Nominating Duncan was Richard Phillips, the current senior pastor of Second Presbyterian. Phillips said Duncan has the experience, competence, trust, and goodwill necessary to lead the General Assembly proceedings. He noted Duncan’s considerable experience at the Assembly and the competence with which he leads.   The 53rd General Assembly has elected Melton “Mel” Duncan, ruling... Continue Reading

The Assembly ratified most BCO amendments approved last year (with Item 3 defeated and Item 7 approved. The Overtures Committee continued its work, recommending approval for electronic meetings of committees, four-year terms for coordinators, and an amendment requiring both wine and grape juice for the Lord’s Supper at GA   Assembly Convenes The 53rd General... Continue Reading

God has put His righteousness on display for all people, including the Philistines. And yet, unless our hearts are softened to the Gospel, we will wriggle every which way in order to avoid His righteousness, and cling to the more accommodating moral standards of our idols.   Japanese lore has it that a powerful 17th... Continue Reading

The world God made is not our enemy. It is our home. The distinctions God established are not prison bars. They are load-bearing walls. They hold up the roof over our heads. Tear them down and the house does not become freer. It collapses.   There was a moment when I was deployed in Iraq,... Continue Reading

We are in the midst of a spiritual war, and the Devil crouches at the door. Am I strengthening my defenses or undermining them? Am I doing the things that will help me to be morally and spiritually strong, or am I becoming comfortable and complacent in the midst of moral and spiritual dangers?  ... Continue Reading

It is never too late to repent. The time to repent is always now. You cannot go back, but you can respond in the present.…Consequences may still come, but for a true believer, it is never too late to be restored to fellowship with God.   One of the most vivid biblical stories of a... Continue Reading

Believers love, obey, trust, worship, enjoy, and serve Christ in everything. As they do, they look ahead to an eternal future where they will see Christ face to face and live with him forever.   Paul’s Prayer Believers who know God should always want to know him more, to be where he is, to meditate... Continue Reading

The genuine Christian will show by his life and by his beliefs whether or not he is truly part of God’s family. And it can be hard to tell at times, which is why we must also recognise that while folks can fool others, they cannot fool God.   We now have plenty of men... Continue Reading

One spouse on fire for the recently discovered Reformed faith, devouring books on imputed righteousness, the regulative principle, and supralapsarianism, while the other wonders what’s wrong with their old Methodist (or similar) church. What counsel should pastors and churches give such couples?   One of the regular patterns I observed in my pastorate was the... Continue Reading

This novel adoption thesis cannot survive exegetical, historical, and especially metaphysical scrutiny without compromising the unity of the incarnate Christ or the integrity of the atonement, it must be rejected as incompatible with Chalcedonian Christology.   Why Add My Voice To this Watershed Issue? I cannot remain on the sidelines of this debate because the... Continue Reading

Among key recommendations: a day of prayer and fasting for revival (as amended), thanksgiving for adult professions of faith, and gratitude for the nation’s 250th anniversary. The committee also voted to keep current BCO language on deacons, rejecting overtures to allow women in the office, while advancing several targeted amendments on judicial processes, session records,... Continue Reading

If truth is personal, then disagreement becomes impossible. If truth is personal, correction becomes oppression. If truth is personal, morality becomes preference. If truth is personal, reality itself becomes negotiable. And if reality becomes negotiable, civilization itself begins to dissolve. This is precisely what we are witnessing today.   Few phrases better summarize the insanity... Continue Reading

The short biblical section I did read over breakfast was in Colossians chapter 1. It knocked straight into my discouragement. Beginning in verse 9, Paul says the Spirit gives us wisdom and understanding of God’s will so we can: 1) bear fruit through our works 2) grow in the knowledge of God 3) draw on... Continue Reading

A congregation sees the sermon on Sunday, but not the hours of study, prayer, and wrestling beforehand. They may notice a hospital visit, but not the many quiet phone calls, follow-up conversations, and intercessory prayers. They benefit from the church’s spiritual health without seeing the behind-the-scenes work of planning, conflict resolution, discipleship, and administration. This... Continue Reading

We have an invisible wall of distinction between ordained ministers and the other offices. The Anglicans shape their clerical office by separating the clerical and lay offices through the use of the terms “ordained” and “commissioned,” and we do not. We ordain every officer, lay or not, and this should not confuse us as to... Continue Reading

