Theology

Peter Abbs identifies Jean-Jacques Rousseau as “the first significant philosopher of deep personal autobiography” (”The Full Revelation of the Self” in Philosophy Now [July/August 2008] 17). Rousseau contrasted himself with other Enlightenment philosophers:
I have met many men who were more learned in their philosophising, but their philosophy remained, as it were, external to them. Wanting […]

During former Annual Moore College Lectures Mark Thompson expatiated on the clarity of Scripture. He was later asked whether the dependence of many Christians on experience rather than on Scripture reflected doubts as to the clarity of Scripture. In his answer Mark pointed out that there is no need to set experience against Scripture and […]

In 1969 I wonderfully came to know Christ through the witness of Navigator Christians in the YMCA, Christchurch, New Zealand. Very soon afterwards Sandy Fairservice sat down with me and helped me to grasp the certainty of my salvation. The first verses I memorised were 1 John 5:11-12:
And this is the testimony: God has given us eternal […]

Last week Andrew McGowan, Principal of the Highlands College, delivered the annual Eliza Ferrie lecture at the Presbyterian Theological Centre, Burwood. He sketched the life and impact of Charles Spurgeon. One of the points he made stuck with me. Spurgeon insisted that one must accept the truth of the Bible as a presupposition. The moment […]

It is very important in assessing the moral and ethical quality of people’s lives, outside Christ, to discriminate sharply between our human assessment and God’s assessment. Knowing that all people have been created in God’s image and knowing that this image, while seriously damaged, has not been erased, we are not surprised to find even […]

Today, on the way back from church Barbara and I listened to Sunday Brunch on ABC Sydney. Simon Marnie was interviewing Eva Cox, prominent for her outspoken views on social policy issues. In the course of the interview she reflected on the horrific things people do to each other. She made the point that everyone […]

Christians sometimes make the error of trying to effect spiritual reform by structural change. So we tinker with the format and content of church services. We might try to change denominational church laws by way of trying to entrench practices which we believe presuppose sounder biblical theology, hoping that by so doing the denomination will become […]

In the minds of many today there is nothing particularly unique about humans. We are just animals. Christine Kenneally appeals to hard scientific fact as demonstrating that our supposedly unique qualities are only more sophisticated versions of traits found in the animal world. She describes the human capacity for language as “the last stronghold of human […]

I was reading an interview between Tony Payne and Oliver O’Donovan in some past issue of the Briefing.  O’Donovan was explaining that to be able to live we have to be able to act; that to be able to act we have to be able to form purposes; that in order to form purposes we have to understand […]

In his pastoral ministry Eugene Peterson was struck by how extensively the cultural and spiritual conditions in which he was working matched the sixth century BC experience of the Hebrews in exile:
the pervasive uprootedness and loss of place, the loss of connection with a tradition of worship, the sense of being immersed in a foreign […]