What’s to be done when the most influential person of all time is silent about arguably the most contentious issue of our own time? Not only do the world’s 2.3 billion professing Christians look to the figure of Jesus of Nazareth as their moral compass, but countless more also respect his teachings and grapple with […]

Read More Why was Jesus silent about homosexuality?

Let me cut to the chase:  I’ve now become convinced that a good portion of American evangelicals should no longer oppose homosexuality. That is, most evangelicals, if they are to be consistent, should have the same ethical expectations of homosexual relationships that they usually do of heterosexual relationships. Two things have led me to this conviction:  first, […]

Read More Why (most) American evangelicals should now support homosexuality

It’s not often that a professor can make a roomful of undergrads explode in laughter–and at the same time engage them in some serious soul-searching. Addressing a crowd of Harvard undergrads, Stanford Business Professor Charles Lee spoke about what every Harvard grad wants:  success. At one point he keenly observed:

Read More What were you made for?

Have you ever wondered:  if there is a god, what makes him laugh? For many skeptics, one of the biggest challenges to believing in a god is the existence of profound evil in the world–no laughing matter. If there is a god, then, perhaps he shouldn’t be laughing. But the God whom Jesus claimed to be […]

Read More Injustice and God’s (very) dark sense of humor

Last November on the night of the U.S. presidential election, around 10pm I decided to check out the voting results for the first time that day. For a variety of reasons I hadn’t followed the campaign much at all.  But from the little I’d heard (or couldn’t help but overhearing), Clinton was expected to win. […]

Read More How are Christians to think about national news?

I am regularly amazed at the ability of my 2 1/2 year-old daughter to communicate. Don’t get me wrong:  not all her attempts to communicate succeed.  At the dinner table, she may (with no little passion) share a thought that none of the other five of us can decipher. But even when her words remain an enigma, […]

Read More Suffering, grief and the existence of God

Defeat.  Loneliness.  Regret.  Failure.  Anxiety.  Confusion.  Shame.  Conflict.  Despair. Insignificance.  Loss. Who does not regularly experience at least some of these hardships? When experiencing them, where, then, does one go to be encouraged–to find true solace and comfort? (No mere amusement or anesthetic, but true encouragement.) Here’s where the Christian goes.

Read More Encouragement for the failing, frail and fearful

In the last book of the Bible, called Revelation, in the fifth chapter, John takes a selfie. As the title Revelation implies, the book claims to describe what was revealed by/about Jesus to John, “who testifies to everything he saw” (1.2).  Accordingly, John uses the phrase “(Then) I saw” (or “I looked”) well over forty times, while inviting his reader to “Behold!” (or “Look!”) around […]

Read More Good Friday we know, but Holy Saturday–what’s that?

It should come as no surprise that some of the best teachers I know are women. In fact, in terms of pure communication ability, I’ve wondered on more than a few occasions if women (on average) surpass men. Of the churches I know, most all of them have women doing some sort of teaching–e.g., teaching children (in Sunday school […]

Read More Can a woman teach in church?

More than 175 years ago the French aristocrat Alexis de Tocqueville published his two-volume work Democracy in America.  Based on his nine-month visit to the States in 1831, it offers lively and incredibly penetrating reflections on political theory and the American cultural landscape. Still highly regarded today, Democracy in America continues to astonish modern readers by its […]

Read More Inequality: a key to flourishing Christian community