Theology Thursday: Buffet 5

Welcome to Theology Thursday! Theology is the study of God, his relation to the world, and our relation to him. I hope these newsletters help enhance your faith and deepen your love for God and his people, the church.

Welcome to the fifth Theology Thursday Buffet! Occasionally, I’ll switch from addressing one topic in long form and instead answer several reader-submitted questions in shorter form.

If you have a topic you’d like to see included in a future Theology Thursday, please respond to this email (or any future Theology Thursday email) with your question! And don’t hesitate to ask, because if you’re curious about something, it likely means somebody else is too.

Let’s grab our plate and dive in.

What is legalism? 
Biblically, legalism is the distortion of God’s law into a system for earning righteousness rather than a guide for living in grateful response to grace. Scripture affirms that the law is good—it reveals God’s holiness and exposes sin—but it was never meant to save. Legalism begins when obedience is severed from relationship and transformed into a scoreboard of spiritual worth. Jesus confronted this in the Pharisees, who meticulously followed rules yet neglected justice, mercy, and love. Their obedience looked impressive, but it was hollow because it trusted performance instead of God.

Legalists (or, people who struggle with legalism, even if they wouldn't describe it that way) care more about control, conformity, and man-made traditions than a genuine relationship with God.

The gospel critiques legalism by re-centering righteousness in Christ, not human effort. We are justified (saved) by grace through faith, and obedience flows from that gift, not toward it. Legalism ultimately breeds pride in the “successful” and despair or even disdain for the “failing,” obscuring the freedom and joy of life in the Spirit. True holiness grows not from fear of breaking rules, but from love awakened by grace.

What do you think of The Chosen?
I love it! Melissa and I started watching season one in mid-2025, and we were hooked immediately in the first episode, when Jesus heals Mary of her demon-possession. His interactions with her are beautiful and moving, and we watched one or two episodes on Sunday evenings until we were totally caught up through season five.

For my money, The Chosen is the best depiction of the Jesus story and Christian art in general ever set to screen. It’s dramatic but not cheesy, well-acted but not distracting, and exceptionally well thought-through in terms of how it portrays its characters and storylines. When an episode is presenting a scene directly from scripture, it is faithful to the text and does not deviate from the scriptural message and its meaning. When an episode is presenting a scene not directly from scripture, it makes only reasonable and defensible choices . In terms of artistic license, the show adds things to scripture but does not change scripture, if that makes sense. It necessarily creates fictionalized backstories and motives for its characters that the Bible doesn’t explicitly include, but they are all plausible, and they do a great deal to enhance our appreciation for scripture and understanding of these characters as real people with real lives, real sins, real desires, real relationships, and real hope for a real savior.
 
The actor who plays Jesus is, in particular, outstanding. His rendering of the Messiah is pitch-perfect, in my opinion. Kind, tender, firm, wise, joyful, burdened, strong, prayerful, obedient, human, divine. Really, really good stuff.

I’m a big fan of The Chosen. If you can go into it knowing that some stuff is directly from scripture and some isn’t, and learn to know and consider the difference, then I can’t recommend it highly enough. It might just make you love your Jesus more than you did before.
 
What does the “glory” of God mean in Psalm 19:1, John 1:14, elsewhere?
There are dozens of verses in the Bible that reference the “glory” of God, but none offer a specific definition. Thus, “glory” has become one of those terms we use a lot without always knowing quite what we mean by it.

In his book Garden City, John Mark Comer describes the glory of God not as a vague radiance but as God’s presence and character made tangible in the world. Glory is what happens when God’s goodness, beauty, power, and love are put on display through creation and human vocation. Humanity was designed to partner with God so that the earth would become a place filled with his glory, reflecting who he is. When people image God well—working, creating, ruling with love—God’s invisible nature becomes visible, like light filling a room. This is the goal of the biblical story from Genesis onward itself.

So, as a means of summary, I think we can understand God’s glory to mean three primary things: God’s perfect nature and character, God’s personal presence and works, and God’s worth and majesty as recognized and proclaimed by his creatures.

TO KNOW GOD AND TO MAKE HIM KNOWN!
- Pastor Brady

Have a question for Theology Thursday? Send an email to office@minierchristian.org and we'll respond, or we'll include in a future Theology Thursday Buffet.