Home » Archive by category Theology (Page 2)

Saul Loses the Girl and Gains a Doomed Throne

In recent posts, I’ve been considering biblical variations on the type-scene, “Foreigner at the Well.”[1] Perhaps you are tired of reading about it… you have been reading about it haven’t you?  I’m sorry; is my insecurity showing? Let’s try this again with a little more confidence. Thou shalt...
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I’ll Have One “Foreigner at the Well” with a Twist

In my recent post, “Wells: The Singles’ Bars of the Ancient Near East,”—I just call ‘em like I see ‘em Folks! Don’t judge me—I discussed the beauty of the ancient type-scene, “Foreigner at the Well.” We discussed how every culture has popular literary scenarios drawn from elements of...
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Wells: The Singles’ Bars of the Ancient Near East

One of my great-uncles, a true good-ol’boy from west Texas, once said to my great-grandmother, “Mamma, it’s hard to find a good woman like you out there.” She replied, “There are plenty of good women like me out there. They  just don’t hang out in the places you...
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There is no Jehovah

Being that few of my friends and neighbors have names that really mean something to us, (Other than Marsha Mello, Amanda Lynne, and Justin Case Yelle). I am intrigued about the psychological impact of living in a culture that makes you feel like you stumbled into a mafia...
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Safari Guide, Treasure Hunter, Biblical Theologian

As a good Evangelical… just a second, I have to adjust my halo… Okay, it’s got that 20s-gangster-hat tilt I like so much… So, as a good Evangelical who has studied at no less than seven Christian institutions, I was trained to preach according to an exegetical model....
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The Worst Interpretive Rule I Ever Learned

If there is one thing I can say about the church I was raised in, indeed I can say many things about it, but this blog is rated PG-13, I suppose, so, I can’t repeat most of them in present company, it is that they had some of...
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Dying for a Vision?

I’m not sure which is worse, the constant misuse of Proverbs 29:18a (KJV) or how many times I find myself saying, “That’s not a good translation,” whenever I try to explain the whole proverb. Now, I have to say, “the whole proverb,” because I’ve never heard anyone actually...
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A Prophet in Nain: Luke’s Portrait of Jesus in 7:11-16

In my previous post “The Inanity of Nain,” I introduced the importance of the physical association of Jesus’ raising of the widow’s son with Elisha’s wondrous raising of the Shunammite’s. (2 Kings 4:36-37)  Nain and Shunem, not two full miles apart, share the western edge of the hill...
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I Have No Political Finesse

Categories, they are like crack for the left brained; they can’t get enough of them, can’t build barriers between them that are high enough, or thick enough. If the government made categories illegal, the left-brained would pawn their grandmother’s TV sets to purchase a few high quality categories...
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Phenomenal Biblical Theology

When I talk about Biblical Theology I usually intend an approach to Scripture that envelopes many things. Like ordering a car and understanding that it will come with a lot of parts already put together… hopefully. Some of my friends prefer kits. Biblical Theology’s  subject is specific. It’s...
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Why the Word “God” Makes me Uncomfortable

One of the problems with being a biblical theologian is the discomfort I suffer whenever someone’s question crosses lines between biblical and “Christian” categories. We have our way of talking. Biblical authors had their ways of talking. A simple question like, “Were the Hebrew prophets monotheists or henotheists?”[1]...
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4 Things You May not Know about Holiness

Words for Holiness in Greek, Hebrew & Aramaic appear over 1000x in Scripture. Issues of holiness were important to those in the biblical era. Almost every aspect of life was impacted by shared and contended ideas of The Holy. Yet, nowhere in Scripture is holiness clearly explained; it...
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What I Mean by Biblical Theology

How hard could it possibly be to find agreement on the meaning of a phrase as simple as biblical theology? In truth… harder than I’d like. Biblical theology is not, after all, merely theological ideas that are “biblical,” and the history of the phrase biblical theology is, unfortunately,...
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Our Pagan Souls

Read my blog long enough and you will find that I frequently bring up the frustration I feel as a right brained individual being often under the biblical studies thumb of the left brained. I read brilliant analyses of biblical era language issues by people whose final categories...
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A Tribute to the Musical Story Teller

One of the great things about learning Hebrew is the ability to share in the feel of the stories beyond raw content. Good writing uses language as more than just a mechanism for passing data; it communicates with a measure of art, and, at times, music, working rhyme,[1]...
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The Power of Women in the Ancient World

I am not insensible to the rage many women feel over the modern misconception that the plight of women in the world is almost solely the result of a grand conspiracy by men to hold women down. Abuse of power, wherever it is found, against whomever it is...
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The Engendering of Gender Generalities

Doing biblical theology requires one to lay aside even precious biases in order to hear the message of Scripture speaking from foreign lands in foreign tongues out of foreign cultures. The Phenomenological method, so vital to biblical theology, demands that we listen to each text as believers wholly...
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