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Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.

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Baptism

Baptismal Efficacy and the Reformed Tradition: Past, Present, and Future

OUR REFORMED HERITAGE When a Reformed Christian hears “baptismal regeneration,” what comes to mind? “Heresy,” most likely. Unfortunately, many in the Reformed community today have lost touch with some important aspects of their own heritage. If Reformed theology is going to continue reforming according to Scripture, we must recover the…

by Rich LuskMay 29, 2002
Theologia

Standing on the Promises | Faith and Assurance in the Bible

Faith and assurance are recurring subjects of controversy in Evangelical circles. We all agree that we are saved by the righteousness of Christ reckoned to us, which we receive through faith alone. Jesus lived and died and rose again as the representative of his people so that all of them…

by Mark HorneMay 24, 2002
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New Perspective on Paul

Getting Some Perspectiveon the “New Perspective”

What’s at stake (or not!) for Reformed Pastors regarding the contemporary discussion of Paul and “the works of the law”? There has been a great deal of talk lately about “the New Perspective on Paul” and the works of, among others, Ed Sanders, James Dunn, and N. T. Wright. Each…

by Mark HorneMay 24, 2002
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Theologia

Did Jesus Preach Gospel or Law to the Rich Young Ruler?

When Christ enjoins upon the young man the duty of following him (Mt. 19:23), he does not give a counsel, but a command to all in common because no one can have a hope of salvation unless he follows Christ (2 Pet. 2:21), although from a particular cause it is…

by Mark HorneMay 20, 2002
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New Perspective on Paul

A Short Note on N. T. WRIGHT and His Reformed Critics

This short paper is not an attempt to provide a comprehensive analysis and defense of N. T. Wright, much less the so-called “New Perspective on Paul” as a whole. Indeed, Wright’s theological project has some failings and the New Perspective as a movement must be considered a mixed bag of…

by Rich LuskMay 20, 2002
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Biblical Studies

Leviticus 1:3-4, 10

Leviticus 1:3-13, Translation 3 If his Nearbringing is an Ascension from the herd, a perfect male shall he bring him near. To the forecourt of the Tent of Meeting he shall bring him near, for his acceptance before Yahweh. 4 And he shall lean his hand on the head of…

by James B. JordanAugust 5, 2001

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Sexual Revolution

Conservatives often point to the 60s as the hinge point in the history of sexual morality. They mean the 1960s. As Faramerz Dabhoiwala shows in his Origins of Sex , the sexual revolution has much deeper roots, in the 1660s and 1760s as much as in the 1960s. Dabhoiwala places…

April 17, 2014

Natural Sex

Christians and traditionalists often condemn homosexual activity as “unnatural” behavior. The apostle Paul uses precisely this term. What does it mean? If it is taken to mean that there is no homosexual behavior in the natural world, then the claim is manifestly untrue. As James Neill points out in The…

April 17, 2014

Music’s Address

“Music,” writes Roger Scruton ( Soul of the World , 175) “addresses us from beyond the borders of the natural world” and thus “requires us to respond to a subjectivity that lies beyond the world of objects, in a space of its own.” It’s one of the intimations of a…

April 17, 2014

Dualism and Teleology

At the heart of Scruton’s Soul of the World is a plea for a “cognitive dualism” that he sets in opposition to all “nothing but” reductionisms - music is nothing but sounds, painting nothing but pigments on canvas, the world nothing but matter in motion, humans thought nothing but neurons…

April 17, 2014

The Sacred and the Covenant

The sacred is Janus-faced, writes Roger Scruton in Soul of the World (15): “Sacred objects, words, animals, ceremonies, places all seem to stand at the horizon of our world, looking out to that which is not of this world, because it belongs in the sphere of the divine, and looking…

April 17, 2014
Uncategorized

Ukraine’s Problem

Keith Darden writes in Foreign Affairs that the main problem in Ukraine is not Russia but Ukraine. It’s dangerous to ignore the fact that Russia is exploiting divisions that have existed in Ukraine for a long time: “inattention to Ukraine’s internal demons reflects a dangerous misreading of current events; the…

April 17, 2014

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