Gary Neal Hansen

Theology. It's good for you.

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You are here: Home / Archives for Calvin

Making Friends in Seminary (Letters to a Young Pastor)

May 12, 2016 by Gary Neal Hansen 2 Comments

Making friends in seminary

Dear ______: Thanks for sharing your thoughts on my recent letter about making friends with John Calvin. I think you drew some conclusions that I wasn’t intending. Let me take a step back. As a person in ministry, you need a lot of different kinds of friends — and seminary is a great place to […]

Filed Under: Ministry Tagged With: Augustine, Barbara Brown Taylor, Barth, Calvin, John Chrysostom, Letters to a Young Pastor, Making friends in seminary, Teresa of Avila

Mirror, Mirror, on the Wall: Heidelberg Catechism and the Law of God

August 6, 2013 by Gary Neal Hansen 2 Comments

You see someone looking in the mirror. Looking. Looking. What is he thinking? Better still, what are you thinking? Too much attention to his reflection — easy to suppose he likes what he sees. We mock the self-absorption of mythical Narcissus, falling in love with his reflection in a pond. But we also fear what […]

Filed Under: Heidelberg Catechism, Theology Tagged With: Calvin, Catechism, Heidelberg, law, mirror, Misery, sin, theology

Meat and Potatoes for the Soul?

March 8, 2013 by Gary Neal Hansen 6 Comments

“Do I really need to pray?” I’ve heard the question often enough.  It is easy to get stuck in puzzles and paradoxes on the topic, even if we know in our hearts and our guts that we need to pray: If God knows what I need, and loves me too, why do I need to […]

Filed Under: Heidelberg Catechism, Theology Tagged With: Calvin, Catechism, Faith, Heidelberg, Prayer, providence, Responsibility

On ‘the art of theological reflection’

March 9, 2012 by Gary Neal Hansen Leave a Comment

When trying to make good use of writings that stand at a great distance from us–whether because they come from long ago or from across the boundaries of cultures, we need some guidelines, some sense of how we might go about it. We pick up a patristic theologian, say John Chrysostom, and find his style […]

Filed Under: approaches Tagged With: Augustine, Calvin, Chrysostom, theological reflection

Theology. It’s good for you.

I'm a Church historian by trade. My writing, speaking, and teaching explores the Christian past to equip today's disciples. Join me here for regular posts on the best of theology, spirituality, community, and ministry. read more…

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