Theopolis Institute teaches men and women to lead cultural renewal by renewing the church. Participants in our various programs—our courses, conferences, and publications—will gain competence to read the Bible imaginatively, worship God faithfully, and engage the culture intelligently.

Theopolis Conversation See more ››

  • The Rite of Circumcision: A Response to Dru Johnson

    by Alastair Roberts on April 18, 2019
    Dr Dru Johnson has written a wonderful and perceptive essay on the connection between ethics and ritual knowing. Although I find myself in fundamental agreement with his perspective, I thought that it might be helpful to investigate his approach from the vantage point of the particular case of circumcision, seeing how effectively his approach can account…

  • A Response to Dru Johnson

    by Peter Leithart on April 11, 2019
    “Ritual” has had a tough time of it in the modern age. Modernity thrives on innovation; ritual is repetition of the same old, same old, with “dead” serving as an almost instinctive modifier. Christians, especially Evangelical Protestants, adopt this stance, on the belief that Jesus freed us from ceremony to bring us to a realm…

  • Moral and Ritual Knowing

    by Dru Johnson on April 4, 2019
    The biblical authors largely consider ethical preparation to be an essential feature of a ritual’s ability to “work.” By “ethical,” I mean their moral responsibilities based on their history and relation to God, enemies, neighbors, aliens, children, animals, homes, and the dirt beneath their feet. By “work,” I mean the ritual’s ability to show the participants something they…

Theopolis Articles

  • A Daughter of Abraham

    by Ralph Smith on April 16, 2019
    Some of the key ways Biblical writers draw attention to important details in their stories are by the use of key words, repetition, and structural devices like chiasms and parallel constructions. The Bible sounds different, even odd, to us sometimes because of the use of these and similar literary conventions. Moreover, when we do not…

  • Rehabilitating Autonomy

    by Mark Horne on April 9, 2019
    It is pretty standard in conservative Christian circles to condemn unbelief for pretensions of “autonomy.” Cornelius Van Til famously (at least among those of us who knows who he is) said that “There is no alternative but that of theonomy and autonomy.” Greg Bahnsen appealed to this quotation by labeling his particular view of the…

  • Jesus: Preacher of Paradox

    by Ralph Smith on April 2, 2019
    Jesus was the greatest teacher who ever taught — the Light of the World, whose pure Truth brought sight to the blind (John 9). Almost no one — even those who speak openly against Him — disputes His reputation as a wise and good teacher of the way of love. The famous line from the…

  • The Book of Esther in Covenant History

    by James B. Jordan on March 28, 2019
    It is clear that the events in Esther are an integral part of the history of the formation of the Restoration Covenant Era. Amalek attacks. Amalek is spoiled. The spoils are used to build the Temple, in the sense that the crude Temple of Zerubbabel can now be glorified with these spoils.  This is not…

  • A Positive View of Music

    by John Ahern on March 26, 2019
    It is not coincidental that John Calvin speaks most strongly in defense of vernacular language just after his defense of singing in church. "From this also it plainly appears that public prayers must be couched not in Greek among the Latins, nor in Latin among the French or English, as has heretofore been the custom,…

  • The Reopened Wounds of Jacob

    by Alastair Roberts on March 19, 2019
    In A Voyage Around the World, George Anson recounts the effects of scurvy upon an unfortunate man: But a most extraordinary circumstance, and what would be scarcely credible upon any single evidence, is, that the scars of wounds which had been for many years healed, were forced open again by this virulent distemper. Of this,…

  • The Way My Story Goes: Interview with Singer-Songwriter Jamie Soles

    by Christian Leithart on March 12, 2019
    Jamie Soles is the reason I know my way around a guitar. When my guitar teacher put the sheet music for Eine Kleine Nachtmusick in my fourteen-year-old hands, I balked. He gave me “Foggy Mountain Breakdown.” I learned half of it. At home, I ignored my teacher’s instructions and tugged out a plastic-bound book of Bible…

  • The Mother’s Smile: Integrative Beauty

    by Esther Lightcap Meek on March 5, 2019
    This is a tough era for mothers. Regard for mothers, while it is always booming in some circles, is decidedly lacking in the prevailing winds of the milieu. In high demand by contrast is contribution to the work force, being a consumer, and basic economic survival, often as a solitary individual, in an environment that…

