…let us rejoice in Dr. Norman's transparent articulation of his views, which has afforded us this opportunity to explore important matters, and let us strive to be both faithful and rigorous in our analysis, all with the goal of glorifying God and edifying the Church.

Suppose: A friend of the family (who was a Christian) has just died, and this young man has been asked to officiate the funeral and needs your advice. What would you tell him to say to the family members when they ask what has become of their loved one? What happens until the resurrection?

In other words, at death the person ceases to exist, but at the final resurrection God creates a new and improved version of the sae person. This extinction-re-creation view was held by Norman’s intellectual hero, the Scottish brain scientist Donald MacKay, and is defended by Norman himself.   This upcoming meeting of the Associate Reformed... Continue Reading

In anticipation of the fast-approaching 2012 Synod of the Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church, at which once again this year issues concern the denominations College and Seminary will be the subject of much discussion and debate, Erskine Board Chairman has sent out an open letter to all ministers and elders in the denomination In addition to... Continue Reading

“…it is also now clear that a majority on the Board do not wish for Erskine to be an “agency” of the Church that is organically related to the Synod. Instead, it envisions a “cooperative” relationship of essentially independent entities in which the Board is not accountable to the Synod. In short, after decades of... Continue Reading

Response of the Erskine College and Theological Seminary Board of Trustees to the 2011 General Synod’s Requests February 17, 2012 theaquilareport.com/files/ECBoardResponse.pdf [Editor’s note: the original URL (link) referenced in this article is no longer valid, so the link has been removed.]

The net result of this was that the coalition of the right and center wings of the church was reestablished, and this right/center majority “ran the table.” That is to say, it did not lose a single vote of any ideological consequence. In retrospect, it is now clear that the influx of ministers trained at... Continue Reading

One recommendation from that report was to consider ending its relationship with the Presbyterian Council for Chaplains and Military Personnel (PCCMP) as an endorsement agency and seek endorsement from the Presbyterian and Reformed Joint Commission on Chaplains and Military Personnel (PRJC). The day began with a wonderful sermon preached by the Rev. Paul Patrick, campus... Continue Reading

General Synod 2011 began this morning with a wonderful sermon by Rev. Kyle Sims from 1 Corinthians 1. Rev. Sims challenged pastors to make prayer a priority, to pray after the sermon (i.e., to pray on Sunday afternoon for the work of the Holy Spirit through the preaching of the word), to pray for the... Continue Reading

The 2011 meeting of the General Synod of the ARP Church opened with a worship service on Tuesday evening. Rev. Dr. John R. DeWitt preached a stirring sermon on 2 Timothy 2:1-11, focusing on a section of verse 9 — “The word of God is not chained.” And this year Dr. DeWitt also administered the... Continue Reading