Pastor's Blog

In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. ~ Genesis 1:1 ~ This simple statement is staggering in its implications. It provides us with a wealth of information. A series of affirmations and denials can be derived from it that has a bearing not only on theology, but also anthropology, philosophy, history, science, and ethics. In fact, there is no area of human thought that ought not presuppose the truths contained in it. (1) The statement denies atheism, not so much by affirming as by assuming the existence of God. [1] (2) It denies polytheism in all its forms and affirms by implication the existence of one eternal God, the Creator and Lord of all. (3) It denies pantheism and affirms the existence of God before and apart from the heavens and the earth. (4) It denies emanationism [2] and affirms that all things were made by a purposeful act of divine will. (5) It denies eternality to the cosmos and affirms its beginning. (6) It denies tha...

Conventional wisdom has it that there is interminable conflict between Christianity and science, that the two are irreconcilable. The conflict thesis—as this idea is called—was touted in two widely influential books written in the second half of the 19 th  century:  History of the Conflict between Religion and Science (1874) by John William Draper and History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom (1896) by Andrew Dickson White. Draper, for instance, wrote: The history of Science is not a mere record of isolated discoveries; it is a narrative of the conflict of two contending powers, the expansive force of the human intellect on one side, and the compression arising from traditionary faith and human interests on the other. [1] The tale goes something like this: The theoretical foundations for science were laid by the ancient Greeks when they began the project of seeking natural explanations for natural phenomena instead of resorting to explanation...

In his letter to the Colossians, in which Paul takes great pains to tell his readers that nothing needs to be added to what Christ has done for our redemption, he writes, “In him you have been made complete” ( Col. 2:10).  We are complete in Christ because of who he is and because of what he has done for us . Who is Jesus? He is a man like no other. He is quite literally in a class all by himself. People sometimes speak of the world’s great religious leaders and mention Jesus along with the likes of Buddha, Muhammad, Confucius, Zoroaster, Gandhi, and even Abraham and Moses. But when they speak this way, they are not speaking accurately.  Why? Because Jesus is utterly unique. These other men were only men—fallen, sinful human beings like the rest of us. Jesus, on the other hand, is the image of the invisible God (Col. 1:15). He is the divine Word made flesh (Jn. 1:1, 14). He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature (Heb. 1:3)....