  • Seeking Integration in a Fragmented World: D.C. Schindler: Are you open to the heart of things?

    by Esther Lightcap Meek on February 26, 2019
    After the dark quiet of the year’s beginning, I return now to pick up the threads of my reflection on integration. This is my own personal inquiry, and for me it is no academic exercise but rather the forefront of my personal quest for the real. My hope is that you may be nourished by…

  • The Chiastic Structure of Lord of the Rings

    by Kelly Kerr on February 19, 2019
    The chiastic structure of The Hobbit we considered in the previous essay is highly suggestive of what might lie in store for The Lord of the Rings saga. It is undoubtedly the case that J. R. R. Tolkien was a literary craftsman. It may even be the case he is more of a craftsman than he is…

  • The Chiastic Structure of the Hobbit

    by Kelly Kerr on February 5, 2019
    Structure plays an important part of any literary work, whether poetry or prose. It adds to the beauty and depth of the work and allows insight to be gained about what the author is trying to communicate. The question that concerns us here is whether or not there exists an underlying structure in J. R.…

  • Learning the Language of Arrival

    by Eric Robinson on January 29, 2019
    Can we learn to communicate from an outside intelligence? Spoiler Alert! If you have not yet seen the movie, this article may provide you with a great deal more information than you wished to know at this point. Since the 1999 film The Matrix received careful scrutiny on many fronts regarding its possible underlying Christian…

  • Sex and the City (Part 2)

    by Richard Bledsoe on January 24, 2019
    The first quotation at the heading of PART 1 is from J. D. Unwin's Sex and Culture, a 676 page volume published in 1934.  The second quotation is from a lecture given by Freud at the University of Vienna, and it parallels the theme of his book, Civilization and Its Discontents.[v]  A primary motivation for the researching…

  • Sex and the City (Part 1)

    by Richard Bledsoe on January 17, 2019
    Sometimes a man has been heard to declare that he wishes both to enjoy the advantage of high culture and to abolish compulsory continence.  The inherent desire of the human organism, however, seems to be such that these desires are incompatible, or even contradictory.  Any human society is free to choose either to display great energy or…

  • Waters of Earth and Heaven

    by James B. Jordan on January 10, 2019
    Genesis 2:5 says that no shrub yet existed in the earth and no field plant had sprouted for two reasons. The first is that "Yahweh God had not caused rain upon the earth," and the second is that "there was no man to serve the soil." Then v. 6 explains that "a spring used to…

  • An Epiphany Hymn: Nations to Him Shall Come

    by Brian G Daigle on January 8, 2019
    This hymn was written by Brian Daigle and is based on the Epiphany lectionary readings. It follows the tune of "We Three Kings." Brian is the priest and rector of Christ the Redeemer Anglican Church. He is also Headmaster and teacher at Sequitur Classical Academy and Director of Chesterton College. Brian lives in Baton Rouge with his wife,…

  • The Church Calendar in Outline

    by James B. Jordan on January 3, 2019
    As a rite of command performance worship, danced before the throne of God for His pleasure, the Church Year is a form of covenant recital or covenant rehearsal. The recital of the covenant in Scripture takes two forms. The first is the recounting of the great acts of redemption that God has wrought on behalf…

  • A New Evangelism? Reconsidering Evangelism in Light of Social Justice and Sexual Assault

    by Mario A. Russo on January 1, 2019
    The recent developments of the #metoo and #churchtoo movements has shed new light on sexual assault in the United States. Its impact has been felt at the highest court in the country. Amid this, a new statement distinguishing the gospel from social justice was published by some within conservative evangelicalism. They are seeking to defend…

  • The Jephthah-Jesus Connection

    by Eric Robinson on December 27, 2018
    Why there is more to Jephthah than meets than eye It was not that long ago that I realized the Jephthah-story and the Jesus-story were basically the same story. Sounds crazy, I know. But here is a one-paragraph synopsis of both: The people of God have gone their own way, chasing after other gods, and…

  • Jesus Rejoiced

    by Peter Leithart on December 25, 2018
    G.K. Chesterton famously said that the Gospels don’t reveal Jesus’ mirth. It’s true we never catch Jesus laughing. But can we believe He never did? I don’t think so. Laughter is human, and Jesus was fully human. Jesus promised that those who mourned would laugh. He mourned; would He not also have laughed? Jesus spent…
More articles...