Listen to what he says in his lecture on Paul’s statement in Romans. He says, “The saints in being righteous are at the same time sinners; they are righteous because they believe in Christ whose righteousness covers them and is imputed to them, but they are sinners because they do not fulfill the Law and... Continue Reading

Quit being concerned about what everyone else is doing, and concentrate on what you are supposed to do. This doesn’t mean we can’t talk to a friend when he or she sins. We can, and they can also talk to us when it’s our turn to be corrected (Luke 17:3,4; Matthew 18:15ff). But for our... Continue Reading

What are the signs that counseling might be hurting more than helping? I suspect this problematic dynamic whenever someone insists on meeting but doesn’t do the homework I assign, whenever someone wants to continue meeting beyond the specified endpoint, or whenever meetings continue with no discernible progress in spiritual fruit. In any of these scenarios,... Continue Reading

“The Presbyterian Church in America is a pace-setting denomination within evangelicalism,” said CBMW President and Boyce College Professor Denny Burk. “I am grateful that they declared the Danvers Statement a faithful declaration of biblical conviction. This kind of clarity will serve their churches well. I’m also grateful that the PCA voted decisively to maintain its... Continue Reading

Perhaps Christians should stop thinking about retirement as simply leaving something behind. Instead, retirement should be viewed as the opporunity to be useful in new ways. Imagine entering retirement with decades of experience, financial stability, and newfound flexibility. Now, you don’t treat retirment as a season of vacation, but a time where your usefulness expands! ... Continue Reading

In an age where anyone can gain a large following online, we tend to look down on those with few followers. In our mega-church era, we can frown upon small churches in rural areas. Such thinking can lead us to despise the small things, even though the vast majority of us will never make the... Continue Reading

Whenever someone in real need crosses our path, we should respond with compassion and help as we would hope to be helped, even if that person isn’t someone we would typically choose to love.     I know you’re a deeply loving person. I see it week after week in the way you treat others.... Continue Reading

Let’s face it: it’s far easier to love “everybody” than it is to love a specific somebody standing next to you. Everybody won’t require anything from you, or have any expectations. Everybody won’t notice if you don’t feel like helping today, or if you’d rather not make the effort to talk. Everybody won’t mind. The... Continue Reading

If unbelief lies at the center of humanity’s relationship with God, then understanding unbelief becomes essential for understanding the human condition itself.   We live in an age of unprecedented knowledge and profound confusion. Never before in human history has information been so abundant, so accessible, and so immediate. Through the internet, social media, digital... Continue Reading

The gospel is much more than a ticket to heaven. And if we are to continue in the way we started—if we are to NOT move on from the gospel, it means that the gospel becomes, over time, the driving force behind every part of our lives.   The world’s fastest man, for the moment,... Continue Reading

As people who were formerly alienated from God and hostile in mind (Colossians 1:21-22), we need obedience and faith modeled to us. Those we’re discipling need that as well. They don’t just need us to tell them about Christ; they need us to show them Christ from the Word and from our lives.   Read:... Continue Reading

We reject our humanness (with its limits and weaknesses), but Jesus embraces it. He not only calls it “very good” in the beginning but shows us how it is good through taking on a body of His own.   The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. John 1:14 Admittedly, I’ve not spent... Continue Reading

You will not agree with every line, and Calvin would not have wanted you to take his word over Scripture’s. But you will rarely find a guide this wise and this warm, one so convinced that God is worth knowing.   John Calvin was born on July 10, 1509. Five centuries have passed and this... Continue Reading

As we are filled with the Spirit, walk in the Spirit, put sin to death by the Spirit, and show the fruit of the Spirit, we can be assured by God that the Spirit lives savingly within us now and is our seal and pledge of greater things to come. What encouraging truths these are!... Continue Reading

It is no accident that Paul chooses coveting as his primary example in his discourse on the struggles with sin. He is pointing to our problem with the heart. We want what we want when we want it. Pornography is a distorted desire of the heart where we demand to have something we should not... Continue Reading

