Kerux Christou, aka Herb's Blurbs

Kerux Christou is a phrase from New Testament Greek meaning “herald of Christ,” i.e., a preacher.

The Lord’s Prayer: Parallel Petitions

July 14, 2016 By Rich Herbster

I’ve never considered myself to be especially strong as a poet. I love to write, but I’m far more prosy than otherwise. But I can appreciate poetry, and the Bible is certainly full of loads of it. The Psalms take a poetic form, obviously, but so too do the wisdom books, huge swaths of the […]

Filed Under: Bulletin Board, Rich's Blog Tagged With: antithetic parallelism, Hebrew poetry, parallelism, synonymous parallelism, the Lord's Prayer

Thy Will Be Done

July 7, 2016 By Rich Herbster

One of the biggest problems we have in prayer is that we have horrifically bad practical theology. We pray as though we understand God to be a genie and ourselves to be his master. We present God a laundry list of stuff we want from him, then get annoyed if we don’t get what we […]

Filed Under: Bulletin Board, Rich's Blog Tagged With: God's will, Lord's Prayer, thy will be done

Thy Kingdom Come

June 30, 2016 By Rich Herbster

The greatest theme of the teaching of Jesus was not love. Nor was it forgiveness. Not heaven. Not salvation. The central theme of Jesus’ teaching (and whatever comes in second isn’t even close) is the kingdom of God. The kingdom of God (or the kingdom of heaven in Matthew’s gospel) occurs at least 81 times […]

Filed Under: Bulletin Board, Rich's Blog Tagged With: Kingdom of God, kingdom of heaven, rule of God, second petition, the Lord's Prayer

Hallowed Be Thy Name

June 23, 2016 By Rich Herbster

An athlete focused on things other than training isn’t going to be a very good athlete (at least not for too long). A musician who doesn’t devote her primary energies to practicing will never be a great musician. Devote the scraps and leftovers of your energies to your relationship with your spouse and you will […]

Filed Under: Bulletin Board, Rich's Blog Tagged With: Hallowed be thy name, Prayer, priorities, saints, the Lord's Prayer

Our Father, Who Art In Heaven

May 19, 2016 By Rich Herbster

One of the most astonishing features of the Lord’s Prayer is its beginning. There are many ways to call upon God: many titles, many names, many descriptors. But the model Jesus provides is a unique and remarkable pattern for addressing God. With an incredible economy of words, he challenges traditional notions of God, and highlights […]

Filed Under: Bulletin Board, Rich's Blog Tagged With: divine immanence, divine transcendence, Lord's Prayer, Our Father, Who Art in Heaven

I felt the need to name my blog. “Pastor’s Blog” is just weak (and, quite unimaginatively, common). Kerux Christou is a phrase from New Testament Greek meaning “herald of Christ,” i.e., a preacher. That’s me – pastor of Mt. Pleasant and Professor of Preaching at Trinity School for Ministry . And it’s a Greek phrase. I’ve spent over a decade as a Greek Language instructor (so Greek is appropriate). I thought it was a cool blog name too. I asked my wife what to call my blog and she suggested (with a good-natured and cute smirk) “Herb’s Blurbs.” Obviously a very different vein, but I like that too. Not only because it rhymes (which it does!), but because it reflects a corrective to my pretense and reflects the more earthy and mundane nature of most of what I have to say. Let’s face it, most of the time I’m more a Herb’s Blurber than a Kerux Christouer anyway. And I spend most of my time with real people who are dealing with real life stuff. The juxtaposition of the two terms hopefully illustrates the kind of content you’ll find here - which will ideally be thought-provoking, spiritually enriching, and practically applicable for everyday, ordinary life.
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