“Morpho-syntactical exegesis”: it all sounds so mysterious! It is not.

In fact, I would go so far as to argue that there is no such thing as morpho-syntactical exegesis as such.

Morpho-syntactical analysis, on the other hand, is a thing.

Such analysis involves the identification and...

If I remember 8th-grade math correctly, and if I am hearing some of my fellow evangelicals clearly, either they or I have transgressed a basic principle of math. I’m pretty sure they are the ones who goofed about a basic issue, our worldview.

What I mean is that, as a people, we are a priori co...

We live in an age when every few years, someone steps up to announce a fatal comet or rogue planet or asteroid. GILL BROUSSARD (like Carlos Ferrada in Spanish a while ago, and others) is one of a long line of dreamers like Immanuel Velikovsky in 1950. And everyone says the same thing, that No, no,...

I almost never publish links to other articles, but this one is unique, and I won’t be able to express it as clearly.

The United States is currently overrun with theologians with good degrees, who are unemployed or underemployed. Here’s some food for thought.

Click “Are PhDs...

What do we do with this?

68% of church-going men and over 50% of pastors view porn on a regular basis.

Of young Christian adults 18-24 years old, 76% actively search for porn.

87% of Christian women have watched porn (at some time). The percentage of all women (Christian or not) who watch porn is on...

From the very beginning I was a reluctant blogger. Years ago, when my friend Mark suggested that I blog, my response was: “Isn’t that one of those things where I would go on and give random opinions and share vacation pictures?” Well, he answered, some blogs are like that, but...

Remember that whole ‘invaders from Mars’ radio show that got Orson Wells into hot water, for panicking the cattle and stampeding the humans? In was back in ’38, but you may have learned about it in school or seen it on the History channel. Well, on advice from the boys down in...

This was originally published in the Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society40/4 (December, 1997): 609-626. TO READ THE FULL ARTICLE, CLICK HERE.

Here is a summary of our conclusion:

Many of today’s cessationists rely on Warfield’s decision to tie the end of prophecy to the...

Does the book of Acts intend to tell us a historical narrative, or does Luke tell us how we should be living? In other terms, is it just descriptive, or is it also prescriptive?

One approach is that we should follow what Acts says – or follow it more confidently – only when its narrative...

In short, no, the evidence suggests that in the first century AD and beyond, it just meant “father”.

Here are the three uses of the term in the New Testament:

For you did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received a spirit of adoption. When we cry,...

Now that two public Christians have renounced their faith, some thoughts about the other 99% of us:

Apostasy is a possibility for every single Christian.

Every single Christian is at risk.

Every single Christian is in constant risk.

Now: How can I, who believe in eternal security, say this?...

I was only recently alerted to this new edition, which seems to have become all the rage in some ministries, especially Pentecostal ones. As is often the case with one-person translations, its author promotes it as the very epitome of Bible translation! I will depend here on the extensive and carefu...

There is a whole genre of exposé literature that follows this formula: “I am an ex-[whatever] and I am going to reveal the shocking inside secrets.” Ex-Communist. Ex-Mormon. Ex-Satanist. Ex-Janitor at Area 51. Ex-Catholic priest (Charles Chiniquy, Fifty Years in the Church of Rome...

This is the homily I gave at the wedding of our daughter Vikky to Chris, on June 29, 2019

John 2 says that “There was a wedding in Cana of Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there. Now both Jesus and his disciples were invited to the wedding.” In John’s gospel, Jesus’ first...

This morning I read a portion of 1 John and happened to remember a rather odd teaching I heard a long time ago.

It ran like this:

Everyone knows 1 John 1:9, ‘If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.’ However [the...

There are hundreds of Bible versions in English. To express myself bluntly, that is hundreds too many, and we are pouring time and energy and resources into new versions that are not needed. I exclude the regular updating of the versions that already exist – and my friends on the NIV...

Fire destroys. But when a building burns, the fire also reveals: old art, former paint jobs, things hidden for centuries.

And the most striking thing the flames revealed was how we interpret events. It turns out that we are hardwired away from objectivity in our interpretations, that we will make...

Once in a while I link to an article which I found to have great insight. While I was doing some reading on the anti-vaxxer movement I came across this one from the close of the 2016 political season. As the article hints, it is shocking to see the number of evangelical preachers who use...

By “Highlights” I do not mean the kids’ magazine, that staple of my dentist’s office as a kid. I read 104 books in 2018 as I pursued my goal of two books a week; this does not include daily Bible reading or magazines. One happy turn was that in 2018 I spend 7 months in the...

Now concerning the times and the seasons, brothers and sisters, you do not need to have anything written to you. For you yourselves know very well that the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night. 1 Thess 5:1-2

“And further, not to know when the end is, or when the day of the end...

To download the entire article with footnotes click here: Shogren_1 Thess 2 Thess and the Olivet Discourse

How can we sketch out the outline of Christian eschatology from the years AD 40-50s and earlier? The Thessalonian epistles provide the clearest, datable data. The Thessalonians learned...