When I was a candidate for the Ph.D. at Southern Seminary, I spent the vast majority of my time with faculty who were specialists in the New Testament. As a result, I missed out on getting to know some of the faculty representing other disciplines. One of the men that I didn’t get to know very well was Dr. Hershael York, Professor of Preaching. I think we have met a couple of times, but in reality I hardly know Dr. York personally. But let me say that I love him nevertheless. He keeps a blog called “Confessions of a Pastor” that is one of the most enjoyable blogs that I…
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ETS Program Online
For all of you theologues that are going to be in San Diego, California this November, you might want to check out the program of the 59th Annual Meeting of the Evangelical Theological Society. It is available online here.
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Review of The Nature of the Atonement: Four Views
James Beilby and Paul R. Eddy, eds. The Nature of the Atonement: Four Views. Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2006. 208pp. $20. It is no accident that Intervarsity has chosen to publish a “four views” book on the meaning of Christ’s atonement. The topic is very much in dispute right now, even among those who are associated with the evangelical movement. Not long ago, the consensus among evangelicals consisted more or less of an affirmation of the penal substitutionary view, but this is no longer the case. As evangelicalism has splintered, so has its tacit orthodoxy concerning atonement. Now, we are not surprised to hear certain pastors and theologians castigating…
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September 11, 2001
Of course I’ll never forget where I was on September 11, 2001. My wife and I were in our second year of marriage, and we were living in Louisville, Kentucky while I was working on my Ph.D. On the morning of the attacks, I was in our apartment, and she called me from work to tell me to turn the television on. I think both buildings had already been struck by the time I tuned in, but I was watching live television as both of them eventually crumbled to the ground. The emotion of that day has left an indelible mark on me. The uncertainty. The questions. The very real…
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General Betray Us?
Politics reached a new low in the run-up to General Petreaus’ testimony before Congress yesterday. The editors at The Wall Street Journal excoriated the slanderous tactics used against Petreaus and have called for congressional Democrats to repudiate MoveOn.org’s full-page ad in The New York Times which renamed the general “General Betray Us.” Norman Podhoretz gives a good account of the “Vietnam syndrome” that has given birth to the cynicism that seems to be the order of the day in politics. In “America the Ugly,” he writes: “It is impossible at this point to predict how and when the battle of Iraq will end. But from the vitriolic debates it has…
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More John Piper on the Problem of Evil
The discussion about Greg Boyd and the problem of evil is still ongoing as I write this blog. The whole thing began with John Piper (John Piper, Greg Boyd, Denny Burk, Greg Boyd, Denny Burk), and so it’s fitting to bring him in again now. Last week John Piper delivered a series of message at Wheaton College titled “Treasuring Christ and the Call to Suffer.” In these messages he addresses the very questions we’ve been discussing for over a week now. If Piper’s messages do anything, they show that the view I have been arguing for is not narrowly derived from the book of Job. Dr. Piper powerfully communicates the…
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A Publicity Coup for Noam Chomsky . . . Not!
You’ve gotta feel for the guy a little bit. Everyone’s favorite linguist has put his best foot forward to write about politics and other areas outside his technical expertise (We know a little bit about that on this blog!). Nevertheless, Noam Chomsky seems to be the man of the hour among all the wrong people. Last Fall, Chomsky got endorsed by the world’s most notorious dictator, Hugo Chávez. And now this Fall, he has just been endorsed by the world’s most notorious terrorist, Osama Bin Laden. All in all, I’d say that’s a pretty bad 12 months worth of publicity. Talk about your unintended consequences!
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Preston Sprinkle on the New Perspective
My good friend Jim Hamilton interviews Preston Sprinkle today about issues related to biblical theology and the New Perspective on Paul. All you bibliophiles and theologues need to check this one out. “Interview with Preston Sprinkle on Leviticus 18:5” – by Jim Hamilton
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A Good Word from Tony Snow
I’m thankful for public servants like Tony Snow—so much so that I have written about him more than once on this blog (see here). Last week, he announced that he would resign as President Bush’s press secretary. Many people will remember that he is a cancer survivor. Unfortunately his cancer has returned. Snow wrote a short piece for Christianity Today describing his decision to step down, and he also shared some of his reflections on having cancer. You should read the whole essay, but one line stuck out to me: “We want lives of simple, predictable ease—smooth, even trails as far as the eye can see—but God likes to go…
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Greg Boyd Responds to My Post
Dr. Greg Boyd is a well-known open theist. Open theists do not believe in God’s omniscience classically defined. They believe that God does not know the future in as much as the future depends upon the choices that will be made by His free creatures. Of course, this is a radical (and I believe dangerous) innovation in the doctrine of God that has wide-ranging implications. Last month, I wrote a short blog post on the collapse of the I-35 bridge. In it, I took issue with Boyd‘s open theist view of how God relates to calamities, and I did so using the book of Job as a case study. I…