The Theology of Christmas Movies

Why did Jesus refer to himself as the Son of Man? Did he ever specifically make the claim that he was God? Why did the world need “God in human flesh” to rescue us in the first place, and was this idea of a divine descent ever mentioned anywhere in the Old Testament? The hosts […]

In the Gospel of Matthew we find the following lines from Isaiah’s prophecy applied to Jesus, “Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel which means, God with us.” Yet the context of that original passage appears to be about a child who was to be born […]

Many commentators have argued that the Gospel of John makes use of categories from Greek philosophy, particularly in its portrayal of Jesus as the divine Word. But is this really the case? Has John blended the story of Jesus with the ideas of Plato? On this program, the hosts walk through the opening lines of […]

Was Jesus merely a nice Jewish teacher who over time began to be worshiped as a kind of god by later generations, or was he thought of as a divine from the earliest days of Christianity? What can we learn about this by examining the earliest documents of the Christian faith? On this program the […]

In the second chapter of John’s gospel, people come to Jesus asking for a sign, and Jesus responds by saying, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up,” referring to the temple of his body. What this means is that he was the true temple, the true location of God’s holy […]

Have you ever taken the time to really listen to and think about the lyrics of the various Christmas carols that you hear on the radio and in the shopping malls at this time of year? On this program the hosts will do just that as they consider popular songs like “Jingle Bells” and “Santa […]

Christmas is the time in which we celebrate the incarnation of Jesus Christ, the Word who “became flesh and dwelt among us” (Jn 1:14). But this same Word, who was God and was also with God (Jn 1:1-2), actually made a number of appearances throughout Israel’s history. On this program the hosts will take a […]

In a humorous moment in the movie Fiddler on the Roof, the main character, Tevye, looks into the camera and remarks, “You may ask, how did this tradition get started? I’ll tell you—I don’t know! But it’s a tradition.” This sets the scene for the movie’s story of Tevye adapting to the changing world around him […]

“Here’s what I love about Jesus. Jesus actually knows that the church is broken and imperfect and falls short. But the difference between us and Jesus is we see that and we use that as a justification to abandon the church. Jesus sees the church, as broken as she is, and on the way as […]

Throughout history, people have appealed to the Bible’s teaching on slavery to justify their own practices. So is the Bible pro slavery? And what’s the difference between biblical slavery and the American slavery of the not so distant past?

Despite the fact that God allowed for slavery, embedded in the Scripture is a sobering rebuke of the institution, as well as an anthropology that teaches that all people are made in God’s image. So the objectification of an image bearer, seeing them as nothing more than an object or property that you can abuse, […]