Posts

A Calvinist and an Arminian walk into a bar…
Category: General
Tags: Arminianism, Calvinism, God's Love, God's Sovereignty, Open Theism, Roger Olson
Toby Bradbury via Compfight Roger Olson posted A Conversation between a Calvinist and an Arminian about God’s Sovereignty that we thought was dead on. In fact, we kind of wonder if Roger is bugging some of the conversations…

The “Third Way”: Seeing God’s Beauty in the Depth of Scripture’s Violent Portraits of God
Category: Essays
Tags: Crucifixion of the Warrior God, Cruciform Theology, Essay, Non-Violence, Picture of God, Third Way
Topics: Interpreting Violent Pictures and Troubling Behaviors
A publishing house recently sent me an advance copy of a book written by a well known scholar on the topic of the non-violent God revealed in Jesus, asking me to endorse it. (Publishing protocol…

Costly Discipleship
Category: General
Tags: Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Discipleship, Kingdom Living, The American Jesus, Zack Hunt
Bob AuBuchon via Compfight Zack Hunt over at The American Jesus is doing a series of posts called “Blogmatics” in which he fleshes out the theological assumptions that inform his blog posts. A couple of…

We Need The Church
Category: General
Tags: Church, Faithfulness, Rachel Held Evans
Vicki & Chuck Rogers via Compfight Last week we shared a thought-provoking article by Rachel Held Evans on the reasons millennials are leaving the church. This week we want to share a follow-up to that…
Lighten Up: Who Sees the Real You?
Category: General, Lighten Up
Tags: Authenticity, Lighten Up
It’s a good question. Many times, as Christians, we can get stuck hiding who we really are because we think we’re not good enough or some other such nonsense. But the real you is the…

The Lion, the Witch and the War
Category: General
Tags: C.S. Lewis, Chronicles of Narnia, Peace, Peacemaking, Red Letter Christians, War
sandy Poore via Compfight Red Letter Christians featured some of Greg’s thoughts in their recent article entitled The Lion, the Witch and the War. The author of the article talks about the C.S. Lewis story and…

Rachel Held Evans on What Drives Millennials (and Others) Away from Church
Category: General
Tags: Authenticity, Church, Millennials, Rachel Held Evans
David Clow via Compfight Have you been wondering why so many churches are dwindling in numbers? Rachel Held Evans was asked to speak about what drives millennials away from church, but her response has struck…

The Cruciform Beauty of Horrific Divine Portraits
Category: Essays
Tags: Bible, Bible Interpretation, Crucifixion of the Warrior God, Cruciform Theology, Essay, God, Jesus, New Testament, Old Testament
Topics: Interpreting Violent Pictures and Troubling Behaviors
“Only a person who is aware of the crucified Christ can properly understand Scripture.” Luther (Table Talks) In the last three posts I’ve been wrestling with how insights from Matthew Bate’s book, The Hermeneutics of…

Conference: Faith, Doubt & the Idol of Certainty
Category: General
Tags: Benefit of the Doubt, Doubt, Doubt and the Idol of Certainty, Faith, Idolatry
We’re really excited about Greg’s book, Benefit of the Doubt, coming out in September. In fact, we’re SO excited that we want to invite you all to a conference we’re holding September 27-28, 2013 at Woodland Hills…

Lighten Up: Lucky Cat
Category: General, Lighten Up
Tags: Humor, Lighten Up
We saw this over at The American Jesus blog and just had to share.

Sermon: God Needs Prayer
Category: General
Tags: Open Theism, Prayer, Sermons, Warfare Worldview
In this sermon clip, Greg Boyd discusses some of the challenges we face when praying. The full sermon wrestles with questions like: If God is all-powerful, does he need our prayers to change this world?…

The Cross and the Witness of Violent Portraits of God
Category: Essays
Tags: Bible, Bible Interpretation, Cruciform Theology, Essay, Jesus, New Testament, Old Testament
Topics: Interpreting Violent Pictures and Troubling Behaviors
In my previous post I noted that the prevalent contemporary evangelical assumption that the only legitimate meaning of a passage of Scripture is the one the author intended is a rather recent, and very secular,…

The Only Starting Point
Category: General
Tags: Faith, Jesus, Roger Olson
Sree V. Remella via Compfight Our friend Roger Olson wrote a great article on placing Jesus first when constructing a statement of faith. It might seem like a small thing, but it deeply matters what…
Tribalism
Category: General
Tags: Breaking Down Walls, Love, Racism, Sandra Unger, Separation, Sermons, Sexism, Tribalism, Unity
Sandra Unger spoke for Greg while he was on vacation the week after the 4th. In this clip, Sandra explains whats tribes are and how that creates unintended separation between people. In the full sermon, she…

Getting Behind the “Letter” of Violent Portraits of God
Category: Essays
Tags: Bible, Character of God, Cruciform Theology, Essay, Hermeneutics, Jesus, Matthew Bates, New Testament, Non-Violence, Old Testament, Reformed Theology, Scripture, Violence
Topics: Interpreting Violent Pictures and Troubling Behaviors
“I will do to you what I have never done before… in your midst parents will eat their children, and children will eat their parents…” Ezek. 5:9-10 In my previous post I offered a brief review…

Arbitrary Election
Category: General
Tags: Calvinism, John Piper, Micah J Murray, Neo-Reformed Theology, Salvation, Unconditional Election
Micah J. Murray wrote a blog entitled Five Reasons I Reject Unconditional Election, which was a response to John Piper’s recent arguments for embracing unconditional election. If you’re looking for Scripture-based argumentation, you would do well…

Finding Christ Behind the “Letter” That Kills
Category: Essays
Tags: Essay
Topics: Interpreting Violent Pictures and Troubling Behaviors
“The letter kills, but the Spirit gives life” Paul (2 Cor. 3:6) The Odd Way NT Authors Use the OT Have you ever noticed the rather strange way authors in the NT tend to use…
From the Heart: Transformation
Category: General
Tags: From the Heart, Testimonies, Transformation, Woodland Hills Church
We absolutely love getting letters of testimony. If you have been impacted by this ministry in a significant way, please consider sharing your story with us. Here’s one we received this week that rocked our…