Archive for the ‘Gospel’ Category

December 29, 2009 1

Simone Weil and the Whiskey Priest: A Spirituality of Suffering

By Robert Minto in Cross(es), Gospel, Motivation, Obligation, Suffering

Simone Weil’s two letters on the subject of baptism, to be found in the opening pages of her famous “Waiting for God,” remind me — in certain ignoble places — of my own history with the sacrament. At one point, Weil allows a backgrounding fear to break through her reasoning:
The mere thought that, supposing I [...]

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October 3, 2009 24

Against Expository Preaching

By Robert Minto in Criticism, Gospel, Preaching, Rhetoric, Scripture

I am currently reading Christ-Centered Preaching: Redeeming the Expository Sermon, by Bryan Chapell. I haven’t finished the book yet, so some of what I am about to say may have to be modified at a later date. Still, I have some objections to this whole movement of expository preaching (to the degree that I’ve been [...]

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August 10, 2009 0

Iconography of a Glory Stain: or, Why Is There a Smashed Bug Dotting My I?

By Robert Minto in Death, Gospel, Mystery

A friend has recently accused me of being a wagon-circler. My preferred mode of discourse, it seems, is to ride my un-pin-down-able pony around the perimeter of some respectable idea and shoot arrows at it. I can appreciate this criticism. My suspicion, however, is that it’s inevitable. I see Christianity as far too dialectically vigorous [...]

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June 17, 2009 0

Blood: The Narrative for a Service in Three Parts

By Robert Minto in Gospel, Mystery

This has actually been posted before on an old blog. Possibly the only thing from that venture worth salvaging. The following three narratives were used to hold together a Good Friday service at Dordt College, which I planned and conducted with the rest of the chapel committee.
I.
Blood.
Scripture is soaked in one of the most lurid [...]

May 28, 2009 1

Does the Gospel Explain Life?

By Robert Minto in Gospel, Mystery, Scripture

This is one of those telling but simple questions that distinguishes between the maze of superficially similar but fundamentally differing theologies. It has immense implications. For Protestants, the various issues that the question raises have a tendency to re-coalesce around another question: does the Bible explain life?
It’s very popular to answer “Yes!”
For example, Reinhold Niebuhr, [...]

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