Fear will always tell you to hold the ball. Faith tells you to throw it. Don’t let the yips steal the joy of simply playing the game God has called you to play.   The yips. The word itself can strike fear into the heart of even the greatest athlete. The yips is a phenomenon... Continue Reading

The study of systematic theology is a glorious, high-stakes privilege. But we must never forget that we are stepping onto holy ground.…He has crossed the infinite gulf of existence to speak to us in words we can understand. He has accommodated His infinite light to our weak, creaturely eyes.…remembering that the goal of all true... Continue Reading

In 2021, Neland Avenue CRC in Grand Rapids, Michigan ordained a deacon in a same-sex marriage. A group of unrenowned pastors and lay leaders started the Abide Project with the goal to maintain biblical sexuality in the CRC. The conflict came to a head in 2022 when the CRC’s annual synod adopted the Human Sexuality... Continue Reading

Has the church begun to balk on her duty to uphold and protect the truth? Is the church crumbling to outside pressure to be conformed to the world? How will the battle for ideas be lost? It won’t be through procreation, but it will be through the church bending the knee to another lord other... Continue Reading

Life and death hang on our ability to hear God—and to hear God, we have to read (or at least listen while someone else reads). He reveals Himself, His will, and His gospel through words. Therefore, you can argue that reading is the most important thing we’ll ever do.   Why don’t you read the... Continue Reading

When we hear the words of Jesus, we are not simply listening to a learned rabbi or sound theologian. We are hearing the Word of God speak.   At various points in the gospels, we are told that Jesus taught ‘with authority’. For example, Matthew says ‘When Jesus had finished saying these things, the crowds were... Continue Reading

Sin is never to be kept within a secure safe box or cage. Sin is a poisonous snake which must be crushed to death.   The works of the Puritan divine John Owen (1616-1680), especially his works on the Mortification of Sin, are well worth the reading but they can be deeply challenging to 21st... Continue Reading

Don’t have enemies because you are caustic and abrasive. Don’t have enemies because you are unfeeling and unloving. But…do have enemies because you stand for truth. After all, Jesus did.   If you are a true follower of Christ, you will have enemies. A lot of enemies. This isn’t a popular idea. Many Christians seem... Continue Reading

If you find yourself still making excuses for sowing discord (or for aiding and abetting others to sow discord), you’ll be ruined before you know what hits you (Proverbs 6:15). God doesn’t like it when people mess with His wife.   There is no foolproof formula for recognizing sowers of discord, but Solomon wants to... Continue Reading

Don’t consider the work you do everyday as without value. No one may appreciate you, but God sees and is pleased when we are faithful in our work. Our work is ultimately done for Him, and is among other good works He has made for us to do in His world, as His people.  ... Continue Reading

Holy and blameless before Him; adopted now and fully in the future; allotted as an inheritance for Him; redeemed now and fully one day as God’s own possession…what a day it will be when God has us perfectly unto Himself and what it will mean for us!   The riches that we have in Christ... Continue Reading

In our time, when this liberty appears to be threatened again by politicians imposing policies that churches deem immoral, a good dose of the old Scots-Irish spirit may again be in order.   Scottish Presbyterianism, with its robust theology, disciplined government by elders, and strict piety, would significantly influence America through the waves of Scots-Irish... Continue Reading

This fool is worthless. He is wicked (Proverbs 6:12a). Nothing good will come of your friendship with him. Perhaps that sounds harsh, but it’s what Proverbs teaches.   The Sower of Discord is the third of Solomon’s three fools in Prov 6:1-19. This person knows what’s good for God’s people better than God himself does.... Continue Reading

The overture and the pushback it received within the increasingly liberal PCUSA prompted national headlines. Three committees in the denomination—the Advocacy Committee for Women and Gender Justice, the Advocacy Committee on LGBTQIA+ Equity and the Advisory Committee on Social Witness Policy—appended “advice and counsel” against the overture after it was introduced.   A committee of... Continue Reading

“A spirit of union, piety, and discipline is particularly necessary for this purpose. By this our church was revived, and became flourishing in our fathers’ days; by this it hath been cherished to our own times, and by this it must be secured.”   As the United States remembers the 250th anniversary of political independence... Continue Reading