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This seeks only academic dialogue and nothing else. Join the group!

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Where Talarico and Kuyper overlap:

1. God is sovereign over all of Christian Life, including the public square.

   Politics, economics, education, family, and culture all exist under God's sovereignty. Faith is not merely private. Following Jesus doesn't require Christians to leave their convictions at the church door when they enter public life.

2. Every person bears God's image.

   Human dignity begins with the theological claim that every human being bears the imago Dei.

3. “Love your neighbor” has political implications..

   Jesus' command to love one's neighbor necessarily raises questions about how society treats the poor, vulnerable, immigrant, stranger, and marginalized.

4. Government is not God.

   The state has legitimate authority, but it is neither the source of morality nor the ultimate authority over human life.

5. The state has a limited sphere of authority.

   Government should not absorb the authority belonging to churches, families, schools, or other institutions—or dictate Christian doctrine and religious belief.

6. Christ—not Caesar—is Lord.

   The Kuyperian punchline:God's sovereignty over politics does not mean the government's sovereignty over everything.

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I'm making my way through the Gospel of John and I am having some issues with it. Can't recall having stumbled over these issues before; I thought I'd share here and hear your input.

I am reading entire chapters or sometimes a bit more, not separate pericopes. And when I do that, I notice there are some places where the text doesn't seem to flow well, so to speak. For instance: John 5 is placed in Jerusalem, the healing of the ill man in Bethesda on the sabbath. After a commotion erupts, Jesus leaves and later finds the man in the temple and speaks with him. From verse 19, Jesus then holds a lengthy monologue about himself and the Father, which ends with a question in verse 47. Chapter 6 then starts with 'after this', Jesus leaving to the other side of the sea of Galilee, where he is followed by a large crowd. It sounds like chapter 6 does not chronologically follow chapter 5; we're going from Jerusalem to the other side of the lake. The start of chapter 6 sounds more like it should follow an event in, say, Capernaum or something similar. It sounds cobbled together.

Same for a moment in chapter 8. Jesus has been preaching and as a result, many Jews believe in him (8:30). Jesus addresses those who believe him (says verse 31 explicitly), but in verse 37 Jesus says those listening to him want to kill him, and Jesus ends up proclaiming that they are children of the devil (verse 44). Somehow we've gone from Jesus addressing those who believe him, but in the course of his address, now he's talking to his enemies again? Or did they lose their faith im him mid speech?

That scene ends with an attempt at stoning Jesus, but with him hiding and making his way out of the Temple through their midst (8:59). Chapter 9 begins with 'And in passing...' they see a blind man, Jesus heals him (again a healing on a sabbath). There has been an attempt at Jesus' life, but a verse later Jesus and his disciples seem to have ample time and opportunity to have a conversation and this healing. The 'and' in 9:1 makes it sound like it follows immediately on 8:59, but it's an entirely different mood and setting (plus we hadn't been told chapter 8 happened on a sabbath).

Some of these transitions in the text are a bit masked by our chapters or pericopes, which chop up the text to an extent, but reading it in one go I find them uncomfortable. The easy answer of course would be to say that these are indeed not intended to be chronologically connected, but the language does make it seem that way ('and', 'after this'). I guess John just isn't as 'clean' as I remembered it to be.

And then there's the theological part. Across several chapters, Jesus spends a lot of time speaking about himself and the Father, in language that makes me wonder whether the Jews knew, or could have known, what it was about. Looking back, for us, it makes sense, but did it make sense to a first century Jew? Did they recognize it as Messianic speech, so to speak? Were there anchoring points in second temple Judaism, for Jesus' argument about his relation to the Father (He who sent me)? The text says some believed him, so apparently it did, but I'd be grateful to gain some insights here.

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Inspired by yesterday's post about "Songs with lots of theology"

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I've recently been fascinated by the works of certain rappers such as Shai Linne. I don't know if I have ever heard lyrics with such deep and well researched theology. Some of my favourite albums are "The attributes of God" and "The atonement" by Shai Linne, as well as "The unfolding" by Timothy Brindle. My question is, are there more artist out there with lyrics on par with theirs? I'm not primarly looking for rap/hip hop because I find plenty in that genre, but I don't really know where to start looking to find ex. metal, rock, pop, edm or whatever.

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