Not counting the first Texas Instruments computer-like thing, the first PC we owned was an IBM XT. It had ten megabytes of memory on the hard drive, and I recall marveling at how roomy that was. Ginormous capacity, and I thought that I would have to type pretty much forever in order fill it up. …
Not Preachy
“On one level these novels [Narnia stories] are tremendous adventures, and on another they are rich theological treatises that teach truth without failing into the tedious habit of preaching to children. The search for truth is simply part of the excitement” (Michael D. O’Brian, A Landscape With Dragons, p. 125).
The Rebirth of Christian Story
“Because the Holy Spirit is always pouring out life upon God’s people, we must never succumb to the temptation to think that the false culture has won. Despite its apparent powers, its noise, and its glamour, it is a moribund system that has not much longer to live . . . A regeneration of Christian …
The Dry Hole of Secular Leftism
As we continue our way through Greg Boyd’s The Myth of a Christian Nation, the internal tensions and incoherencies continue to mount. The longer he goes, the more specific he must become, and as he becomes more specific he sees contradictions where there are none, and suggests contradictory sentiments to us, even in the same …
No Kidding
“Films, videos, and commercial television have come close to replacing the Church, the arts, and the university as the primary shaper of the modern sense of reality” (Michael D. O’Brian, A Landscape With Dragons, p. 61).
A Tsunami of Malice
Democracy is, as the fellow said, two coyotes and a sheep voting on what to have for lunch. But if the sheep is the rich guy, then the parable needs to be expanded. In the global economy, sheep can always move assets offshore, and you know, this metaphor is getting away from me. The point …
Knocking Down Walls for No Reason
I do not mean this as a backhanded slap at all. In his next chapter, “The Myth of a Christian Nation,” Boyd says many worthwhile and important things. He talks about the importance of prayer as social activism, and he emphasizes rightly that a power under approach can be used by God to accomplish great …
Why the Serpent Does Not Symbolize Honesty
“The meanings of symbols are not merely the capricious choices of a limited culture. We cannot arbitrarily rearrange them like so much furniture in the living room of the psyche. To tamper with these fundamental types is spiritually and psychologically dangerous because they are keystones in the very structure of the mind” (Michael D. O’Brian, …
Your Word and Her Heart
A man ought never to be in a position to break a woman’s heart unless he is also simultaneously breaking his word. His word ought to always be a protective barrier between him and her heart. He ought never to be in a position to destroy her without destroying his own integrity first.
Still Shunning the Centurions
In his second chapter, Boyd discusses the Kingdom of the Cross, setting it in stark contrast to the Kingdom of the Sword, which he addressed in the first chapter. If I were to critique his argument in a phrase, it would be with the phrase false alternatives. Quoting Rosser and Yoder, Boyd says that the …