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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Robert Weldon Whalen, Sacred Spring: God and the Birth of Modernism in Fin de Siecle Vienna . Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2007. Hardback, 339 pp. $25.00. Sacred Spring is part travelogue, part intellectual history, part art and music criticism. Whalen’s thesis is that Viennese modernism, the source of so much of…
One Axel Schmidt has written a book entitled: Die Suche nach dem rechten Lebens-Mittel. Harry Potter als Beispiel einer modernen praeparatio Evangelii . “Harry Potter” is part of the subtitle, of course, the Harry Potter that, for Schmidt, is an “example of a modern preparation of the gospel.” Harry Potter.…
Two notes about Babel: 1) What does it mean to construct a tower to heaven? Traditionally, this has been understood literally: They were trying to build a tower high enough to reach the sky. But were they really that naive? Surely they had climbed mountains and realized that the sky…
INTRODUCTION “Follow Me,” Jesus said as the new Moses, leading a restored Israel out of the old Egypt-Israel that was under the reign of Death. How do we follow Him? That’s what the Sermon on the Mount is all about. THE TEXT “And seeing the multitudes, He went up on…
Matthew 4:24: And the news about Him went out into all Syria; and they brought to Him all who were ill, taken with various diseases and pains, demoniacs, epileptics, paralytics; and He healed them. Jesus comes preaching, casting out demons, and healing. In doing all this, He fulfills the prophecies…
Jesus is the light of the world, the eternal radiance of His Father. When He comes into the world, He chooses to dwell in a place of darkness and gloom, a place under the shadow of death, the despised borderland of Galilee. Good for Jesus, we say. We’re happy He…
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