It is clear that for some people ‘faith deconstruction’ is just that. They have come to see the historic teachings and doctrines of the church as crafted to make us pawns and suppress our personhood. They are walking away from both the church and the traditional Christian faith altogether. For them, deconstruction—a dismantling—is the end-point of the process.
“No” she said, “you don’t understand.” She was right, as always. I did not understand grace. And then in the space of maybe a minute or so G launched into this exposition of God’s promise of forgiveness in the Bible. I don’t remember exactly what words she chose, but I know she said that God loved me and that all I had ever done and even all that I might continue to do that was wrong, it could all be forgiven.
How do we move from becoming anxious about what we see and read to being able to have peace as we build a habit of turning to God with prayers and petitions based on what is going on? And how do we keep from letting our minds go down an endless spiral of negative information and instead choose to dwell on restorative things?
I have to see that I have a need for forgiveness because I am a sinner. Now, that’s sort of negative. That’s humility. That helps toward forgiving other people when you realize “I’m a sinner too”. But that’s the bad news. The good news is the cost of forgiveness. What God went through, what Jesus went through in order to get you that forgiveness and to forgive you freely. And that fills you with grateful joy, and there’s a need for both the humility and the joy.
Next to sex and gender, the subject of race is the most discussed topic in our culture today. Storms of rhetoric and conflict swirl around it every day in politics, the arts, business, the media, and especially social media. It is natural and right for Christians to speak in these conversations out of their personal experience, but since we believe that the Bible has the right to interpret our experience and to critique every culture, we must look to it as our final authority.
How did you first become a follower of Christ or interested in Christianity? For most, if not all of us, someone said something, did something or brought us somewhere, and a process began.
Dear Dr. Keller, In my husband’s passing, I have run into so many people that tell me they wished they would have told my husband what he meant to them. It has made me more aware of those who have had an impact on me. I wanted to reach out and let you know the…
My story begins in the summer of 1975 when I was 22 years old. I had graduated from High School in southeastern Virginia four years earlier and since that time had been floundering, trying to figure out life. I wished I had gone to college. For three summers I had seen high school classmates come home for the summer and then go back to school in the fall. If I had gone to college right after graduation, I would almost be done, I reasoned.
Since 2015, Reformed Theological Seminary has partnered with Redeemer City to City to raise up leaders for ministry in New York City. Approximately 40% of those leaders are women whose lives and communities are being influenced by their theological education. Part of the vision of RTS New York City was to keep New Yorkers in…
In an unassuming corner of one of China’s most important cities, 20 people, all wearing face masks, recently met for the first time in a rented room. In the corner an open laptop showed 30 faces calling in. This was the launch of Pastor Hu’s new church.
In this interview Rebecca McLaughlin talks about some of the inspiration for writing her book Confronting Christianity and some of the insight she’s gained in her life that led her to address the hardest questions that Christians face today. As she talks about her experiences you will learn how and why she believes that Christianity is objectively the best hope for the modern world.
Biblically, sin is anything that falls short of God’s will and glory, that violates his law and his character (1 John 3:4; Romans 3:23). There are at least four ways in which what we will be calling racism is a violation of God’s glory and therefore is a sin. It is sin.
Irwyn Ince discusses his work with churches and their leaders to bring about multi ethnic gospel communities like we see in the Bible and how he is working to help bridge racial divides in the church. As he talks about his work, you will learn why he is hopeful that the gospel can bring unity to the Christian community and more ethnically diverse churches.
I’m a data and analytics consultant, involved in various types of work, most recently advising companies on what data to track and how to personalize people’s experiences with it. If anyone understands the gravity of privacy, it is the people who synthesize and use data in their line of work. The cultural mandate to “be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it” has emphasized the responsibility I have to continually research, question and advise either for or against methods of tracking, technology and usability.
Unfortunately, many churches did not voice their opinions in a respectful way, but instead became militant in their stance, insulting the dignity of anyone from the LGBTQ+ community. It was during this period that I received an invitation from Pachy Quesada, president of Los Pinos Nuevos association of churches, asking me to come to Cuba…
Just one hour after I was dancing on stage in front of an audience of 2,400 with a live orchestra, I found myself alone, sitting on my bed in my apartment. I wanted to feel that after-performance high; I wanted to enjoy the fulfillment of something I had spent two decades training for. Securing an…
In 2017, I became homeless, living in my car. I lived in my car up until the end of September, when I sold it for some money. I had lost everything—my family, my friends. When you’re homeless, you are a non-person. You’re invisible—people don’t see you.
A story of marriage renewal from Heather Bixler, a violinist and a neuroscience student at Columbia, and her husband David Bixler, a saxophonist.
Which justice? There have never been stronger calls for justice than those we are hearing today. But seldom do those issuing the calls acknowledge that currently there are competing visions of justice, often at sharp variance, and that none of them have achieved anything like a cultural consensus, not even in a single country like the US. It is overconfident to assume that everyone will adopt your view of justice, rather than some other, merely because you say so.
Biblical justice is rooted in the very character of God. When we look at what the Bible says about justice we see that God not only punishes evildoing, but through mercy and grace he also restores those who are victims of injustice. Biblical justice is characterized by: radical generosity, universal equality, life-changing advocacy, and asymmetrical responsibility.
This Month's Featured Book
In this booklet, Tim Keller looks at how one can become a gospel-humble person who is neither too self-condemning, nor too self-loving, but instead is transformed by the gospel to be a self-forgetful person, loving our neighbors like we love ourselves.
