The greater issue before us is [the] disturbance of the peace and purity of the church. We ought not hinder ourselves from rectifying a clear and present problem today, on the possibility that it might not be a perfect solution.   Every year dozens of Overtures are sent to the General Assembly of our denomination for... Continue Reading

Jesus is outraged not because he has lost a friend [Lazarus], but because of death itself. Death is such an ugly enemy. It generates endless and incalculable anguish. And for anyone steeped in the entire biblical heritage, death itself is a mark of sin.   Expressions of Grief Today it is considered good form to... Continue Reading

We know that the sacraments have a teaching function. They exist to encourage and edify the body of the faithful. By maintaining a standard of the appropriate mode (and therefore appropriate symbolism) for baptizing, we are shepherding our people. We are teaching them about the Lord’s nature of interacting with His people and the way... Continue Reading

There is no legal “right” to compel others to say things they don’t believe. Until the Supreme Court explicitly reaffirms the foundational protections of religious liberty and free speech, there will be no end to the state compulsion or harassment.   By the time I visited Masterpiece Cakeshop in 2016, Jack Phillips, the man who had famously... Continue Reading

Justice is getting what you deserve and giving others what they deserve. And the standard for what is just is God’s righteousness. This is what Francis Schaeffer argued forty years ago, and it is something we need to recover today.    Where do human rights come from? Are these five alleged “human rights” actually right?... Continue Reading

We see very clearly in 1 Corinthians 13 that any attempt at repentance not grounded in love is pointless. Repentant love must be directed both vertically and horizontally. This means that God is not pleased with us swapping out sexual sin for some other, less damaging pleasure.    Anyone who’s experienced being enslaved by a... Continue Reading

The Christian will struggle with sin his whole life. But the Christian struggles in Christ. Before regenerating grace appeared we did not struggle in Christ. Now we do because now, in union with Christ through the Holy Spirit, we are not totally depraved.    Let us consider then how the doctrines of grace are good... Continue Reading

Our cultural and national identities are part of that great train of treasures which the kings of the Earth will bring into the heavenly New Jerusalem. Until that time, just as we strive, in God’s power, to rid ourselves of sin, leaving only the best of us for God’s service, so too we should work to strip... Continue Reading

Don’t focus too much on whether others think you are nice or religious or respectable. Follow Jesus. And, like Jesus, welcome anyone who comes to him, including those who you might naturally exclude or think are disreputable. Make sure you care less about how you look to others and more about how you can please... Continue Reading

While he believed that government had the responsibility to protect the most vulnerable, he always insisted that the voluntary principle was the ideal to spread the Christian faith and to act as the locus of social welfare. When in 1870 compulsory state education was introduced in England, Shaftesbury was incandescent. He was deeply skeptical of... Continue Reading