Phil Gons

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Archives for 2007

The Nativity Story (2006)

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The Nativity StoryI bought The Nativity Story for my parents for Christmas (along with Planet Earth and Blue Planet) and remembered that I had never posted about it here. Shanna and I watched it last spring when it first came out on DVD. It’s not fresh on my mind, so I can’t give a detailed review, but I do remember enough to know that I enjoyed it and would recommend it.

It was very faithful to the biblical accounts. While I wasn’t convinced that all of the ways they acted out the story were the best, those issues were minor and their interpretations were generally within the bounds of viable options. I was initially disappointed with how abruptly the movie came to an end, but then I remembered that it was a movie about Jesus’ birth, not His life. Though The Nativity Story isn’t my favorite biblical movie, it is one that I would recommend and will probably watch again.

Other Reviews:

  • Peter T. Chattaway’s review at ChristianityToday.com
  • Al Mohler’s review at AlbertMohler.com
  • David DiCerto’s review at CatholicNews.com
  • Dale Mason’s review at AnswersinGenesis.org
  • Steven Isaac’s review at PluggedinOnline.com

Migne’s Patrologia Graeca in Logos

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Users have requested Migne’s 161-volume Patrologia Graeca many times. It seems that Logos is now giving some serious thought to pursuing it. Bob Pritchett, President and CEO of Logos, recently wrote this in the Logos Greek newsgroup:

We’ve recently been talking about Migne’s Patrologia Graeca and hearing from some users how it could be a great addition to Logos Bible Software.

. . .

While page images are available in our own SeminaryLibrary.com and some other sources, as far as we know there is no full-text electronic edition. And at 161 volumes of Greek text, much of it with parallel Latin, Patrologia Graeca would be our biggest pre-pub project ever. (We estimate that the keyboarding cost alone would be 5 times that of ICC.)

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“To Him Be Glory Forever”

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A couple of weeks ago, I noticed in the Grammatical Relationships section of the Bible Word Study report for εὐχαριστέω an interesting pattern regarding the objects of εὐχαριστέω. I wrote this in a blog post at the Logos Bible Software blog:

Of the 23 complements or objects of the verb (i.e., who is being thanked), they are nearly all God. The only human objects are Prisca and Aquila (Rom 16:3). The rest of the references are God—and arguably, God the Father. (Jesus is the object one time [Lk 17:16].) I realize that God can refer to the Triune God, but the contexts and general pattern suggest that the Father is in view.

Thanks is given to

  • the Father (Col 1:11–12; cf. Jn 11:41)
  • God the Father through Jesus (Rom 1:8; Col 3:17)
  • God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ (Col 1:3–5)
  • God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ (Eph 5:20)
  • God [who is distinguished in the context from Christ] (Rom 14:6; 1 Cor 1:4, 14; Phil 1:3-6; 1 Thes 2:13; 2 Thes 1:3; 2:13; Phm 4-5; Rev 11:17?; cf. Lk 18:11)
  • God [who is later identified as the Father] (1 Thes 1:2–4)
  • God [undefined in the immediate context] (Acts 27:35; 28:15; 1 Cor 14:18)

This pattern reminded me of a similar pattern that I gave some thought to a couple of months ago.

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The Trip to Bellingham

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Well, we made it safely to Bellingham last Tuesday (11/6). Sorry for the very delayed update. We finally got internet set up with Comcast on Tuesday. Prior to that we had been connecting by using Shanna’s Verizon phone as a modem, which was incredibly slow! Anyway, we enjoyed our trip out here far more than we anticipated. We’re thankful to God for the safety and nice weather during the entire trip. Of course, it did start raining shortly after we arrived, but we had been warned that it would rain often, so we were mentally prepared. Our first Saturday here was absolutely gorgeous, though!

