Shannon Costello

The adults in our small group recently decided that the children should have a little class of their own, instead of playing the entire time.  Last time we met we brought them upstairs to break the news to them.  There was a certain amount of reluctance on their part to leave their games and join [...]

I’ve appropriated another subtitle for this post, this time from a book by E. Luther Copeland. His book deals with the history of an American Protestant denomination. His thesis was extremely intriguing and is not impacted by what I discuss here.
While discussing a fairly controversial subject — women in the church [...]

Someone else described me as “sweet” last week. As far as I am concerned that is blatantly false. I know I am not sweet.
“Sweet” is the sort of word that makes only rare guest appearances in my own speech about others, but I do regularly describe people as “good” or “bad”. And so does the [...]

(That was the subtitle of Arthur Farnsley’s doctoral dissertation, which has little to do with this post. However, some of the ideas the author discusses there are inspiring my thoughts here.)
What you believe is important for what it makes you do. This is one reason why minor doctrinal issues may not be terribly [...]

God views all suffering. He can see my suffering and the suffering of starving people and Jesus’ suffering and the suffering that hasn’t happened yet but surely will.
God sees the wrongs that cause suffering — hate and envy and rejection of that which is right.
God brings beauty out of suffering. Often there is [...]

Essential doctrine must have its basis in the Bible, where it will often be treated explicitly and at length. It leads one to reconciliation with and devotion to God. Essential doctrine is never in conflict with the Bible.
The Apostles’ Creed is a good example of essential doctrine. The existence of a [...]

I believe in God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth.
And in Jesus Christ his only begotten son, our Lord; who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead, and buried. On the third day he rose again from the dead; he ascended [...]

I noticed something sort of scary today while reading Matthew. The response of the leaders of Israel to Judas is exactly characteristic of them.
Jesus tells them that they pay close attention to little things like tithing, but that they ignore very important things such as justice, mercy, and righteousness. They should pay close [...]