Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
But I say to you who hear, love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. Whoever hits you on the cheek, offer him the other also; and whoever takes away your coat, do not withhold your shirt…
Part 5: Laying New Foundations in a Dying World As I mentioned above, the history of Israel involved several centuries as a church-without-a-culture, and then several centuries as a culture-without-a-city. To be sure, there was an informal culture around the church of the Patriarchs, but the civilization of free farmers…
In the Reformation Tradition we baptize both professing believers and their children. In the case of infants it is now commonly insisted that this is done because the children are already in covenant with God. Baptism is a sign and seal of a previously existing reality. Despite the popularity of…
Concerning Sex & the Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper Is not the cup of blessing which we bless a sharing in the blood of Christ? Is not the loaf of bread which we break a sharing in the body of Christ? Since there is one loaf, we who are many…
Protestant-Catholic debates about the sacraments have usually taken the form of debates about sacramental efficacy. Protestants claim that Catholics believe that sacraments work ex opere operato, virtually a magical view of the sacraments. A priest goes through the motions and says the mumbo-jumbo and — presto! — the sacraments confer…
In 27.2, the Westminster Confession says that because of the “spiritual relation” between sacraments and the things they represent, “the names and effects of the one are attributed to the other.” Applied to baptism, this means that when the Bible says that we are baptized into Christ (Rom. 6), it…
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“Do not lay up treasures for yourselves upon earth, where moth and rust destroy,” Jesus commanded (Matthew 6:19). Just before, He has been warning about practicing righteousness before men (6:1), in alms, prayer and fasting. The chapter ends with an exhortation to “seek first His kingdom and His righteousness” (v.…
Leland Ryken taught English at Wheaton College for and astounding 45 years, and he is sharing the fruits of that long tenure in a Crossway series, Christian Guides to the Classics. So far Ryken has written on Homer’s The Odyssey , Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter , and Milton’s Paradise Lost…
When the seventh trumpet sounds, the heavenly temple of God is opened and the ark appears. Lightning, thunder, an earthquake, and a great hailstorm accompany the revelation of the Lord’s throne (11:19). This verse opens a section of several chapters that deal with the Satanic attack on the church, persecution…
George Weigel always gives a good pep talk, and not only to Catholics. He’s a can-do Catholic. Weigel does it again in Evangelical Catholicism: Deep Reform in the 21st-Century Church . The Counter-Reformation church is dead, and the “Presentitis” of some post-Vatican II Catholicism is a dead end. Weigel attacks…
My review of Philip Jenkins’s challenging Laying Down the Sword: Why We Can’t Ignore the Bible’s Violent Verses is up at the Comment magazine web site.
Jonathan V. Last ( What to Expect When No One’s Expecting: America’s Coming Demographic Disaster ) has a modest proposal for fixing social security: “Since the 1980s, policy wonks have been telling us that our social welfare programs are about to implode. The system is not sustainable! Either benefits or…
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