John Owen on John Bunyan
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 I love this anecdote: "...the most learned of the Puritans hung for hours, that seemed like moments, upon the lips of this untutored genius.
The king is reported to have asked Owen, on one occasion, how a learned man like him could go "to hear a tinker prate;" to which the great theologian answered, "May it please your majesty, could I possess the tinker's abilities for preaching, I would willingly relinquish all my learning."
But it was good for us that this never happened. And good that the writings of both men, so different in style, and yet so full and fragrant of Christ, influence us still today. Labels: Anecdotes from Church History
Happy 500th: John Calvin (audio links)
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D. A. Carson sermon series on John
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 Originally preached at the 1992 EMW Aberystwyth Conference. John 3:1-16John 6:1-71John 1:1-51
John 11:1-57
If you download the sermons you are allowed to make one copy for your personal use. Please don’t redistribute copies of these sermons without first asking permission. Labels: Sermons
D. A. Carson sermon series on Revelation
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Out now: The Westminster Confession into the 21st Century: Volume 3
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 Christian Focus have now made this third volume available. Here's the blurb: This important collection of essays seeks to place the work of the Westminster Assembly in its historical, theological, political and social setting and challenge inaccurate historical assertions that have since become commonplace. It places Westminster in its relation to earlier and later Reformed theology and provides a fresh evaluation of its contribution to the Calvinist tradition. It commends it to us as a faithful expression of clear-headed Christian thinking. Topics include: The Thirty Nine Articles at the Confession; Karl Barth and the Westminster Confession of Faith; The New Perspective, Paul, Luther & Judaism; Objections to the Covenant Theology of the Confession; The Nature of the Lord’s Supper according to Calvin and the Westminster Assembly. You can take a look at the contents page and the introduction by the editor Ligon Duncan here. Al Mohler writes: “We live in a day of wholesale historical amnesia and theological confusion. The antidote for this crisis is clear - we need a recovery of what has been lost. That is what makes The Westminster Confession into the 21st Century so important and timely.
The Westminster Assembly represents one of the most decisive moments in church history, and this collection of essays brings new light to our understanding of the Westminster divines and their work.
Here we find scholarship matched to a deep love for the church. This book is a worthy successor to the first two volumes in this series. I celebrate its publication and commend it to all who love the church.”
Joel Beeke on Assurance (audio)
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 This message was given at the EMW Aberystwyth Conference in 2000. Joel Beeke, AssuranceIf you download this message you are allowed to make one copy for your personal use. Please don’t redistribute copies of these sermons without first asking permission. Labels: Sermons
Doug Kelly sermons on the Trinity
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Remembering Calvin's God
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 In his exposition of 2 Kings 2 ("Seismic Shift in the Kingdom of God") Dale Ralph Davis underlines the point that not only is God's power not tied to a particular era, it is also not tied to a particular instrument. He then relates the details of John Calvin's funeral as described by Emanuel Stickelberger: Calvin had given definite instructions for his funeral. Nothing must distinguish it from that of any other citizen. His body was to be sewed into a white shroud and laid in a simple pine coffin. At the grave there were to be neither words nor song.
The wishes of the deceased were scrupulously carried out. But although in accordance with his will all pomp was avoided, an unnumbered multitude followed the coffin to the cemetery Plainpalais with deep respect and silent grief. He who was averse to all ambition did not even want a tombstone.
Just a few months later when foreign students desired to visit the place where the Reformer's earthly remains rest, the place could no longer be pointed out among the fresh mounds.
