Featured Issues

George H.W. Bush: President As Servant Leader

George Herbert Walker Bush (1924-2018) died on Friday evening, 30 November 2018. He had a form of Parkinson’s disease that forced him to use a wheelchair or motorized scooter in recent years. He served as president from 1989 to 1993, capping a career of more than 40 years of public service. A decorated Navy pilot (compiling 126 carrier landings and 58 missions) who was shot down in the Pacific in 1944, he was the last of the World War II generation to serve as president. President Bush was a skilled negotiator and diplomat and, as president, helped end the Cold War and the threat of nuclear engagement with a careful handling of the Soviet Union’s collapse and the liberation of Eastern Europe. James A. Baker III, former Secretary of State, said of President Bush: “[He] was the best one term president the country has ever had, and one of the most underrated presidents of all time. I think history is going to treat him well.”

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About IIP

James P. Eckman (Jim) is President Emeritus and Professor in Bible and History at Grace University in Omaha, Nebraska. He has been at Grace since 1983. He holds the following degrees:

  • B.S., Millersville University of Pennsylvania (1969)
  • M.A., Lehigh University (1973)
  • Th.M. (with honor), Dallas Theological Seminary (1983)
  • Ph.D., University of Nebraska–Lincoln (1989)

He has also completed additional postgraduate work at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. He received the Charles A. Nash Award in Historical Theology while at Dallas Seminary. [Read More]

Featured Issues

Gene-Editing And Genetically Altered Babies

Science has always struggled with the scientific (technological) imperative: Just because science can do something does not mean it must do it. That imperative is now being tested by the gene editing technique known as CRISPR. For several years now, several scientists have warned of the day when the gene editing technique CRISPR would be used to create a genetically altered human being. Among other things, their concern was that that CRISPR would be misused to alter everything from eye color to IQ. For this reason many nations have banned CRISPR and any procedure that deliberately alters the genes of a human embryo.

China vs. America And The New World Order

The world order put together by the United States after World War II is unraveling. In the Middle East, nation states are disappearing, replaced by ancient tribalism and clan loyalties rooted deep in the region’s history. The benefits of open borders with lower tariffs and growing international trade are being challenged by a narrow nationalism, a dangerous isolationism and a short-sighted introversion. All aspects of the old order (e.g., the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, NATO and the European Union) are under siege with little or no public trust in that order. Because this old order was built on globalization, free trade and a commitment to democracy, the democracy part of the foundation is producing an unexpected tension between the leaders of the world and those being led. Upheaval, chaos, disorder and dysfunction now characterize our world. There is no better evidence of this unraveling than the relationship between China and the United States.

Bible Study Podcast

Acts 15:36-16:15

Dr Eckman leads discussion of Paul’s Second Missionary Journey.

Culture & Wordview

Where Is American Civilization Going? The Challenge For The Church

Globally speaking, the church is at a significant crossroads right now. The geographical epicenter of our faith is shifting from its centuries-old epicenter in the northern hemisphere (e.g., Western Europe, the United States, Canada) to the southern hemisphere (e.g., Latin America, Africa, South Asia), where it continues to grow at astonishing rates. In his book The New Faces of Christianity: Believing the Bible in the Global South, Phillip Jenkins argues that 60% of the world’s population of Christians right now live in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. By 2050, we’ll see these numbers shift even further; estimates indicated that there will be approximately 3 billion Christians in the world, 75% of whom will live in the Global South.

Ethics

Should We Grow Transplantable Organs for People in Animals?

For the first time, biologists have succeeded in growing human stem cells in pig embryos, increasing the possibility that one day soon we may develop human organs in animals for later transplant. . . This means that the human-organ-growing pigs would be examples of chimeras?animals composed of two different genomes?a human and a pig. When the human stem cells are implanted into an early pig embryo, the result is an animal composed of mixed pig and human cells.