From time to time, people get a little bit twitchy about different things that are seen as end time signs. In particularly, the so called “Mark of the Beast” has caused much eschatological angst over the years as people have tried to work out what it is. Different things have been suggested from bar codes… Continue reading Digital ID and the mark of the beast
Category: Theology
The Big Story
The Big Story course is now available on YouTube. This programme introduces you to the plotline of Scripture and how God’s plan of salvation unfolds. It will also help you to get a feel for narrative preaching and see how big themes help you to unpack specific Bible passages. The Big Story offers a foundational… Continue reading The Big Story
Home in flesh
Veiled in flesh the Godhead see, hail the incarnate deity.” Very God, begotten not created. One of the things that people have consistently had trouble with through the ages has been the identity of Jesus. This goes right back to the early church when the Gospel message about him kept encountering pagan beliefs about the… Continue reading Home in flesh
Christian nationalism: learning from castles and COVID
One of the reasons that we’ve been slow to respond to Christian Nationalism is the belief that it is not one single thing and therefore impossible to define. So, for example, Kevin DeYoung in his article “Six Questions for Christian Nationalists” says: “no one agrees what a Christian Nationalist is”[1] whilst Andrew Wilson recently wrote,… Continue reading Christian nationalism: learning from castles and COVID
Christian Nationalism and prophecy
One of the things I’ve observed is that some of the key people and churches in the Christian Nationalist Movement tend to lean heavily on prophetic words and this feeds into the approach to preaching. Here is an example from Chrisopher Wickland. In fact, this was the first part on the subject I’ve just looked… Continue reading Christian Nationalism and prophecy
A sixth Sola?
Yesterday I wrote about the “five solas” of the Reformation. These are things we rely on for specific aspects of our faith and were coined to describe specific challenges the Reformation identified. Because of this I think that it should be possible to identify other “solas”, so long as we don’t try to get those… Continue reading A sixth Sola?
These things alone
I recently wrote about “sola Scriptura” or “faith alone”. The point is that Christians don’t only have Scripture on its own in isolation. They do have things like experience, their ability to reason things out and prophecy. The point is that Scripture alone and uniquely is our sole authority for knowing and serving God. So,… Continue reading These things alone
What about marriage and eternity?
When Jesus responds to the Sadducees conundrum and the Levirate marriage, he insists that in “the age to come”, there is no more giving and receiving in marriage (Luke 20:27-40). This may leave us with a few pastoral questions and implications. First of all, there was the immediate pastoral implication for people in that context. … Continue reading What about marriage and eternity?
What kind of story?
This video is part of my “Big Story” series. I hope you get to watch all of the series but I thought I’d share this specific one which helps us think about the type of story that the Bible tells. Is it comedy or is it tragedy?
Disciple the nations … is Christian Nationalism Biblical?
through them, that this is what he did before Christ came and that this did not change afterwards. This turns on one little but famous phrase. In Matthew 28:19, Jesus tells his disciples to, according to the translations we are all familiar with “Go and make disciples from all the nations.” However, a more wooden… Continue reading Disciple the nations … is Christian Nationalism Biblical?
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