The question faced in a growing number of churches is whether or not it is acceptable to claim respect for the authority and inerrancy of Scripture while at the same time denying that Adam and Eve were a special creation of God from the dust of the ground at a particular point in history and... Continue Reading

If someone wants to pound nails with wrenches and drive screws with butter knives, and then to prevail upon his neighbor and his tools when he needs serious work done, then shall we call him a carpenter on par with his neighbor?  Some seem to be answering “yes”; and they are not just asking that... Continue Reading

I don’t mean to imply, of course, that all Millennials have rejected religion in favor of a kind of angry, portentous neo-paganism, only that a great many members of this age demographic have more or less done away with religious belief, and in the absence of religion they have ascribed a quasi-religious morality to a great many... Continue Reading

As a pastor, I think it is important to know your people. Where are they? What do they need now? Sometimes they need a kick in the butt. Some of them may need to look at the question of faith – in whom, for what, by what means. But I guess I have become increasingly... Continue Reading

Many readers will know historian David Bebbington’s standard definition of evangelicals as Protestant Christians marked by biblicism, crucicentrism (the centrality of Christ’s work on the cross), activism, and conversionism. I have argued – and continue to argue in my forthcoming biography of George Whitefield – that for eighteenth-century evangelicals, an emphasis on the ministry of... Continue Reading

however, we can take any comfort in the concept of hell, we can take it in the full assurance that there will be no cruelty there. It is impossible for God to be cruel. Cruelty involves inflicting a punishment that is more severe or harsh than the crime. Cruelty in this sense is unjust. God... Continue Reading

As a Christian I have realized the grace of God enables me to be more than my depraved nature, and even more than the generally positive personality I might have inherited.  That possibility drives me to share the Gospel even with really evil and bad people, which in my mind includes everyone and not just... Continue Reading

Do you see the relevance of the Wheaton Community Covenant? In effect, the government is stepping in to help non-married members of the Wheaton community — note the reference to students — violate the terms of the covenant that they have voluntarily affirmed….Are there other cases in which the government plans to attack doctrinally defined... Continue Reading

“We often turn our attention to the light literature of the day, and the new books that appear; we read the articles in the reviews, and we take the daily papers, and are, many of us, well versed in the politics of the day. And hence our preaching suffers. We want absorption with the great... Continue Reading

“Defenders of religious liberty can sometimes find it difficult to infuse real pathos into their arguments, especially because the cases around which our legislation is often shaped tend to be unsympathetic. People ask themselves: am I personally bothered if religious universities or hospitals or businesses give contraceptives to their employees? Do I find it offensive... Continue Reading