In her book, Christianity after Religion, author Diana Butler Bass briefly discusses the First Great Awakening, launched in 1730, followed by a Second and Third Great Awakening. Bass mentions the 1960’s as the beginning of a Fourth Awakening in North American religion. Following her brief discussion on these four awakenings, Bass writes: “ … trying [...]
NO! Don’t Pull Up The Weeds!
The Society of Biblical Literature was founded in 1880 to foster the academic study of the bible. Around the same time in history an evangelical movement began in America. The movement fostered the idea that the bible is the authoritative, inspired, infallible Word of God divinely planted in the hearts and minds of individuals who [...]
The Church’s Extreme Make-Over: Part II
In previous blogs I’ve suggested that the church of tomorrow will differ from the church of today in three important ways: Time, Language, and Government. The Church’s Extreme Make-Over: Part I focused on the subject of Time. Part II focuses on the subject of Language. To defend the idea that the church’s extreme make-over will include or involve a change of language, I draw [...]
Jesus Christ
The Gospel according to Mark opens with these words: “the beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ” When the word, Jesus, and the word, Christ, are spoken together, the numeric values of both words differ from the values of each word when spoken separately. As seen in the previous two blogs, the Greek letters [...]
Jesus and His Church
After Jesus heard Peter’s response to the question, “Who do you say that I am?” Jesus answered him, “Blessed are you, Simon, son of Jonah! For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father in heaven. And I tell you, you are Petros, and on this rock I will build my [...]
Who Do You Say that I Am?
Jesus said to them, “But who do you say that I am?” Simon Peter answered, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” Matthew 16:15-16. I’ve always cherished this particular encounted between Jesus and Simon Peter. I suppose I am drawn to the question, “Who do YOU say that I am?” because of its deeply personal nature of and the thought-provoking process that each [...]
Reflections
To date, I have written 31 blogs on the subject of The Language of Creation – enough to write a book! This blog offers a review of the material I’ve covered in the past 31 blogs and some concluding remarks about The Language of Creation along with some questions that I have in my own [...]
He Was Raised
He is not here for he was raised, Matt. 28:6. He has been raised, Matt 28:7. He was raised, Mark 16:6. He is not here, but was raised, Luke 24:6. Was raised the Lord, Luke 24:34. Therefore when he was raised, John 2:22. And was raised, Romans 4:25. Was raised Christ, Romans 6:4. This communication [...]
“With Me in Paradise”
One of the criminals, executed along with Jesus, said “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” Jesus responded, “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in Paradise“ Luke 23:43. This promise – given to an ordinary criminal who simply acknowledged the fear of God and the kingly nature of Jesus’ identity - is a promise that [...]
Let There be Light – Part 2
Now that we’ve looked at the entire verse of Genesis 1:3 through the lens of The Language of Creation, I will break the verse into individual words and examine each word. The first Hebrew word in this verse is quite simply defined as ‘to speak, say, declare, tell, etc. Its letters are added together to the sum of [...]