It is getting harder to explain the BTS phenomenon to people without sounding like the facts are being made up. Industry execs and celebrities have resorted to comparing it to Beatlemania — which sounds like an exaggeration until one witnesses ARMY in person (the name for their worldwide and fiercely devoted fan base). ARMY generates more traffic for BTS on social media than Donald Trump and Justin Bieber…. combined. Their latest album has surpassed 1 […]
How do we help people who are wrestling with doubts in their faith? Can we create a safe space for them to question and voice their doubts without being judged for their questions? How do we help give them this space, while also still pointing them gently back to the truth that God is real and present even when He does not feel near? These questions came to mind after I read an article on […]
Readers of the Bible may be shocked to discover that an important historical event is missing from its narrative. Most people have never heard of it, even though this event may have well changed the course of history. And more intriguing, it seems that the biblical authors and editors may have sought to suppress this event. Their reason, however, needs some exploration. The Battle of Qarqar In the mid 9th century BCE, the Assyrian Empire […]
I’m running a 10-mile in the upcoming Twin Cities Marathon on Sunday, October 7th with Team Venture. We’re raising money to support Anti-Trafficking in Nepal by providing young girls with a year of housing, accommodation, and education. Would you please prayerfully consider supporting my run financially to help me and my team meet our support goals? Here is the link to my fundraising page where you can learn more about what we’re doing: https://venturemiles.org/#/fundraiser/7667b05c-a9c2-4101-99d3-3c523dd90886 I […]
My new article in Journal of Biblical & Theological Studies is now officially out. The paper is entitled, “Eschatological Emphases in 1 Thessalonians and Galatians: Distinct Argumentative Strategies Related to External Conflict and Audience Response.” In this article I am addressing a couple of different issues at once. To begin, there is the issue of the chronological ordering of Paul’s letters. Most scholars tend to think that 1 Thessalonians is the earliest and most primitive example of […]
Even in the midst of the industrustrialization of England during the 19th century, poet and priest Gerard Manley Hopkins insists upon the sustaining and revealing presence of Christ in the physical world. In his Petrarchan sonnet, “Hurrahing in Harvest,” the poet, reflecting upon the late summer fields ripe with abundance, encounters Christ whose presence stirs the soul and propels the speaker into communion and union with God. The poem seeks to represent this space as […]
I recently read an article by Leonard Cassuto on career diversity, and how David Porter, an English professor at the University of Michigan teaches a graduate seminar on helping students look at other job opportunities outside of teaching positions and academia. This article gives me hope as it shows how colleges and universities are finding creative ways to help graduate students look outside of academia for jobs, especially during a time of limited professorships. I’m […]
I recently read “The Statement on Social Justice and the Gospel” formed by a group of fourteen men, signed by John MacArthur and many other Christian leaders with over 6,000 signers. They state how they do not see social justice issues as essential to the gospel and how the emphasis of social justice can detract from the gospel. In section 6 about the gospel, the statement says, “This also means that implications and applications of the […]
What is Fundamentalism? Christian fundamentalists (think R.A. Torrey, A.C. Dixon, or recently, John Piper, Norman Geisler, Paul Washer, John MacArthur, Wayne Grudem, etc.) are part of the movement in Evangelicalism that originated in 1910s America. This phrase has been used to connote religious bigotry, abuse, and close-mindedness, but fundamentalists are merely Evangelicals with a complex (we will see whether this complex is merited further on). This was the branch of American Christianity that found its roots […]
Ever since I started down the path of academic theology I have been plagued by a single word: “literal”. No other word has caused me near the same amount of frustration and headaches than this word. Not only is it often, ironically, ill defined and vague, it becomes, also ironically, a license to interpret or translate a text in anyway the person doing the action sees fit. But the real problem is that there are […]
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