How to Endure the Night
Introduction Christians rejoice that God has called us out of our spiritual darkness into his marvelous light (1 Pet. 2:9). We walk by faith in the Light of the world. Yet sometimes God calls us to walk at night, when…
Category Reformation21
Hate the Sin and Love the Sinner?
Context, Context, Context Christians can be guilty of making pithy statements of a theological nature that require a lot of explanation for the phrase to be accurate. If an explanation is not offered, we are sometimes demanding a lot of…
Where are the Peaceable Presbyters?
A recent dust up on Twitter has me asking, “Where are all the peaceable presbyters?” Several years ago, I had a personal Twitter account. It seemed like every PCA pastor was using it, and I felt like I was missing…
Parents, Discipline Your Little Children
Perhaps there was a time when parents generally over-disciplined. Today too we must believe that “correcting [children] unduly” is a sin against the fifth commandment. [i] But the more common modern problem seems to be insufficient discipline. Couple our cultural moment…
Is Your Chief End to Glorify and Enjoy Yourself?
Ever since the garden of Eden, sin has been cast as freeing and God’s law as enslaving. Today it’s endemic; sin is glamourized in sitcoms, on magazine covers, on YouTube, in Hollywood, by the influence of peers, and of course,…
No, The Trinity Debates Aren’t Over
In 2016, there was an eruption in conservative Evangelical and Reformed theologians surrounding the doctrine of the Eternal Functional Subordination of the Son (EFS). There’s no need to rehash what has already been said, as that has been summarized helpfully…
The Single’s Training Ground
You have been entered into the marathon. You have been given a number. You have taken your mark. The starting gun has been fired. Uh oh. This particular marathon will prove to be much harder and longer than the norm.…
Respectability and hospitality (and Friendship and Fidelity)
The qualifications for elders in 1 Timothy 3 and Titus 1 mention that for a man to be a minister he must be a one-woman man, be sober-minded, and be self-controlled. In my experience, these and other qualifications are commonly…
When A Pastor Falls
Strategically, Satan can do a great deal of harm to the church when he can play a role in the fall of a pastor. Pastors therefore should understand they are the special objects of attack (Zech. 13:7). But they should…
Bridging Your Real-Life and Virtual Identity
When we were young, my mother, undaunted at having sons instead of daughters, read us some Betsy Tacy books. My mind wandered during many of those hours, dreaming about being a pirate or an NFL running back (neither of which…