David Gibson with Brief History of Christmas Celebration in Culture and Church
Here are some excerpts from Gibson’s post, “David Gibson: No Church This Sunday—It’s Christmas – WSJ.com” (emphasis mine): By the early decades …
More Curate, Less CEO in Pastoral Ministry
Mark Galli has a wonderful article at CT (Link) that discusses the need for pastors to be more life-giving and less the CEO …
Tim Keller on the Shifting Center of Christianity and the Pitfalls of Power
From Tim Keller’s “King’s Cross” (pgs 124-125): The heart of the gospel is the cross, and the cross is all about giving …
J.C. Ryle on Divine Origin of Church
J.C. Rule, from his commentary on Luke: There is something deeply instructive in the fact which is now before us. It shows …
Peter, Petros, Petra: The Man, The Confession, or Both?
The following passage has been the subject of much interpretive debate: Matthew 16:13–19 (ESV) — 13 Now when Jesus came into the …
Is America a Christian Nation?
My friend Scott Kistler dives into the perplexing question over at “Tempora Christiana“.
Baptism and Easter
Pictures: Picture on top left is of a Catholic Baptism (notice that he is standing in a pool of water a full …
Ephesians Effect Upon 2 John’s
John Calvin noted Ephesians as his favorite book. John Knox requested that John Calvin’s sermons on Ephesians be read on his deathbed. …
Book Review of Michael Haykin’s “Rediscovering the Church Fathers: Who They Were And How They Shaped The Church
Haykin, Michael A.G. 2011. Rediscovering the Church Fathers: Who They Were and How They Shaped The Church. Crossway: Wheaton, IL Thanks to …
Barnabas on Circumcision and some Interesting Typology
Epistle of Barnabas Chp. 9 – But the circumcision in which they have trusted has been abolished, for he declared that circumcision …
Westminster Assembly Was One Vote Short of Adopting Immersion as Mode for Baptism
The vote was 25-24 in opposition to immersion and if one person changed their mind, things would be different to say the …
Would Westminster Divine, Jeremiah Whitaker, Subscribe to The Federal Vision?
David Wright devotes a chapter to the Westminster tradition of baptism. Interestingly, the drafting of the statement on baptism elicited some discussion …
Question and Answer (in a page or less): "What does ‘patristic’ mean?"
Question and Answer (in a page or less) What does “patristic” mean? “Patristic” refers to the first centuries in the history of …
One Catholic Church?
James Davison Hunter says that, “…Christianity in North America…is a weak culture; weak insofar as it is fragmented in it’s core beliefs …
Defending Christendom
There’s a lot in Peter Leithart’s interview with Jason Hood at the Society for the Advancement of Ecclesial Theology’s website, so I …
Women in the Reformation
Justin Holcomb, writing at The Resurgence blog, writes short descriptions of the lives of several women that God used in the 16th …
Book Review of Daniel Hyde's "Welcome to a Reformed Church"
Hyde, Daniel R.. Welcome to a Reformed Church: A Guide for Pilgrims. Orlando, Fla.: Reformation Trust Pub., 2010. Print. Reformation Trust provided …
The New Birth in a Wicked World: Cyprian’s “Letter to Donatus”
I recently read Justin Taylor’s brief interview with Michael Haykin from Southern Seminary. Haykin, whose book on the Church Fathers is forthcoming, …
Reformation Day 2010
I liked Peter Leithart’s quotation and explication of Martin Bucer’s words. This was his short post: Bucer wrote, “Because by faith we …
Book review: “Eccentric Culture,” by Rémi Brague
Eccentric Culture is a brief book (less than 200 pages), but dense and challenging. It also has a fairly simple thesis: European …
Book review, “How Africa Shaped the Christian Mind,” by Thomas Oden
Through his work as editor of Intervarsity Press’ forays into making ancient Christian commentary more accessible to modern people, Thomas Oden became …
The Reformation and State Power
Peter Leithart quotes historians Luther Peterson and R. Po-Chia Hsia’s contentions that the desire for confessional uniformity (whether Catholic, Lutheran, or Calvinist) …
Mark Driscoll’s Article on St. Patrick
This is a great article by Mark Driscoll on St. Patrick: link.
The Political Undercurrents of the Reformation
Peter Leithart passes on an observation from William Cavanaugh’s Theopolitical Imagination: the Reformation took hold in kingdoms where unresolved tensions remained between …
Robert Louis Wilken lecture on the Church Fathers and Scripture
Wheaton College, just a bit over an hour from my home, has inaugurated the new Center for Early Christian Studies. On October …