I eventually wrote a short book to help ordinary Christians understand the exciting and frustrating tension of being simultaneously restless and patient for the future new creation because of our assurance that it is superbly good and securely ours. In my teaching of seminary students, inaugurated eschatology has been a repeated theme. Throughout fourteen years of pastoral... Continue Reading

Since Christians have the truth—the truth of salvation from the One who is the Truth of total reality—it is our duty to be heralding not merely the truth for individual salvation but also the truth for right living in society. Schaeffer is calling for believers to submit to the lordship of Christ over our own... Continue Reading

The confession of sin culminates in the acknowledgment of our condition. Due to our rebellion from God our Creator there is no health in us… we are miserable offenders. Brought lower still to our fallen, creaturely, and God-dependent state, the remedy of the gospel as declared in Christ Jesus is set forth! The minister then declares that through faith... Continue Reading

There are hundreds of books on the Reformation, but if one coming to the subject for the first time were looking for the best place to start, he would be hard pressed to find a better introduction than Stephen J. Nichols’ The Reformation (Crossway, 2007). For those who find history difficult, Nichols’ style of writing... Continue Reading

Christians, who understand what God requires, obey or disobey on principles, not whims or wishes. Schaeffer observes that wherever the Reformation flourished, two essential and inseparable aspects from the Christian worldview governed citizens: (1) because God ordains governments, he establishes proper order, including officials to whom honor is due (Romans 13:7); and (2) the obligation... Continue Reading

Confessing the Faith: A Reader’s Guide to the Westminster Confession of Faith by Chad Van Dixhoorn. Historical and practical in its focus, this book provides a guide to the confession, considers its original proof-texts, and seeks to deepen the reader’s understanding of the Westminster Confession. Both advanced and general audiences can benefit from this book and... Continue Reading

If you’ve never read the Screwtape Letters before, I’d encourage you to grab a copy. The book consists of 31 letters from a senior demon Screwtape to his nephew, a junior demon, named Wormwood. This is arguably Lewis’s most influential work. You can read it in a month just doing one letter a day. They... Continue Reading

Bribery takes behavior out of the moral framework and makes obedience to you optional. Can that be right? What if the child turns down your proffered sweets or sticker and decides being disobedient is more fun? Do you enter into negotiations and up the ante? You are teaching the children that the only reason to... Continue Reading

We live in an age whose moral barbarisms eclipse what Schaeffer saw in his own day. Were he alive today, Schaeffer would not be shocked in the least. Instead, watching the wreckage of the world, he might say with tears, “You should have listened to me” (cf. Acts 27:21). Contemporary society is living proof of Schaeffer’s... Continue Reading

The sources to which “gay Christians” constantly appeal—secular psychology, sociological data, identity theory, and the personal experiences of people who identify as sexual minorities—are not sufficient to guide us into all truth…If the Bible is God’s holy, inerrant, and clear revelation, then it is the foundation of all that we should believe and do—regardless of... Continue Reading