Parchment & Pen Blog

Last week in a Sunday school class I was teaching, someone asked about being delivered from depression. I noted that God is surely able to do so. But I tried to give another perspective on this—that pain may actually be a means of blessing. As C.S. Lewis observed, pain is God’s megaphone to rouse a [...]

Well, I am not just trying to just pick on the Emerging church (especially since I am always being accused of being a part of it!), but I wrote the original ten as twenty. I did not want the last ten to go to waste. In fact, I think they may be better than the first ten!  10. You start a [...]

Most of you did not know, but I am at Camp Kanakuk in Branson MO this week speaking. It is their family camp. I am teaching for five days on grace. I started Tuesday introducing the need for grace in our postmodern culture. I then defined grace from a biblical perspective. Yesterday we began what [...]

In a previous post I put this question forward: Would Christ have died had he not been killed? The question is brought about by our pondering upon Christ’s identification with humanity and humanity’s identification with sin and death. Since Christ did not sin, and death is a result of sin, then wouldn’t it be systematic [...]

The emperor has no clothes. You all know the story. When people have an influential belief, there are reasons why it is influential, right? Of course, or it would not be influential. But the “what” of these reasons is always a case of hit or miss apologetics where consideration of their view is either asked for based upon the evidence, [...]

  Download (right-click to download)

One of the most neglected aspects of the Christian faith within Protestantism is communion. Some churches observe it only once a year; most, once a month. But in the beginning of the Christian faith, it was observed daily. After abuses, the practice fell to once a week, the Lord’s day. Many churches still observe the [...]

Note: there are multiple sessions that will play back to back. Total time is just over 1 hour. (what is this all about?)

Well, maybe not a year. In fact it will be 60 weeks. Starting today (June 24), those of you who have desired to become a part of The Theology Program of Reclaiming the Mind Ministries, but but do not want to be a formal student will have this new opportunity.

This is an interesting question to ponder. I believe that it is more than just pure speculation, but has implications on how we view Christ and His identity with mankind and how you view the effects of sin on man. I will leave this up here and then blog on it soon to defend my [...]

I thought that I would continue with the blogging fun. Here are the top ten signs that you are taking this blogging thing TOO far.  10. You blog on blogs. 9. Your username on other blogs is one of the following: blogforhim, semperblogging, jediblogger, blogaphobia. 8. You send the XML of your own blogs to your [...]

Not really 101. My brief six months of blogging does not quite qualify me to teach this level of blogging education. Either way, I thought that I would give you some of my thoughts, colored with shades of green as they may be. I like blogging. I don’t really know why yet, but it is [...]