Word of Courage or Word of Despair?; Joshua 2

Prayer: God, you have given us a history. I pray for wisdom to comprehend it and humility to understand it, so that what was written for our benefit might strengthen us and glorify the risen Christ. To Your name be all things, Lord. Amen. In theatre and story writing there is a well known rule …

Mind Under Matter (Part Three): Christology and Conclusion

The implications of objective idealism for Christian theism are numerous, but I will limit myself to engaging the issue of Christology. This proposal adopts four main guiding principles. First, following the Council of Chalcedon, Christ possessed two natures yet was one person (hypostasis). This conviction is crucial in order to affirm that Christ lived a …

A Reflection on Depression: Structure, Dissociation, and Community

As I write this, it is raining at the beach. I'm sure there is some idiom about such a thing which currently escapes me, but it's a sentiment which seems appropriate. Every year my family plans for our vacation the year prior (oftentimes right after the vacation we were just on). The bright side is …

Mind Under Matter (Part Two): The Mind-Body Problem

The mind-body problem is simply the question of how the mind relates to the body. How does a supposedly immaterial thing, mind, relate to a physical entity, the body? Solutions to this problem have ranged from physicalism which maintains that what a person experiences as her mind is reducible to brain activity, a physical phenomenon, …

Mind Under Matter (Part One): Introduction and Quantum Mechanics

Abstract How does the mind relate to the body, and how did the divine Logos become incarnate as the man, Jesus of Nazareth? The aim of this paper is to illustrate how quantum mechanics implies what has been called objective idealism and so provides insight into the philosophical mind-body problem and the theological Christology debate. …

Age of Despair or Age of Testimony?; Psalm 71

I remember my grandfather before he passed away always being a pretty big guy. During the 50’s, when he was younger, he served in the Navy, so he was fairly muscular and strong. Further, he stood about half a foot taller than most people, so if you ever saw a photo of him from around …

On the Church

Defining the church was a pertinent question for the Reformers and the Roman Catholic Church (RCC) and remains a difficult issue to navigate today. Any cogent account of the church needs biblical justification as the Bible records its origins and what Christ and the apostles thought of it. Therefore, based on the biblical data, the …

Shame, Sin, and Death: Communicating the Doctrine of Hell in an Honor and Shame Culture

How ought missionaries communicate or theologize concerning the doctrine of hell in an honor-shame culture? This question has become increasingly relevant as the locus of Christianity has moved away from Western countries in Europe and North America and towards the global South and Far East where some of the largest Christian populations exist in nations …

The Nature of Justification

The doctrine of justification serves as the fundamental issue dividing Christian traditions, particularly Protestantism and Catholicism. What rests on this question is not only the Christian’s current status before God but also the implications for how the Christian ought to live and why. While this doctrine encompasses a broad range of questions, the three main …

Scripture as Narrative

Scripture’s significance within the first couple hundred years of the early church was predicated on the claims about itself and the patristic deductions from these claims. Starting with the Hebrew Bible, the early church fathers argued for Jesus Christ’s fulfillment of these scriptures. They utilized Old Testament prophecy coupled with the direction of the Scriptures …