John Frame’s new book, The Escondido Theology, is finally out and available. I commend it to you. After you have read it, you may then google up responses/reviews to it, clamber into your canoe of irencism, and paddle all over a small mountain lake of snark.
Swinging Thuribles at Each Other
This is near the beginning of a new year, and so why not some predictions? But I am not interested in predicting for the next twelve months — let’s make this interesting and go for a century. After the appropriate time has elapsed, and everybody can see where I was right and where I was …
Grace Running Around Loose
I know that not all the readers of this blog are Protestant, but most are, and so I would like to ask you all to take a moment to thank the Lord for the faith and courage of our dear brother, Dr. Martin Luther. We are now just seven years away from celebrating 500 years …
An Interview At the Pearlies
Scott Clark has a long post here, in which he urges Reformed congregations to hold the line on strict subscriptions to their confessions, applying that standard of subscription with regard to the members of their congregations. In contrast to that form of Reformed sectarianism, here is a dose of Reformed catholicity. “In all Churches a …
The World is not God’s Hat on a Windy Day
The word providence comes from the Latin pro and videre, meaning “to see beforehand.” Our word provision comes from the same source. We know that God sees everything before hand. So as we turn to the Bible’s teaching on this subject, we will see that there is a very close connection between God’s providence over …
What Ritual Can Do
Baptism in water can be a complicated subject—and yet the author of Hebrews treats it as one of the Christian “basics.” This should make us wary because the evangelical Christian world doesn’t have this sorted out yet, and yet it should also make us eager to sort it out—to grow up into maturity as our …
When God Drops the Rope
If we hear a word enough, we think we know what it means. We live in a Christ sub-culture that has strongly emphasized the need to be “born again.” Without denying this need for regeneration at all, we still have to place the reality in a biblical context, lest we turn it into something entirely …
A Foundational Prayer
It is sometimes said that what is called the Lord’s prayer is not really the Lord praying, but rather is the Lord’s prayer offered to His disciples, for their use. This is helpful, but we still must not forget that this is the master of prayer teaching praying. “After this manner therefore pray ye: Our …
Christ the Lord of Song
Our motive for all that we do is to be the glory of God — even if it is something as mundane as eating or drinking (1 Cor. 10:31). How much more should we be seeking the glory of God when we are in the act of worshiping Him? Certainly, most Christians would agree that …
Is Discipline a Mark of the Church?
Church discipline is relatively rare in the modern church and, because it is rarely done, when it is done, it is too often done poorly. As with everything, we have to turn to the Scriptures for guidance and protection. “I wrote to you in my epistle not to keep company with sexually immoral people. Yet …