Limited Atonement
Christ’s atonement is the climax of God’s long-anticipated salvation, so why would anyone want to limit it?
Of course, at one level, everyone limits Christ’s atonement: some limit its scope (it is for God’s elect only); others limit its efficacy (it does not save everyone for whom it was intended). Thus, it’s not whether one will limit Christ’s atonement; it’s just how. For this reason, I propose a more positive and less... Continue Reading
Never Read a Bible Verse (and Never Listen To a Sermon Clip)
"Instead, always read a paragraph at least.”
If we want to properly understand any given verse of the Bible, we need to set it within its wider context. After all, words spoken to a single prophet in ancient Israel have a very different context than words spoken to an entire congregation in New Testament Rome. These different contexts mean the very same... Continue Reading
What Only Suffering Can Say
How Trials Feed the Flame of Witness
Believers like Elisabeth Elliot, Joni Eareckson Tada, and Gerald Sittser have astonished the world, declaring the sufficiency of Christ even in the hottest fires. Elliot buried two husbands: one was murdered on the mission field and the other died of cancer after four years of marriage. Tada, a quadriplegic who was injured in a diving... Continue Reading
Why Read the Book of Obadiah?
Without Obadiah, our Christian faith would be woefully deficient.
I personally cannot remember a time anyone mentioned to me they were studying through Obadiah in their devotions. I cannot even remember the last time I heard a sermon on Obadiah—if at all. I am willing to bet you could say the same. Perhaps, that’s because Obadiah is hard to understand. Lost somewhere in... Continue Reading
Cessationism
cessationism, the doctrine that the spiritual gifts that communicate or confirm divine revelation ceased with the death of the last Apostle.
How is it fair to blame Pentecostal/charismatic Christians for misunderstanding cessationism when the only cessationists they know deny the abiding reality of so-called sign gifts of tongues, miracles, and prophecy more because they are afraid of the unusual than because of a well-developed, biblical argument? “They worship that way because they don’t have the... Continue Reading
The End of Creation: Soli Deo Gloria
Ignoring the clear revelation of God’s truth, in the final analysis, proves to be a costly mistake that will have consequences that extend into eternity.
The German astronomer, Johannes Kepler, accepted biblical revelation and understood the importance of giving credit where credit is due: “The chief aim of all investigations of the external world should be to discover the rational order and harmony which has been imposed on it by God.”1To do any less would be tantamount to theological treason.... Continue Reading
2 Things You Need to Know about the Exclusivity of Christ
Your spiritual conversations may coast rather smoothly until you land on the exclusivity of Christ.
To speak of the exclusivity of Christ is just a way of saying, along with the apostles, that “There is no other name given among men by which we must be saved” (Acts 4:12). It is simply an affirmation of Jesus’ own words when he spoke to his disciples in the upper room just before... Continue Reading
A Heavenly Vision
The priorities of our lives are transformed by this desire to see the face of God.
As a result of our fallen nature, we once lived “in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind” (Eph. 2:3). But now we are called to consider our “spiritual blessing in the heavenly places” (1:3), to be filled with “all the fullness of God” (3:19), with “the fullness... Continue Reading
Remember the Rainbow
Next time you are out on your prison regulation, one-hour’s exercise a day, look out for the rainbows. Remember the Lord’s promise.
The rainbow has come full circle. In the midst of a pandemic – one in which even many Christians struggle to avoid engaging in unrestrained catastrophism – we are reminded that the Lord has promised never to destroy all humankind again. The closest we will ever come to such disaster is when the Lord himself... Continue Reading
Does Scripture Promise that “No Virus can Touch your House” as a Believer?
The same God, who is a dwelling place and saves believers from death in Psalm 91, is the same God, who is a dwelling place and gives believers over to death in Psalm 90.
Does Psalm 91 promise us that no virus can ever enter our household? Do the Scriptures teach us that we will never suffer from disease, disaster, danger, or destruction? Let me give you at least 4 reasons that interpreting Scriptures like this, in the way that some teachers are proposing that we would interpret them, is... Continue Reading