Dear visionaries, Susanna wrote: “Alternative visions like slavery, Doug?” To which I respond: Sure, given relativism, why not? Susanna needs to stop opposing slavery and racism as “her personal preference” (binding on no one) and start opposing it for principled reasons, as I do. Abandon your principled defense of relativism, which cannot be distinguished from …
Alternative Visions
Dear visionaries, I am concerned about the growth of absolutist fundamentalism on this list. Susanna listed a whole bunch of things that I am apparently “guilty of” that she appears to think are bad in every circumstance. Where is relativism when you need it? Let’s all work harder at embracing alternative visions! “Apologetics in the …
David’s Tent
Our Lord and God, when Shiloh fell, Your mercy on Your people was buried deep, hidden, in the rubble of disaster. When the ark of the covenant was plunder, Your invisible hand held it firm. When the covenant came back to Israel, Your hand was still there, and Uzzah’s hand was impudence. The silent tabernacle …
Limit the Damage
Once there was a husband and wife who thought that Christian marriage meant that the other person had to do certain things that were right there in the Bible, plain as day. The husband thought his wife ought to be respectful and submissive, and the wife thought the husband ought to be loving and sacrificial. …
Distinctions Within the Covenant
God makes distinctions between particular congregations. He does not divide the world into two great categories, the baptized and unbaptized, and treat them all accordingly. But neither does He treat everyone according to their individual status alone. It is true that everyone stands or falls at the Last Day one at a time, and God …
The Need for Answered Prayer/Psalm 28
INTRODUCTION As the people of God, we must not ever be content with unanswered prayer. We cry out to the Lord, and we do not do this because we want to hear ourselves talking in a religious way. We do this because we seek deliverance and salvation. THE TEXT Unto thee will I cry, O …
Sweet Purple Doctrine
The Poems of Rowan Williams (Eerdmans, 2002, 111 pp. Rowan Williams is the current Archbishop of Canterbury. This is the second book of his I have read, and the first that I have finished. The first book, his treatment of the heretic Arius, was scholarly and well-written, but it lost me somewhere and I ditched. …
Talking Reasonably to My Windshield
A friend recently gave me a couple of CDs of a recent broadcast of The White Horse Inn with Michael Horton. While listening to the program (I am not done yet) a couple of comments caught my attention. I think that if we worked though the issues surrounding these comments, we might have the possibility …
The Slavery of Relativism
Dear visionaries, Susanna has outed me. Was that nice? I ask you. First things first: she says, “In my ‘simplistically relativist’ world some things are always wrong . . .” I do not want to say that anything was wrong with your history courses, but something was seriously askew in your philosophy and ethics study. …
Preparing the Tongue for Worship
No man can tame the tongue, James tells us. But the Word of God also tells us that what is impossible for men is possible with God. What is impossible for the flesh is easy for grace. We have thanked God for the work He is doing in our midst. It is right that we …