The confusion about how Christians should respond to the political issues today betrays an apparent disconnect between our theology and our practice. Many of us have conveniently relegated politics and culture to the periphery of our lives. We are busy people. We don’t have much use for political intrigues and bickering.
Continue reading Toxic Politics and the Third WayCategory: Random
Don’t Skip the Private Parts
Romans 6:12-14 says, “Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, to make you obey its passions. Do not present your members to sin as instruments for unrighteousness, but present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life, and your members to God as instruments for righteousness. For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace.”
Romans 5 is the ground for Romans 6. Because you have been justified through faith in Christ, you are dead to sin. You are not its slave anymore. You are free. You can now walk in the newness of life. There are two things you can do to apply this verse to your life:
First, do not present your members as instruments of unrighteousness.
Continue reading Don’t Skip the Private PartsBible-Quoting Fascists?
A Response to John Nery’s Column at the Inquirer
“How can someone who knows the Bible well enough to quote from it at will—usually from the Old Testament—support the killing of drug suspects or the manifestly unfair shuttering of an entire TV network?”
That’s how John Nery of Inquirer.net started his column today, July 21. I was intrigued not just because I somehow recognized the Bible-quoting person he was writing about but also because fascism and the Bible don’t usually appear together in the same sentence.
Continue reading Bible-Quoting Fascists?The World Needs Healers
The world needs healers. I don’t mean doctors. Yes, we need doctors but I’m talking about healers—people who bring healing and wholeness to our fractured society simply by being here.
Continue reading The World Needs HealersChronological Snobbery
John Piper:
“I have an abiding fear of what C. S. Lewis called chronological snobbery. Chronological snobbery is the arrogant notion that the ideas of our own day are better than the ideas of a bygone day just because the ideas are in our day. Chronological snobbery feels that things are truer because they are newer. And so it is both irrational and naïve.
Continue reading Chronological SnobberyWhy It’s Good to Tremble Before God
Imagine a crisis like this: you are a king of a small kingdom and two bigger nations conspire to draw you into a losing battle. They wanted to remove you from the throne and replace you with a puppet king. The coalition was strong. All your political advisers say you are facing a major disaster. What do you do?
Continue reading Why It’s Good to Tremble Before God