For All It's Worth

Have you ever been sitting on your sofa and wondered why certain textures of food make the meal your eating less appetizing, even downright disgusting? Even more, have you ever wondered why certain voices on the radio (preachers, newscasters, sports announcers) automatically send your finger to turn the off button? I have not come up with a good answer why these two things bother me at an endless rate. I often think that maybe it is something to do with my psychological makeup, something in my mind that sends a signal to my brain that this kind of texture or that kind of voice is disturbing. Lately, I have been listening to many radio preachers on our local AM Christian station, 91.5. The majority of the preachers have voices that are pleasant to the ears and whose messages are edifying and encouraging. Yet, there are a certain few whose voices seem to rattle my eardrums like a noisy woodpecker beating on the next door neighbor's house. However biblical and theologically orthodox t...

"A few months ago my American publisher asked me, 'Why are you so conservative?' At that time I simply replied, 'Why not?' Perhaps I should have added: these distinctions between 'conservative' and 'liberal' or even 'progressive' (and what is progress in theology if not a new and reflective return to the testimony of the apostles and a concern for that to which they witness?) are ultimately meaningless. We are concerned only with the truth, theological and historical. The truth is our sole obligation; we have to seek and present it. and in the end it will prevail against all our conjectures, all our desires to be right, our imaginative constructions and our anxiety." Martin Hengel, Preface (xv) Between Jesus and Paul I find Professor Hengel's comments in the preface of his book about Jesus and Paul to be both insightful and illuminating regarding the goal of doing theology and history. Martin Hengel is one of the world's ...