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Response Post: Kim Riddlebarger Against the Eschatological Optimism/Pessimism Paradigm
I was born-again in the Jesus Revolution era of the late 1970s and it seemed dispensational premillennialism was what every Christian believed about “end times.” I had no reason to question it, so I waited expectantly for the rapture to happen at any time. In due...
Response Post: Mike Horton and Culturally Irrelevant Christianity
In my last post I responded to Carl Truman and what I called two kingdom Pietists. These thinkers are every bit as dualistic as Gnostic Pietists, but with an intellectual bent. Mike Horton is another unfortunate example of this mentality and worldview. Horton is a...
Response Post: Carl Truman and Two Kingdom Pietists
Sometimes I read something and I just can’t let it go. I have to tell somebody about it and share my reaction. Much of the time it’s my poor long suffering wife, and since I got active on Twitter early last year, that allows me an outlet, but you have to be pithy...
Articles on Theology
The Real First Christmas
No, it wasn't Bethlehem and Mary and Joseph, baby Jesus and a manger, shepherds keeping watch by night, a choir of angels, a bright star or wise men from the east. Actually, that first Christmas was the fulfillment of something that came way before that, and if you...
More Thoughts on Mars Hill: There is Something New Under the Sun, the Church!
In my previous post on the dysfunction that was much of Mars Hill church, I focused on The Church being full of sinners, saved sinners, but sinners nonetheless. So to be surprised when "stuff" happens, and sinners act like sinners, is silly. Even a cursory look...
The Rise and Fall of Mars Hill: Nothing New Under the Sun
Mars Hill was a phenomenon in the first decade or so of the century. The church grew, sprouted many campuses, and had an impact far and wide, driven by the intense and entertaining preacher who led it.
Articles on Explanatory Power
Apollo 8 and Our Privileged Planet
When I was eight years old the Apollo 8 astronauts took the first ever trip around the moon. The trip was launched on December 21, 1968, and became the first manned spacecraft to leave low Earth orbit, reach the Moon, orbit it, and return. Even as an eight-year-old I...
Darwin Ain’t So Great After All
If you have ever had any kind of interaction with an atheist/materialist/skeptic, etc., one of the things they hang their hat on is that evolution is a "fact." Darwin was a genius, and only a benighted, troglodyte, imbecile would argue with the scientific "consensus."...
Why Is Homosexuality Unnatural in Addition to Sin?
Given this is ostensibly a blog about parenting, and that I soon have a book about parenting to be published, and we live in the 21st century, I can't escape commenting on homosexuality. As you know it is ubiquitous in our culture, and if you have children you won't...
Articles on Culture
There is Nothing as Seductively Secular as Frank
If you have to ask what Frank, stop reading right now. Anyone who lived in the 20th century, and raised their kids well in the 21st, should know that could only be the incomparable Sinatra, the Chairman of the Board. The other night my wife told some little intimate...
A Charlie Brown Christmas: Now More Than Ever!
As is our family Christmas tradition, we watched yet again the wonderful Charlie Brown Christmas special that first aired in 1965, when I was all of five years old.
The Triumph of the Therapeutic: It’s All About Me!
I'm not sure the title of a book can better capture our age than Philip Reiff's 1966 classic The Triumph of the Therapeutic, especially in the tumultuous 2020. The book is Reiff's take on Sigmund Freud, who he thought a genius, and the response of other psychoanalysts...
Articles on Apologetics
Korn’s Brian Welch Responds to his Critics-It Takes Revelation and Evidence
I wrote recently about a documentary of Korn guitarist Brian Welch's conversion to Christianity. He had a serious issue with drug addiction, even after his conversion, and some people are accusing him of replacing his addiction to drugs with an addiction to religion....
The Bible is an Historical Book, Not a Religious One!
I can't tell you how many moronic, absolutist, immature, know-it-all atheists I've come across in online comments sections who declare with absolute certitude that the Bible is all myths and fairy tales, full of metaphorical unicorns and other such unbelievable...
Josephus and the Historical Credibility of the Bible
Not many Christians are familiar with first century Jewish historian Josephus, which is unfortunate. The life, death, and resurrection of Jesus (the latter rejected purely out of anti-supernatural bias) are the most well-attested facts in all of ancient history. But...
Articles on Parenting and Family
A Christian Case for the Necessity of Classical Education – Take 2: My Epiphany
In my previous post, Take 1, I didn't relate that I was late getting on the classical education bandwagon. I've always been a fan of the liberal arts, the humanities and such, but the term "classical education" meant little to me even into my 50th year. I was so...
A Christian Case for the Necessity of Classical Education – Take 1: Progressive Education
That's actually another book in my brain, and one I think needs to be written (and there are plenty already out there, but I may have something unique to add to the conversation; we'll see . . .), but right now a blog post, or two, is the best I can do. I was inspired...
Christians: Have more kids!!!
When I saw the announcement of our latest Supreme Court Justice nominee, Brett Kavanaugh, I couldn't help notice that this practicing Catholic family had only two kids, daughters. As precious and cute as they were, I wondered why only two. Not too many years past,...