Have you ever stopped and wondered why we wear clothes? If you think about it, it’s an odd custom. Before exposing ourselves to the public, we choose to hang colored material from our shoulders and hips and then cinch everything together with a strip of cowhide. It’s true that this whole business provides some consolation on a frosty morning, but let’s be realistic, shall we? It’s summer. And summer means sultry. And sultry means sweat. And sweat means my clothes play the sponge more than anything else. I don’t know about you, but I’ve got better things to do with my hot months than spend them in the arms of a soggy carpet.

Milton called our clothes “these troublesome disguises.” Far bett…

Continue Reading →

I’d like us to consider Psalm 2 from three perspectives. First, we’ll examine the message of the psalm. Second, we’ll look at how the New Testament uses it. Finally, we’ll ask how this psalm speaks to the task of world evangelization.

The Message of Psalm 2

Psalm 2 begins with a question: “Why do the nations rage and the peoples plot in vain?” (verse 1). Verses 2–3 specify this futility: the kings of the earth reject Messiah’s right to rule. In response, God gives the nations the cosmic raspberry and ridicules their pride, claiming that he has set his king on Zion (verses 5–6). In verses 7–9, the psalmist recalls this coronation, noting especially God’s promise to make the nations his he…

Continue Reading →

How can we reconcile God's sweeping control over creation with the existence of such horrors as cancer, famine, genocide, sexual abuse, tsunamis, and terrorism? Voltaire sums up the issue nicely in his "Poem on the Lisbon Disaster," written after the devastating Lisbon earthquake of 1755:

Ill could not from a perfect being spring,
Nor from another, since God's sovereign king.

His point is that since God is good, he can't properly be the source of evil. Likewise, if God is all-powerful, no one else can thwart his intentions. So we're stuck, it seems. Who's to blame for the suffering we experience? Though we lack the space here for an extended discussion, let's consider seven biblical affir…

Continue Reading →