Russell Moore

Russell Moore is the dean of the School of Theology and senior vice president for academic ddministration at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky. He also serves as a preaching pastor at Highview Baptist Church. For additional resources by Moore visit Moore to the Point.
 

Dec

16

2009

Russell Moore|7:07 AM CT

The Princess and the Frog? Yes and Neaux
The Princess and the Frog? Yes and Neaux avatar

As one who grew up right across the state line from New Orleans and spent most of my young life romping through its streets and marshes, I took my family to see Disney’s latest animated film “The Princess and the Frog,” set in the Crescent City and the bayous around it.

Since then several have asked whether it’s a thumbs-up or a thumbs down. I’ve got mixed feelings.

Here’s the upside:

1.) It’s in many ways a typical Disney film, with all that means.The visuals are good, and the storyline is entertaining.

2.) This is the first Disney animated film with an African-American protagonist, and that’s a long time coming.

The film introduced some of the racial and class tensions that have existed historically in the crescent city (and all around the country) with a clear sense of the “arc of history bending toward justice.”

3.) It’s good to see New Orleans as the setting, especially...

 
 
 
 

Dec

01

2009

Russell Moore|5:15 PM CT

Jesus Has AIDS
Jesus Has AIDS avatar

Jesus has AIDS.

Just reading that in the type in front of you probably has some of you angry. Let me help you see why that is, and, in so doing, why caring for those with AIDS is part of the gospel mandate given to us in the Great Commission.

The statement that Jesus has AIDS startles some of you because you know it not to be true. Jesus, after all, is the exalted son of the living God. He has defeated death in the garden tomb, and defeated it finally. Jesus isn’t weak or dying or infected; he’s triumphant and resurrected.

Yes.

Yes, but, what we’re often likely to miss is that Jesus has identified himself with the suffering of this world, an identification that continues on through his church. Yes, Jesus finishes his suffering at the cross, but he also speaks of himself as being “persecuted” by Saul of Tarsus, as Saul...

 
 
 
 

Nov

09

2009

Russell Moore|10:14 AM CT

What the Church Can Learn From Sesame Street
What the Church Can Learn From Sesame Street avatar

Sesame Street turns forty this week. And, if you’re under forty, I’ll bet just seeing those words in type means a theme song is now running through your head. That’s because the children’s educational television show has worked itself through an entire generation of American popular culture. There’s something here I think the church can learn from the Children’s Television Workshop.

Now, as I soon as I mention Sesame Street, I know some of you will balk about its educational value. You’ll point me to studies suggesting that learning the alphabet from singing puppets actually shortens kids’ attention spans. No argument here. But simply learning facts was never the primary goal of the program.

As the New York Times puts it, this was a “messianic show,” with a “mission” to remake the way children envisioned the world.

Yes, Big Bird and Bert and Ernie and...

 
 
 
 

Oct

26

2009

Russell Moore|10:50 AM CT

Inerrancy Fatigue?
Inerrancy Fatigue? avatar

I’ve suspected the “battle for the Bible” was lost ever sense my Microsoft Word spell-check started suggesting the word “ignorance” every time I type the word “inerrant.”

Texas pastor Bart Barber posts this morning one of the finest, and most charitable, explanations of inerrancy I’ve seen in a long, long time. I suspect he’s right that there’s a sense of “inerrancy fatigue” among some evangelicals, including perhaps some within my Southern Baptist denomination. His response to the theologian-in-residence at the Baptist General Convention of Texas is strong, comprehensive, and merciful.

The outside world won’t hear our inerrant Bibles until we start displaying how corrected we are, personally, by it (I’ll write more on that later).

Barber’s post is a good model of someone who is talking to regular people (those able to cross list arguments and counter-arguments by Barth, Henry, and Lindsell are not who will decide this matter), showing why it...

 
 
 
 

Oct

21

2009

Russell Moore|6:17 AM CT

Swine Flu and the Common Cup
Swine Flu and the Common Cup avatar

As I type this there’s a bottle of hand sanitizer next to my computer. And there’s one on the table behind me. And there’s one on the credenza in my outer office. And there’s one in my coat pocket. And two in my car.

