Okay, so I just removed Stacey’s posting privileges. Why is that? I let this thread run a little longer than I usually do for several reasons. First, I wanted to see how the argument morphed and played out, and secondly, because I am on the road, and close monitoring is harder to do. I have …
Ligonier: Catnip of the Internet!
I am not writing as any kind of Ligonier insider. I used to write for Table Talk some years ago, and I have spoken at a few of their national conferences. Other than that, my relations with Ligonier have been warm, cordial, and distant. I am not writing with direct knowledge of any of the …
Poetasters As Self Important
“He there faces the fact that modern poets are read almost exclusively by one another. He looks about for a remedy. Naturally he does not suggest that the poets should do anything about it. For it is taken as basic by all the culture of our age that whenever artists and audience lose touch, the …
Can”t Imitate Abstractions
“Abstractions can be true and can be affirmed, but they cannot be imitated. This is why many schools are filled with children who learn various biblical abstractions and can repeat them back, but there is nothing there to imitate. Children from other denominational traditions repeat back a different set of abstractions. The lives of the …
Good to be Wary
“There is no such thing as truly ‘pure’ violence. Nevertheless, sacrificial violence can, in the proper circumstances, serve as an agent of purification. That is why those who perform the rites are obliged to purify themselves at the conclusion of the sacrifice. The procedure followed is reminiscent of atomic power plants; when the expert has …
An Evangelical Sacrament
God has established His covenant in the world, and this covenant is visible. It has visible and external signs, and the covenant people of God gather at particular, identifiable places. They have water placed on them, they hear the Word preached, they sing songs, they pray, they eat the bread and drink the wine. God …
Wipe Your Feet At the Door
During our time of confession, there is a short time in which you are urged to confess Your individual sins. The time there is not short because we are trying to encourage you to trivialize whatever sin you may be confessing. Nor is it because we do not want you to have time to gather …
Why Being Smart Just Changes the Speed At Which We Can Get Into Sin
“I gladly admit that we [the cultured] number among us men and women whose modesty, courtesy, fair-mindedness, patience in disputation and readiness to see an antagonist’s point of view, are wholly admirable. I am fortunate to have known them. But we must also admit that we show as high a percentage as any group whatever …
Distance Learning
“Incidentally, this is one reason why all forms of cyber-education will necessarily be second best. Certain learning can be acquaried at a distance, and in one sense every book ever written is a form of ‘distance learning.’ Consequently, what can be place on a page and withdrawn from that page many years later can also …
Restrained Vengeance
“Such thinking reflects the ignorance of a society — our own — that has been the beneficiary of a judicial system for so many years that it is no longer conscious of the system’s real achievements. If vengeance is an unending process it can hardly be invoked to restrain the violent impulses of society. In …