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Sacramental Theology

The Gospel according to the Sacraments (Part 3): One Lord, One Faith, One Baptism

In the first post of this series, I proposed that the sacraments of baptism and communion are the nexus point for the evangelical and ecumenical movements. In the following post , I proposed a new orientation for ecumenism – a conciliarity of the cross – with the necessary confession of…

by Michael SpalioneJanuary 2, 2018
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Baptism

Christian Mission and Cultural Transformation

“Contextualization” is now, and has been for a long time, the buzzword for the day. 1 Missionary effort in non-Western countries is all about “contextualization” — making our communication of the Gospel, if not the Gospel itself, fit into the culture to whom we from the West speak. 2 There…

by Ralph Allan SmithDecember 28, 2017
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Sacramental Theology

The Gospel According to the Sacraments, Part 2

In my previous post , I highlighted the sacraments as the point of convergence between evangelicalism and ecumenism arguing that baptism and communion are presented in the New Testament as signs of the gospel that simultaneously enact and remember union with Christ and the unity of Christ’s body. I concluded…

by Michael SpalioneDecember 27, 2017
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Baptism

Baptism and Contextualization: Part 2

Click HERE for Part I of this series. What does baptism have to do with culture? As I said in the previous essay, the short answer is “everything!” To begin with, baptism is baptism into Jesus’ death (Romans 6:3). Paul explains this as the crucifixion of the “old man” (“old…

by Ralph Allan SmithDecember 21, 2017
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Advent

Twin Nativities

In the accounts of our Lord’s nativity and early childhood, so familiar to us from many years of Advent and Christmas services, we often fail to recognize in them the gentle intimations of a greater nativity that is yet to come. The attentive ear, however, can discover in these passages…

by Alastair RobertsDecember 19, 2017
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Advent

Daughters of Zion

Isaiah warns that Yahweh is coming to remove Judah’s leaders in every area of social, economic and political life so completely that there will be no one left to lead besides children (3:4) and women (v. 12). As Isaiah goes on, however, it becomes clear that the women of Judah…

by Peter LeithartDecember 14, 2017

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Uncategorized

Freedom, Grace, Gratitude

It’s unfitting for God to fail to complete His purpose in the world, Anselm says. But his argument seems to imply that God is constrained to save. If this is true, Boso wonders, do we owe Him gratitude? After all, as Anselm himself admits, “when someone acts beneficently against his…

February 13, 2013

Rationality and discrimination

In the course of explaining to Boso why God must have created man in a state of righteousness, Anselm ( Cur deus homo ) analyzes rational nature. Rationality is a power of discrimination ( potestatem discernendi ), and particularly a power of moral discrimination: It distinguishes right and wrong (…

February 13, 2013
History

Atheist hagiography

Timothy Larsen reviews Susan Jacoby’s The Great Agnostic: Robert Ingersoll and American Freethought , and finds it to be an “endearing” sample of a disappearing genre of historical writing: hagiography. Larsen observes, “Christian historical writing has now matured to the point where it has dispensed with hagiography. Christian scholars are…

February 13, 2013

Justified from custody

During a graduate seminar yesterday, one of the students highlighted the language of confinement and imprisonment in Galatians 3:23-24. Before faith appeared (presumably a reference to Jesus, Pistos , Revelation 19:11), “we were kept in custody under the law, being shut up to the faith later to be revealed.” “Kept…

February 13, 2013

Trinity House: Web Site

The Trinity House web site is live. Today, Pastor Rich Lusk gives a primer on Ash Wednesday and explains how Lent edifies the church.

February 13, 2013
Literature

Hyping Jane

Ron Rosenbaum thinks Jane Austen is overhyped . Not, he insists, overrated. But lost in what he calls “the tsunami of schlocky, rapturous, over-the-top, wall-to-wall multiplatform of celebration of the 200th anniversary of Pride and Prejudice . He’s got plenty of evidence to back it up: Erotic Austen, Tweeting Elizabeth…

February 13, 2013

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