A Brief History of Power

Koontz has a singular intellect, and offers a wealth of insight about the meeting place of human, political, and church history. This podcast has been consistently the most information-dense that I’ve come across, with little to no filler. I encourage new listeners to focus on the early material (during covid). Quality has gradually dropped off post-2024, with excessive inside jokes between Koontz and Grills, and more skippable episodes in general. The newer stuff is indeed more titillating and fantastic (I.e. cryptids), but the older material was truer to the name, and genuinely more threatening to the powers and authorities of this present age. ⭐️⭐️⭐️for recent episodes, but this is offset by a 5++ star rating for the earlier material.

Too much fiddlefaddle.

I’m disappointed in Dr. Koontz’s portrayal in Brief #33/Episode 922 of Calvinism as “considering election abstractly, apart from the means of grace.” This is inexcusably mistaken. The Westminster Confession of Faith says, “As God hath appointed the elect unto glory, so hath he, by the eternal and most free purpose of his will, fore-ordained all the means thereunto” (WCF III.VI). He always proceeds to portray Calvinism as teaching a sort of “nihilism” in which, because one is either elect or reprobate, it doesn’t matter how we live. Seriously? This is an unacceptably sophomoric understanding of Calvinism for someone with “Doctor” in their title.

As a Reformed listener, I have some (relatively minor) theological differences with the hosts, but find their analysis of historical and current cultural issues to be consistently on point. Where their Lutheran theology informs a slightly different viewpoint than my own, I find it helpful to have some cross-pollination from a reformational brotherhood. The discussion is consistently relevant and yet without devolving into punditry. It also helpfully deals with historical issues. And of particular note to Reformed listeners, there is a fluency with Reformed thinkers I appreciate (no straw manning here).