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Theologia

Reflections on the Importance of Predestination in the Christian Mindset

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…

by Mark HorneJune 4, 1998
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Biblical Horizons

The Case Against Western Civilization, Part 5

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…

by James B. JordanJune 4, 1998
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Baptism

Why Do We Baptize?

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…

by Mark HorneJune 3, 1998
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Eucharist

This Is What We Are:

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…

by Mark HorneJune 3, 1998
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Baptism

Sacramental Efficacy

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…

by Peter LeithartJune 3, 1998
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Baptism

Baptism and the Church

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…

by Peter LeithartMay 29, 1998

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Theology

Rehabilitating patriarchy

Russell Moore gave a vigorous presentation at ETS on why egalitarians are winning the evangelical gender debate. He summarized some of the recent sociological work on evangelical family life, which presents a mixed picture. On the one hand, Bradford Wilcox’s Soft Patriarchs, New Men shows that evangelical fathers are not…

November 18, 2005
Literature

Herod’s fears

In For the Time Being , W. H. Auden described Herod’s reaction to the news that “God has been born.” If this is true, and if the news gets out, Herod thinks, all is lost; confusion will reign. The passage is one of the most effective descriptions of the nature…

November 17, 2005
Literature

Herod’s fears

In For the Time Being , W. H. Auden described Herod’s reaction to the news that “God has been born.” If this is true, and if the news gets out, Herod thinks, all is lost; confusion will reign. The passage is one of the most effective descriptions of the nature…

November 17, 2005

Emerson as Sacramental Theologian

Lundin spends considerable time describing Emerson’s rejection of Christian orthodoxy in favor of an American version of Romanticism, and shows that Emerson’s departure from orthodoxy centered on his rejection of the Eucharist. Emerson resigned his post at the Second Church of Boston because he could no longer administer the Supper…

November 17, 2005
Literature

Lewis as critic

Toward the close of Lundin’s book, he offers a number of intriguing criticisms of CS Lewis as a literary critic. He claims that while Lewis recognized the corrosive effects of the Enlightenment and Romantic conception of the self in his theological writings, he adopted a form of romanticism in his…

November 17, 2005
Philosophy

Denken ist Danken

One of the important themes that emerges from Lundin’s book (mentioned in the previous post) is the centrality of gratitude in thought. Heidegger, he says, “was fond of the seventeenth-century Pietist phrase Denken ist Danken , ‘to think is to thank.’” Lundin expounds the point a few pages later: “Through…

November 17, 2005

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