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Christians are supposed to develop spiritual strength. It’s not just that they’re empowered by God from outside and above themselves (though that’s absolutely true, praise God!), and it’s not just that they have natural powers and abilities (though that’s relatively true, though personal mileage may vary). In addition, there is such a thing as spiritual strength. You might think of it as a middle category between outside help and natural ability. It’s a real, theological thing. Paul prays for it in Eph 3:16: “That God might grant you according to the riches of his glory, that ye may be strengthened by his Spirit in the inner man.” (Geneva Bible translation because I’m about to quote an author contemporary w/KJV 1611.) It takes a fine theological reader to notice that “strengthening the inner man” in this passage refers to this third category of power: not…

Q: LATC 2025’s theme is Receiving Redemption, and it focuses on how salvation is received by human persons and communities. Why did this aspect of soteriology catch your attention and make you propose a paper on it? A: I think it’s a well-timed topic considering the release of the new Oxford handbook of deification this year. Also, I think there are perennial questions about when and how and who receives redemption that are always worth exploring more carefully to make sure that we get God and the gospel right. Also, I found it interesting that it was not titled receiving salvation! Since redemption is Barth’s preferred term for the third act (creation, reconciliation, redemption) and since the Scriptures are clear that redemption is for the whole cosmos, I am excited to see if and how people discuss the specifics of that word.  Q: The title of your…

Q: LATC 2025’s theme is Receiving Redemption, and it focuses on how salvation is received by human persons and communities. Why did this aspect of soteriology catch your attention and make you propose a paper on it? A: The intersection of doctrine and ethics is one that especially interests me, and many of the questions surrounding our reception of salvation push on some abiding tensions in Christian theology. Insofar as those tensions create obstacles that make it harder to see how the Gospel inducts us into a particular way of being in the world, I want to try and help the church navigate those obstacles where and when I can. Q: The title of your paper is “Being in Response: The Role of Gratitude in Reconciliation”. How will you be approaching the conference theme in this paper? A:  Søren Kierkegaard writes in a journal entry that…

I’ve been sharing brief interviews with the theologians who will be presenting papers at Los Angeles Theology Conference 2025 (Mar 12-14, registration here). I really enjoyed Fellipe do Vale’s answers to these questions, and am looking forward to his paper in which he works out an applied soteriology that goes from a high-level Augustinian account of the nature of sin all the way down to… clothes! Q: LATC 2025’s theme is Receiving Redemption, and it focuses on how salvation is received by human persons and communities. Why did this aspect of soteriology catch your attention and make you propose a paper on it? A: I am endlessly interested in finding out about the reception of our salvation impacts how we live our daily lives. So often, we have a “stated theology” about redemption and a very different “lived theology”; I think this is a problem, and…

Jacqui Service’s LATC parallel paper is a perfect example of a conference paper in which a scholar extends and explains a recent book. Dr. Service’s summer 2024 book on the Trinity still seems brand new, and her proposal for how to talk about the God-world relation in redemption has not yet been adequately engaged by the scholarly community. Enter the conference paper! Without simply reporting on or rehashing her monograph, Dr. Service builds on that work and takes the next step, a step directly in line with the conference theme. Theology conferences are fit for many purposes, but one of my favorites is this intelligent use of a scholarly gathering to circulate large-scale theological projects in manageable small sizes. Conferences are also great for getting to hear the speaking voice of authors who you’ve only read. It’s always striking for the voice in your…

Dr. Sherelle Ducksworth is a theologian at Clamp Divinity School of Anderson University. She will be presenting one of the twelve parallel papers at LATC 2025, March 12-14 at Biola University. Here’s a quick interview with Dr. Ducksworth about her paper. Q: LATC 2025’s theme is Receiving Redemption, and it focuses on how salvation is received by human persons and communities. Why did this aspect of soteriology catch your attention and make you propose a paper on it? A: I have always been interested in contemplating theology constructively. I was teaching a class on a trinitarian soteriology, and the notion of grace began to intrigue me. I wondered how beginning with God’s triune being and life might shape how to understand the doctrine of grace. Q: The title of your paper is “A Trinitarian Approach to Grace.” How will you be approaching the conference theme in this…

