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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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Shiloh Redux

In his temple sermon, Jeremiah warns the people of Jerusalem that Solomon's temple is going to share the same fate at Shiloh (Jeremiah 7:1-15). Shiloh is where the Mosaic tabernacle was pitched when Israel entered the land. It remained there until the Philistines destroyed it and captured the ark (1…

January 26, 2018

Pity the Avant-Garde

Chris Kraus reviews Richard Cabut and Andrew Gallix’s Punk is Dead in the TLS . It was a short-lived movement, with a golden age of "between four and eighteen months," and was over by 1978. That obsolescence was built-in, as philosopher Simon Critchley says in an interview in the book:…

January 26, 2018

Music and the Mind

Musicologist and philosopher Jenny Judge thinks that the mind is more than a machine . Music provides the evidence. According to some philosophers, "if you can’t consciously represent the finer details of a guitar solo, the way is surely barred to having any grasp of its nuances. Claiming that you…

January 26, 2018

Benjamin in the Book of Chronicles

Benjamin Giffone's "Sit At My Right Hand" is a study of the tribe of Benjamin in the book of Chronicles and "in the social context of Yehud" (as the subtitle indicates). After sections examining the Chronicler's setting in the Persian era and the role of Benjamin in the "Deuteronomistic History,"…

January 26, 2018

Bible and Tradition

Few people have had a front-row seat to the various controversies that have rocked the Reformed world since the 1970s. John Frame is one of those few. Irenic and gentle as he is, he has been a target of attack and a spark of controversy throughout his long career of…

January 26, 2018

Failure of Patience

Toward the end of his "Short Treatise on the Lord's Supper" (sections 57-60), Calvin summarizes the history of Protestant disputes concerning the Supper. He focuses attention on the debate between Luther and Zwingli that culminated at Marburg (1529), and points to the failures on both sides that led to the…

January 25, 2018

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