This blog will be quiet through the weekend while I attend The Spirit of Sports, the 2015 Symposium on Faith and Culture at Baylor University in Waco, Texas. I’ll be presenting a paper tomorrow afternoon on “Anabaptist Visions of Sport” — see a preview here — and then enjoying panels and addresses featuring everyone from philosopher Jamie Smith to historian … More Deep in the Heart of Texas
Growing up, my favorite two pages in any book were Hymns 381-382 in The Covenant Hymnal (1973): “Day by Day and with Each Passing Moment” and “Children of the Heavenly Father,” both originally written in Swedish by the great Lina Sandell. If the stale old joke is actually true and Swedish is the language of heaven, then surely the … More Children of the Heavenly Father
It’s October 31st, which means it’s time to continue an annual Reformation Day tradition: I don’t know how happy I ought to be that this video will probably end up being the most popular thing I’ve ever done. But for today, let’s embrace it, overlook all the terrible things that resulted from the Reformation, and … More Happy Reformation Day
Until he died last night, I had no idea that horror film director Wes Craven had graduated from Wheaton College. (He discussed his fundamentalist Baptist upbringing and his decision to flee from it in a 2011 interview with the New York Times Magazine.) Of course, this got me wondering: who else would I be surprised to learn … More Who Are the Most Surprising Christian College Alumni?
From my very first Christmastide as a blogger… Because it’s about the parents of Jesus, it makes for a decent sequel to my previous post. Not just Boxing Day, Return Unwanted Gifts Day, or Two Turtle Doves Day, the second day of Christmas has enormous theological importance: It reminds us that when the angels returned to the … More Best of The Pietist Schoolman: “What Child Is This?”
Next month my colleague Sam Mulberry and I are again taking a group of Bethel University students on a three-week trip to Europe to study the history of World War I. I’m especially excited to be in Europe during the first year of the war’s ongoing centenary, and will try to find a way to … More All Is Calm: The Christmas Truce of 1914
Today I’m happy to present a guest post on J. S. Bach and Pietism. It comes from Chuck King, visiting assistant professor of music at Trinity International University, where he teaches courses in music and worship and music history, as well as directing the Symphonic Band. He has three decades of experience as a pastoral minister … More Bach and Pietism (Chuck King)
J. D. Woods, a professor in the Art Department here at Grace and an acoustic musician, is one my favorite colleagues and he often gets asked to perform with his guitar or banjo. I can easily see Pete Seeger’s influence on his life. Yesterday morning, I found the following note from him in my inbox: … More A Colleague Remembers Pete Seeger
Track this and tell me that God doesn’t work in mysterious ways: 1. When I was hired to come to a Baptist/Pietist/evangelical college as the new European historian, I was expected to teach an upper-level course on the Reformations. The last time I had studied this chapter in history was… oh, the first week of … More Why I’m Almost a Lutheran
I’m off to Baltimore, Maryland to attend the annual meeting of the Evangelical Theological Society. It will be only my second trip to Charm City — and I’m not sure that attending a conference hosted at the Hilton while staying in a room with a view (I’m promised) of Camden Yards is quite a representative … More The Streets of Baltimore
The Pietist Schoolman 