2 Kings: The Power and the Fury, p. 33 As Dale Ralph Davis vividly expresses it "Why do we need a Calvin grotto when we have the God he served?" Labels: Anecdotes from Church History
Afraid of Infinitude
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 The following is Doug Kelly's contribution to the Christianity Today Forum "Has God been held hostage by philosophy?" (January 9th, 1995). You can also read the contributions of Roger Olson, Timothy George and Alister McGrath here. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- One of the best things about this most provocative book is its subject: it is actually about God, rather than being another evangelical "how to" or self-help manual. Clark Pinnock is certainly right about one thing: "The concept of God is the most important topic in theology." To their credit, the five authors have done something far from universal among theologians and philosophers; they have written in clear, straightforward English prose. It seems to me that they have been honest and aboveboard in plainly expressing what they think. Even those who strongly disagree with their conclusions will have to respect them for their transparent clarity. Moreover, one must commend their desire to make their theological discourse practical so that it addresses living issues such as the reality of intercessory prayer, and how to interpret evil and fight it in today's world. Several of these authors properly point out that the classical tradition has not always done full exegetical, theological justice to the matter of God's impassability. I was genuinely disappointed that, because of crucial, exegetical and central theological weaknesses, these brethren were unable to improve this situation. Indeed, what they have to say on this point and many others constitutes one of the saddest intellectual and spiritual retrogressions I have ever seen outside openly heterodox thinking. The really crucial weakness that devastates the promise of this volume to present a fresh, more biblical view of God is this: The authors feel that God cannot be infinite and personal at the same time. To deal with us personally, rather than harshly and mechanically (which is how they see "sovereignty"), God either must be finite or, at least, refrain from employing such infinitude. Some of the authors hold that God really is not infinite (e.g., God literally does not know what is future); some of them suggest that he must voluntarily refuse to use his infinite abilities as the price of humankind's being guaranteed personal significance. As a result of a selective biblical exegesis (that looks only at the human limitations implied in a word—such as repent—and strangely fails to consider the word in the light of the infinite subject to whom it refers) and a failure actually to read the Fathers of the Christian church, these writers attempt to get rid of God's infinity by ascribing it to classical theology's being the illegitimate offspring of the cohabitation of biblical concepts with pagan Hellenistic philosophy. In reality, a careful reading of the Fathers (such as Athanasius, for instance) would indicate the profound Christianization of Hellenistic terms and concepts. Though they began as Greek terms conveying pagan content, such concepts as creation, being, logos, providence, and person were thoroughly transformed during the first four or five centuries of the Christian era in the light of Old Testament prophecy and the apostolic testimony to Christ. Perhaps lack of familiarity with this field of study explains why the authors dismiss so easily the entire classical tradition as being no less Neo-Platonic than Pseudo-Dionysius, who in truly unbiblical fashion describes God as "beyond being." But they fail to point out the very significant fact that when Athanasius (long before the time of Pseudo-Dionysius) quotes this passage from Plato's Republic, he changes it to state that God is "beyond all created being"—a profoundly biblical concept (Athanasius, Contra Gentes, 2.2;40.2). This leads us to the heart of their problem. It seems to me that these "openness" writers have failed to think through the profound implications of the difference between created (finite) being and uncreated (infinite) being. This failure to think clearly is manifestly demonstrated in their impoverished grasp of the relationship of language to being (i.e., epistemology). They seem to work on the assumption of the univocal validity of language for both God and man. That is, a word must mean for God the exact same thing it does for a human. For instance, "before and after" impose on God's experience the same limitations they do on that of humankind. But one wonders how they could have neglected the church's pivotal teaching on the analogical usage of language (i.e., that there are both similarities and differences when the same word is applied to created and uncreated being). A brief reading of a few sections of Saint Thomas Aquinas's Summa Theologiae or perhaps chapter five of E. L. Mascall's Existence and Analogy might have transformed this book. And long before Aquinas or Mascall, Saint Hilary of Poitiers (fourth century) wisely remarked (in De Trinitate 4:14) that human words are subject to God, rather than God being subject to human words (in the sense of comprehensively defined and thus limited by them). The human mind "must not measure the divine nature by the limitations of [its] own, but must gauge God's assertions concerning himself by the scale of his own glorious self-revelation. … Since we are to discourse of the things of God, let us assume that God has full knowledge of himself, and bow with humble reverence to his words" (1:17). In other words, the reason the five authors of The Openness of God deny the infinitude of nearly all the attributes of God is their failure to have heard what Hilary (and the whole orthodox Christian tradition) could have said to them. That is, we must not attempt to project our creaturely limitations onto the God who made us (as though we had made him). That would be a violation of the second commandment. Rather, with Saint Paul, let us understand that the analogy (and glorious reality) of God as our Father makes sense because fatherhood is from God (Eph. 3:14-15), as the incarnate Christ and outpoured Spirit have shown us. Hence, as Athanasius says, "God does not make man his pattern, but rather, since God alone is properly and truly Father, we men are called fathers of our own children, for of him every fatherhood in heaven and earth is named" (Contra Arianos 1:23). Human reason, therefore, must adjust itself to God's being and not the reverse. Repeatedly in this volume, the authors univocally limit the infinite God by what they are able to understand (see, for example, the definition of divine omniscience on p. 136). This short-sighted procedure causes them throughout the book to deny one side of clear biblical teaching (such as God's sovereignty) in order to affirm the other side (such as human responsibility). Sadly, all too little that they write in this volume can be taken seriously either by scholars or by ordinary Christian layfolk until its authors rethink their basic approach. May they be blessed in doing so!
