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I begin every semester of teaching my undergraduate apologetics class with a unit on “meta apologetics.” That’s a fancy-sounding phrase, but it simply refers to the study of the nature of apologetics. In other words, before launching into apologetic answers and arguments, time needs to be given to careful reflection on the nature of apologetics itself.

In this unit, we discuss topics like the biblical justification for apologetics, the history of apologetics, the relationship between apologetics and other disciplines like theology, and the underlying assumptions of apologetics. I also introduce students to various strategies and approaches to apologetics including evidential, presuppositional, and existential apologetics.

The point that I always make when discussing these different approaches is that strategy is always dependent on context.

Apologetics done well and effectively must be deeply contextual. It requires that we actively listen to the questions and concerns of the skeptic before offering a response. Further, it requires that we are sensitive to the cultural context in which the skeptic lives. The aspiring apologist who has read a handful of books or watched a few YouTube videos can produce some fine-sounding arguments, but if she hasn’t taken the time to understand the context in which the defense of the gospel is taking place, all her arguments will land with the effectiveness of dissonant gibberish.

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Many people associate the story of Jonah with a giant fish. If you look at most children’s Bibles, the fish fiasco seems to be the main point of the story. This is what Tim Mackie calls “The Veggie Tales Factor.”

While I’d love to dive into Jonah’s flight from God, his pseudo-heartfelt prayer in the belly, or his anger at God’s divine mercy, I want to look at one surprising word in the story.

“And the Lord appointed a great fish to swallow up Jonah. And Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights.” (Jonah 1:17, ESV)

I’ve been sitting with the story of Jonah for over two months now, as well as working my way through the Bible Project’s class on Jonah. A few times in the class, Tim Mackie has suggested spending an afternoon with a cup of tea and a concordance. So I took him up on the idea, but substituted the tea for coffee. For some reason, I got curious about one word. So I started tracing every use of the word swallow in Scripture.

Exploring the original Hebrew or Greek can uncover deeper nuances that enhance our understanding of the biblical text beyond what’s conveyed in English.

At first glance, this might not seem like one of those deeper words. But there’s more going on beneath the surface.

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Have you ever looked for something all over your desk, kitchen counter, or workbench with no success only to see it magically appear right where you were looking one minute before? When your eyes are opened, it can be truly frightening.

That’s kind of what the Kingdom of Heaven is like.

The message was to change your ways—or you’re going to miss something huge! Turn around; there is an amazing reality breathing down your neck and you don’t even know it!

But what does the Kingdom of the Heavens look like? In Matthew’s Gospel, the phrase “Kingdom of Heaven” occurs 32 times in 28 chapters. Take a walk with me through these first 9 chapters of Matthew and see what the Kingdom is like.

Matthew 5:1-12. It is a Kingdom …

Matthew 5:13-16. Kingdom citizens are salt and light to a world of rotten darkness.

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What comes to mind when you hear the phrase “God fearing”?

One of the first things I picture is an old movie. Maybe it’s even black and white. And one of the characters is described as a “God-fearing woman” or a “God-fearing man.” It could even be a John Wayne movie, such as the 1947 feature Angel and the Badman in which John Wayne plays an injured outlaw who is nursed back to health in a proper, God-fearing home.

There was a time when that phrase was commonly used to describe a pious and upstanding member of the community.

But we almost never use the phrase anymore, though a few people may pine with nostalgia for those “olden days” when there were more “decent, God-fearing folks.” The idea of fearing God, however, occurs regularly in the Bible and means something far deeper than being decent, moral, and churchgoing.

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Author’s note: This is my sixth and final article in a series dealing with pastoral burnout. Recent Barna research revealed that 33% of ministers had given serious thought to quitting. My own research for a graduate studies project showed 63% of those surveyed had given or were giving serious thought to quitting the ministry. Previous articles provide an overview to challenges ministers face and how key regular rhythms of renewal like silence and solitude, community and abiding prayer help create resiliency.

I like running, but I hate running on a treadmill. My favorite kind of run is on a dirt path through a wooded area. Makes me feel like a kid again. But the absolute worst kind of run is on a treadmill. It just feels like I am not getting anywhere. Sure, the screen tells me how far I’ve run, but I haven’t really gone anywhere. Ministry can feel like that.

It can feel like you are running really hard but not getting anywhere.

In my research on pastoral burnout, one of the challenges many ministers talked about was the lack of clear, identifiable successes. I could relate to their experiences as I too have struggled in ministry to know if what I was doing was actually doing any good.

In one ministry, I took a side job as a bus driver to make a little extra income for my young family. That job became so rewarding because I had a clear way to identify that I was succeeding: getting the kids to school safely and on time. If only, I would bemoan, there was something like that in ministry.

