Transgender people are no longer rare: from President Biden’s assistant secretary for health, Rachel Levine, to prime TV interviews, movies, documentaries, sporting events, and glossy magazine covers. (Remember when Bruce “became” Caitlyn Jenner?) The media has presented the faces of “successful” gender transitioners—people who look fitting and right with their new opposite-gender appearance. High-paid entertainers […]
I am Chinese and grew up in a traditional Taoist-Buddhist family. At the age of 18, I started practicing Zen Buddhist meditation and continued to do so for 20 years until my conversion to Christianity. Coming from an Asian background, I have been amazed at how Eastern meditation has garnered such gigantic interest in the […]
The characteristics of authentic Christian meditation, drawn from Scripture, are as follows: It recognizes our feeble spiritual condition. The psalmist asks to be cleansed from secret faults and be kept from presumptuous sins. See Ps. 19:12, 13. Nowhere does Scripture talk about getting in touch with an internal divine spark or with one’s immortal soul—there […]
On May 14, 1948, the modern State of Israel declared its statehood in portions of Palestine once inhabited by its ancient people. A secular democracy, it was formed as a cultural homeland for both religious and nonreligious Jews. Despite strong opposition, many Jews and Christians cite God’s promise to Abraham and his descendants to support […]
You may not realize this, but many Christian authors, radio hosts, and television producers who talk about “the end times” have accepted a system of prophetic interpretation called dispensationalism. Whether or not these teachers themselves even recognize this, one thing is obvious: they usually place the Jewish people at the epicenter of events predicted to […]
No piece of real estate in the world has generated more attention than the Temple Mount in Jerusalem. Situated on Mt. Moriah, where Abraham prepared to sacrifice Isaac, the site is considered holy to Jews, Christians, and Muslims. Here, Solomon’s magnificent temple stood from the tenth century BC until Babylon destroyed it in 586 BC. […]
The word Armageddon is mentioned only once in the Bible. We find it in Revelation 16:12–16 during the sixth of seven last judgments God sends upon the earth just before Jesus returns: “Then the sixth angel poured out his bowl on the great river Euphrates, and its water was dried up, so that the way of the kings […]
Fourteen-year-old Kim was comfortable with her life in a missionary family. True, at church she just went through the motions, but she “knew enough ‘Christianese’ to get by.” Although she had no personal relationship with God, she was satisfied to think of herself as a baby Christian. Now she comments that the baby hadn’t grown […]
In the writings and traditions of the three Abrahamic faiths—Jews, Christians, and Muslims—a coming Messiah will judge the world and usher in a reign of righteousness. While some Jews are still looking for their promised Messiah, Christians believe that Jesus of Nazareth fulfilled those prophecies in His incarnation, death, resurrection, and ascension; now they await […]
Have you ever stood before a piece of modern art, trying in vain to make sense of it? Shapes suggest, colors hint, but no coherent pattern emerges. Asking innocently What’s the artist’s point? comes with the condescending answer, Don’t stand in judgment about what a modern artist finds meaningful! The incoherence of art is only […]