Jason Albertson

I took a chance on an audiobook this year.  It’s been a year without much slack, and leisure reading has been hard to come by, so I’ve been listening to more audiobooks while I work around the house. This one was a recommendation from Hoopla , and I gave it a try: Time Shelter by Georgi Gospodinov. From the description, I thought it would be a funky story about time travel. Instead, it was a tragic and often funny story about how Alzheimer’s disease affects individuals and societies, and I think it has something to say about this week’s kerfuffle over the US Senate’s dress code. Time Shelter Time Shelter is a Bulgarian novel, published in 2020 in Bulgarian then translated into English in 2022. The narrator’s relationship with a mysterious friend, Gaustine, is the core around which the story develops.  Gaustine pulls the narrator into a business venture: he is developing a clinic for patients with Alzheimer’s disease. He wants to provide them with the greatest possible comfor...

I think most of us are used to thinking of Christian worldview in education as something that affects class content. For example, if I’m teaching a high school science class, I might take time to talk about what creation reveals about God, and I might think of that as Christian worldview integration.  Those content-level connections often end up feeling—and being —squashed in where they aren’t actually helpful. When that happens, it cheapens the way we and our students think about the truth, because it’s a misuse of the truth. That kind of mis-integration can lead us to think of a Christian worldview as a habit of tipping our cap toward God at the end of every conversation. If we only ever portray God’s perspective as an obligatory afterthought, I would argue that that’s actually a subversion of a Christian worldview. There’s a deeper level of Christian worldview integration available, and I think it’s actually a more helpful level. What if we could apply Christian teaching not jus...

Across the canon of Andy Griffith, there’s a type of episode that pops up again and again.  “The Bed Jacket” is an example that illustrates the type. It’s Aunt Bee’s birthday, and she insists that she doesn’t want any frivolous gifts. She’s a Very Sensible Person, after all. Then she sees something frilly that she really wants, and she’s in a bind—she can’t tell Andy and Opie, because that would mean she’s actually not a Very Sensible Person. The usual hijinks ensue, and Andy finally discovers what Bee really wants through one of her friends. He gets her the gift in such a way as not to reveal that he knew she wanted it. She’s happy, and he’s The Good Guy that we all knew he was.  That’s the type of episode I’m thinking of: Andy becomes aware that another person’s self-perception is just plain wrong, and then he bends over backwards to keep them from being confronted with that reality, and therefore he is The Good Guy. The problem-person is usually Barney (e.g., “Andy Saves Ba...

I recently witnessed a discussion where a question arose: is it ever appropriate for a lay-person to confront a leader about a problem in their teaching? This is an attempt to address that question by surveying confrontation in Scripture. This doesn't address the question from other perspectives that would be helpful—Christian spirituality more broadly, systematic theology, psychology and sociology would all add valuable insights. This is just intended as a baseline. Religious leaders can confront those under their authority. In Scripture, there are examples of religious leaders confronting people who are under their authority about problems in their beliefs or practices.  For example, Paul confronts the Corinthians believers about a number of problems, and he explicitly says he has a right to their respect (1 Cor. 9:1-12). He cites his apostleship, the fact that he has personally seen Jesus and the fact that he founded the church in Corinth (1 Cor. 9:1).  But Paul denies that...

As I read the gospels, I’m amazed by how many people Jesus delivered from suffering, most often from disease or demon-possession. Of course, He warned us that following Him would deliver us into suffering too, especially social suffering (Matt. 5:11-12; John 15:18-25). His example also teaches us that following Him may expose us to spiritual (Matt. 4:1-11) and physical suffering (Matt. 27:26-50). But for the people I know and pray for, His Kingdom doesn’t seem to deliver people from disease and death as often as I would expect. Why? Not for lack of power. I know people who have been touched by His power in unmistakable ways. But why so rarely? In some cases, I think I can tell why. In this stage of history, the one between Creation and the Judgment, God often appears to avoid overpowering people who rebel against Him (Rev. 22:11). That accounts for suffering that comes from people who choose evil.  But what about disease?  Why doesn’t God always heal? There are some standard a...

A Reconciled Life… Paul’s message in 2 Cor. 5:14-21 exhorts us to be reconciled to God through Christ. It’s easy for me to truncate that reconciliation—to think of it only in terms of my guilt being taken away, and not to consider what kind of life flows from that reconciliation. And he died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for them and was raised again.  Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. What is it like to live that new kind of life? How could you describe it? From my own experience, I would describe a reconciled life with God as deeply satisfying. There are a bunch of things that go into that satisfaction. For example, The experience of walking in step with the Spirit (Gal. 5:16-25). We get a hint that this is a little bit like life with God in Eden (Gen. 3:8), which is just astounding to me. Living without the shame of unconfessed sin. I don’t thin...