Bible and Theology on Heroes

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The Difference Between Heroes and Saints

Author

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It turns out the Christian story is a good story in which to learn to fail. As the ethicist Samuel Wells has written, some stories feature heroes and some stories feature saints and the difference bet...

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Villians Over Heroes

Author

Dante Alighieri

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In imaginary works it is difficult to make virtuous characters as believable and attractive as bad characters. The villains of literature and screen–Captain Ahab, the boys who go bad in Lord of the Fl...

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Heroes on this Earth

Author

Philip Rhinelander

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If ever mortal men found a real hero on this earth, those men were the disciples. They, indeed, were hero-worshippers. Then think of the horrid shock and shame which overwhelmed them at the Cross. It ...

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The First Diciples: Real Heroes

Author

Philip J. Rhinelander

Keywords

Scripture

Mark 15:22-41, John 19:16-30, 1 Corinthians 1:18

If ever mortal men found a real hero on this earth, those men were the disciples. They, indeed, were hero-worshippers. Then think of the horrid shock and shame which overwhelmed them at the Cross. It ...

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A Saint Like Us

Author

Stuart R. Strachan, Jr.

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Scripture

Acts 16:30-33, Romans 8:38-39, Hebrews 7:25, John 5:24, John 15:6-8, 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18, Ephesians 6:18, Jeremiah 33:3, Psalm 86:3, John 15:1-10

For the most part, when we think of saints or heroes of the faith, we think of people who are altogether different than we are. They seem to embody a quality of communion with God that is impossible f...

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Scripture Filled with Non-Heroic Figures

Author

Eugene H. Peterson

Keywords

Scripture

Genesis 12:1-13, Genesis 27:35, Exodus 2:12, 2 Samuel 11:, Matthew 26:74

One of the first things that strikes us about the men and women in Scripture is that they were disappointingly non- heroic. We do not find splendid moral examples. We do not find impeccably virtuous m...

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Author

Dallas Willard

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Scripture

Isaiah 40:31, Philippians 4:13, Joshua 1:9, Hebrews 12:1-2, 2 Timothy 1:7, Ephesians 6:10-11

This is an age for spiritual heroes—a time for men and women to be heroic in faith and in spiritual character and power. The greatest danger to the Christian church today is that of pitching its messa...

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Author

Dietrich Bonhoeffer

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The future of modern society depends much more on the quiet heroism of the very few who are inspired by God. These few will greatly enjoy the divine inspiration and will be prepared to stand for the d...

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The Bible in Batman

Author

Mia Levetan

Keywords

Scripture

Isaiah 53:4–5, Genesis 22:9–14, Exodus 32:30–32, John 15:13, Philippians 2:3–8, Psalm 22:1 & 16–18

In the 2008 Batman film, The Dark Knight , the Joker (played by Heath Ledger) tries to get Batman to reveal his identity by kidnapping and executing one citizen every day until he reveals himself...

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Changing Your Mind

Author

Stuart R. Strachan, Jr.

Keywords

If you really want to change, it starts with your story. If you want to change the story of your life, you need to change the stories in your mind. So what story do you want to live? Do you want to ex...

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"The Batman Effect" The Power of Identity

Author

Ryan Bundrick

Scripture

Romans 13:14, Colossians 3:9-10, Ephesians 4:22-24, Hebrews 12:2, Colossians 2:6

A group of researchers sought to study the nuances of self-control. They conducted a study with a few dozen kindergarten students and gave them a painfully boring, repetitive task designed to test how...

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Only the Penitent Man Shall Pass

Author

The Pastor's Workshop

Keywords

Scripture

1 Peter 5:6, Luke 18:13-14, James 4:10, Acts 3:19, Matthew 3:8

With the recent release of a new installment in the Indiana Jones movie series, our family decided to re-watch the original trilogy (I like to act as though Kingdom of the Crystal Skull never existe...

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Sticking With One Another

Author

Thomas G. Long

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Scripture

2 Corinthians 1:3-7, Deuteronomy 31:8, Psalm 23:4, Galatians 6:2, Philippians 2:7-8, Romans 12:15, John 15:13

Robert Wuthnow told a story about a man named Jack Casey, who worked as a member of an ambulance rescue squad. When he was a child, Jack had oral surgery - five teeth pulled. The little guy was terrif...

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A Prayer for Those Who Govern

ALL SINGING: (America the Beautiful, first verse) O beautiful for spacious skies, for amber waves of grain, For purple mountain majesties above the fruited plain! America! America! God shed His grac...

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The Unmerited Gift of Grace

Author

Randy Alcorn

Keywords

Scripture

Romans 5:6, Luke 23:39-43, Titus 3:5, Ephesians 2:8-9, Romans 5:6-8

If you’re not stunned by the thought of grace, then you aren’t grasping what grace offers you, or what it cost Jesus. In 1987, eighteen-month-old “Baby Jessica” fell twenty-two feet into a Texas well....

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Subtraction Stew and Fulfillment: The Phantom Tollbooth

Author

Ryan Bundrick

Keywords

Scripture

John 6:26-27, John 6:35, Isaiah 55:1-2, Jeremiah 2:12-13, Proverbs 27:20, Amos 8:11

In The Phantom Tollbooth , there is a special kind of food called “subtraction stew.” Produced by a mathemagician, this stew makes you hungrier after you’ve eaten it. Our three main characters don’t ...