I don’t want the swine flu. And I’m not alone.

This past Sunday’s New York Times tells us that swine flu is wrecking two American traditions: the Saturday night beer pong and the Sunday morning Eucharist. At the same time, writer Lauren Winner says in the Wall Street Journal that swine flu fears are far-reaching enough to doom the common cup of the Lord’s Supper for the time being.

I’m all for losing the beer pong, but the common cup is too important to throw away.

The Christian concept of the church as household necessarily entails a recovery of the Lord’s Table in our churches, especially in “low...

 
 
 
 

Oct

19

2009

Russell Moore|2:48 PM CT

Where the Wild Things Aren't
Where the Wild Things Aren't avatar

This past Saturday I took my three oldest sons to see the movie Where the Wild Things Are. Some Christians are all exercised about the fact that the movie might be too frightening for children. They’re wrong. The movie is not a great one, but that’s not the reason why. As a matter of fact, Where the Wild Things Are fails because it’s not scary enough for your kids.

And there’s something there Chrisians can learn about children, horror, and the gospel.

From the time my sons were babies I’ve read to them the Maurice Sendack classic picture book. They love it, and so do I. They’d sit attentively through Goodnight Moon, but they’d squeal “Let the wild rumpus start!” whenever we’d journey with Max to the place of the wild things.

Children, it turns out, aren’t as naive about evil as we assume they are. Children of every culture, and in every...

 
 
 
 

Oct

05

2009

Russell Moore|6:36 AM CT

What David Letterman Can Teach Us About the Gospel
What David Letterman Can Teach Us About the Gospel avatar

If you pay a little attention right now to David Letterman, you could learn something critical about carrying the gospel to your neighbors, and to yourself.

I’m not talking about re-tooling some Christian version of the late night comedian’s “Top Ten Lists” or his “Stupid Pet Tricks.” I’m not talking about his cynical humor, or emotionally detached coolness. I’m talking about why he was so scared of a blackmailer’s extortion.

We’ve all been there.

Last week Letterman started off a segment on his nationally-broadcast program “The Late Show” by telling his viewers a “story.” The studio audience, laughing along, seemed not to be able to tell, at first, if this was a set-up for a joke or a skit, but it became clear this wasn’t a gag.

Letterman said that he had gotten into his car at six in the morning one day to find an envelope in his car, an envelope with...

 
 
 
 

Oct

02

2009

Russell Moore|9:55 AM CT

Is a Deacon Just a Servant?
Is a Deacon Just a Servant? avatar

There’s an entire generation of conservative evangelical churches where one would be more likely to find an unfrozen caveman in the congregation than a biblically-functioning deacon.

Some churches have known little more than a “board” of deacons making decisions for the church. Some have, at worst, a thugocracy in which the meanest and most aggressive men in the church intimidate the rest of the Body through verbal bullying or the threat of a loss of financial support.

God’s Spirit seems to be, as he almost always does, shaking things back into order in Christ’s church. Congregations across the world are rethinking deacons, and reclaiming the old pattern of deacons as servants, the pattern laid down by Scripture itself.

As with almost anything else, there’s a danger of being reactionary, and over-correcting the problem. We could swing from a corporate board model to a non-profit volunteer co-op model, and miss the biblical pattern just...

 
 
 
 

Sep

28

2009

Russell Moore|1:31 PM CT

Michael Moore, Mammon, and Me
Michael Moore, Mammon, and Me avatar

While in Detroit this past Saturday, I saw an advertisement for the new Michael Moore movie denouncing capitalism and the free market system. It irritated me, and then, the more I thought about it, it irritated me more, in ways I didn’t expect.

Moore is, first of all, no relation, and, second, not new to iconoclastic filmmaking. His previous cinematic offerings have taken on everything from corporate greed in the car industry to gun control and school shootings to 9/11 conspiracy theories.

What amazes me is not that Michael Moore doesn’t like capitalism. It’s that he’s trying to make money off of his denunciation of capitalism, and using advertising to try to do so. It’s almost as though the filmmaker is winking at us, kind of like the Borat character, bilking us for our cash and laughing at our gullibility for giving it to him.

My first reaction to the new Moore movie was...

 
 
 
 
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