What’s the Greatest Ecclesiastical Threat Facing the Church Today?
We are increasingly unchurching the churched.
How many Sundays did they actually spend with the communion of saints in public prayer, public reading of Scripture, public preaching, partaking of the sacraments—did they ever meet with an elder or pastor? If these things are not a part of the normal experiences of young people, they’re not really connected to the church
The 3 Tenses of the Gospel
The moment we drift away from the gospel, we perish.
At every stage—justification, sanctification, glorification— we come with empty hands, seeking mercy from our heavenly Father. Even at the point of our obedience as Christians—we are to “work out [our] salvation with fear and trembling”
Gay Marriage and the Future
Legal gay marriage in all 50 states is inevitable at this point
As a Christian and as a pastor, I will never retreat on the issue of marriage. It’s just too important. I will continue to teach and preach what the scripture says on whatever platform the Lord allows me to stand on.
The God of Peace
As a culture we’ve lost sight of the depths and seriousness of our sin.
The peace that Paul refers to is the peace of “God and sinners reconciled.” What joyful news this is! As the country preacher once said, “God ain’t mad no more!”
Changing standards?
In our anything goes culture, what are the rules for public officials?
If the secretary of agriculture, say, is engaged in an adulterous relationship, would that be a lesser offense than adultery by the CIA director, or the secretary of defense? Should one stay in office and the others resign? What would Carrie Bradshaw advise?
Questioning Christian Reconstructionism (Dominionism)
And Defending the Way of the Cross
America is by no means the kingdom of God (who ever said it would be, except perhaps the Reconstructionists or other social gospelers) but I would not want to live in any other place or time. God has blessed us immeasurably and it is by no means evident to me that America is in decline. With that in view I’ll take Paul’s approach to civil government as a model rather than Caleb and Joshua’s attitude toward the Canaanites.
Reading the Bible for Revival
For revival to happen, folks need to hear about Jesus. For people to trust Jesus, they need to hear the gospel
Doing biblical theology, redemptive history, isn’t a cure-all, not when it’s done wrong. Sometimes it comes out like this: isn’t it neat that Jesus is here in this strange place, Amen. Sometimes it leaves out what Jesus has to do with these very real issues in my life. I learned from Jay Adams that a... Continue Reading
What You Don’t Know About Complementarian Women
In her new book, Rachel Held Evans wants to put us all in one camp. Not so fast.
Even if all complementarian women did prefer cookbooks to systematic theologies—and they don’t—theological seriousness is not qualified by content but method. And it is just as theologically substantive to talk about homemaking from a biblical perspective as it is to discuss scientific theory or any other feature of contemporary life. Both could be approached in... Continue Reading
Christian Reconstruction, Alive and Well
The Christian Reconstruction movement is not dead
Christian Reconstructionism continues to be much maligned and misrepresented. Churchmen continue to throw stones at it because it believes that the Kingdom of God is greater than the Church. The spiritually-minded belittle it because it defines good and evil in terms of God’s law. Pietists deride it because it believes that the Bible speaks specifically... Continue Reading
Brothers, We Are Not Sisters
The best thing in the church for the women is for the men to be men.
Our battles over women’s ordination are often misguided in emphasis. We ought to spend less time trying to keep the women from becoming men in the pulpit, and more time teaching men to become men in the pulpit