“…the majority of ministers and elders, while being personally men of great integrity and doctrinal orthodoxy, will tend to side with the left in the initial rounds of the struggle.” In my last two posts, I have tried to suggest that the reasons for a church’s decline into liberalism are not always immediately doctrinal, but... Continue Reading

What is right and just in these situations? What is loving to neighbor? Walk through each step of ethical reflection, explaining how you arrive at your answers, grounding your answer in Scripture and the gospel… Every year my Christian ethics class ends the year with a final examination that amounts to answering a hypothetical question.... Continue Reading

“Matthew 25: 45-51 is meant to show the temptation which besets all in authority to forget the responsibility that goes with power. …” I’m just back from a wonderful visit to Liberty University’s law school, where I gave a talk called “Making Sense of the New Financial Deal.” (I also had a chance to spend... Continue Reading

We have not given enough attention to the fact that voluntary alternatives have been proposed. Dave Sarafolean has suggested one way, and Martin Hedman has proposed another. The rumor is that another alternative, voluntary plan is in the works To the best of my knowledge, all the Presbyteries that are going to vote in 2010... Continue Reading

I think Wright is wrong in not seeing 2 Corinthians 5:21 as a statement of soteriology and I think he is wrong in not seeing Paul’s discussion of righteousness and justification in Romans as a statement of soteriology. Been following the Wright/Schreiner/Thielman exchange over justification at ETS last week in Atlanta? Among the many good... Continue Reading

The first danger I want to highlight is that of the celebrity pastor who is ultimately so big as to be practically beyond criticism. Not all historical phenomena that manifest themselves as doctrinal are necessarily immediately doctrinal in cause or origin.’ That statement, made to me by a mentor in my field of historical theology,... Continue Reading

Bush’s confirmed picks to the Supreme Court, from a pro-life standpoint, were superb. His actual policy changes, from bans on partial birth-abortion to stopping taxpayer funding of the deliberate destruction of human embryos, were wonderful George W. Bush is an interesting man with a complicated presidency that most Americans—going into Bush’s final year of office—deemed... Continue Reading

“Imagine a group photo of all the students who come to your church (or live within your community of believers) in a typical year. Take a big fat marker and cross out three out of every four face …About that time, I began encountering many other “leavers”: a basketball buddy, a soft-spoken young woman from... Continue Reading

We have not yet moved the conversation past anything but practical issues of buying postage and printing documents. There are significant issues of theology and Biblical interpretation at stake. Whatever we vote to do, we ought to bring these issues to the fore, as our forefathers have done on these very issues, and debate them... Continue Reading

The next danger is the minister in a confessional church who thumbs his nose at the church’s public standards of doctrine and practice. Yesterday, I noted how the big personality can shift the church in the wrong direction. A closely related phenomenon is that of the minister who thumbs his nose at the church’s public... Continue Reading