Letter to the Editor: "Despite the fact that he was the reason Roe was struck down, for which we thank God . . ."But there's the rub: The hard-core abolitionists DON'T thank God for this. ...
Letters Fall Like Leaves on a Pond in a Japanese Haiku
No Mas, Part Two
“So the views I hold to are a different kind of thing from what is represented in the common understanding of the Federal Vision, and the differences involved are connected to everything. They are a different kind of thing, not a lesser amount of the same thing. Thus when I speak of the objectivity of the covenant—which I will continue to do—this is not a lite version of what someone else might mean by it. Now I do not say this because I am angry or upset with anybody. I say it because I think I have learned something.”
The Auburn Avenue Chronicles Vol. 2, pp. 875-876
Federal Vision No Mas
“Everybody knew (or thought they knew) what that phrase [Federal Vision] represented. Since I certainly owned the phrase, albeit with modifiers, and lots of energetic typing, what happened was that I was thought to be owning what people knew as this. But the more I typed that, the more it made people’s heads hurt. So one of the few things I have been successful at doing is persuading a number of people that I am a sly fellow, and one who bears close watching. Heretics are slippery with words, and since I have spent a lot of time trying to grease this particular piglet, I must be a heretic. So I have finally become convinced that the phrase Federal Vision is a hurdle that I cannot get over, under or around.”
The Auburn Avenue Chronicles Vol. 2, pp. 874-875
Clearly Stressful
And My Fence is Protestant
“Protestants can be decidedly Protestant without being bigots. And so I will conclude by citing my very favorite papist, G.K. Chesterton. He once said that you ought never to tear down a fence unless you knew why it had been put up in the first place.”
The Auburn Avenue Chronicles Vol. 2, p. 870
Perseverance Now
“To argue that I have every spiritual blessing in Christ right now, but that perseverance is not among these blessings because perseverance cannot be contained within the present moment is to speak the language of a system, a particular theology, and not the language of the Bible.”
The Auburn Avenue Chronicles Vol. 2, p. 863
The Unspeakable GIft
“Eternal life is a gift, and it is too big a gift to fit into the present. I can possess eternal life now, which means that my hands have to be able to hold the future—because eternal life encompasses the future as much as it does the present. And I can have it now. ‘And this is the record, that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in his Son’ (1 John 5:11).”
The Auburn Avenue Chronicles Vol. 2, p. 861
Letters Found Right Where They Should Have Been
Letter to the Editor: Let's say a father with children in the home has a major failing as a parent. He becomes aware of this sin and fully and completely repents. Still some children ...
Church Barnacles
“A historic Protestant view of church, of Word and sacrament, is truly liberating. We can see the church of Jesus Christ sailing down through the entire course of church history, and we can recognize it as His beloved ship. We don’t have to count all the barnacles first. Neither do we have to deny the existence of the barnacles.”
The Auburn Avenue Chronicles Vol. 2, p. 860
Books Worth Reading
Talk at the Grace Agenda 2024 Pre-conference The Principles of War by Jim Wilson My father was a graduate of the Naval Academy, and studied at the Naval War College. After he got out of the Navy, in the 1960’s, he wrote a series of articles applying the classic principles of war, as outlined by …