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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
What Has Brandon to do with Christianity?
I try not to get into politics here, but it’s hard to avoided in the current political and cultural climate, so sometimes in must be addressed, thus Brandon and Christianity.
Revelation, Our Awesome God, and the Desperate Faith of Secularism
At my other blog I've been writing through the Bible the last seven plus years, from Genesis to Revelation (that might sound familiar to you hard core Genesis fans), and have made it to Revelation 4. I thought I'd share here a version of a post I did there about my...
Mercy Me and a Gospel Concert
Last week my son and I went to see the Christian band Mercy Me. Even though I'm not really a fan of the band, nor do I listen to Christian contemporary music (I don't listen to much of any kind of music anymore), it was an enjoyable concert. It was held at the arena...
Articles on Explanatory Power
It’s So Hard to Believe, But It Is So Hard Not to Believe
This phrase came to mind the other day as our family got word that my wife's beloved stepmother, Dora Walston Haggard, had died unexpectedly. She had been going through some health challenges, but none that appeared remotely life-threatening. All of a sudden when...
No, Death is Not Natural
Death is an underrated tool in the apologists's toolbox. Put another way, we can use death more often and more effectively to defend the veracity of the Christian faith. Christians are usually put on the defensive when the subject of death (and suffering) comes up...
Telos: The Secularists’ Worst Nightmare
Back in 1968 as the sexual revolution was raging, Pope Paul VI wrote a profoundly counter-cultural encyclical called Humanae Vitae. One of the things that made it so profound (and something completely missed by the Evangelical leaders of the day) was its appeal to...
Articles on Culture
RIP Eddie Van Halen – Memento Mori
Eddie Van Halen was my sworn enemy when I was a teenager aspiring to be a guitar god. I'm a bit competitive by nature. I'll never forget a trip I took to the local Guitar Center on Hacienda Boulevard (SoCal) when I was 16 or 17. For some reason driving there I was...
The Good Place: How Culture Helps Strengthen Your Children’s Faith
It's become a cliche that we live in a "post-Christian" culture. This is shown in obvious hostility to Christians and their faith, but more perniciously when Christianity and God are ignored as if they are completely irrelevant to existence. The latter provides the...
Why Supporting President Trump is a Moral Imperative
I rarely get political here because my passion is to defend the veracity of the Christian faith, as I have to my children all their lives, and to rest of my brothers and sisters in Christ. But I feel I must in this case get political because I'm weary of left-wing,...
Articles on Apologetics
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...
“Science Uprising”: New video series unmasks materialism for what it is: Wrong!
Too many Christians allow low-simmering doubt into their minds because the dominant Western secular cultural narrative assumes materialism at every point, that is that the material, matter, is all that exists. And, if materialism is true, Christianity is not. In the...
Where Did The Idea of a Personal, Creator God Come From?
Being a person of extreme apologetic bent, I'm always looking to validate Christian truth claims. Apologetics is critical in a Western culture drenched in secularism, where most people fit into one of the Triple A categories: Atheist, Agnostic, or Apathetic. For them...
Articles on Parenting and Family
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,...
Americans Read an Average of 16.8 Minutes Per Day; Spend 166.2 Minutes Watching TV
One of my apologetic strategies for my children has been to annoy them, and if you ask them they will tell you I'm really good at it. Of course since the annoying has a purpose, they are willing to endure the annoyance of it all, most of the time. One thing I'm really...