Dr. Greene's Writings

Our last essay ended with the suggestion that being saved means more than having our sins forgiven. It involves a new life; that's why it is spoken of as being born again. In John 7:38, Jesus says that if we believe in him, from our innermost being will flow rivers of living water. Water is essential to life. This promise is that we are to be channels through which life from God is to be communicated to others. That's exciting, but also a bit scary. It implies a closeness to God in every side

Before we go back to the topics that we were considering last spring, we need to look a little farther at the differences between secular and Christian schooling. They both have nothing but the creation for curriculum. The secular school, however, in its goal of preparing students for today's culture, is really trying to help students gloss over or forget the void, which exists in the heart of every human being. It seeks to equip students for success. In this connection, Nord says in Religion

We have been talking about the Christian worldview in recent issues. A worldview is a window on the world, a perspective from which we see the world we live in. Everyone has one, thought people are not usually conscious of that. Walsh and Middleton say that a worldview answers four questions: who am I, where am I, what's wrong, and what is the remedy? The Christian worldview is often defined as: creation, fall and redemption. In talking about the World of God as the means of creation, we have

In the last article we discussed the fall of Adam and Eve and noted that while they had freedom to disobey God, their disobedience changed them so that they did not have the power on their own to undo what they had done. God had to do that. However, before we talk about God's plan and what it cost Him, we need to look more carefully at just what our first parents (and so we, ourselves) lost when they fell and what this says about the real meaning of the gospel.

Early Eden

"He who has ears to hear, let him hear."
Mark 4:9

Recently in these brief essays we have been thinking about the Word of God, what it is and what it says. Today we want to turn to the topic of our response to the Word. We encounter the Word in at least three ways: in the Bible, which is the written Word, in Christ, who is the living Word, and in the creation, which was brought into being and is maintained by the Word (Hebrews 1:3). Since the creation provides the entire

We are back now to our original topic, that is an alternative consciousness gained through a Christian worldview. The first element in that worldview is creation. We live in a created world. Neither we ourselves, or our environment we live in, just happened by chance. The entire world that we are conscious of, came to exist as the result of a creative act by the living God. Our question this time is how did God create the world?

The answer of the Bible is that God spoke

The Word of God called everything that exists into being. Further, it continues to exist only because of that same word. The Bible is the written form of the Word. It may be helpful at this point to ask, what is the central message of the Bible?

Several answers are possible. The central theme of the Scriptures certainly is the Person of Christ, the incarnate Word of God. Another answer might be the greatness of God, which includes a number of other ideas such as love, or

Last month's digression on the topic of public school needs at least a little more discussion. Hence the topic for this month.

Let us say again that Christians should be concerned about the government school system and, as much as they are able, involved in it. We should be thankful for those who are active in this way, and for Christians who feel they can teach in the secular school in good conscience. We can thank God for their witness, even though it is severely

In earlier essays I have suggested that Christian schools should lead students to develop an alternative consciousness, i.e. a different way of seeing the world than the people around us have. A worldview, sometimes called a plausibility structure, is something everyone has, though we are seldom conscious of it. It is a framework within which we understand the world we live in. We don't usually even realize we have one, because worldviews are usually held below the level of consciousness.