StephenBarkley.com

John 3:16 says, “For God so loved the world . . .” 1 John 2:15 says, “Do not love the world . . .” There’s an apparent contradiction—a mixed message—here. You can’t get around it linguistically. The same author wrote these verses using the verb agapaō for love and the noun kosmos for world in [...]

If there’s one thing any self-respecting preacher should be good at, it’s the ability to digress. I’m sure you’ve heard a few diversions from the pew. One minute the speaker’s following the inner-logic of the message, the next minute he’s off on some tangent. John does that exact thing in these verses. One minute he’s [...]

I’m still adjusting to the whole parenting thing. Let me share one of my frustrations with you: toys. I remember watching the commercials that came on during cartoons as a kid, longing to own every single trinket that was marketed towards my age bracket. Now, I feel differently. I’ve turned my back on that childhood [...]

Contradictions. Flip-flops. U-turns. These words get a lot of mileage on CNN every election season. The pundits on one side are always looking to find opposing views within the other camp. The public can put up with a lot of things from a candidate, it seems, but not a change of mind. A surface reading [...]

In Another Land, the final album of Larry Norman’s famed trilogy, has a catchy little track on the CD reissue called Looking for the Footprints. The lyrics are simple: Looking for the footprints of the man who wears the sandals. If you’ve heard it, you’ll remember. If not, buy yourself a copy! That one-line song [...]

I’ve been saved thousands of times. I know this because of a nightly routine I followed for years as a kid. Each night, just before I’d fall asleep, I would remember some of the sinful things I did that day. Afraid that everyone would be raptured while I was asleep and that I would wake [...]

I’m sure you’ve heard one. They like to stand at busy intersections to make themselves heard. They display a morbid fascination with the fate of the unrepentant, as viewed through the lens of people like Dante. These self-appointed prophets only seem to be happy with the negative. Rob Bell did a good job interpreting them [...]

“Gentlemen, gentlemen, and ladies: all theology is but a matter of emphasis.” These words were repeated often by John Stephenson, my Christology and Soteriology professor back in Bible College. The more I study, the more I find those words to be true. Take Jesus’ nature as an example. If you swing the pendulum of belief [...]

Lies have an awkward way of snowballing. Most begin simply. Did you eat those chocolate chip cookies we were saving for dessert tonight? No. Then you need more lies to cover up the first one. That’s funny—it looks like you’ve got chocolate smeared around your mouth. It’s not chocolate, it’s . . . um . [...]

Ryan, my 15 month old son, was trying to eat his favourite addiction (Cheerios) on the front step the other day. His left hand held a spare set of keys that he’s decided to take everywhere. His right hand was clutching a bright blue ‘nail’ from his Little Tike’s Work Bench. He was squatting down [...]