James Ernest

For better or for worse, faith comes by hearing (thoughts on the silencing of a malignant voice)

The silencing of a voice that poisoned our nation and our churches reminds us that “faith comes by hearing” not only when we are listening to the word of Christ but also when we are listening to a different voice.

A thousand days elsewhere: reading Psalm 84 on Ash Wednesday 2021

We have been living the Thousand Days Elsewhere, but even now The Presence is available. Let us journey toward joy together.

How to ruin the perfect prayer (Psalm 63)

Why should we let the Psalms—or our own prayers—be ruined by the inclusion of unworthy emotions and desires?

Follow the bulls: part 2, the return of the bulls (Psalm 51)

This is the only possible solution to the problem of failure in self-knowledge, the problem of the locked room of delusion and self-deception: to be known by The Other, to invite and open oneself to the knowledge that only The Other has, but which The Other has offered to share.

Fearing and not fearing (Psalm 56)

Fear is a fearful thing. It can cause blindness. It can undermine our rationality. It can make us shoot our wife or betray our country. It can be both a symptom and a cause of unfaithfulness to our God.

Follow the bulls: part 1, the banishment of the bulls (Psalm 50)

Psalm 50 is a psalm of judgment. When God’s people fall in with thieves and adulterers, God rejects their sacrifices.

The oldest biblical political principle; or, How I learned to stop worrying and love libertarianism

Discovered and revealed! The Bible verse that clearly and irrefutably establishes small-government libertarianism as THE biblical principle governing economics and politics for Christians.

My mouth filled with blessing: Psalm 34 as rule of life

What would it mean to take the first three verses of Psalm 34 as an individual and communal rule of life?

Jesus, the Lordists, and the flash flood (Luke 6:46–49)

We have lived in the beautiful foundationless house, and we have seen the flash flood. Now what?

The simplest psalm (Psalm 117)

St. Athanasius said that the Psalter contains in itself a perfect summary of every other part of the Bible. I think we could also say: Psalm 117—the shortest and simplest of the Psalms—sums up the entirety of the Psalter, and so in some sense the entirety of the Bible.