Gospel.com Blog

Last year I saw a chunk of the Berlin Wall at a museum, it was a profoundly ugly chunk of concrete and I cannot imagine being separated from family and friends by it. I was far too young to register the significance of the wall coming down when I was younger, but the twenty year anniversary has given me a good chance to retroactively be in awe of what it meant for Germany and the world.

Christianity Today has an interview with a German pastor that gives some insight into what the Wall meant and how it’s still affecting life today.

Here’s an excerpt:

What can Christians take away from the fall of the Berlin Wall?

It’s a shame that we still have an invisible wall. People who are extremely left wing or extremely conservative in their political stance never meet at the same table or shake hands.

What did really unite the first churches? It was not a shared cultural background, as some were Jews and others Gentiles of many different kinds. It was not a fully shared set of rules and regulations, as Jewish believers followed some very different rules than Gentile believers, and as Paul rules out the law as a foundation in Ephesians 2:15. But it is also not the “multicultural” approach that is popular today in the political and public arena where everything is being held together by an unquestionable respect for the differences of the other. In the early church there was much questioning, admonishing, and discussing, theologically as well as ethically, about the right and just way.

The church creates this amazing opportunity; in the church people can come together that would otherwise never sit together: people from the political right and left, people having very different attitudes about sex, power, and money, people who suffered from communists and people who were communists, the “environmentalist” and liberal “capitalist,” people with Jewish backgrounds and others with German, Arab, or other backgrounds. Not by simply tolerating each other and leaving each other untouched, but by welcoming each other as brothers and sisters in Christ, and then the joined struggle begins. What truly unites us is the shared confession of Christ and a life-long struggle with each other and with God to find a biblical way for life and work.

What about you? Do you remember when the wall came down? Did it mean anything to you and your faith?

One of the most popular resources in the Gospel.com community has always been its collection of devotionals.

The list of devotionals published by community members includes Our Daily Bread, Meet with God, the Lifetime Guarantee Daily Devotional, and many, many others. Starting today, we’re going to post an excerpt from one of these many different devotionals on the blog each morning.

Today’s devotional is from Daily Encounter, a weekday devotional written by Richard Innes of ACTS International:

As is commonly known, one of the biggest killers of ideas is the excuse, “We’ve never done it that way before.” 


However, profound ideas can come from the strangest places. Creative genius comes to people who are open to new ideas and different ways of doing things. For example, in 1964 the freighter Al Kuwait which was carrying 6,000 live sheep capsized and sank in Kuwait’s harbor. The sunken ship with its decomposing cargo began to present a serious threat to the country’s water supply through its desalination processing plant.

To overcome the problem the ship had to be raised and moved to a safe place without falling apart and dumping its poisonous contents into the nation’s water supply.

Karl Kroyer, a Danish engineer working in Kuwait, came up with a novel idea. He pumped 27 million ping-pong balls into the freighter’s hull which slowly raised it to the surface.

And where did he get this idea? From a Donald Duck comic book. Somebody sank Donald’s boat and he and his feathered friends raised it by filling it with ping-pong balls!

When it comes to creative living, a better place to get great ideas is in the words and examples of Jesus in the Bible. It pays to know it and hide its truths in our heart. One’s life is greatly enriched when it is lived in harmony with God’s Will and Word.

Read the complete devotional at ACTS International, or browse the Daily Encounter archives for many years’ worth of past devotionals.

One of the goals of contemporary Christianity is to translate the Bible into every possible language. It’s a desire that flows from the Great Commission in which Jesus tells us to go make disciples of all nations. We see Bible translation as a way to ensure that everyone has access to becoming one of Christ’s disciples.

Yesterday, I ran across a fascinating article yesterday that Lausanne Pulse published a few years ago about the history of Bible translation. In the article they mention that the Bible spent the first 1500 years of Christianity in only 35 languages. It wasn’t until the Reformation that Christians started focusing on Bible translation. Yet despite that renewed focus, it took the organization of the Bible Societies in the 1800s for Christians for it to really take off.

The following is a conglomeration of two charts from the Lausanne Pulse article, Bible Translation in a New Millennium:

I don’t have much commentary on this other than to say that it’s just amazing to see how we’ve doubled the number of languages the Bible can be read in in the past seventy years! Yet, even though we’ve made such great progress in the past few hundred years, there are still about 4,000 languages to go.

