Gerrit Scott Dawson Photo

Gerrit Scott Dawson

Gerrit Scott Dawson is pastor of First Presbyterian Church in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and author of Raising Adam: Why Jesus Descended into Hell.

Take Your Worst to the Table: Reclaiming the Heart of Communion

Take Your Worst to the Table

Reclaiming the Heart of Communion

A whirlwind of questions can surround the practice of Communion, often obscuring its simple goodness. At the Table, Jesus trades our worst for his best.

Here at the End of All Things: How to Deal with Change

Here at the End of All Things

How to Deal with Change

Life is full of endings — sudden endings, painful endings, endings that mark us forever. Only Jesus Christ makes our ending a change for the better.

We Cannot Cancel Hell: Finding Hope Through Final Judgment

We Cannot Cancel Hell

Finding Hope Through Final Judgment

Honest readers of the Bible will not be able to escape the reality of hell. But honest lovers of the God of the Bible will escape its awful, eternal torment.

The Sweet Ache of Friendship: Braving Shadows and Chasing Heaven

The Sweet Ache of Friendship

Braving Shadows and Chasing Heaven

In moments when the extraordinary breaks into the ordinary, we feel, even if only briefly, that we were made for a beauty beyond this world.

Faith in an Age of Unbelief: Breaking the Spells of Modernity

Faith in an Age of Unbelief

Breaking the Spells of Modernity

The world assures us only what we see is real. It repeats the lie until we wonder if it’s truth. How can we break the devil’s spell?

Break the Hardness in Me: A Holy Week Prayer for the Heart

Break the Hardness in Me

A Holy Week Prayer for the Heart

All of us need help feeling as we should feel before the cross of Christ. So how can we enter into the sorrow and awe of Good Friday?

Christmas and Our Longing to Belong

Christmas and Our Longing to Belong

We long for home — for a safe, happy place where we belong. And every year, the manger reminds us that our longing for home is really a longing for him.

Jesus, Only Jesus: What ‘Christ Alone’ Really Means

Jesus, Only Jesus

What ‘Christ Alone’ Really Means

The name to answer our guilt is not our own name or Mary’s name or Muhammad’s name. The answer is Jesus, only Jesus.

When Death Does Us Part: Last Words of a Long Lost Love

When Death Does Us Part

Last Words of a Long Lost Love

When a long and happy marriage finally ends, nothing in this world can quite remove the wound a living spouse carries. But something beyond this world can.

Agony in the Garden: What Jesus Suffered in Gethsemane

Agony in the Garden

What Jesus Suffered in Gethsemane

In the garden of Gethsemane, the fate of the universe turned on one sentence, pressed from Jesus like oil crushed from an olive: “Not my will, but yours, be done.”

God in Skin and Time: Jesus as the Beloved Son

God in Skin and Time

Jesus as the Beloved Son

“Son of God” is a familiar title filled with profound mystery. What does it mean for Jesus, the son of Mary, to also be the Son of God?

The Death of Gandalf: When Tolkien Pierced My Heart

The Death of Gandalf

When Tolkien Pierced My Heart

Sometimes made-up scenes teach us reality best, like the profound and enduring lessons from Gandalf’s fall into the abyss.

A Daring and Beautiful Duel over Death

A Daring and Beautiful Duel over Death

What should we see when we look at a skull? In Shakespeare’s ‘Hamlet’ and George Herbert’s “Death,” two of the greatest English poets duel over the grave.

Into the Waters with Us: Five Reasons Jesus Was Baptized

Into the Waters with Us

Five Reasons Jesus Was Baptized

When Jesus was baptized, he went under the water for us — so that he might represent us, and so that we might be with him forever.

King over Chaos: The Lordship of Christ on Election Day

King over Chaos

The Lordship of Christ on Election Day

The early Christians had almost no political or economic power. Many were slaves. Yet they all shared one revolutionary conviction: Jesus is Lord.

The Day Jesus Stayed Dead: Waiting in the Heartache of Holy Saturday

The Day Jesus Stayed Dead

Waiting in the Heartache of Holy Saturday

Jesus not only died and rose. He was buried. And our full redemption rests, in part, on the silence of Holy Saturday.

The Human on Heaven’s Throne: Why the Ascension of Christ Matters

The Human on Heaven’s Throne

Why the Ascension of Christ Matters

Many of us rehearse the gospel as Jesus lived, died, and rose. But do we remember that he ascended? What are we missing when we forget the ascension?

Why the Ascension of Jesus Matters: An Interview with Gerrit Scott Dawson and Jonny Woodrow

Authors on the Line

On May 9 we celebrate the ascension of Jesus, a date marked out 40 days after his resurrection, when he departed from earth and returned bodily to heaven (Luke 24:50–53, Acts 1:9–11). On first glance, Jesus rising up in the…

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