Parchment & Pen Blog

I received this email today. It is from a former pastor of 20 years who left the ministry in 2000. He is now an agnostic (does not know if there is a God). I recently heard a statistic which says that 80% of those who are in seminary will no longer be in ministry within [...]

Back in 2006, N.T. (Tom) Wright—the prolific author, New Testament historian, and bishop of Durham—came out with a book that seeks to grapple with evil from a biblical perspective: Evil and the Justice of God (InterVarsity Press, 2006). I, along with fellow Christian philosopher Mike Rea (Notre Dame), had the privilege of responding to Wright’s [...]

The third in the series of four ‘living eulogies’ is dedicated to my mom. I know, I know: it’s absolutely shameless of me to extol the virtues of my own mother when the rest of you don’t have your own blog so you can’t. Life isn’t fair; get over it. At the same time, I [...]

I have thus far discussed what it means to be charismatic equating a charismatic with one who adheres to a continuationist view of the “supernatural sign gifts.” In other words, a charismatic is one who believes that gifts such as prophecy (speaking on behalf of God), working of miracles, healing, tongues, and, if you so [...]

Many thanks will be given if you announce this on your blog, site, or newsletter.

As many reading probably know, I used to be firmly entrenched in third wave, word/faith, charismatic circles.  During that time, there was most certainly hunger and an earnest desire to be on one accord with what God was doing, with how I believed that the Spirit was moving.  I did study the Bible, well actually [...]