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A Fool Vs A Fool for Christ

Author

Os Guinness

Keywords

Scripture

1 Corinthians 1:18, 1 Corinthians 4:10, Acts 26:24-25, Romans 1:21, Proverbs 1:7

The first type of fool in the Bible is the character that might be called the fool proper. Folly in a fallen world is obviously partly relativistic, and we are always wise to say, “Says who?” Differen...

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The Glory of Man & the Glory of God

Author

Fleming Rutledge

Keywords

Scripture

Exodus 33:18-23, Isaiah 6:1-4 , Daniel 4:28-37, John 17:1-5 , 2 Corinthians 3:7-18, Psalm 19:1

What resonance does the word glory have in today’s English language? How often is it used, and with what meaning? The adjective glorious is familiar enough—we might say that we saw a “glorious” sunset...

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Author

Pheme Perkins

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Scripture

Mark 16:1-8, Isaiah 41:10, Ephesians 2:8-9, Matthew 28:20, Psalm 34:18, 1 John 1:9

The women’s response brings readers face to face with the mystery of faith. There are no heroes among Jesus’ followers. The hostility that put Jesus on the cross has reduced them all to flight and fea...

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Emotions are Divine: Why Pastors Need Biblical Permission to Feel

Author

David Lamb

Keywords

Scripture

John 11:35, Psalm 5:5, Psalm 6:1, Psalm 78:58, Psalm 78:40, Psalm 18:19, Psalm 25:6, Psalm 5:7, Exodus 20:5, Exodus 22:23, Isaiah 15:5, Luke 15:null, Genesis 23:2, Genesis 42:24, 1 Samuel 1:10, 2 Samuel 1:11-12, 2 Kings 8:11-12, 2 Kings 22:18-20, Mark 14:72, John 20:11, Acts 20:37, Revelation 5:4

When the Professor Weeps: A Personal Story About ten years ago, I was teaching a course on the psalms for my seminary students in the midst of a personal health crisis. It wasn’t in my notes, but I ...

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Claiming Your Identity as a Saint

Author

Addison D. Bevere

Keywords

If you’re anything like me, when you hear the word saint, you probably think of anybody but yourself. We picture stained glass windows depicting Peter, Paul, or Mary. We think of modern-day heroes lik...

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A Triumphal Procession

Author

Stuart R. Strachan, Jr.

Keywords

Scripture

Zechariah 9:9, Matthew 21:1-11, Mark 11:8-11, Luke 19:36-44, John 12:16-19, Revelation 19:11-16

Two thousand years ago, triumphal processions were massively popular. It was, in all likelihood, the only chance most people would have to see the leaders and heroes of the day. For the Romans they t...

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Sam’s Encouragement

Author

Jake Meador

Keywords

In the final pages of his great epic The Lord of the Rings, J.R R. Tolkien writes of his heroes, Sam and Frodo, and their desperate quest to reach the cursed Mount Doom to cast the ring of power, a de...

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The End of Human History

Author

G. K. Chesterton

Keywords

Jesus

Scripture

Matthew 27:57-60, John 19:41-42, Luke 23:50-56, Romans 6:4, Colossians 2:14-15, Isaiah 53:9-11, 1 Corinthians 15:20-22

They took the body down from the cross and one of the few rich men among the first Christians obtained permission to bury it in a rock tomb in his garden the Romans setting a military guard lest there...

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Saving Souls Without Discipling?

Author

Steve Corbett and Brian Fikkert

Keywords

Scripture

Genesis 1:28, James 2:15-17, Romans 12:2, Isaiah 58:6-7, Micah 6:8, Colossians 1:19-20, Matthew 28:19-20

I had just finished presenting much of the material in this chapter [on the role of the Church helping the poor] to an audience in Africa. A very tall and muscular African man in the audience approach...

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Managing the Big Battalions of Life

Author

Frank W Boreham

Keywords

Scripture

Genesis 21:1-5, 1 Samuel 2:1-11, Luke 1:11-17, Luke 2:1-21, Isaiah 9:6, Matthew 1:21, Micah 5:2

A century ago, men were following with bated breath the march of Napoleon and waiting feverishly for news of the war. And all the while in their own homes, babies were being born. But who could think ...

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Author

Phillip Yancey

Keywords

Scripture

2 Corinthians 12:9, John 4:1-26, Jonah 1:4, Luke 19:1-10, Hosea 1:3, Acts 9:1-19

I have come to know a God who has a soft spot for rebels, who recruits people like the adulterer David, the whiner Jeremiah, the traitor Peter, and the human-rights abuser Saul of Tarsus. I have come ...

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Author

G. K. Chesterton

Keywords

Scripture

John 19:38-42, 2 Corinthians 5:17, Romans 6:4, Acts 2:24, Colossians 2:12, Isaiah 53:9, Luke 24:6-7

They took the body down from the cross and one of the few rich men among the first Christians obtained permission to bury it in a rock tomb in his garden the Romans setting a military guard lest there...

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Author

John Barth

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Stories

Everyone is necessarily the hero of his own life story.

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For the Sake of the Medal

Author

Timothy Keller

Keywords

On a TV detective show some years ago I saw a story of an old man in his eighties, an ex-Marine, sadly broken down and accused of a crime. Two big, strapping military police and a snarling Navy lawyer...

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