Stephen Hawkings is about to release a new book which denounces the belief that God created the universe. Instead, he argues that because of the existence of gravity the universe was able to spontaneously create itself out of nothing. A few news sources from around the globe have interviewed some leading scientists to hear more opinions. I’ll update this note when I read some good ones from both sides:
Initial post I read from CNN.
From John Lennox, professor at Oxford.
On Friday (3.19) I accepted my offer of admission to the ThD degree at Wycliffe College of the Toronto School of Theology. I’m very excited about starting there in September, and look forward to interacting with some of their distinguished faculty, including Christopher Seitz, Ephraim Radner, Glen Taylor, Joseph Mangina, and Terence Donaldson. Now, I just need to crush some theological German reading. Ah!
Andy
For the past few Christmases I have posted a little note about the season, influenced by what I’ve learned over the last year. This year, I have spent a lot of time in the Psalter, a book which begins with a lot of complaining, but in the end calls us to a posture of praise. In a time of the year when we celebrate the birth of our King, we must come to terms with the fact that his birth meant the death of other children born around the same time he was, from the same town, with a life much like his own. His birth meant that everything was going to change. His birth meant that there would be change, but not right away – not soon enough for a lot of folks. Was it soon enough for those parents who had their little children murdered by Herod? Was it soon enough for the leprous who would die a few years before a grown Jesus would be able to heal them? When would the peace come? When would the “good will to all men” actually come? Read more... (854 words, estimated 3:25 mins reading time)
I started an online book forum for John H. Sailhamer’s new book, The Meaning of the Pentateuch (IVP Academic, 2009). I just received my copy of the book yesterday and am very excited about getting into it. From what I’ve heard, professor Sailhamer has incorporated much of the material from his classes over the years, and has even dedicated the book “to my students”. As one of them, I’m not only looking forward to the material, but also to the memories of some classes that will surely come back to mind. Read more... (534 words, estimated 2:08 mins reading time)
Having finished my Psalter study during the month of July, I’ve been asked to do a class on Genesis this September-November at my church every Wednesday night! It’s been very good to get back into Genesis again, and I hope that the class will be as beneficial as the one I was able to teach last fall. So, for the next ten weeks I’m going to probably be posting some of my thoughts on Genesis. Read more... (287 words, estimated 1:09 mins reading time)
I stumbled upon a great OT resource I thought I might share with you. It’s from a Jewish website (www.chabad.org) which offers the entire OT text with commentary from Rashi. Though Rashi came up with a hermeneutic that was expressly anti-Christian, some of his insights into the Hebrew can be very valuable and offer a glimpse back into ancient interpretation. Here’s a link to the text and commentary starting at Psalm 1: http://www.chabad.org/library/bible_cdo/aid/16222/showrashi/true
Blessings, Andy
I watched the History Channel documentary “The Link” on Monday night, and was fairly disappointed in its coverage of the fossilized lemur/anthropoid. Rather than seeing an objective look at the fossil, what I saw and heard were the same three or four scientists speaking of their enthusiam for the find. Upon further research (a simple Google search), I was even more disappointed. The documentary portrayed its claims about the fossil as conclusive, but that’s seems far from the truth within the larger scientific community. Both evolutionists and creationists see holes in the claims made by the documentary, and its important to know the whole truth about the issue. I compiled a short list of online articles that I thought explained the entire situation well. In all of them, what seems to be the larger issue is not the fossil itself, but how the scientific community handled it. With the 200 year celebration of Darwin coming up soon, it seems that the media entertainment industry played some cards to get a documentary made, a book written, and a scientific journal article published, without first waiting to hear the reaction of other scientists. As with the Jesus ossuary a few years back, it seems that media giants want to stir up controversy and misinform the public, rather than being honest and objective. I wish more people would have the sense to check the claims of the media (which is not difficult, just search it on Google and read a few websites), and not simply take their claims as Gospel truth. Read more... (282 words, estimated 1:08 mins reading time)
This upcoming weekend I have the opportunity to read a paper at the Eastern Regional ETS (www.etsjets.org) meeting. This is the first big academic activity I’m doing outside of seminary, and I’m pretty nervous about it. I thought I would post my paper for you all to check out if you’d like. I just finished one of the ‘almost final’ drafts, so it won’t change too much before I read it. If you do read through it by Friday then leave a note for me, any feedback would be helpful.
Click here for paper. Read more... (320 words, estimated 1:17 mins reading time)
Many of us think about the Word of God as a living and active Word. By that, we usually mean that God can use the Bible to speak into any of our life circumstances. It is able to see how we need to be encouraged, and will encourage us in that area. Other times we speak about the Word of God as if it can mean different things at different stages in our life. All of these ways of thinking about the Word as living are beneficial for us. That said, there needs to be a word of caution as well. Sometimes the implications of these ideas can do us harm than good, if we understand them wrongly. So, I’ve thought of three words of caution that I think form a good boundary as we seek to understand the Bible as a living Word. Read more... (1139 words, estimated 4:33 mins reading time)
In these days the birth of Jesus Christ is celebrated by the lighting of trees, the singing of advent hymns, and by hoping to experience a foretaste of everlasting peace, hope, and love. The giving of gifts and the eating of kingly Christmas feasts leaves some with the memories of family and friends, of laughter and fun, and of relaxation and joy. Others, however, are not able to celebrate with such euphoric pleasure. Instead, this time of year may bring up memories of hate and forsaking, rather than love and faithfulness. To them, the birth of Jesus Christ reminds them not of good things, but of things they wish they had never experienced or could remember. It is these people who might not get the contemporary Christian version of the Christmas story. They cannot relate to the birth of Christ, as we normally present it. “If angels sing choirs of peace and joy when Jesus is born, why am I experiencing such pain and sorrow?” It is to such questions that I hope to address in this short article. Read more... (1487 words, estimated 5:57 mins reading time)
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