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Apologetics

Presumptuous Presuppositions: The Apologetics of Cornelius Van Til

Whether one entirely agrees with him or not, no Christian interested in apologetics–the reasoned defense of the Faith–can afford to be uninterested in Cornelius Van Til, the late professor of Apologetics at Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia. According to John Frame, Van Til “is perhaps the most important thinker since…

by Mark HorneJuly 15, 1997
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Baptism

Richard Bacon’s “What Mean Ye By This Service? Paedocommunion in Light of the Passover” A Brief Response

Reverend Richard Bacon is the pastor of First Presbyterian Church of Rowlett, Texas. He has written a tract entitled “What Mean Ye By This Service? Paedocommunion in Light of Passover,” printed by Presbyterian Heritage Publications (P.O. Box 180922, Dallas, TX 75218). I am writing this brief response to set forth…

by Mark HorneJuly 6, 1997
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Angels

Twelve Fundamental Avenues of Revelation, Part 5

As we move toward a consideration of Dynamic Cosmic Revelation, there is a further aspect of revelation through action that should be discussed here, and that is this: God is particularly revealed to us in times of crisis and distress. When things are going well, we forget God. When distress…

by James B. JordanJuly 3, 1997
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Biblical Chronology

John Sailhamer Weighs In, Part 4

We conclude our analysis of John Sailhamer’s book *Genesis Unbound: A Provocative New Look at the Creation Account* (Multnomah Books, 1996), which argues that Genesis 1:2ff. is not about the creation of the whole world, but about the preparation of the Land of Eden, which is also the Promised Land.…

by James B. JordanJuly 3, 1997
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Biblical Horizons

The Sin of Ham and the Curse of Canaan, Part 2 (An Exposition of Genesis 9:20-27)

Commentary A. Noah’s God-like Labor: 8:20 And Noah, a master of the ground, was the first, And he planted a vineyard. 21 And he drank from the wine, And became drunk, And lay uncovered inside his tent. It appears to me that there is a balance between "ground" and "tent"…

by James B. JordanJuly 3, 1997
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How to Worship

Why Does the Pastor Wear a Robe?

A Defense of the Use of the Ministerial Robe in Public Worship The purpose of this series of articles is to explain our biblical philosophy of worship and how we have sought to implement it here at Providence Reformed Presbyterian Church. We have thought through our worship services. We have…

by Jeff MeyersJune 20, 1997

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Local Grace

In his introduction to Charles Taylor’s A Secular Age , James KA Smith sums up Taylor’s argument that the Reformation hastened the “disenchantment” of the world ( How (Not) To Be Secular , 38-9). Taylor’s summary of Calvin sounds like a summary of Barth: “The Reformers ‘all see the reigning…

April 25, 2014

Encounter with Orthodoxy

John P. Burgess of Pittsburgh Theological Seminary spent a year with his family in Russia and recounts the experience of Russian Orthodoxy in his 2013 Encounters with Orthodoxy . It’s a very personal, sympathetic account. He describes Orthodox practices, and also some theology, in a way that I suspect an…

April 25, 2014

Confessional and Catholic?

Willem van Asselt’s Introduction to Reformed Scholasticism provides a superb overview of the history of Reformed Scholasticism, as well as a survey of the current state of the literature. Early on, he emphasizes the “catholicity” of Reformed Scholasticism: “those who practiced it explicitly aimed to stand within the tradition of…

April 25, 2014

Via Negativa

Benjamin Kaplan’s Divided By Faith is primarily a revisionist history of the rise of toleration in early modern Europe. He challenges the Enlightenment notion that 18th-century intellectuals introduced the idea, showing instead that toleration appeared first as a set of practices in religiously diverse regions of Europe and was first…

April 25, 2014

Lifted

Lifts might not have changed everything, but they changed a lot, according to Andreas Berard’s Lifted: A Cultural History of the Elevator . The TLS reviewer observes how the elevator transformed architecture, and the class distribution of vertical space: “The lift allowed the dramatic recalibration of building types. Staircases were…

April 24, 2014

Red, Black, Gray

How did religion survive and revive in China? Answering that question in Religion in China , Fenggang Yang sketches the outlines of a political-economic sociology of religion. Like many sociologists of religion, he rejects the theory of secularization. Modernity has not proven to be the solvent of religious faith that…

April 24, 2014

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