Denominations do not wake up one morning debating monogamy by accident. The road from one compromise to another is not always straight and every church that stumbles in one place does not arrive at the same cliff by sundown. Still, the habit of compromise is real. Once a church learns to set aside Scripture in... Continue Reading

The RPCNA is made up of 86 congregations (several were recently released to form the RPC of Canada) across 7 presbyteries. Currently 10 congregations are without pastors; we are also in need of more ruling elders; and finances are stable across the denomination (we have a $37 million synod-level portfolio plus other assets).   The... Continue Reading

 Jesus, the Glorious One, has been anointed and is even now at the right hand of God. And yet that same one knows what it means to be tempted in every way, just as you are. He is high above, and at the same time, infinitely down to earth. This is who you have in... Continue Reading

The Councils of Orange and Carthage had closed the door on this doctrine. But what was closed there was opened at Trent. The Magisterium’s reaction to the Reformation placed the pre-modern and now modern church that remains tied to Rome in contradiction with orthodoxy. This is hard for Roman Catholics to hear. Because no one... Continue Reading

Paul’s metaphor of the soldier’s armor has become so familiar to many of us that we have forgotten that God (via a letter of Paul) is instructing us to do certain things in preparation for spiritual warfare. Granted, there is some disagreement among New Testament scholars about what some of these metaphors represent. But I... Continue Reading

From the conclusion of our executive report (drawn from the Pastoral Letter): We affirm that only those “who conform to the biblical requirement of chastity and sexual purity in their descriptions of themselves, their convictions, character, and conduct should be considered for leadership.” Additionally, we affirm that “Courts may consider for ordination candidates whose ongoing... Continue Reading

I believed the slogan “LGBTQ lives hurt no one.” My friend, a biological male who lived as a woman and was chemically castrated after years of estrogen, gave me a box of books on Christian theology. He had left the church for transgenderism, and I seemed to be interested in Christianity. So, he dropped off... Continue Reading

Loved ones, this is where the academic-practical bridge must be crossed with immense care. If we truly believe that theology is taught by God, it must radically alter our posture as students. It is incredibly easy for young, intellectually driven men to turn the study of Reformed theology into a blood sport. We want to... Continue Reading

When a Christian understands not just that they are saved, but the biblically grounded theology that informs them of how they are saved, their assurance shifts from a fragile and emotional “hope so” to an objective and rooted “know so.” By pursuing a theology of consistency, coherence, and explanatory power, we do not complicate our... Continue Reading

We speak in code, in algorithms, in the vocabulary of enhancement and optimisation and human flourishing. But the underlying grammar is the same. A unified global civilisation, sharing tools and platforms and ambitions, is engaged in a coordinated attempt to build its way out of creaturely existence. The tower has many names, artificial general intelligence,... Continue Reading

The most common claim from Mormons was that Christian is in the name, as in “The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints,” and that the doctrinal differences are secondary. However, using the same vocabulary does not mean we are using the same dictionary. When it comes to the contrast between Mormonism and Christianity, the differences make all the difference in the world.     On Monday, the Pentagon announced... Continue Reading

Our Lord described the church as an institution that included both tares and wheat. Sometimes the tares gain the upper hand and lead the church into apostasy. Some churches have degenerated to such a low degree that they cease being churches at all. But no church in any age has been utterly pure. It was... Continue Reading

A common argument lodged by critics against the New Testament’s integrity is that it was wildly unstable in its earliest stages. That is, our copies of the New Testament do not reflect the content of the original autographs (the original written documents of the biblical authors). Muslim polemicists adopt these arguments to support their accusation... Continue Reading

Maybe you know the intricacies of the atonement; perhaps you know the five solas and affirm the doctrines of grace. Your favorite hobby is to study the deepest theology and all you like to do is read Puritan after Puritan. To be sure, all of those things a great in themselves. (Yes, read the Puritans!)... Continue Reading

As I listened to the debate, I had an overwhelming sense of déjà vu – that I had seen this all before.  Seventeen years ago, I helped lead my congregation into the EPC to escape from the homosexual agenda that infected the PC(USA). Now, I was witnessing the very same thing in the EPC General... Continue Reading