As I write, Israeli troops are massed on the border of Gaza, and they are about to go in to topple Hamas. They are doing this in response to a steady stream of rocket/mortar attacks from Gaza. Hamas is trying to provoke just such an invasion, in an attempt at a rope-a-dope strategy. Israel has …
Christ the Soldier
Even if we differ with it, and even if we differ with it sharply, we are all still affected by the idea of Jesus as the prototypical hippie. Those who adopt the idea may do so with the applause of pacifists, or with a Nietzsche-like disdain. But it is a very common and very influential …
Better Than That
John famously begins his gospel by saying that the Word was in the beginning with God, and that the Word was God. We have two things associated here that we don’t normally associate — identity and togetherness. I am me, but I don’t normally think of myself as being with me. I am generally close …
Looking Over a Fence
God is light and in Him is no darkness at all (1 John 1:5). We bow before the One who dwells in unapproachable light (1 Tim. 6:16). He is the perfection of all light. But, in keeping with our theme in this series, we have skewed views of what perfection is really like. We want, …
Marduk and the Trinity
The issue is not whether God is perfect, but rather whether we have a firm grasp of what perfection actually means. We have a tendency to measure everything by our own blinkered experience and, once persuaded that something in the divine life is different from what we now know and experience, we are morally certain …
Are You Crazy?
One of our most difficult intellectual problems is that of letting the Bible define perfection. Instead of this, we persist in bringing along our own notions of perfection in order to impose them on the Bible, and particularly on the Garden of Eden. And this seems okay, just so long as we don’t push it …
The First Violence
The first act of violence in our world’s history was done to Adam by God. God placed Adam into a deep coma-like sleep, opened up his side, and removed a rib, from which He fashioned Eve (Gen. 2:21-22). This happened before the Fall, and the bloodshed involved was therefore not a consequence of sin. Having …