Dear Wormwood, Seeing as your Uncle Screwtape is busy after being promoted to a particular world leader, he has handed you over to me. Now, my dear Wormwood, I see that the possibility of a human war, and all that leads up to it, has enticed you. It is of vital importance to your mission that you remember your greatest weapon: a worldly contentedness. Perhaps you wonder, “But what sort of man would be content...
Enough for him whom cherubim, Worship night and day, A breastful of milk, And a mangerful of hay; Enough for him whom angels Fall down before, The ox and ass and camel, Which adore (A Christmas Carol, Christina Rossetti) It’s hard to imagine the King of the universe, the Word of God through which everything has been made, being content with a stomach full of milk, laying in a manger of hay. For the rest of humanity,...
Many years ago when I was new to biblical faith and largely unaware of other belief systems outside of my own (or at least of the couple congregations I had attended), I met a co-worker who described himself as ‘Eastern Orthodox’. At the time I met him I had been a Christian for only a couple years. I was an Agnostic up until my twenties and I was inexperienced with various religions or versions of...
“You deserve to be happy.” “You deserve someone who treats you well.” “You deserve to be taken care of.” “You deserve the best in life.” Problem: These don’t seem to be happening with much consistency. If there was any cry under which modern culture united, it would be the one that preaches humanity deserving to be happy and all the things attached to that idea. There’s plenty of problems that stem from the ambiguity, such...
At the table sat seven fishermen, a tax collector, a zealot, and the other three apostles who at the very least were Jews. If you’re like me and grew up in 21st century United States, then that probably wasn’t the most eyebrow raising description. Except for the tax collectors, because I don’t think the majority of us have happy feelings when we think of the IRS. But what was it actually like? The fishermen were...
Kanye West’s 7th album, The Life of Pablo (TLOP) was released a few weeks ago. On this album, Kanye gives his listeners a window into his life and thoughts. Furthermore, I believe this album gives us a picture of a particular type of Christianity that characterizes our american society. The Atlantic’s review of the album is spot on with its analysis of the individual tracks as it details Kanye’s struggle between family life and the...
By now, most of us have been thoroughly inundated—thanks, largely in part, to ESPN’s wash-rinse-repeat approach of showing the elevator video—with coverage of the NFL’s domestic violence problem specifically as it relates to Ray Rice. The reaction against Rice was swift, virtually unanimous and severe. Understandably so. The reaction against the NFL could aptly be described with the same aforementioned adjectives. Yet when I thought about how people responded to the NFL, something seemed so off....
A few months ago, a family member brought a particular newspaper article to my attention. The title “New Testament gets a new look by Jews.” As someone who is very interested in not only the study of the Old Testament, but also the Jewish Backgrounds of the New Testament, and the Christian faith, this seemed quiet intriguing. After all, the more I have learned to try to adjust my worldview, experiences, and perceptions of God...
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