“In light of what we have considered, we see that it is inaccurate to talk about free will, as though there were an autonomous thing inside of us, capable of acting in any direction, regardless of the motives of our hearts. If such a thing existed — a creature who made choices apart from the …
Gospel, Not Hectoring
“The awfulness of human guilt needs redemption, not a lecture” (Lowry, The Homiletical Plot, p. 86).
Wiener Schnitzel is UnAmerican
Details are just beginning to emerge about some American atrocities in Afghanistan. Some of the individuals accused are already on trial, which is at it should be. The presenting problem for the politicos and spin doctors in this situation appears to be the fact that there are allegedly supposed to be a multitude of photographs …
Gold or Gravel
“Our words and actions, therefore, are determined not by an autonomous will, but rather by our nature — whether good or bad . . . because our choices proceed from our hearts, our responsibility before God is not limited in the slightest. Our words are determined by our hearts, and we will be judged on …
The Moment of Resolution
“The crucial moment in the sermon as homiletical bind is not in the ‘asking’ but in the revelation stage when matters are turned upside down, and thereby seen in a new way . . . Most literary plots find their climax in the moment of resolution sometime before the ending” (Lowry, The Homiletical Plot, p. …
Obams Away!
Okay, so now the most leftist president we have ever had has opened up a third front in the Middle East. Sure, it has been done in the liberal way of war . . . lots of wish-it-weren’t-soing, lots of crabwalk drills, lots of getting the French to bomb first, lots of important people doing …
Lent Without Easter
In Leviticus 23, the weekly sabbath is listed along with the rest of Israel’s festivals as a feast, as a festival. The weekly sabbath was a day of rejoicing, not a day of gloom. The Jews had only one penitential day out of the year — their Good Friday, Yom Kippur, the day of atonement. …
Vertical and Horizontal
When we come before the Lord to worship Him, we are to have pure hearts. We have a vertical relationship with God, and a horizontal relationship with one another. The Bible teaches us that there needs to be a symmetry between those two. If the liturgy and the sermon create the wrong kind of space, …
Propitiation or Wrath
Gracious Father, You are the one who sent Jesus Christ into the world, to be the propitiation for our sins. And yet, Father, we have tried to claim that we do not need this propitiation, which leaves us under Your righteous and holy wrath. Have mercy on us, we pray.
Like Scarsdale
A denial of Hell is the very apex of short term thinking. Living your life here and now as though eternity matters is the epitome of long term thinking. And once these fundamental “mentalities” have set in, it is not long before you start to see other manifestations of them. Deferred gratification is essential to …