Today is the anniversary of the World Trade Center attacks, and writers around the web are contributing thoughts and reflections about that fateful event and its aftermath. One such site is Relevant Magazine, which has asked a number of writers from the Burnside Writers Collective to share their thoughts on 9/11 and the effect it’s had on their spiritual lives. The reflections are short, honest, and thought-provoking.

What about you? Where were you on 9/11, and what went through your mind when you first heard the news? What does it mean to you today—is it just another tragedy (albeit a particularly horrifying one) among many that have struck the world before and since? Or has it had a more profound impact on your faith?

This week marks the anniversary of what everyone can agree was a troubling moment in world history: the atomic bombing of Japan. Tomorrow marks the 64th anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima, followed three days later by the anniversary of the Nagasaki bombing.

This morning, looking for a Christian perspective on this anniversary, I pulled up an essay by Al Mohler reflecting on the spiritual and moral questions raised by the atomic bombings. Mohler offers some opinions that could be debated, but his closing point resonates strongly:

The 60th anniversary of the Hiroshima bombing should serve as a catalyst for Christian reflection on the morality of warfare, the reality of human sinfulness, the frailty of human wisdom, and the burden of history. For all these things, we will give an answer. Until then, we must do the very best with what we have, what we know, and what we face.

Endless ink has been spilled over the morality and necessity of the atomic bombings, and many essays have been written about what a Christian attitude toward war should look like. As an American Christian, I find the atomic bombings to be a particularly difficult moral question even decades after the fact: on the one hand, it’s impossible not to view the ending of World War 2 as a morally good outcome; but I’m unable to say that even such a good outcome makes the bombings themselves morally good. Can something be both morally necessary and morally evil? (I’ve read quite a bit about the final days of World War 2, and the book that captures most harshly and vividly the moral bleakness of the war—the European war, but it’s certainly relevant to the Pacific war as well—is Max Hasting’s Armageddon. Hastings was interviewed at Christianity Today on the topic.)

So as Mohler says, perhaps the most appropriate response at this point is for Christians to simply keep asking the difficult questions raised by this, and other, morally upsetting moments in history. (I recommend this essay/study guide on different Christian attitudes toward war if you really want to delve into the topic, perhaps in a small group discussion.)

Several weeks, there was much chatter on Christian blogs and news sites about the Codex Sinaiticus, one of the earliest ancient copies of the Bible. The excitement centered around news that the Codex Sinaiticus had been put online in its entirety. (You can take a look for yourself at the Codex Sinaiticus website.)

Now that the story has had some time to settle down, the folks at the Get Religion blog are looking back and analyzing the way the Codex Sinaiticus story was reported in the media. It interesting to see a number of errors (some of them perhaps understandable, given the somewhat esoteric nature of the story) highlighted in retrospect, and there’s plenty of evidence to support Get Religion’s ongoing thesis: that when it comes to religion stories, despite its best attempts, the media often misses out on some important details.

Do we know the exact location of Jesus’ tomb? What is the Shroud of Turin, and is it authentic or an elaborate hoax? Why were there guards at Jesus’ tomb, and who were they? If you’ve ever wondered about some of the details of the Easter story, our friends at the Archaeological Study Bible can help: they’ve created a site that looks at some of the most interesting situations, questions and objects surrounding Jesus’ death and resurrection.

There are ten different entries, each discussing an Easter-related topic with insight provided by archaeological discoveries. Here’s an excerpt from the entry on the Upper Room—is it possible to identify the exact place in Jerusalem where it the Last Supper took place?

Christian tradition, supported by Cyril of Jerusalem (c. 310-386), identifies the site of Holy Zion Church in Jerusalem as the place where the upper room was located. This may well be correct, but the story is complicated and details are disputed by scholars. [...]

The traditional location of the upper room at Holy Zion Church is called the Cenacle or, in Latin, the Coenaculum. It is located outside the Old City near the Zion Gate and may be seen on the sixth-century Madaba Map, an ancient mosaic map of the Holy Land. The Cenacle is also (erroneously) referred to as David’s Tomb.

There’s plenty more to satisfy the archaeology geek in all of us. Explore it yourself here.

It’s John Calvin’s 500th birthday! Well, it isn’t exactly his birthday quite yet (that doesn’t happen until July 10 this year). But that hasn’t stopped a lot of people from celebrating the hugely influential theologian’s life and work—there are conferences engaging Calvin’s legacy scheduled all throughout the year.