I’m eagerly looking forward to this paper at the 2025 L.A. Theology Conference (register here!). Tom Dove is working on the doctrine of conversion, and this paper is a great opportunity to hear some of his analysis of this important doctrine. Here’s our interview: Q: LATC 2025’s theme is Receiving Redemption, and it focuses on how salvation is received by human persons and communities. Why did this aspect of soteriology catch your attention and make you propose a paper on it? A: For as much of my Christian life as I can remember, I’ve been interested in how the gospel effects change among individuals, communities, and societies. A few years back this interest—unexpectedly—led me to the doctrine of conversion, which I now think is a kind of “ground zero” for exploring the relation between grace and change in the Christian life. To my mind, claims how…

Los Angeles Theology Conference is officially not an interdisciplinary conference. An important part of our brand has always been sharply focusing on the discipline of theology, and on topics that are immediately recognizable as doctrinal. Even our participants who are trained in philosophy, biblical studies, and history—and we’ve had lots of them—are game to step up to theological subject matter proper for LATC. The distinction may not always by precise, but in an age when (it seems to me) most academic theology gatherings tend toward “theology and x,” LATC has an intentional focus on “theology, period.” But all truth is connected, theologians consider doctrines across all sorts of boundaries, and of course theology’s remit is to study all things in light of God. So an intentional focus on doctrine will always bring with some exceptions and borderline cases. The 2025 conference on applied soteriology…

Kathryn Tanner, the Frederick Marquand Professor of Systematic Theology at Yale Divinity School, will be delivering a plenary address at the Los Angeles Theology Conference (March 12-14). Registration is still open, so join us for this excellent spring conference located in sunny Southern California and featuring a wide range of participants from all around the USA, Europe, and Australia. Q: LATC 2025’s theme is Receiving Redemption, and it focuses on how salvation is received by human persons and communities. Why is this aspect of soteriology worth close theological attention? A: I think this question of human reception has a crucial bearing on all sorts of other theological issues—who Christ is, how Christ works, the nature of grace, and so on. It shouldn’t be neglected, therefore. Q: The title of your plenary address is “Unconditional Grace and the Problem of Reception.” How will you be approaching the…

The first plenary address at LATC 2025 (register now!) will be a wide-ranging introduction to the theology of receiving salvation. This talk, on Wednesday evening, will be by Andrew Davison, Regius Professor of Divinity at Oxford. It will be open to the public at no charge, though you do need to register (did I mention you should register for the conference? We need to know how much coffee to order). Professor Davison took the time to answer a few questions about the subject. Here’s what he had to say: Q: LATC 2025’s theme is Receiving Redemption, and it focuses on how salvation is received by human persons and communities. Why is this aspect of soteriology worth close theological attention? A: It’s a fascinating and important topic for several reasons. I’ll stick to three. First, the topic of how salvation is received is less often discussed…

I don’t play favorites with the breakout sessions at LATC, and I’m excited about all (twelve!) of them. But I have to admit that the way Charles Helmer has developed his theology of divine hearing in the direction of our conference theme has really drawn me in. Helmer’s explanation of what it means, and why it matters, that God hears us, is a wonderful mixture of biblical imagery, classical doctrine, and contemporary application. If you can get to Los Angeles on March 12-14, 2025, you need to come to the Los Angeles Theology Conference. We won’t be broadcasting or recording it, and the in-person experience is wonderfully engaging and welcoming. There will be a book in due course, but the gathering is the thing. Here’s a quick exchange with Helmer about his paper: Q: LATC 2025’s theme is Receiving Redemption, and it focuses on…

Cambria Kaltwasser will be at LATC 2025 in March presenting a paper that uses friendship as a theological category for thinking about the dynamics of salvation. Her work will feature one of the closest engagements with the thought of Karl Barth at the conference, which will add a lot to the mix. I asked her a few questions about the paper; here are her answrs. Q: LATC 2025’s theme is Receiving Redemption, and it focuses on how salvation is received by human persons and communities. Why did this aspect of soteriology catch your attention and make you propose a paper on it? A: The conference theme evokes questions that have long animated me regarding grace and human agency. Like many of my fellow Reformed theologians, I inherited a certain allergy toward anything smacking of works righteousness, which too often included any concrete account of personal regeneration in…

