Reflections on the loving kindness of the Triune God
Formal training in theology isn’t always reliable. I’m thinking of the disaffected vision of God, and the rationalistic faith, offered in too many schools. Such settings represent cooling embers of once bright fires. With students who arrive with lively faith and then graduate with chilled hearts. The “fire” is the Bible portrayal of a living …
Read More Experiencing the SpiritA number of scholars have commented on Augustine’s “pessimism.” The label has also been attached to Martin Luther and John Calvin who shared Augustine’s belief in Original Sin. That is, they all affirmed the Bible teaching that humanity died in Adam. So that no one has spiritual life without new birth. Jesus supported this when …
Read More Optimistic or Alive?There it was again. In an academic book—this one on Christian Anthropology—a scholarly writer noted, in passing, Augustine’s “pessimistic view of human nature.” And that was it. In recent years I’ve seen the same dismissive charge against Augustine by a number of otherwise sound scholars who dismiss original sin with a single sentence. Let me …
Read More Augustine’s Pessimism“What do you mean by ‘affective theology?’ I’ve never heard of it before I met you.” It’s a fair question. I first found the label in Heiko Oberman’s The Dawn of the Reformation where he wrote of fourteenth-century Christians whose “suspicion of speculation” led them away from prior theological streams. They preferred “an affective theology …
Read More Affective SpiritualityIn the sixteenth century John Calvin was a gift to the young Protestant Reformation; and he remains helpful today. The broad Bible reach of his Institutes, for instance, is still engaging. Some, I know, will be suspicious. Calvin has a reputation as a cold intellectual fixated on divine sovereignty and predestination. But, certainly to my …
Read More Calvin & the SpiritLuca and Anca spent the day with me visiting the ruins of Pompeii near Naples. Then the next day Luca and I visited the Naples archealogical museum where most of the artifacts of Pompeii’s destruction from the eruption of Mount Vesuvius are on display. I was surprised by my response to the experience. Let me …
Read More PompeiiWelcome to All Saints Eve, 2017—now reduced to the weirdly twisted event of Halloween. Halloween aside, many of us know this day marks the 500th anniversary of Martin Luther posting his Ninety-five Theses in Wittenberg, Germany. I’d love to be in Germany but having missed my chance let me at least offer a reflection in …
Read More Luther in 1517[A technical note: the subscription feed for Spreading Goodness failed and needed to be replaced. In the changeover this post wasn’t sent to most subscribers and needs to be re-sent. But some of you will have seen it already – sorry for any inconvenience!] I’m returning to the ministry of the Spirit in this post—a …
Read More Reflecting on the SpiritJonathan Edwards (1703-58) offered some unique and helpful insights about the Holy Spirit in his “Treatise on Grace.” Right now I’m reading Robert W. Caldwell’s study, Communion in the Spirit: The Holy Spirit as the Bond of Union in the Theology of Jonathan Edwards, where he probes the “Treatise” in his second chapter. As Edwards …
Read More Broken LoveAugustine, the lead pastor of the church in Hippo, North Africa, spent more than a decade writing the City of God—from 413 to 426. It was his response to news that Alaric, commander of the Goths, had sacked Rome in 410. So Christians in the Roman Empire were shaken. Christians throughout the Empire, including the …
Read More The City of God