True Vs. False Repentance: What’s the Difference?
God's will is that you might experience the genuine repentance that leads to life.
False repentance is scary because it can trick us into thinking we’ve truly repented when, in reality, we’ve only found more crafty ways to hold on to our sin. Do you constantly long for your sin? Do you love your sin more than Jesus and find yourself only hating its consequences? Do you avoid brothers... Continue Reading
10 Things You Should Know About the Exclusivity of Jesus Christ or the “Scandal of Particularity”
The so-called “scandal” of particularity is in fact an unimaginable expression of divine mercy.
The doctrine I believe is taught in Scripture is known as particularism or exclusivism or restrictivism. Advocates of this view insist that all are lost apart from a conscious and volitional embrace of Jesus as personal Lord and Savior. Salvation is available only to those who by faith in Jesus have become confessing Christians. ... Continue Reading
What’s So Great About Total Depravity?
Some find it odd that Calvinists seem to love total depravity (the doctrine, not the condition) so much.
I would offer three answers to this important question. For the doctrine of total depravity is not just something we learn so as to score high marks on some theology exam. Instead, total depravity is a doctrine to live by. “I’m not totally depraved, am I?” The answer from the Bible, and the testimony of... Continue Reading
Temples of the Holy Spirit
Paul's Call to Holiness
Temple language is particularly prominent in Corinthians and Ephesians. First readers had the advantage of Paul’s own extensive teaching — these were two cities we’re told he spent most time in — and of reasonable Old Testament literacy. Reviewing the relevant background helps us appreciate the huge demand Paul makes of us. “Your body... Continue Reading
Biblical CBT Vs Worldly CBT
The only way to make sure we are acting sensibly is to fact check our feelings – which are fleeting and mercurial – against solid, unmoveable facts that we know.
When I first became ill with depression and CBT was suggested, the ‘facts’ that were suggested to me as my feelings lied to me proved not to be facts at all. They were really opinions, or ideas, dressed up as facts that were open to a fair degree of interpretation. It was only when a... Continue Reading
The Bible Never Promises Immediate Physical Healing in the Atonement
According to Copeland, Jesus didn’t merely die for your sins. He also died for your sickness and poverty.
The key to understanding the 1 Peter passage is to look carefully at the context. Peter begins by stating how Jesus bore our sins in His body on the tree. He connects Jesus bearing our sins with Jesus’ body being nailed to the cross. Next, Peter tells us why this is so significant. He says this was so thatwe might... Continue Reading
5 Exercises in Theological Humility
In an attempt to offer five exercises in theological humility, I hope we can recover some of what Paul was so doggedly fighting for in his attempt to unify the theologically and culturally diverse church in Corinth.
The Corinthians argue over whose teaching is best (chapter 3), food offered to idols (chapter 8), liberty in Christ (chapter 10), and so on. And Paul continually tries to remind them that they’re not all right about everything all the time. In a partisan world where Jews and Greeks had several wildly different customs and... Continue Reading
Let’s Bring Back The Sabbath As A Radical Act Against The Always-On Economy
We all feel like we can never work enough. Perhaps it’s time to re-embrace the idea of a forced break from our labor.
In a Sabbatarian economy, the right to rest–the right to do nothing of value to capital–is as holy as the right to work. We can give freely to the poor and open our homes to refugees without being worried that there will be nothing left for us. We can erase all debts from our records,... Continue Reading
How One Book Changed My Life (Part 2)
Mastricht taught me not only the goodness and necessity of reason in theology, but also its proper limits.
But Mastricht’s vision of faith and reason, I discovered, was much more true and satisfying. In it the Bible is indeed the “perfect rule of living for God” (117), and absolutely necessary in order to know Christ for salvation (129-130), but even so, some truths taught supernaturally in Scripture are also taught naturally in nature... Continue Reading
How Suffering Reveals Your True Self
Suffering draws out the true thoughts, attitudes, assumptions, and desires of your heart.
Like a stream, your attitudes, choices, reactions, decisions, and responses to whatever you are facing flow out of your heart. The heart is the center of your personhood. The heart is your causal core, as dry soil soaks in the liquid of a stream. Suffering draws out the true thoughts, attitudes, assumptions, and desires of... Continue Reading