Assurance amidst an Uncertain World
The quintessential American goal is the pursuit of happiness – a difficult and elusive objective, especially amid the current global, national, local and personal turmoil in which we find ourselves, but nonetheless, we continue the quest for bliss and joy, again, as individuals, communities, a country and a world. Now, consider an old saying: “Human life cannot avoid the pattern of birth, aging, sickness, and death.” Does this adage not ring painfully true today? Can we truly be happy while in bondage to such a terrible cycle?
Two Testaments, One Word, One God
This article was originally published in the Fall ’07 issue of Revisions, The Least of These.
The Old Testament is not irrelevant or displaced by the New Testament—the whole Bible reveals God’s truth. more…
Has the Church Replaced Israel?
This article was originally published in the Spring ’08 issue of Revisions, The Pursuit of Happiness.
God’s faithfulness to Israel’s restoration demonstrates his salvation plan for all mankind. more…
Has the Church Replaced Israel?
This article was originally published in the Spring ’08 issue of Revisions, The Pursuit of Happiness.
After the time of the apostolic church, a set of beliefs commonly called replacement theology, or supersessionism, began to develop among Christians regarding the nature of the Church’s relationship to Israel. In an attempt to reconcile Christian teachings with Greek philosophy, Origen of Alexandria (A.D. 185–254) introduced an allegorical interpretation of Scripture—as opposed to a literal, grammatical-historical system—to theologians that led them to regard Old Testament (OT) prophecies and promises to natural Israel as applying to the Church instead.1 Along these lines, in his A.D. c. 410 book The City of God, Augustine of Hippo began to claim a spiritual, rather than literal, manifestation of the biblically prophesied reign of Christ on Earth with the Church inheriting Israel’s promised kingdom,2 thus arguing that God was finished with Israel and had replaced them with the Church.3 Hence replacement theology holds that the Church has, in essence, replaced the physical Israel of the Bible from God’s perspective. As a result, replacement theologians would say, there is no more continued need to look to Israel to appreciate the work of God on Earth—the Christian Church is the “true Israel” and the sole instrument for glorifying God among the nations now. The invalidity of this standpoint is not just established through a straightforward interpretation of Scripture but even by the lessons of secular history as well. Most importantly, an insensitivity or apathy towards the importance of the nation of Israel and the physical descendants of Abraham weakens the impact that the promises of God in His Word should have on all believers, and leads one to overlook the truly monumental, macro-historical unfolding of God’s redemption plan for the world.
- Lindsey, Hal. The Road to Holocaust. New York: Bantam Books; 1990. [↩]
- Torres, Alan. “Replacement Theology”. The Biblicist. http://www.biblicist.org/bible/ replace.shtml. 21 February 2008. [↩]
- Levitt, Zola. The Trouble with Christians, the Trouble with Jews. Zola Levitt Ministries, Inc., Dallas, TX, 1996. [↩]
One Nation Under God
This article was originally published in the Fall ’08 issue of Revisions, Church and State.
Today, discussing religion in public or over the dinner table is awkward for the average American. And within official forums like public schools, federal courts and Congress, religious expression—specifically, the voicing and practice of Christian ideals—is downright taboo. In fact in recent years, even feeble references to Christianity have been fiercely obstructed from entering the public square. Within 40 years, the United States has progressed from the 1962 Supreme Court Engel vs. Vitale ruling against verbal, voluntary prayer in public schools1 to a 1989 Nebraska court ruling in Gierke vs. Blotzer that prohibited a student from even opening his Bible while at school.2 However, at the time of this country’s founding, public religious expression was protected, not obstructed, by the government. Indeed, Christianity greatly influenced the nation’s founding documents and proved to be a guide for subsequent public governance.
Who Is God?
This article was originally published in the Spring ’10 issue of Revisions, Gender and Christianity.
Some are frustrated by how the Bible refers to God in masculine terms, especially in this age of gender egalitarianism, and wonder why God is described as a “he” in the text. We must learn how God formed the natural realm we live in, in order to appreciate how God uses language and relationships we understand to explain Himself to us. Ultimately, questions about the gender of God boil down to the chief and more fundamental question of God’s nature: Who is God? What exactly characterizes the essence of God? This is a far more prolific line of enquiry to be enamored with.