Have you been told that the "sin" literally means "missing the mark" in the original Greek? In fact, it does not. The verb "hamartano" (αμαρτανω) was sometimes used in pre-Classical and Classical Greek to refer to missing a target. Homer uses it in the Iliad to speak of a man who failed to hit his... Continue Reading →
New Link
My friend Bill Isley just launched a theology blog. I hope you'll visit it at http://www.billisley.com/
How did they train disciples in the Early Church?
Paul didn’t just pass out workbooks and tell his disciples to fill in the blanks for next Sunday. He didn't go on TV and tell millions of people how to live, then pack up and go home. No, he was a day-to-day living model of how a Christian should live: “you became imitators of us and... Continue Reading →
Is the devil out to get you?
A friend from Costa Rica writes in: I seem to be everywhere running into people who are debating different aspects of spiritual warfare. I have a friend whom I respect very much; nevertheless he sees Satan even in different foods or in commercial products. It's as if there is a spirit everywhere. If anybody doubts,... Continue Reading →
Bible Commentaries and Dictionaries, a word of advice from Logos and myself
Kyle Anderson from Logos software just published a fine article on how to use Bible dictionaries. He warns against simply reaching for a commentary when we are studying the Bible. I heartily applaud this basic sentiment. As Christians, we are supposed to be enjoying the Bible, not reading the tale of how some other person... Continue Reading →
Will God Heal Us? A Re-Examination of Jas. 5:14-16
By Gary Shogren, Seminario ESEPA, San José, Costa Rica Originally published in Evangelical Quarterly 61 (1989): 99-108; bibliography and some ancient references updated in 2008. “Are any among you ill? Let them summon the presbyters of the Church and let them pray over them after anointing them in the name of the Lord with olive... Continue Reading →
Let’s put a warning label on false prophets
Link - How to calculate when Jesus will come - without even being a prophet! My wish is simple, and it would make me so very happy. I'm going to campaign for it until the proper authorities take notice and step in. (1) I want us to identify all preachers who have mistakenly announced that it... Continue Reading →
Did they discover a giant skeleton in Greece (or Egypt or Saudi Arabia or Wisconsin?). Well, no…
Don't believe everything you read. When it comes to spams, the rule of thumb is, reject it unless you have credible proof (a second spam is not credible proof). To put in another way, an e-mail that has obviously been circulating for a while with the header THIS IS REALLY COOL is probably not the... Continue Reading →
Should a Christian be politically correct?
Jerry Falwell was fond of describing his Liberty University as “conservative as Harvard is liberal.” In other words, if Harvard University is on the far left, then the appropriate Christian response is to run in an equal and opposite direction. It is Newton’s Third Law of Motion as applied to a Christian political and social... Continue Reading →
The First Amendment, beta version
By Gary Shogren, Seminario ESEPA, San José, Costa Rica Newt Gingrich is on record as saying: There should be no mosque near Ground Zero in New York so long as there are no churches or synagogues in Saudi Arabia. The time for double standards that allow Islamists to behave aggressively toward us while they demand... Continue Reading →