By Corey Fields Last month, former Seventh-day Adventist pastor Ryan Bell (not to be confused with Rob Bell) dropped the bombshell: he doesn’t believe in God anymore. His story has hit national media outlets such as NPR and the Huffington…
Where is God?
John’s prologue is actually a poem that introduces major themes that will be developed in the unfolding of the story that follows. It is a beautiful poem about the mystery of incarnation. I love the story about two mischievous boys,…
Tasting the Kingdom
Blasphemy and freedom
The Charlie Hebdo incident: we cannot not sight it and refrain from all comment. It would be redundant to revisit here the obvious aspects of the incident. Thus, obviously, the murderers at the office of the French satirical magazine were…
SBC leader sees ‘chasm’ between liberal, evangelical denominations
By Bob Allen A Southern Baptist Convention leader says that rather than representing two points on a spectrum of Christianity, evangelical Christianity and liberal Protestantism are different and competing religions. Albert Mohler, president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville,…
Gaining theological heft
By Molly T. Marshall This time of year is a “come to Jesus” season for many of us as we assess our need for better health, which usually includes weight loss for the more sedentary among us. We weigh hopes…
God’s Bet on Humanity and Creation
“Our world is in need of a savior!” A line we might expect to come right out of a sermon in a church. But, it’s not. If we are paying attention, we can hear it being whispered from different corners…
Important origins
Important Origins (Part 2 in the series, How God changes our neighborhood) In the first part of this series I set up this idea that the key theological concept of Christmas, the Incarnation, can be boiled down into a simple…
When God moved into the neighborhood
The Word became flesh and blood, and moved into the neighborhood. – John 1:14a MSG Occasionally called the “forgotten Christmas story,” the first chapter of John describes the incarnation of Christ in philosophical prose. In contrast Matthew and Luke give…
Bodies in motion: Some Baptists are recovering the physical in worship, prayer
By Jeff Brumley Baptists have historically minimized bodily movement in worship and prayer out of concern for appearing too charismatic or Catholic, scholars and spiritual formation ministers say. Baptisms and altar calls and the occasional layings-on of hands are accepted,…
The Taliban in the self
Shots rang out. Blood was everywhere. Bodies hit the floor. Children screamed. The images and descriptions of the scene at a school in Pakistan are more than horrific. Over 130 children are dead over an extremist religious ideology. From terrorist…
There is purpose
There’s an argument going on. Sometimes you have to listen closely, but it’s rumbling beneath the polite noise of our sophisticated society like the background radiation of the Big Bang, filling every black hole as it sweeps across an infinite…