You don’t have to adhere to Calvinist theology to acknowledge the enormous significance of Calvin’s contributions to church history. Calvinism continues to be an important influence in Christainity today; Time Magazine recently noted its resurgence in evangelical circles. In honor of Calvin, then, here are a few links to help you get in on the celebration this year:

• Not surprisingly, Calvin College in Grand Rapids has an extremely comprehensive list of Calvin-related conferences taking place in 2009. They’re taking place all over the world, from Tokyo to Calvin College’s own backyard in Michigan.
• Perhaps the biggest Calvin celebration this year is the Calvin Quicentenniary, a conference and tour that visits most of the major locations relevant to Calvin’s life and ministry, and which features talks by a wide range of Calvin scholars. Have room in your schedule to visit Geneva, Switzerland this July?
• Even if you’re not participating in the big Calvin conference just mentioned, the Calvin 500 Blog is posting daily about all manner of Calvin-related events, trivia, and discussion.
• If you aren’t familiar with John Calvin or his teachings, there’s a good overview of his life and theology at the Christain History Institute. The Wikipedia entries for John Calvin and Calvinism have more detailed information if you’re interested.
• Calvin’s most important written work, Institutes of the Christian Religion, is available online for free at Christian Classics Ethereal Library, if you really want to delve into Calvin’s ideas.
• Not every Christian adheres to Calvinist theology, of course. The main theological branch of Christianity that is generally set in opposition to Calvinism is Arminianism. Googling around the web will turn up a lot of different (and strongly-held) opinions about the two strains of theology; for a neutral perspective, start with Wikipedia’s entry on the ongoing Calvinism/Arminianism debate.

Calvin’s birthday might not be the flashiest event in church history, but it’s an important one. Take advantage of this anniversary to learn a bit more about one of the church’s most famous scholars!

What is a Valentine, exactly? It’s not just a mildly witty romantic card you pick up at the florist along with a bouquet of roses. Valentine—make that Saint Valentine, and there was more than one person who bore that title—was a Christian martyr, although details of his life (and his connection to what would become a holiday about romantic love) are somewhat vague. Christianity Today has a concise history of the holiday and the practice of card-exchanging on February 14, as does the Christian History Institute.

If your curiousity isn’t satisfied by those articles, the Wikipedia entry for Saint Valentine has more info, and History.com has an entire section devoted to the holiday.

It’s a big day for significant birthdays. 200 years ago today, two of the most influential men in recent Western history were born: Abraham Lincoln, who presided over the bloodiest moral and civil struggle in U.S. history, and Charles Darwin, who brought the concept of natural selection into the public sphere. It’s interesting to look back at major historical figures and try to sort out their religious beliefs; but as it turns out, the spiritual beliefs of both Lincoln and Darwin are surprisingly difficult to pin down, despite the major moral and religious repercussions of their actions and ideas.

I’ve gathered a few links exploring the ongoing quest to discern Lincoln’s and Darwin’s relationship to Christianity:

• Abraham Lincoln’s religious beliefs remain a puzzle, despite the fact that he consistently cast the Civil War and the struggle against slavery in moral and religious terms. Mark Noll has written an excellent essay about Lincoln’s beliefs, in which he argues that despite his lack of theological training or regular churchgoing, Lincoln articulated a surprisingly nuanced and thoughtful view of how God relates to nations and political structures. Wikipedia has a thorough review of Lincoln’s many, varied, and often vague references to his religious beliefs. One reason it’s hard to get a grasp on Lincoln’s beliefs is the tendency for different generations to interpret Lincoln’s words and deeds in radically different ways.



• Charles Darwin is remembered less fondly by many Christians today due to his theory of evolution, which continues to be a major issue in many Christian churches and denominations today. But was Darwin himself religious, or even Christian? Answers in Genesis, although certainly critical of Darwin’s legacy, has a very thorough look at Darwin’s religious beliefs and influences that challenges us not to be too quick to cast Darwin as a saint or a devil. For more on Darwin’s ongoing influence today, see this essay about Darwin in the New York Times earlier this week.

Given their massive role in shaping Western society, there’s no shortage of information online and in your local library about these two historical giants. (And their shared birthday has inspired others to link the two as fellow culture-shapers.) Whether you think Lincoln was a saintly leader or a conniving politician; whether you consider Darwin a champion of reason or a destroyer of faith, today’s a good day to read up a bit on one or both of these historical—and perhaps religious—icons.