Cruciform Theology
When God Endorsed Polygamy
Category: General
Tags: Bible, Cruciform Theology, God
Topics: Interpreting Violent Pictures and Troubling Behaviors
We often find God acting as if he supports things we know, by other means, that he does not. For example, though his ideal was monogamy, it’s clear in the biblical narrative that, once God…
How to Interpret the Law of the Old Testament
Category: General
Tags: Cruciform Theology, God, Jesus, Law, Old Testament
Topics: Attributes and Character, Biblical Interpretation
While there are multitudes of passages in the OT that reflect an awareness that people are too sinful to be rightly related to God on the basis of the law, there is a strand that…
The Starting Point for “Knowing God”
Category: General
Tags: Cruciform Theology, God, Jesus, Luther, Transcendence
While it makes sense that Hellenistic philosophers embraced knowledge of God as the simple, necessary and immutable One in an attempt to explain the ever-changing, composite, contingent world (see post here for what this means),…
Crucifying Transcendence
Category: General
Tags: Church Fathers, Cross, Cruciform Theology, God, Jesus, Philosophy, Platonism, Transcendence
Topics: Attributes and Character
The classical view of God’s transcendence in theology is in large borrowed from a major strand within Hellenistic philosophy. In sharp contrast to ancient Israelites, whose conception of God was entirely based on their experience…
The Greatest Mystery of the Christian Faith
Category: General
Tags: Cross, Cruciform Theology, Incarnation, Love, Self-Sacrificial Love, Trinity
God has always been willing to stoop to accommodate the fallen state of his covenant people in order to remain in a transforming relationship with them and in order to continue to further his sovereign…
The Rule of Love
Category: General
Tags: Augustine, Cross, Cruciform Theology, Jesus, Love, Rule of Love
The traditional confession that Scriptura sacra sui ipsius interpres (“Sacred Scripture is its own interpreter”) presupposes that there is one divine mind behind Scripture, for example. Moreover, Church scholars have traditionally assumed that Scripture’s unity can be…
Should Innovative Theology Be Rejected?
Category: General
Tags: Approaches to Theology, Bible Interpretation, Cruciform Theology
Topics: Biblical Interpretation
In some conservative Christian circles innovation is suspect, if not sin. And as a result, theologians and pastors who take this stance often criticize what I propose in my writings simply because it’s innovative. However,…
Is the Bible History?
Category: General
Tags: Bible, Bible Interpretation, Cruciform Theology, Historical Criticism
Topics: Biblical Interpretation
Even though I argued for interpreting the final form of the biblical canon as opposed to using the history behind the text in my post yesterday, I am not endorsing the radical post-modern view that biblical texts…
The Bible is Infallible NOT Inerrant
Category: General
Tags: Bible, Bible Interpretation, Covenant, Cruciform Theology, Faith, Inerrancy, Infallibility
Topics: Biblical Interpretation
While the cruciform understanding (explained here) of the “God-breathed” nature of Scripture is in tension with the way most talk about inerrancy (See previous post on inerrancy), I do not believe it is at all incompatible with what…
The Key to Understanding the Bible
Category: General
Tags: Bible, Bible Interpretation, Cross, Cruciform Theology, Jesus
In yesterday’s post we discussed how Jesus is the starting point for interpreting Scripture. If this is the case and Jesus is the subject matter of all Scripture, then the ultimate challenge is to disclose how each aspect of…
An Alternative to Biblical Inerrancy
Category: General
Tags: Bible, Bible Interpretation, Cruciform Theology, Inerrancy
Topics: Biblical Interpretation
As with all other theological issues, when it comes to affirming that Scripture is “God-breathed,” everything hangs on where one starts. A dominant strand of the Evangelical tradition started with the assumption that, if God is…
Rethinking the Resurrection
Category: General
Tags: Cross, Cruciform Theology, Jesus, Resurrection, Revelation
Topics: Christology
As much as every other aspect of Jesus life and ministry, I submit that the resurrection must be understood in light of the cross. This event was not anything like the resuscitation of a random…
The Old Testament Is NOT on the Same Plane as the New Testament
Category: General
Tags: Bible, Cruciform Theology, Jesus, New Testament, Old Testament
Topics: Biblical Interpretation
Paul taught that unbelievers are blinded by “the god of this age” when they read the OT such that “their minds are made dull” and a “veil covers their hearts…when the old covenant is read”…
Does the Old Testament Justify “Just War”?
Category: Q&A
Tags: Augustine, Cruciform Theology, Just War, Kingdom Living, Non-Violence, Old Testament, OT Violence, Violence
Topics: Enemy-Loving Non-Violence
Since the time of Augustine, Christians have consistently appealed to the violent strand of the Old Testament to justify waging wars when they believed their cause was “just.” (This is Augustine’s famous “just war” theory.)…
What To Do With the Violent God of the Old Testament
Category: General
Tags: Bible, Crucifixion of the Warrior God, Cruciform Theology, Jesus, OT Violence
Topics: Interpreting Violent Pictures and Troubling Behaviors
For eight years Greg has been researching for and writing the book entitled The Crucifixion of the Warrior God. In it he confronts the commonly held idea that the Old Testament depictions of God behaving violently should be…
Rethinking Transcendence
Category: General
Tags: Classical Theism, Cruciform Theology, Philosophy, Transcendence
Topics: Interpreting Violent Pictures and Troubling Behaviors
Going back to pre-Socratic philosophers and running through the major strands of the church’s theological tradition, the conception of how God (or, in ancient Greece, “the One”) was arrived at primarily by negating the contingent…
The Ultimate Criteria for Theology
Category: General
Tags: Cruciform Theology, God's Character, God's Love, Theology
Topics: Theological Method
Theology is thinking (logos) about God (theos). It is a good and necessary discipline, but only so long as it is centered on Christ. All of our speculation and debate about such things as God’s…
The Call to a Cruciform Life
Category: General
Tags: Cruciform Theology, Enemy Love, Kingdom Living
Topics: Following Jesus
Jesus repeatedly taught that following him meant that one had to be willing to “pick up their cross daily and follow [him]” (Lk 9:23; 14:27). Picking up our cross is the centerpiece of following Jesus…
Love and Violence
Category: General
Tags: Augustine, Cruciform Theology, God is Love, Violence
What does it mean to confess that “God is love” and that we are called to “live in love” (Eph. 5:2)? One of the more common ways of understanding God’s love has its roots in…
A Dialogue with Derek Flood Part 2: Is ALL of the Bible Inspired?
Category: General
Tags: Bible, Biblical Authority, Book Reviews, Cruciform Theology, Derek Flood, Disarming Scripture, Inspiration, Jesus
Topics: Interpreting Violent Pictures and Troubling Behaviors
Image by TheRevSteve via Flickr Yesterday, I offered the first part of my response to Flood’s comments regarding my review of his book. Today I’ll finish up my thoughts. Scripture and Its Interpretation Flood confesses that he is…