Schneider’s seventh chapter concentrates on four “parables of affluence,” taken from the gospel of Luke. In doing this he is tackling the central challenge to his thesis, and he is taking it head on. “All the Gospels agree that a great deal of Jesus’ teaching was on the subject of wealth, and that most of …
Look at the Warts Right
I need to explain the background of this one first. Other than the news and an occasional football game, our family has not really been a big teevee watching family. As a result, my ignorance of the world of sitcoms is nearly perfect, which led to the obvious conclusion — I need to blog about …
Tangible Blessing
“At thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore” (Ps. 16: 11) Growing Dominion, Part 136 “By humility and the fear of the Lord are riches, and honour, and life” (Prov. 22:4). Because we have all learned our Gnostic catechism responses, our tendency is to immediately spiritualize the lesson. By humility and the fear of …
Only God
Mark does not use the word hamartano, but he does use hamartia six times. He tells us that John the Baptist came and preached the baptism of repentance for the remission of sins (1:4). In the next verse, all of Judea came out to be baptized, confessing their sins (1:5). In the next chapter, Jesus …
In Other Words, Cool Your Baby Jets
“Violent gesture, even when commended by some, will be sure to strike others from its comic side . . . Therefore, do not carry action too far, and if you feel that you are naturally very energetic in your delivery, repress your energies a little. Wave your hands a little less, smite the Bible somewhat …
Just Say It
“The culture of the West, infused as it is with Christian values, is superior to any other, and all the valid charges against the West are indications that it has betrayed its own heritage. It is not superior because it is wealthy; it is wealthy because it is superior, because it believes that work is …
Desire
Yesterday, I began a short series of sermons on Desire, Envy, Competition, and Ambition. The message yesterday was Desire Runs Deep.
In Which We Have All Majored
We come now to the words from which we derive the name of our little study — hamartiology, the study of sin, in which all of us have majored. Those words are hamartano and hamartia respectively. They are used so often in the New Testament that we will have to take our time in order …
So Stand Straight
“We do not go into the pulpit to slouch about, and to look free and easy, but we go there upon very solemns business, and our posture should be such as becomes our mission” (Charles Spurgeon, Lectures to My Students, p. 281).
Ressentiment
“The twisted path from humanism’s soaring tributes in honor of the human divinity to the consequences of modern humanitarianism is best explained by the concept of ressentiment. When Nietzsche wrote his celebrated attack on Christianity, he transliterated this word from the French because he could find no German equivalent . . . When Scheler’s book …