Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
Rounding Out the Traditional Doctrine of Justification Justification and the Church The traditional Protestant doctrine of justification fails to fully hold together the soteriological (forgiveness of sins) and the ecclesiological (covenant membership). This is part of a larger problem, of course, namely, the dichotomizing of church and salvation. Biblically and…
John Piper’s book, Counted Righteous in Christ: Should We Abandon the Imputation of Christ’s Righteousness (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 2002) is, from any perspective, a passionate work. Nevertheless, I find I need to disagree with parts of it. The reason I do this is not because John Piper’s book does…
What follows is a handout for a Sunday School class I have taught recently at my church . Presbyterian doctrine teaches what the Bible says about God sovereign control over history and his unconditional choice (election) to bring some people to everlasting glory while allowing others to remain in unbelief…
“Covenantal Nomism” sounds like a description of tiny contract-loving creatures who live underground. But it is actually a recent term used to describe the pattern of religious belief and practice in first-century Palestinian Judaism. The idea is that God graciously establishes a structured relationship based on promises, a “covenant,” with…
What follows deals primarily with two essays, one by Dr. Douglas Kelly and the other by The Rev. Richard Phillips . My reason for writing this essay is that many people are confidently saying things about N. T. Wright that I believe are contrary to fact. I choose Dr. Kelly…
The Bible is often treated as a book of rules with directions for living. To some extent, that is true; but it is neither the whole truth nor the most important truth about the book. Ultimately, the Bible is a story about God and man and their reconciliation in Christ.…
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INTRODUCTION Jesus has already warned that His coming and the mission of the Twelve divides families (10:21), and He returns to that theme at the end of the discourse (vv. 34-36). He is the Prince of Peace, but the peace He brings comes after He brings a sword. THE TEXT…
Jesus whispers. He speaks dark and hidden parables. But He instructs His disciples to shout out His words on the housetops (Matthew 10:26-27). This is the history of the church in a nutshell. A Pharisee traveling to Damascus is throne from his horse and Jesus speaks to Him, and the…
Matthew 10: I send you out as sheep in the midst of wolves. As we saw in the sermon this morning, Jesus distinguishes His disciples from the leaders of Israel as sheep from wolves. The Jewish leaders prey on the people, but the Twelve are supposed to take their place…
We often think about mission as the thing that happens after all the really important stuff is over and done. Jesus died, rose again, ascended, and gave the Spirit, and now that everything is finished, we start the mission. Mission is announcing what has already happened. There’s some truth to…
In a summary of the theology of Matthias Scheeben, von Balthasar notes that he “proposes a Christian theology of sacrifice which strongly rejects the Baroque theory of ‘destruction’ and returns to the wholly personal and spiritual concept of sacrifice of the Fathers, especially of Augustine.” Sacrifice is not essentially “destruction”…
Pelagius agreed with Augustine that sin cannot be a substance, since God doesn’t create evil. For Pelagius, this meant that sin cannot corrupt or wound or weaken human nature since “how could that which lacks substance have weakened or changed human nature.” Augustine’s response is to quote Scripture (Psalm 40),…
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