With the 2025 Los Angeles Theology Conference coming up in March, I’m posting mini-interviews with some of our speakers, asking them to share about what they’ll be presenting at the conference. We’re excited to have Todd Billings with us this year. Here’s what he’ll be speaking about: Q: LATC 2025’s theme is Receiving Redemption, and it focuses on how salvation is received by human persons and communities. Why is this aspect of soteriology worth close theological attention? The gift of life in Christ is exactly that—a gift. Yet it is an astonishing drama that we can easily lose sight of. Forgiveness and new life are not abstract concepts, nor are they rewards for our hard work or earnest praise. By the Spirit’s work, we are united to Christ through faith and receive an identity and calling that we did not create. We are adopted children of…

With the 2025 Los Angeles Theology Conference coming up in March, I’m posting mini-interviews with some of our speakers, asking them to share about what they’ll be presenting at the conference. We’re excited to have Frederick Bauerschmidt with us this year. Here’s what he’ll be speaking about: Q: LATC 2025’s theme is Receiving Redemption, and it focuses on how salvation is received by human persons and communities. Why is this aspect of soteriology worth close theological attention? A: Thomas Aquinas said that knowledge is received by a knower in a way that is suited to that knower, and I think the same is true of grace: grace is received by us in a way that is suited to the kind of beings that we are. To me this suggest that in thinking about salvation we need to think not just about how God gives it,…

Here’s video (below) and a rough manuscript (below below) of a sermon I preached for my church, Grace Evangelical Free Church of La Mirada, on Jan 26, 2025. We’re preaching through the book of Acts, and have reached chapter 19, the period of Paul’s resident teaching ministry in Ephesus. The story we’re going to learn from today gives us guidance in how to keep our focus on the main thing. When life gets noisy, when there’s a lot going on, when we’re surrounded by distractions, and when people start shouting, that’s when we need to be called back to the main thing, the big picture, the real truth. Somebody has said that the main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing. That’s good advice, even if we’re just talking about business management or productivity. Focus, concentrate, bring things to a point….

I had a chat via email with Julie Canlis about what she’ll be presenting at the Los Angeles Theology Conference (March 12-14 at Biola). Click through to see the list of all 16 presentations, and join us in March if you can. It’s going to be a significant conversation among leading theologians on a major topic. Here’s one quick peek at one plenary speaker’s contribution: Q: LATC 2025’s theme is Receiving Redemption, and it focuses on how salvation is received by human persons and communities. Why is this aspect of soteriology worth close theological attention? A: Sometimes I think we are so fixated on salvation, that we forget that we have a part to play. Jesus saved us so that we can become the kind of people who experience salvation in all the depths of our being now – so we can become living icons…

There’s a passage in Basil of Caesarea’s Against Eunomius (written 364) that is so helpful that I keep coming back to it over and over. I think I had to see it quoted about a dozen times before I finally began to recognize just how good it is. It may not jump out and grab you instantly. But if you’re trying to think about the absolutely fundamental principles of trinitarian theology, Basil makes a few moves in this passage that draw everything together. I was about to make a handout of the passage for students, when I realized it would be better to put it here in public. So here it is. It’s got everything: conceptual clarity, terminological precision, and epistemic distinctions that help keep you on track. I’ll add a little commentary below, but the main thing to see here is primary text…

A while ago, I did some teaching about the doctrine of eternal generation. It’s something I teach about plenty: see this book, or this chapter, or this free article at Desiring God. As I wrapped up the lesson, a friend asked about the terminology. The exchange took place on social media, but with someone I know in real life. He’s not a trained theologian but is an active church member, and he has legal training which he uses both in practicing and teaching law. You’ll see the fine, analytic turn of his mind in the way he poses this (lightly edited) question: Under the ordinary lay use of “generate” as I understand it (something akin to “create” or “cause to come into being”) the notion of eternal generation appears self-contradictory, as something generated must have not existed before it was generated. (This would also…