This is the second part of James Renihan’s essay on the scope of theology. To read part one, click here. The Scope of the Whole We have already cited the common language of the great English Protestant Confessions, Presbyterian, Independent…
I was once struck by a brief radio address given by a Jewish Rabbi on the morning of Yom Kippur. She spent the whole time allotted to her talking about Isaiah 58 and how it links to the deliverance of…
There are many ways to think about God’s attributes. They can be divided between those that affirm something about God and those that deny something about God, those that are communicable to creatures (i.e. can exist in or be communicated…
Theology on Target The Scope of the Whole (Which Is to Give All Glory to God) Part 1 On October 16, 1845, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow wrote these familiar lines in a poem titled “The Arrow and the Song”: I shot…
Is the conversation about God’s attributes “old fashioned” and “western”? Regarding systematic theology, one often encounters the critique that the logical ordering of various topics is “western” or “Greek” or “academic”–all of which are really meant as synonyms for “bad”…
As we remember the Reformation this week, those who stop to think about the anniversary (too few of us, no doubt) will probably either celebrate it as the birthday of the Protestant churches, or lament it as the beginning of…
The whole of the Christian life can be summed up in these two little words (favorites of the Apostle Paul): “in Him.” Our union with Christ is the definitive aspect of our salvation and our status before God and others,…
Recently, my friend Adam Parker wrote a helpful article reminding us that a pastor is not an hourly employee. In his article, Adam describes how the work of pastoral ministry is difficult to quantify and more time in the office…
One of my favorite things is getting together with other pastors and asking them how their ministry is going. Most of the time a pastor will say that things are going great, and then he will share some of the…
In my previous post, I discussed how patience (along with the closely-related virtues of endurance and perseverance) is one of the most valuable Christian virtues in connection to Christian maturity. However, there is another virtue of the Christian life which,…