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“Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house; yet it did not fall, because it had its foundation on the rock. But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash.” (Matthew 7:24-27, NIV)

Building codes may seem complicated, tedious, and expensive, but they exist for a reason. Ignore them, and someone is going to get electrocuted, the toilet won’t drain right, or the basement will flood. A friend of mine in plumbing had a guy who wanted to put a wood-burning stove in his garage. These require very expensive, double-walled stainless steel pipe. He just wanted to use the existing duct work. “You can’t,” my friend said, “It’s too hot. It’ll melt the pipe and burn your garage down.”

His response: “I don’t care.”

In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus has laid out the “best practices” for life construction. Now it’s up to us to decide if they’re worth the effort. Often, they strike us as unrealistic—pie-in-the-sky stuff. The truth is we are the ones who are unrealistic. We use gas line for water, then rage when the fittings leak.

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All of us have habits. Some good; some bad. In The Patient Ferment of the Early Church, Alan Kreider calls habits our embodied behaviors—our reflexes. Habits are not strategies; they are responses. James Clear says diet is not a strategy; it’s about our habits of food placement. Put fruit in a bowl on the counter. Put ice cream in the back of the freezer….of our neighbor’s refrigerator.

We often ask what makes something effective. Just because something works does not make it worthwhile. A person can lose weight by picking up smoking, or spend more time with their family by quitting their job. Those decisions achieve one outcome at the expense of another. Instead, effective means doing what is fruitful and faithful, with neither at the expense of the other.

Our church, White Station, has been studying Paul’s Letter to the Romans for all of 2025. Here are seven habits that transformed the life of that church that can help us to be effective today.

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We say Jesus began his ministry at thirty—but the Greek text never says that.

Luke 3:23 reads, “Jesus, when he began, was about thirty years of age…” Most English translations fill in that beginning with the word “ministry.” You’ll find it in the NIV, the ESV, even the Reina Valera in Spanish. But here’s what most people don’t realize: the word “ministry” doesn’t appear in the original Greek. What Luke actually says is much simpler—Jesus was about thirty years old when He began, after His baptism.

Now, I think I get why the translators added the word. After all, it’s right after Jesus is baptized that He starts preaching, teaching, healing, calling disciples. But Jesus’ baptism only marked the beginning of His public ministry.

So we ought to be careful with that kind of language, because it risks giving the impression that the first thirty years of His life didn’t really count for God. As if He were just biding His time in a workshop, waiting for His real ministry to begin.

But Jesus didn’t see life that way—and neither should we.

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The Restoration Movement emerged from a collective belief that Jesus’ prayer in John 17 called for obedience rather than admiration. Barton W. Stone and Alexander Campbell thought that Christian division was not only bad, but also morally wrong. Jesus asked God to make his followers one so that the world would believe, and they did. For them, unity was not optional, spiritualized, or put off until heaven. It was a command given to the church in the past. So, restoration didn’t start as an experiment; it started as an act of submission. There was a cost to that submission from the start; it took guts to call division disobedience instead of something that had to happen.

The Restoration belief was never that the Bible answers every question completely. Instead, it was that the Bible is clear enough on important issues of faith, obedience, and fellowship.

Stone’s instincts were influenced more by spiritual chaos than by systematic reform. The Cane Ridge Revival of 1801 showed that American Christianity has two sides. This led to a lot of people converting, too much emotion, and the breakdown of the church. Stone did not assert that Scripture was ambiguous; instead, he contended that human systems often contradicted its unifying principles. Revival could bring people back to life, but it couldn’t fix a church that was determined to keep its borders safe. He learned that creeds weren’t just neutral summaries of faith; they were also tools that could be wielded to keep people apart. Tightening control won’t bring people together, something which requires repentance and humility in the presence of the Bible.

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When you think of God, what do you see? I know God is Spirit, but Jesus is God—and so when you think of Him, what does His face look like? Can you bring yourself to look up and lock eyes with Him?

I remember one of my college professors talking about the two extremes the Church tends to swing between. The Church will emphasize God’s love to the point that we forget He is holy. Then it will overcorrect, like a student driver, and emphasize His holiness to the exclusion of His love. The former can lead to churches full of people but with no real, life-changing message to give. The latter can lead to smaller churches marked by legalism.

More and more, I realize that life is tension, and the key to living a fruitful life is learning to live within that tension. As followers of Jesus, we must follow His way—being people of truth and grace, love and holiness, Lion and Lamb.

Jesus held tightly to truth and holiness, yet He was so gracious and loving that He was invited to all the great parties—not by the religious leaders, but by sinners. Jesus was fun to be with, yet He also drew clear lines. He didn’t affirm people’s sin; He called them to swear full allegiance to Him—to die to themselves. He had no problem confronting the self-righteous, yet He was gentle and compassionate toward those who turned to Him.

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