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Essays

The Great Inviter

W. Dale Brown, put in front of an audience, was always disarming: smart, artless, arch – and Calvin College’s Festival of Faith and Writing put him in front of many audiences. Given his druthers, though, Dale would station himself at the back of a crowd. From there, he could wink at the latecomers. He could chuckle, a little less than circumspect, at the speakers’ jokes and quirks. He could whisper along with the poets and commit the orators’ maxims to…
February 28, 2015
Essays

A Seeker of Gospel-Shaped Stories

I somehow managed to earn a bachelor of arts in literature without ever encountering Miguel de Cervantes’ Don Quixote until a high school production of Dale Wasserman’s 1965 play Man of La Mancha. I went as a rookie minister in the 80s because a 16-year-old junior from my youth group was playing the role of Aldonza, the scorned scullery maid Quixote keeps calling Dulcinea because somehow when he looks at her, all he can see is a princess: “I see…
February 28, 2015
Reviews

North-South Relationships in the Global Church

Sister Churches, By Janel Kragt Bakker SISTER CHURCHES: AMERICAN CONGREGATIONS AND THEIR PARTNERS ABROAD JANEL KRAGT BAKKER OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS, 2013 320 PP. $26.96 Christianity is rooted in the Middle East and flourished in North Africa for centuries. Yet since the conversion of the Roman Empire to Christianity under Constantine in the fourth century it has been perceived as a Western religion, and for 17 centuries Christianity has been closely tied to the cultures and peoples of the North Atlantic.…
February 28, 2015
Inside Out

Getting Away

At Standing Stone State Rustic Park near Hilham, Tennessee, they ought to have a sign: No Internet Access No Cable Television No Phones No Cell Tower No Microwave No Seafood Buffet. If You Came Here To Keep Up, Turn Around. The only sign they do have is one that says “No Pets,” a rule, as far as I can tell, that almost everyone ignores. But it is possible that I have mistaken the strays that populate the place for family…
Thomas B. Phulery
February 28, 2015
Essays

A Curious Professor

Part I: Holberg In all the years of our long friendship, there was never a week that went by when Dale Brown and I did not talk about teaching. We talked about our own classes, of course, and our students, but we also talked about all the pedagogical “nitty-gritty” – grading and assignments and course readings – trying to figure out how to get ever better at what we felt was the most meaningful part of our job as professors.…
February 4, 2015
Poetry

Tongues that Dance

Smidt’s burning bush has tongues of flame that dance and leap in autumn’s winds. The oaks that shed their dull brown leaves seem to look askance as this tall bush so boldly flaunts her red. I do not take my shoes off as I pass – though Moses did when “I Am” told him to – but stop before I hurry on to class. “Perhaps a voice will tell me what to do,” I muse, not for a moment thinking…
Dave Schelhaas
February 4, 2015
Reviews

N.T. Wright’s Copernican Revolution

Paul and the Faithfulness of God BOOK REVIEW PAUL AND THE FAITHFULNESS OF GOD N.T. WRIGHT FORTRESS PRESS, 2013 1519 PP. IN TWO VOLUMES $89.00 Bishop N.T. Wright has written a prodigious number of books. This book is his Summa, the most prodigious of them all. He’s been working on this book for decades, all while he was publishing his many other popular books, commentaries, articles and monographs. My own reading of the New Testament has been much altered by…
Daniel Meeter
January 10, 2015
As We See It

The Work of Lent: Learning with Emily Dickinson

I didn’t grow up celebrating Lent. I came to it later in life. My first Ash Wednesday came late winter, only months after burying our firstborn son. Ashes; all was ashes. Dust; all was dust. In the dimly lit sanctuary, I found dried palms, ashes and words about loss. I discovered words to voice what was seething in my heart: words of honesty in Lent, however unsavory they might have been. How does one sing the songs of Easter when…
January 10, 2015
Essays

Common Grace and Race

That Abraham Kuyper was a racist, following the conventions of his time, is something that no neo-Calvinist would deny. His views on race and his theological impact – to some degree – on the rise of apartheid in South Africa have been well documented. For Kuyper, this is no mere blind spot: the problem of race in his thinking is situated within some of his most important theological formulations, namely his doctrine of common grace. With Kuyper, common grace is…
January 10, 2015