Today is the last day of primaries in the Democratic contest for the presidential nomination, and it looks like Hillary will be out of that contest this week. It is possible that she will stay in formally in order to be able to challenge the Michigan and Florida apportionment of delegates, but whether she gets …
Sin Unto Death
In his first epistle, John uses the verb hamartano a number of times. If we claim that we have not sinned, we are representing God to be a liar, because He says that we have sinned (1:10). John writes so that we will not sin (2:1), but if we do sin (2:1), we have an …
Metaphors Are Fun That Way
“You may build up laborious definitions and explanations and yet leave your hearers in the dark as to your meaning; but a thoroughly suitable metaphor will wonderfully clear the sense” (Charles Spurgeon, Lectures to My Students, p. 349).
The Key to Eternal Relevance
“Examining the economic pronouncements of the church leaders, one is reminded of Chesterton’s remark that the morality of most moralists has been ‘one solid and polished cataract of platitudes flowing forever and ever.’ Having convinced themselves, rightly, that the biblical tradition has much to say about economics, the church intellectuals make theological statements serve as …
Sin and Altars
Yesterday’s message from the book of Amos was on the tendency of unbelievers to bring their corruptions to an altar. Sinners like to sanctify their sin.
A Ragbag Response to Green Baggins
Lane gave me a helpful nudge the other day. What with end of school year frenzy, and a trip back east, I lost track of where we were. I will try to get us caught up here — but that will mean that my responses will be kind of a ragbag and briefer than they …
Scram, Padre
I am genuinely enjoying Johnny Cash and the Great American Contradiction. As I have mentioned before, Rodney Clapp is an astute social critic, and many of his insights are really valuable. But there are times, and this chapter is one of them, when the underlying incoherence of his political theology catches up with him, tackles …
An Unhassled Bride
Never forget that the point of worship is identical to the point that God has established for the history of our world. The meaning of worship is the same as the meaning of history. God is engaged in remaking the human race in Jesus Christ. There are three main points to the Christian worldview, which …
Sacramental Union
We learn from the Westminster Confession that in both sacraments—baptism and the Lord’s Supper—there is a spiritual and sacramental union between the thing and the thing signified, such that it is appropriate to speak of one under the terms of the other. We do this without confounding the thing and the thing signified, but, following …
Internationalist Power Monkeys
The next chapter of Clapp’s book, “Tradition and Progress,” correctly identifies one of the central tensions in American life. “The United States considers itself at once the most traditional and the most modern and progressive of Western — or any other — countries” (v. 63). We are far more religious than any other industrialized society, …