I want to thank everyone who came over to help us pack, load the truck, and clean. We appreciate your sacrifice and kindness immensely! Thanks to Josh McCarnan, Jason Cornwell, Dave Wike, Jim Gaston, Josh and Laurel Louk, Melissa and Bryan McKinnon, and Jordan Gons. Thanks as well to those who called and offered to come over. We should have taken more of you up on your offer to help! Thanks as well to all of those who prayed for our trip. We’ll certainly miss all of our friends from Greenville. Please come out and visit us. There’s lots to do in the Bellingham area, and we’d love to have you stay with us!

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Moving to Bellingham & Joining Logos

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Logos Bible SoftwareShanna and I are in the midst of a major transition. We are wrapping up things here in Greenville, SC (like packing and trying to sell or rent our condo) and preparing to move about 2,900 miles across the country to Bellingham, WA. I will be taking a job (in the marketing deparment) with Logos Research Systems, Inc., the makers of Logos Bible Software, and Shanna will be looking for work once we get settled in. I didn’t realize how big of a task preparing for a move like this would be! It’s good for us, though, because it’s making us rely upon God more than when we feel like we have things under control.

We’d appreciate your prayers. Here are some specific things you can pray for us:

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Fonts Supporting Polytonic Unicode Greek

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Greek ManuscriptRod Decker, Professor of Greek and New Testament at Baptist Bible Seminary, Clarks Summit, Pennsylvania, recently blogged about how new Vista fonts Cambria, Calibri, Candara, Consolas, Constantia, and Corbel unfortunately do not support polytonic Unicode Greek. Be sure to check out the PDF where he evaluates them.

In a comment, I noted that another new Vista font, Segoe UI, does support polytonic Unicode Greek. I also mentioned some nice polytonic Unicode Greek fonts that come with Adobe’s Creative Suite: “Arno Pro (serif), Garamond Premr Pro (serif), and Hypatia Sans Pro (sans serif)—a free gift downloadable after registering the product.” Decker responded and asked if I would post a PDF with samples, so that’s what I’m doing.

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The Failed Strategy of “Trinity & Subordinationism”

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trinity-and-subordinationism.jpgKevin Giles’s The Trinity & Subordinationism is easily one of the worst books I have ever read.1 I say that not because I disagree with the position he defends (i.e., the Son is not in any sense eternally subordinate to the Father); I’m still in the process of evaluating the evidence. Rather, I make that statement based primarily2 on what the book itself sets out to do.

Giles’s goal in T&S is to move beyond the exegetical impasse regarding eternal subordination in the Trinity by appealing to tradition.

Quoting biblical texts and giving one’s interpretation of them cannot resolve complex theological disputes. . . . I believe this approach [to “doing theology”] should . . . be abandoned today because it always leads to a “text-jam.” . . . What we have today is a bitter stalemate (3).

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  1. I should clarify that I have read and am referring to only his section on the Trinity, which is its own distinct unit. [↩]
  2. I’ll probably follow up this post with the book’s other problems, such as (1) misunderstanding and misrepresenting complementarians, (2) selective reading of history, (3) eisegesis of historical texts, (4) category confusion, etc., etc. Here’s one example of misrepresentation to give you an idea of the way Giles interacts with complemenatarian Trinitarianism throughout the book: “Rather than working as one, the divine persons have been set in opposition—with the Father commanding and the Son obeying.” I wrote this in the margin, “Opposition?!!! What a massive misrepresentation!” I challenge Giles to show one complementarian who considers the Father and the Son to be in a relationship of opposition! [↩]

Free Piper & Sproul Sermon Tapes

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tape.jpgI’m getting rid of all of my old sermon tapes and planning to donate them to Goodwill. Does anyone want them before I do? Here are the series that I have:

John Piper

  1. Four Sermons on the Holy Spirit (4 Sermons on 2 Tapes)
  2. Hallowed Be Thy Name: Eight Sermons on the Names of God (8 Sermons on 4 Tapes)
  3. Preach As Worship: Meditations on Expository Exultation (4 Sermons on 2 Tapes)
  4. The Providence of God (2 Sermons on 2 Tapes)
  5. Romans 8:28–30: Eight Sermons (8 Sermons on 4 Tapes)
  6. What Is Baptism? (4 Sermons on 2 Tapes)

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