Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
Camping’s Attempted Substantiation Camping attempts to justify his hypothesis with several lines of argument, all of which are erroneous. 1. Gaps in Genealogies He first mentions the fact that in some of the "begatitudes" of the Bible, generations are left out for some reason or other. Matthew 1:8 and 11,…
I am often asked why I am not an Episcopalian, since I like liturgy so much. My answer is that if I had a call to serve in Episcopal circles, I would certainly entertain it. When I have looked into such groups as the Reformed Episcopal Church, however, I have…
For Part 1, click HERE . Now, what does this mean? Are we to believe that Adam was supposed to earn "merits" before God apart from faith ? Surely nobody wants to maintain this. The traditional explainers of the covenant of works always try to nuance their theology so as…
This issue of Biblical Chronology begins a second series of studies. The first series, Vols. I:1–V:4, concerned the chronology of the Bible itself. We saw, first, that the Bible is indeed concerned with chronology, contains much chronological information, and that the chronology in the Bible is complete from creation to…
David A. Weir, The Origins of the Federal Theology in Sixteenth-Century Reformation Thought (New York: Oxford University Press, 1990). A thorough reevaluation of the federal theology is desperately needed today. John Murray, in his introduction to The Covenant of Grace (1953) appropriately reminds us that it is of the essence…
An "essay" is a foray into a topic. It is not the last word. I hope that this essay or foray is a helpful word. This essay is designed as brief and suggestive. The doctrine of the covenant of works finds expression in the Westminster Standards, where it is also…
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Sheldrake ( The Science Delusion , 10-12) explains why physicalism - the hope that physics will finally vindicate materialism - is doomed. One reason is the “Cosmological Anthropic Principle,” which claims that “if the laws and constants of nature had been slightly different at the moment of the Big Bang,…
During his PhD research, Rupert Sheldrake ( The Science Delusion , 1-2) made an original discovery about plant cells: “dying cells play a major part in the regulation of plant growth, releasing the plant hormone auxin as they break down in the process of ‘programmed cell death.’ Inside the growing…
Constantine permitted transfer of legal cases from civil to ecclesiastical courts, and also permitted ministers to manumit slaves. Both, Potter says ( Constantine the Emperor , 181 ), were steps that effectively turned clergy into civic authorities. On the first decision, Potter notes that “The main problem with Constantine’s decision,…
TD Barnes has vigorously contested popular ideas of the Edict of Milan: It was not issued in Milan and didn’t affect Italy; it didn’t legalize Christianity, which was already legal; it was not an edict. This can leave the impression that the declaration of Licinius on June 13, 313 was…
Potter ( Constantine the Emperor , 95) asks what Constantine was doing during the great persecution. His answers are speculative; we don’t and can’t know for sure, since Constantine’s feelings and thoughts were never recorded. But it is a worthwhile speculation: “He was a visible member of the court; many…
David Potter’s Constantine the Emperor has many virtues. Potter is hugely well-informed about Roman history, and is able to place Constantine in his context like few others. His discussion of Diocletian’s “interventionist” policy (his Price Edict and his edicts regarding Christianity) is superb, as is his sense of the limits…
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