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Inside Out

Do You Want to Be Healed?

“Soon another Feast came around and Jesus was back in Jerusalem. Near the Sheep Gate in Jerusalem there was a pool, in Hebrew called Bethesda, with five alcoves. Hundreds of sick people – blind, crippled, paralyzed – were in these alcoves. One man had been an invalid there for thirty-eight years. When Jesus saw him stretched out by the pool and knew how long he had been there, he said, ‘Do you want to get well?’” – John 5:1-6, The…
Thom Fiet
June 30, 2016
As We See It

Forgiving Pope Francis Might Be Good for Us

“In the afterglow of #PopeFrancis’ Apostolic Visit to America, what are your thoughts on the #PopeInUS?” activist and theologian Peter Heltzel, who is also my systematic philosophy professor, optimistically asked Facebook friends one morning after the pope had returned to Rome. But recent disclosures had left some with an unpleasant aftertaste. “I’m struggling with this Kim Davis thing,” one friend responded. Another wrote, “Secret meeting with Kim Davis has removed all afterglow.” Such a shame! The week before, at New York’s 9/11…
June 30, 2016
Essays

Reformed Assessments of Arminianism: Praise from Unexpected Quarters

In a recent article in the Christian Century, Sarah Hinlicky Wilson and Thomas Albert Howard discussed the appropriate ways for Protestants to celebrate the forthcoming quincentennial of Luther’s issuing of the 95 Theses. They proposed that this commemoration should include some Protestant repentance for sins we have committed in our break with Rome. The same recommendation should apply, I want to insist, to the celebrations some of us will engage in of the adoption of the Canons of the Synod…
Richard J. Mouw
June 30, 2016
Essays

The Human-Flourishing Argument

In the middle of March 2015, the Elders Board of City Church San Francisco announced in a letter to its congregation (and published on its website) that the elders would no longer require their lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender members to commit to a life of celibacy. This was big news and the occasion of much public castigation, because, while City Church is a congregation of the Reformed Church in America, it is more widely known as San Francisco’s largest…
Daniel Meeter
June 30, 2016
Essays

Jan Hus after Six Centuries

Six hundred one years ago – July 6, 1415 – in the German city of Constance, a Roman Catholic council declared Jan Hus, the Czech church reformer, to be a heretic. He was turned over to secular authorities to be burned at the stake. Because he was accused, among other things, of being a disciple of the English reformer John Wycliffe, is was oddly fitting that when Hus was burned some of the kindling for the fire included the writings…
Ronald A. Wells
June 30, 2016
Reviews

A Roadmap for the Church’s Mission

The Story that Chooses Us THE STORY THAT CHOOSES US: A TAPESTRY OF MISSIONAL VISION GEORGE HUNSBERGER EERDMANS PUBLISHING, 2015 176 PAGES $17.78 In his book The Story that Chooses Us, George Hunsberger reaches back in time and chronicles the evolution of the mission mindset as we have grown to understand it today. In doing so, Hunsberger prompts us to imagine a roadmap that reveals where we are headed. It becomes evident that if the church in the Western context…
April 30, 2016
EssaysScience

Genesis 1 within the Faith-Science Debate

What are we going to do with Genesis 1? I have heard that question throughout my career, first as a pastor and then as a professor. I understand the urgency behind it, but the question itself needs serious revision. For Christians, a more important question asks what Genesis 1 is going to do with us. Or, to put it differently: How does God want to challenge and nurture the church through Genesis 1? Obviously, in order to arrive at an…
April 30, 2016
As We See ItScience

Lunar Stories: The Violence of Creation

THE FORMULAS AND EQUATIONS THE AUTHOR USES IN HIS MOON RESEARCH. Tales of the moon’s creation abound in myth, legend, history and science. Given its conspicuous brightness and nearness, we should not be surprised that the moon has captured the imagination since the dawn of human consciousness, variously treated as a deity or a vessel of the divine (such as J.R.R. Tolkien’s lunar Isil, guided by the reckless Tilion) or in a significant departure from other ancient Near East cosmologies,…
April 30, 2016
As We See It

Integrating Science and Faith

A 2015 Pew Research poll indicates that 59 percent of Americans believe that science and faith are “often in conflict.” Sadly, an even larger percentage (73 percent) of nonreligious Americans believes that science and faith are “often in conflict.” These data suggest that Christians are not doing a very good job of helping people understand the proper relationship between science and faith within or outside our faith communities. In this issue of Perspectives, you will hear from scientists and theologians…
April 30, 2016