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Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.

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Assurance

The Call of Grace: How the Covenant Illuminates Salvation & Evangelism

Book Review The Call of Grace: How the Covenant Illuminates Salvation & Evangelism by Norman Shepherd The Call of Grace is an excellent manual to put in the hands of laymen to teach them how to rest in God’s grace while taking seriously the prize of the upward call of…

by Mark HorneJune 3, 2002
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Baptism

Why I Did Not Baptize My Daughter

My Role as a Parent in My Children’s Salvation Evangeline Jael Horne is our third child. My two boys were born while we were at seminary and we had the privilege of giving them to Jeff Meyers, our pastor at that time, for baptism. When Evangeline was born, however, I…

by Mark HorneJune 3, 2002
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Eucharist

John Calvin & Paedocommunion

John Calvin writes in the Institutes about the possibility of admitting children to the Lord’s Supper by virtue of their baptism once and only once: At length they object, that there is not greater reason for admitting infants to baptism than to the Lord’s Supper, to which, however, they are…

by Mark HorneJune 1, 2002
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Eucharist

For the Children’s Sake: An Alternative Angle on the Paedocommunion Debate

The debate over paedocommunion does not seem to have made much headway on either side in recent years. Certainly both sides have made a solid effort to argue for their position. But no resolution seems to be forthcoming in the near future. As a convinced paedocommunionist, I find the church’s…

by Rich LuskJune 1, 2002
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Baptism

Can Baptism Do Anything?

Lots of conservative Protestants want to answer “no” to this question. The problem with this position is that conservative Protestants are bound to believe what the Bible teaches. And the Bible says inconvenient things, like “baptism now saves you” (1 Peter 3.21), or “all of you who were baptized into…

by Mark HorneMay 30, 2002
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Baptism

Calvin On Baptism, Penance, and Absolution

This paper is something of a follow-up to my earlier study, “ Baptismal Efficacy and the Reformed Tradition: Past, Present, and Future .” One of the more controversial aspects of that paper was my claim that Calvin held to a very high view of baptismal efficacy. Indeed, he was a…

by Rich LuskMay 30, 2002

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History

Christianophobia

Brian Stanley reviews Rupert Shortt’s latest, Christianophobia , in the TLS , and has this to say: “For Christians in Western Europe and North America, freedom of belief and worship is universal and unquestioned. For perhaps 200 million of their fellow believers elsewhere – principally in Asia, the Middle East…

November 26, 2012

No Other Name

Again in Church Dogmatics The Doctrine of the Word of God, Volume 1, Part 2: The Revelation of God; Holy Scripture: The Proclamation of the Church , Barth teases out the “negative” consequences of the confession that God has revealed himself in Jesus. If, Barth argues, Jesus tells us that…

November 26, 2012

Facts, Interpretations, and Jesus

At the beginning of Church Dogmatics The Doctrine of the Word of God, Volume 1, Part 2: The Revelation of God; Holy Scripture: The Proclamation of the Church , Barth insists that the actuality of Jesus is prior to the question of the possibility of incarnation. One cannot move from…

November 26, 2012
History

Urban Renewal

Glaeser ( Triumph of the City: How Our Greatest Invention Makes Us Richer, Smarter, Greener, Healthier, and Happier , 9) observes that city officials often attempt to renew a city with a “massive construction project - a new stadium or light rail system, a convention center, or a housing project.”…

November 23, 2012
History

Detroit’s Decline

The auto industry was the secret to Detroit’s success. Its “Fordist” model of industrialization was also the cause of Detroit’s decline, according to Edward Glaeser’s Triumph of the City: How Our Greatest Invention Makes Us Richer, Smarter, Greener, Healthier, and Happier (8-9): “Cities thrive when they have many small firms…

November 23, 2012

Mediated immediacy

Mediation does not stand in opposition to immediacy, argues Jean-Luc Marion in an essay on Pseudo-Dionysius. Rather, in the mode of gift, “mediation neither troubles nor retards immediacy but rather completes it” and indeed ” only mediation produces immediacy” ( The Idol and Distance: Five Studies (Perspectives in Continental Philosophy)…

November 21, 2012

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In Medias Res

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