s a certain decorum that pastors must follow when spending their... Continue Reading

“As I grew older, I eventually shed the Lutheranism (ELCA) of my youth. It was increasingly theologically liberal, socially progressive and seemingly devoid of an explicit gospel message, often displaced by fuzzy theology and entertainingly cute stories. This was the Lutheranism I remember—”Luther-lite,” one that Luther himself would scantly recognize. The years have taken a... Continue Reading

“Such misconceptions are even prevalent in the evangelical world, as preachers like Tony Campolo insist that the greed principle underlies the modern capitalistic system of America.  Many well-meaning evangelicals, who have a genuine care for the poor, find themselves drawn to the rhetoric of people like Campolo and their disdain for capitalism.”   Ever since... Continue Reading

When a Christian falls, say, into adultery, it is a bad enough scandal.  But when a leader falls, the impact is so much greater because the general public regard leaders as the moral barometer of the church as a whole.   A further implication of this is that the manner in which a church handles the... Continue Reading

Works of revisionist history have begun to hit the shelves in bookstores across the globe. Maybe Christians misunderstood the Jesus story all along. There is nothing more tantalizing and sexy than a new proposal (or a re-hashing of an older one) that paints a different historical portrait than what has been told for thousands of... Continue Reading

One of the most common objections to the doctrine of election is that people do not see the point of sharing the good news and working hard for the gospel if God has already chosen who will believe. But human logic sometimes runs in the opposite of biblical logic. The world says “Why speak if... Continue Reading

Yes, it was right to worship Jesus as God in the womb, in the manger, on the breast, at play, in school, in the workshop, in the court, and on the cross; but in the tomb? Surely not. Jesus was in heaven for these few days, His human soul still united to His divine nature, rightly being... Continue Reading

There are times for outrage. There are times to turn away from leaders who have proven themselves unworthy or unfaithful. There are times to expose the charlatan or the unfaithful and to make a fuss and to raise an outcry for the sake of distancing ourselves and protecting others. But it’s not every time. It’s... Continue Reading