The Beloved House of God
What used to happen in a sacred tent or majestic temple now happens wherever a local, duly-led congregation of Jesus-followers gathers to worship God.
Psalm 84 is a…is an exuberant love song extolling the place where God draws near and dwells. With a New Testament understanding of God’s House in mind, we may capture the truth like this: “How dearly loved is the gathered church, the House of God!” Two events coincided in our church a few Sundays... Continue Reading
This Messianic Age
Everywhere we look, people have appointed themselves as the savior of others.
As false messiahs and idols always do, they falter, fall down, and fail us. What freedom and joy there is knowing the only One anointed by heaven to save! In their influential book When Helping Hurts on poverty alleviation, Steve Corbett and Brian Fikkert speak of the “god complex” or “savior complex” that so many exercise—especially in... Continue Reading
What’s an Exile to Do? Brace Yourself to Face Fiery Trials with Joy
Trials do to our faith what fire does to gold.
Know that our God has His good purposes in our suffering for His will, and that He sets the limits of how intense our suffering is and how long it lasts. Take the Apostle’s approach: do good and, if suffering comes, trust God to refine you and confirm you through it. The sobering truth... Continue Reading
The Heart of God’s Law
Tracing the Ten Commandments to Jesus
When we understand the relationship between the law and the covenant, we can turn afresh to the question of how Christians ought to fulfill these commandments in light of the work of Christ. For centuries, the Christian church has given careful attention to the Ten Commandments. In his commentaries, John Calvin devotes hundreds of... Continue Reading
Land Acknowledgment Statements: The Cultural Violence of the Academic Elite
The primary purpose of these statements is not to do justice to the victims of historical oppression but rather to signify one’s affinity for the performative rituals of academic wokeness.
The intellectual elite who fetishize the tragic stories of marginalized groups in America are less interested in redressing those sufferings than they are in using them to maintain their membership in an elite group that is far removed from the plight of the “Other” (as they might say). After a quick search of my... Continue Reading
“Antiracism” Deserves a Capital Letter: A Preview of Voddie Baucham’s Fault Lines
Antiracism has its own cosmology, original sin, law, gospel, martyrs, priests, means of atonement, new birth, liturgy, canon, theologians, and catechism.
Because Antiracism is a definable ideology and new religion, rightly capitalizing it as a proper noun deprives Antiracism of its by-design rhetorical underpinning. In the language of Antiracism, simply being not racist is not enough. Recently on Twitter, a Ph.D. student at a Southern Baptist seminary threw shade at Voddie Baucham’s upcoming book Fault Lines for... Continue Reading
The Problem of the Premise
If you begin with a faulty cause premise the argument fails, and good intentions cannot and will not rescue it.
By framing the cause of racism as “whiteness” it makes it an ethnically ancestral sin that condemns all in that tribe both past, present, and future. It means guilt without redemption. Unfortunately, if a voice of objection to this faulty reasoning it is raised it is met with the response that the objection only proves... Continue Reading
Why is Inseparable Operations Such a Hard Sell?—The Trinity and Inseparable Operations
The doctrine of inseparable operations affirms that the triune persons act as a single agent externally, while internally their operations are divided.
The doctrine of the Trinity ultimately rests on the biblical datum of inseparable operations. But the reverse is also true: triune unity necessarily implies the inseparability of God’s external operations. For both teachers and pastors, the doctrine of the Trinity has been one of the most demanding topics, often resulting in glazed-over student eyes,... Continue Reading
The Road to Worms: The Diet of Worms in Historical Context
Pre Lux Tenebras—“Before the Light, Darkness”
The true darkness that dominated the time leading up to the Reformation was the darkness of the obscuring and eclipsing of the gospel. The church taught that peace with God could be obtained through man’s works. That is the ultimate darkness. Eternal darkness. In the spring of 1521, Martin Luther and a few colleagues... Continue Reading
How Unspeakably Solemn
Our reflection on the final judgment is meant to lead us as sinners to see our need for Christ and the redemption He accomplished.
A few more laughs, a few more tears, a few more sighs and we will all find ourselves in that one great assembly, standing shoulder to shoulder in the collective mass of humanity before the Lord Jesus Christ, the Savior and the Judge of all the earth. On account of the recent focus on... Continue Reading
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