THE MOTHER OF ALL PROOF TEXTS: A Reflection on 2 Timothy 3:16
It may be fairly said that 2 Timothy 3:16 — “all Scripture is inspired by God” — is the mother of all proof-texts because it brings to legitimate birth the…
Exposition
AMY CONEY BARRETT: An Esther Come to the Kingdom? (with a Postscript from Dobbs)
Shakespeare’s heroine Portia, decked in judicial robes, is acclaimed "a Daniel come to judgment.” Will Amy Coney Barrett be an Esther come to judgment?
FROM THE BOSOM OF THE SON TO THE BOSOM OF THE FATHER: Pondering the Feast Day of St. John, Apostle and Evangelist
This year I participated in the midnight and morning Christmas services at our parish church. I read the Gospel from St. Luke at the first service and heard a sermon…
++YORK ON INTERPRETING THE BIBLE: Moral Equivalence and Moral Equivocation
The paradigm of disagreement, as he poses it, is a matter of moral equivalence. “Some say this, some say that.” “Some say God made sex for marriage, some say love…
IMAGE-BEARERS FOR GOD: Does Biblical Language for Man Matter?
My goal in this essay is to make a case from Scripture for traditional language for man and for understanding how men and women, each in a particular way, are…
GOD THE FATHER’S DAY: A Patriarchal Convergence
In recognition of the “solar eclipse” of Father’s Day (USA and UK) and Trinity Sunday, I am re-posting something I wrote last year, noting that in the absence of a…
EASTER OCTAVE, DAY SEVEN (Holy Saturday): “Father Into Thy Hands I Commit My Spirit”
I preached this meditation at my parish church in Pennsylvania on Good Friday 1995 Then Jesus, crying with a loud voice, said, “Father, into thy hands I commit my spirit!”…
GOD THE FATHER: Three Biblical Reflections
Justin Welby, the Archbishop of Canterbury, recently issued a press report about how he experiences God as father: The Most Revd Justin Welby said that calling God “father” for him…
VERY MAN: TWO GOOD BOOKS ON SEEING JESUS
Twenty years ago, I gave a lecture titled “Seeing Jesus: Who Did Jesus Think He Was?” Here is the way I began it (updated a bit): When I became a…
REDISCOVERING THE TAPESTRY OF SCRIPTURE: Understanding Its Plain and Canonical Sense
Imagine yourself standing in front of one of those huge old tapestries that one sees hanging in a cathedral.[1] You immediately notice the intricate weaving into rich patterns of themes…
The Person And Work Of The Holy Spirit
Presented at the Global Anglican Future Conference 21-26 October 2013 By Rev. Prof. Stephen Noll “Glory to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit, as it…
THE RAPE OF DINAH: Foolproof Composition or Imaginative Construal
THE NEED to interpret the Bible is axiomatic in the history of theology, for Christianity has always been, as one author puts it, a “hermeneutical religion.”(1) Only a super-Puritan would…
WHEN DID THE EXILE END? Perspectives from the Intertestamental Period
A lecture delivered to the IBR Intertestamental Literature Section of the Institute for Biblical Research (November 1989) AS A TEACHER of the history of Israel, I have always drawn a…