Let all the nations be glad. The Lord is God, and He is extending His reign to the uttermost parts of the earth. Since He is doing this, just as He promised, we cannot by our sins and compromises keep it from happening. But our sins and compromises can keep us from exulting in the …
Sacralized Sentimentalism
“It may seem strange that Christians fell victim to the optimistic, humanistic, ‘romantic’ vision of love—so much so that its last strongholds are probably within Christian circles” (H.R. Rookmaaker, Modern Art and the Death of a Culture, p. 78).
Can’t Fight Gas With Gas
“Pop evangelical sentiments, diffused in their normal gaseous way, are utterly inadequate for resisting the spirit of our age, which wants to seep into the unsuspecting school through every available crack” (The Case for Classical Christian Education, p. 208).
The West as the True Woodstock
“It was the biblical empathy for victims that aroused a truly historical interest in ‘actual historical events,’ and it is this interest that helped define the world’s first counter-cultural culture — what we call ‘Western culture'” (Gil Bailie, Violence Unveiled, p. 131).
Westminster XXII: Of Lawful Oaths and Vows
1. A lawful oath is part of religious worship (Deut. 10:20), wherein, upon just occasion, the person swearing solemnly calleth God to witness what he asserteth, or promiseth, and to judge him according to the truth or falsehood of what he sweareth (Exod. 20:7; Lev. 19:12; 2 Cor. 1:23; 2 Chron. 6:22–23). Not only is …
Westminster XXI: Of Religious Worship, and the Sabbath Day
1. The light of nature sheweth that there is a God, who hath lordship and sovereignty over all, is good, and doth good unto all, and is therefore to be feared, loved, praised, called upon, trusted in, and served, with all the heart, and with all the soul, and with all the might (Rom. 1:20; …
The Public Cross
Introduction: Jesus was crucified in a public way, and His death necessarily has public ramifications. There is no way to be fully faithful to the message of His death and resurrection in private. Private faith in this public event cannot, in the very nature of the case, remain private. The Text: “For I determined not …
Still Trying to Find a Rock to Throw
This editorial column ran in our local paper last night in response to a front page article that they ran some days before. That article described the release of a book by a local academic as a response to what I have written and said about slavery. So Why Isn’t the Record Straight? Here is …
Then You Qualify
We gather around this Table, week after week, month after month, and year and year. The mere fact that we do this means that we are defining the boundaries of our lives by it. At the same time, we are responsible to understand what is happening here, so that we do not drift into a …
No Doctrinal Grape Nuts
As many of you noted, the front page newspaper article last weekend made clear that some local unbelievers are very unhappy about the influence that our church is having in the community. We are grateful that we are having enough influence to be noticed, and we are equally grateful that our opponents have been judicially …