May 2015

So What IS God Like?

2 Comments / God, Theological Reflection, Uncategorized / By /

Somebody made a quirky comment about God and Jesus the other day; it got me thinking. It went something like this: “I’m a Jesus person; the God of the Old Testament needs rehabilitation, and Jesus did that.” Aside from who/what you think might be “the God of the Old Testament,” can you see what is wrong with this statement? The comment basically states that Jesus is not the same God as YHWH of old! It also suggests that the speaker might not be truly Trinitarian. But let’s take a look at one statement of the character of God found in […]

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How Can We Know the Nature and Character of God?

Leave a Comment / God, PCUSA, Scripture, Theological Reflection / By /

I have heard it said, even in PCUSA General Assembly committee meetings, that God is unknowable. “God is so vast and so big that we cannot possible know or understand what God wants to do.” This is a bogus claim in the guise of humility. As I have written before, God wants to be known and has gone to great lengths to make himself known to his creation (cf. Deuteronomy 4:5–8, 32–36). Not only can we know about God—his nature and character—we can actually know God (more on that in a later post). Our investigation into God’s background is not

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The God of Self Must Stand Down

6 Comments / Current Events, God, It All Started in the Garden, Moral Authority, PCUSA, The Property Clause, Theological Reflection / By /

The human lust for power is a natural outflow of Adam and Eve’s resistance to God’s authority. When a person, a group, or a nation believes itself to be any equivalent of “the center of the universe,” bad things begin to happen. Adam and Eve’s choice may seem innocent enough to modern eyes, but within a generation, murder had entered human experience. The desire of one to dominate another comes out of the irreconcilable demands of two adjacent egos vying for the center of the universe. If a culture adopts the philosophy that all people are free to do whatever

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Allegiance to the Wrong God

2 Comments / God, It All Started in the Garden, Theological Reflection / By /

Mark Labberton, president of Fuller Seminary, recounts the story that took place when he was pastor at First Presbyterian Church of Berkeley (California). A very brief report of the story appears in his book The Dangerous Act of Worship (p. 64), but he shared an expanded version in a talk a few years ago: A gentleman came to him a bit confused and befuddled, because his wife had just become a Christian. His purpose for the visit was to get the Cliff Notes rendition of the faith—“just bullet points, please”—so he could hold his own in the nightly conversation he

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The Gods We Worship

1 Comment / Current Events, God, Theological Reflection, Turkey / By /

My second prod to think and write about belief in God comes from my experience in Turkey and Greece, where “gods” were everywhere—or at least remnants of worship spaces, icon niches, and other ancient signs of pantheism and Greek/Roman mythology. Walking up the hill through the ruins of Delphi (Greece), we encountered the monument to Argos, the sanctuary of Gaia, and the great temple to Apollo. In Ephesus (Turkey), strolling down the main road made of marble, we saw what is left of the Temple of Artemis (one of the seven Great Wonders of the Ancient World, but represented now

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God Is the Central Issue

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[Sorry for the delay . . . “Life” has been happening, and my days have been zooming! Yesterday it was getting a water leak fixed.] The topic of God is popping up here and there, not only in my personal life but in our culture. My thoughts are sparked this week by the latest Pew Survey, which took the pulse of American religious practice, denominational affiliation, and basic beliefs. You can read the results of the survey here and here. The attention-getters in this survey are the changes in the religious landscape since this survey was done previously in 2007. In

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Why Blogging Is So Challenging

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Blogging presents some challenges, some of which are confronting me these days. So I thought it might be helpful to sketch those out a bit as a way of setting the context for what is to come. Blogging for many writers replaces personal journaling, particularly for those who choose to write every day. Successful blogs can be very targeted, for example, on family food experiences or grief processing. My theme, Bringing the Word to Life, simply calls me to reflect on what is happening (either in my own life or in current events) in light of Scripture. I have gone

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What Helps When I Feel Overwhelmed?

1 Comment / Personal, Spiritual Disciplines, Turkey / By /

Technically speaking, I am unemployed. All that means is that the work I do is self-directed and without remuneration. Working at home, alone, usually means work without encouragement or even accountability. My admiration for the world’s great writers grows by the day, as I appreciate more fully the inner perseverance needed for literary productivity. My big issue now is that there are too many other things to do besides writing, each requiring intense concentration until finished—the kind that pushes all other priorities to the margins. Memorizing a lot of music really fast. My husband and I are participating in a

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