Sola Scriptura. Also, God is Love
Fair warning: the message is a bit of a matryoshka doll; it’s an exhortation to love embedded in a encouragement for apologetics embedded in a dissertation about sola scriptura embedded in a Reformation Day sermon.
Confessionalism Promotes Academic Integrity
Doesn’t being “confessional” mean that certain kinds of questions are, by definition, verboten? Wouldn’t that in turn mean that academics in those institutions have to sacrifice the “science” of biblical and theological study upon the altar of confessional consistency? Not at all. I believe the opposite is the case.
Is being biblical and confessional an academic liability?
We are confessional, which means we stand in the great tradition and ask “what’s next.” And we are Biblical, which means that when we ask that question we turn to the Word of Christ, working through the Spirit, and find it both fit and suitable for the building up of the church, for the race that we are called to run.
The Law was Added: A Paraphrase of Galatians 3:15-29
Ok, but then why add the Covenant of Law at all? What purpose would it serve? Why not just fulfill the Covenant of Promise without any intermediary period of Mosaic Covenant (and with it, the seed as national Israel)? The law was added to illustrate, illuminate, incubate, impede but also aggravate the problem of transgression.
Don’t Lose the Languages
The only way to keep your Greek and Hebrew is to read Greek and Hebrew. I think you probably already knew that was the answer. You just didn’t want to admit it. But the languages are just like everything else: if you don’t use it, you’ll loose it. So what we really need is not a trick or a gimmick, but a reading plan. In the rest of this post, I will offer two.
Paul was not a Theologian
Paul was not a theologian, he was a pastor. Paul’s theological endeavors are secondary to his pastoral purpose; he uses theology to address and resolve pastoral problems.
Only John Witnessed the Ascension Twice
As far as I can tell, there’s only one apostle that had the privilege of seeing the ascension twice, at two different times in his life, and from two different points of view: John,...
Why is there no verb in Ephesians 3:1?
I’m confused by Ephesians 3:1… it seems to be an introductory clause to verse 2, but it has no verb. Is there a verbal word that I am missing, or is the action of the clause implied?
Does Christmas Really Matter?
The first Christmas changed everything forever.1 And let’s be clear about what that means. Christmas is not an idea, not an emotion or an attitude or an ethos or symbol. Christmas isn’t a metaphor;...
From Paper to Pulpit
A sermon, in contrast to a paper, isn’t ordered and organized and determined by a thesis, but rather by an exhortation. The center of the sermon–the thing around which it is in orbit–is it’s exhortational purpose, not its doctrinal or exegetical content.