Christian Blog Curator

I just go around sharing what I find on the web that's worth reading

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Is Reformed Theology now meaningless?

Is Reformed Theology now meaningless?

I think the term Reformed Theology is reserved to Theologies that align to historical reformed creeds. Period. Such a position is almost too little, too late to address all that is going on in the Reformed theological nexus. The Reformed school needs to clarify its bounds, and I feel it needs to appraise the importance of its distinctives. If they are not important, then the entire system needs…

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How to fix a Traditional Worship service Part 1

How to fix a Traditional Worship service Part 1

There is something missing in all the literature on Church renewal and growth. All it takes to see the problem is to type into Google “How to improve a Traditional Worship Service.” Granted, in SEO (the world of being seen on the internet) the saying is “The best place to bury a dead body is Page 2 on Google” yet if you click through to pages 13, 15, 20… you really won’t find anything on the…

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The Tree of The Knowledge of Good and Evil

Like most pastors, I’ve begun delving into the world of livestreaming! MAN IT WAS ROUGH! My laptop dumped the mic exactly on the day ! needed it.

Here’s the most recent lesson:

I’ve decided to look at a case where “there’s a myth here… and it’s in most people’s reading of the passage!”

What’s that mean? Well Today, we will be looking at the “Fall of Man” and specifically the Tree of…

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Changing Format

This page started as a classic blog in 2014, when the format was already rusty. Currently, I’m adjusting it to be a topical study of theological elements and topics that interest me. For the most part, I assume “you know the normal view” and I want to make it clear “We aren’t going to look at the normal view.”

As a pastor, let me formally disavow anything here is more than thoughts.

One…

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Parables of Jesus – Mark 4:1-20 The Sower I'm trying using youtube to host an audio-only podcast because of all the players I find it the least annoying/ plays straight through on any device.

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How to Podcast a Sermon (or Lecture)

How to Podcast a Sermon (or Lecture)

1st get a recorder.

At the most basic cellphones do a decent job. Android has it under “voice recorder.” If you have an Iphone, it’s able but I can’t tell you where. Anyways, if you’re buying Apple than you probably have money to buy the equipment.

My suggestion (which I’ve used) is this one by Sony. It’s really clear/ manages most the “deciding” so the mix isn’t muddy even if the room is…

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Sermons now available online

Sermons now available online

I am aware my speed of blogging really tanked… become non-existent with taking on my first Church and having to focus on Sermons and evangelism.

Lots of new directions!

I decided to really par down on what I didn’t need to do and to focus on the task at hand. Most my website effort has gone into making eppingcommunitychurch.org respectable.

You can catch my sermons right now by following my Podca…

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Of Pluralism and Monism - And Abrahamic religion

Of Pluralism and Monism – And Abrahamic religion

I apologize a tad for this one being incomplete; I want to get what I have done from 6 years ago out to some folks while I work on updating it

Of Dualism, Monism, and Pluralism – Why a Trinity?

There is a tendency in a human logical systems to run down to a base unit of reality; there is a similarity between Buddha saying that there is a comic “one” at the bottom of it all, theist coming to one…

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Easter on Christmas! A sermon on the Theodicy

Easter on Christmas! A sermon on the Theodicy

It’s been a while since I gave my blog any attention. As some may know, I got my first ministry Job in New Hampshire at Epping Community Church. Yet, also in typical fashion everything went off at once so I had to move 5000 miles and had to have orthopedic surgery. Yay!

Anyways, NH is the least religious state… and I am new in the pulpit… so I figured why not go for it!

I write with spaces so it…

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Materialist Christianity: "Soulless" Constitutional Humanity

Materialist Christianity: “Soulless” Constitutional Humanity

In the work, In Search of the Soul: Perspectives on the Mind-Body Problem, author Kevin Corcoran presents his view of Constitutional Humanity. What follows is my reflection and my response to a book of essays I really suggest you grab.

“Constitutional humanity” is a materialist stance regarding human persons. It is an anthropological position that stands counter the normal idea that people have…

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Isreal: the Real Woman at the Well in John's Gospel

Isreal: the Real Woman at the Well in John’s Gospel

The woman at the well as a personification of Israel (Ephraim) in John 4

I preached a sermon last time John 4’s story of the “Woman at the Well” came up in the lectionary, and it turns out that many in my audience (who are Educated) liked the novelty of the thesis I used. Sometimes it’s the familiar that surprises!

I connected the Sumerian woman to Ephraim as a personification (while not denying…

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The Theological Method of Augustine: "Slavery to Signs" in On Christian Doctrine

The Theological Method of Augustine: “Slavery to Signs” in On Christian Doctrine

In On Christian Doctrine, St. Augustine, Bishop of Hippo, promotes his view that the biggest error possible for an exegete can make is to take a figurative sign or narrative literally; to do so, betrays that one is only thinking in a “this worldly” carnal and nonspiritual sense and for Augustine is the root of idolatry and much error.

The importance of this insight in my own personal theology,…

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Colonialist legacies, Globalization, and The American Influence on World Christianity

Colonialist legacies, Globalization, and The American Influence on World Christianity

In The New Shape of World Christianity Mark Noll says “Christianity in its American form has indeed become very important for the world. But it has become important, not primarily because of direct influence.”[1]In contrast to Noll, I feel the situation is far too complex for Noll’s theory of a separate American form and “American influence” to stand. The idea that a direct influence and an…

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How Trade and Popes wrecked India's Thomas Christians.

How Trade and Popes wrecked India’s Thomas Christians.

When the Portuguese established the colony of Goa, they were seeking primarily to establish routes of commerce. Their machismo in simply eliminating the opposition served this end well. However, the Portuguese also felt a moral imperative to help the local “Thomas Christian” population they found there.

The primary method of the Portuguese to further this goal was still to utilize political…

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Do Christian's have the Authority to Heal? Ken Blue thinks so

Do Christian’s have the Authority to Heal? Ken Blue thinks so

Ken Blue’s Authority to Heal is for me enjoyable on two levels. Topics of Christianity in application are particularly edifying to me; moreover, to Blue the assumption that God intervenes is a given. That alone makes the book an interesting read.

That stated, as with all theology touching the Charismatic movement I remain slightly arm’s length with Blue. I am not a cessationist; however, I think…

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Why Satan is not Lucifer in Isaiah 14

Why Satan is not Lucifer in Isaiah 14

In Isaiah 14:12-27, one finds a a long taunt against Lucifer, the one who challenges God. The language is harsh and dismissive. The pride of this “Lucifer,” a king, was writ large, and the terrible results of Lucifer’s hubris seem to be a biblical version of the English adage, “the bigger they are, the harder they fall.”

Yet it is from the immediately preceding verses of Isaiah 14: 9-11, the…

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Pastoral Care Case Study: Death of a Child

Pastoral Care Case Study: Death of a Child

A Pastoral Care case study is a method where a professor provides students with a hypothetical situation and ask them to reason out how they would resolve the issues facing the congregation. As such, they are worth sharing and investigating with other’s in the industry.

This case study was given to me last year for P504 at Fuller seminary, and as the professor told me he planed to use it as an…

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