The Value of Children and the Global Fame of Jesus Christ

I had the awesome opportunity to run into Mr. Brent Nelson from the Council for Biblical Manhood and Womanhood last week as I stopped by their office in Louisville, KY. I had no appointment, and really had little more than a half-brain-stormed idea that I brought with me to discuss, but Mr. Nelson was extremely [...]

Ignoring the Obvious in the Great Commission: Who’s going, and who are they going to?

“And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And [...]

Stop Lying in Worship: Justice is More than a Good Line in a Gospel Song…

On this blog, it’s not an uncommon occurrence for me to address the failings of “contemporary evangelicalism” as a whole, painting with broad strokes and illustrative generalizations, the bleak picture that the American church has found itself in. However, today I’m bringing it home; to my own front door. Conservative Reformed Protestantism, lend me your [...]

A Package Deal: Pondering Birth Control in Light of Joshua Harris’ “Boy Meets Girl”

Before I pretend that Josh said something that he did not, in his bestselling book entitled “boy meets girl: say hello to courtship“, let me just get one thing clear: Harris never (overtly) opined on the issue of birthcontrol (at least intentionally) in the pages of this provocative piece encouraging young singles to pursue “romance chaperoned [...]

Unless I Am Convinced By Sound Reason: Has Our Pragmatic Defense Of Birth Control Undermined Our Understanding Of Biblical Ethics?

I enjoy being convinced of things, especially things that I had once held a strong opinion about (which is just about everything when it comes to me!). But like most people in this culture, I prefer to be convinced of facts rather than wisdom. Facts are typically clean, well formed, and easily digestible. Wisdom, on [...]

Family Planning: Let’s Consider a Pre-emptive Strike

“Many are the plans in the mind of a man, but it is the purpose of the LORD that will stand.” - (Pro 19:21)
Scripture never talks about “planning” being a bad thing, in the generic sense. In fact, it gives an almost universal stamp of approval to it, even giving us guidelines for how to [...]

Childlessness and Chronological Snobbery in Christian Culture

“There is a great difference between rejecting something you have known from the inside and rejecting something (as uneducated people tend to do) simply because it happens to be out of fashion in your own time. It is like the difference between a mature and traveled man’s love for his own country and the cocksure [...]

Birth Control in Light of the Image of God: Closing Arguments, and Parting Words

(The following post is the final partof a 5-part series entitled “Birth Control in Light of the Image of God“, modified from a paper I wrote for an M.Div. course in Systematic Theology II, April 2008)
It is very difficult to defend the non sequitur argument (mentioned in the previous post), because it is couched in [...]

Birth Control in Light of the Image of God: Part IV - Objections

(The following post is part 4 of a multi-part series entitled “Birth Control in Light of the Image of God“, modified from a paper I wrote for an M.Div. course in Systematic Theology II, April 2008)
The premiere objection to this position on birth control is that it is a non sequitur argument (a Latin term [...]

Birth Control in Light of the Image of God: Part III - In The Shadows of a Technological Image

(The following post is part 3 of a multi-part series entitled “Birth Control in Light of the Image of God“, modified from a paper I wrote for an M.Div. course in Systematic Theology II, April 2008)
Technology changes the way we think about things. And reproductive technology is no different. In fact, it may indeed be [...]