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How Coaching Youth Sports Helped My Thinking about Christian Character

The most important activity that helped refine my view of character education was not taking classes on epistemology and ethics from Dallas Willard. Nor was it taking all my other Ph.D. classes that addressed virtue or moral development. It was coaching youth league sports. Granted, readings in philosophy, ethics, and theology led me to recognize…
June 25, 2025
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AI and the Grammar of Descent

Recently, there’s been even more press than usual about AI proliferation and its associated risks. The hype has been driven, in part, by the now infamous Ross Douthat interview with Daniel Kokotajlo, executive director of the A.I. Futures Project, in which Kokotajlo suggests that AI could take over civilization—and “then kill all the humans”—by 2027.…
June 24, 2025
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God Made All Nations from One Blood: The Origins of a Biblical Argument against Slavery

In 1526, William Tyndale’s ground-breaking translation of the English New Testament appeared. In this translation, Tyndale used a unique phrase that was not in John Wycliffe’s original English translation. Instead of translating a key passage from Paul’s sermon to the Athenians in Wycliffe’s original way, “ made of one all the kind of men” (Acts…
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Mirrors Transformed by Light:Meditations on the God Who Is Light

I’d like to propose a thought experiment -- one that may transform your understanding of something you see every day. Thought experiments can change the world, or at least your understanding of it. Einstein’s great scientific breakthroughs started with a thought experiment, something like this one. For our experiment, imagine how a mirror works. If…

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Scapegoating: Baby Steps at the Dead Sea

Sometime in your life, you have been a scapegoat. At some point in your life, you have been at the bottom of a pecking order, or at least very near to it, and you have felt ashamed and afraid. It’s likely that this experience morally compromised you. Maybe you lied to protect yourself. Maybe you…
June 10, 2024
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How to Articulate and Incarnate Your Institution’s Christian Identity: Lessons from Australia

Developing a theologically-informed vision of excellence about any topic, such as Christian higher education, requires not only serious theological and empirical study but also two other important things: 1. Studying the topic’s history; 2. Making international comparisons. Regarding the latter, one of the wonderful things about doing international research in Christian higher education is that…
June 7, 2024
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It Takes a Village to Form a Christian Scholar

I can still recall my nervousness as I taught my first classes at a Christian college. I was well-educated in electrical engineering at a large secular university, which is to say I was not well-educated in anything else. I had spent many years being catechized to think like an engineer, but faith remained largely peripheral…
June 4, 2024
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Intolerance and the Riddle of Words

“I don’t understand why Christians have to be so intolerant of others.” I had just finished a moderated discussion on religious pluralism with an articulate professor from another university who argued that all religions and forms of spirituality are equally valid options in today’s diverse world. I agreed that different religions and spiritual practices could…
May 28, 2024
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Atypical Conversations with Students about Their Research Projects

When I was a doctoral student, one mentor secretly sent their friend (another professor) to my poster at a professional conference to ask the most difficult methodological and statistical questions about my research content. I think my mentor viewed this as an initiation of some kind to the academic presentation experience. Suffice it to say,…
May 23, 2024
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On Going to Church: Mimesis and Magnificence

Recently, thanks to a collaboration with fellow CCCU school Gordon College, I was able to spend a month in Italy teaching art history to a wonderful group of Christian students. This was, of course, a priceless opportunity for an art historian. Italy abounds in stellar museums and archaeological sites, and over the years, I have…
May 21, 2024