Machen, Confessionalism, and Seminary Education
For Reformed and Presbyterians, J. Gresham Machen stands as both a fine advocate of the creeds and confessions and a tragic victim of the failure of sound preaching in the church.
Machen’s book, Christianity and Liberalism, remains a hard-hitting and concise summary of the issues at stake between supernatural Christianity and its liberal counterfeit. And his own career is tragically ironic: prosecuted by a church for breaking church law by a denomination that had signally failed to prosecute others for lethal deviations for theological orthodoxy. In... Continue Reading
Context Matters: God Won’t Give You More Than You Can Handle
We should deal with the fact that the larger biblical witness clearly contradicts the statement that “God won’t give you more than you can handle.”
The consistent biblical witness is that: God gives people more than they can handle so they will learn to trust that only he can handle it. The common aphorism that “God won’t give you more than you can handle” is triumphalistic nonsense that fails to account for the common human need for lament through deep... Continue Reading
The End of Discernment?
Discerning truth from fiction, right from wrong, lies at the centre of Christian ethics (Phil 1:10).
So much online writing today celebrates so-called discernment bloggers whose purpose seems to be spotting the fault in others. They experience schadenfreude at the fall of others (1 Cor 13:6). And worse, much of this writing appears under the guise of Christianity. Discernment bloggers have contributed to the end of discernment because they have damaged... Continue Reading
The Apostles’ Creed: Ascended & Seated
There are multiple verities closely associated with the bodily ascension and session that are vital to us as believers.
We often speak of Jesus’ three fold office as being that of prophet, priest and king. When we think of him as priest we tend to think of him as either the one offering the sacrifice or the one being sacrificed. Yet, in Luke’s gospel we find him engaged in the priestly activity of pronouncing... Continue Reading
The Call to Repentance and the Championing of Grace
“I’m cheering for the next generation,” the pastor said, “but I feel like an ogre for stressing repentance all the time.”
His good news was the announcement of God’s kingdom, and the first word to follow? “Repent!” No wonder Jesus didn’t tell the rich young ruler to walk with him for a while until he stopped coveting. No, he got to the root of an unrepentant heart when he said, “Sell all your possessions and give them to... Continue Reading
Do You Not Know That the Friendship of the World is Enmity With God?
My righteousness, in God’s eyes, actually did exceed that of the scribes and Pharisees because it was the imputed righteousness of Christ.
All those years of struggling to please him and seeing how utterly helpless I was at being perfect and sinless no longer mattered at all. Yes, we are to seek to walk upright in the power of the Holy Spirit, but, in this, I am not climbing my way to heaven. My place is already... Continue Reading
Sleeping as an Act of Faith
Sleep is a declaration that we are not God, and He is in control.
While everyone periodically deals with a night of poor sleep, finding yourself strangled by worry in the middle of the night should cause us to examine matters at a deeper level. You see, sleep is not merely a physical necessity. It is a theological declaration, and God has designed it to be that way. It... Continue Reading
Lord’s Day Meditation: “Behold, To Obey Is Better Than Sacrifice” by C. H. Spurgeon
How many adorn their temples and decorate their priests, but refuse to obey the word of the Lord!
“To obey,” even in the slightest and smallest thing, “is better than sacrifice,” however pompous. Talk not of Gregorian chants, sumptuous robes, incense, and banners; the first thing which God requires of his child is obedience; and though you should give your body to be burned, and all your goods to feed the poor, yet... Continue Reading
All the Lonely People
This is where we must start in cultivating deep, meaningful relationships. It starts with God.
I think if we’re honest with ourselves, we long for deep relationships with others. We may be tempted to think our longing indicates that something is wrong with us, that something is deficient in us, but I assure you it is not. That longing for deep relationship was placed in us before the fall. We are... Continue Reading
Should We Still Say The Apostles’ Creed?
The Gospel must be said. Truth must be said. The Creed must be said.
A ‘confession’ dives deeper into the specific doctrines that divide groups while a ‘creed’ expresses precisely what all the associated groups have in common. When we say the Apostles’ Creed we are speaking with one voice across all Christian groups, throughout time, declaring the irrefutable truth of Scripture. As believers we must, with confidence, be... Continue Reading