Interview with David McWilliams, author of Galatians (a Mentor Commentary)
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 David McWilliams commentary on Galatians has just been released. He was recently interviewed over at the WTS Bookstore Blog.
WTSBooks: As a veteran pastor, how would you advise the Church to interact with proponents of the New Perspective? Put another way, how can someone responsibly dialogue with the new perspective? DM: I have been an ordained Presbyterian minister for 25 years. I have seen many fads come and go, many errors proliferate and I think that the best way to handle this is to teach the truth.
If justification by grace alone, through faith alone on the basis of the finished work of Christ alone had been so part of the warp and woof of the church’s preaching and teaching and had been understood by Christians to be indispensable for daily Christian living, the new perspective would have been a tempest in a tea cup.
I am not saying that we do not have to point out error; but, getting the gospel way down deep in the heart is the best defense against false gospels. This has been my aim with my congregation and with my seminary students. Dialogue with those who are confused is part of the minister’s work. Paul makes this plain in his writing to Timothy. So, we must be gentle, patient, pastoral. On the other hand, the teaching of this in our churches is intolerable and calls for us to take seriously the anathema proclaimed by Paul in Galatians 1.
We who have a biblical view of Paul’s doctrine of justification, as summarized in the Reformed confessions and the leaders of the new perspective understand one another. We do not agree. And the disagreement is vital and serious; it relates to the very nature of the gospel itself.
Paul defines the gospel in terms of justification, the work of Christ, and makes plain that new covenant ministry is ministry of righteousness as over against condemnation (Rom. 5:16; 2 Cor. 3:9).
About this, in the teaching ministry of the church, there can be no dialogue; only faithful proclamation of justification by grace through faith. We do nothing to be accepted by God; Christ has done it all.
You can read the whole thing here and buy the commentary here (US, WTS don't ship overseas) or here. David McWilliams is the Senior Minister of Covenant Presbyterian Church, Lakeland, Florida where he has served for 20 years. In 2009, McWiliams was appointed as Adjunct Professor of Systematic Theology at Redeemer Seminary, Texas. He has earned degrees from Mercer University, Westminster Theological Seminary, and University of Wales. Labels: Books
David Robertson on recent developments in the Church of Scotland
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Paul Helm reviews N.T. Wright's Justification: God's Plan and Paul's Vision
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 There is more to come but the first post, which is a rewarding read and merits careful attention, can be found hereLabels: Justification, Links
Hug me, I'm a false apostle
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 I'm currently reading through, with great profit, Phil Ryken's commentary on Galatians in the Reformed Expository Commentary series. Here's a snippet: We cannot simply assume that we have the gospel. Unless we keep the gospel at the center of the church, we are always in danger of shoving it off to one side and letting something else take its place.
Martin Luther rightly warned that "there is a clear and present danger that the devil may take away from us the pure doctrine of faith and may substitute for it the doctrines of works and of human traditions..." The good news of the cross and resurrection must be preached, believed, and lived. Otherwise it will be lost.
The church's greatest danger is not the anti-gospel outside the church; it is the counterfeit gospel inside the church. The Judaizers did not walk around Pisidian Antioch wearing T-shirts that said, "Hug me, I'm a false apostle."
What made them so dangerous was that they knew how to talk the way that Christians talk. They used all the right terminology. They talked about how they "got saved." They told people to "trust in Christ." They "presented the gospel." Only they did not have the gospel after all.
We should expect, therefore, that the most serious threat to the one true gospel is something that is also called the gospel. The most dangerous teachers are the ones who preach a different Christ but still call him "Jesus." Ryken, Galatians, p. 21 Labels: The Defense Against the Dark Arts
On this day in history: Samuel Davies
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 250 years ago today the great preacher Samuel Davies, author of the hymn "Great God of Wonders" and described by Martyn Lloyd-Jones as "the greatest preacher [America]...ever produced, left his congregation in Hanover to become the president of "The College of New Jersey" at Princeton. Less than two years later his earthly course would be over. Samuel Davies died of pneumonia in February 1761. In his farewell sermon at Hanover, Virginia, Davies urged his listeners to consider the "now" and the "not yet": Survey the sacred treasure of the divine promises laid up for you in the Bible, and stand lost in delightful wonder at your own riches. Behold the immense inheritance which the blood of Christ has purchased for you. Quoted in Iain H. Murray, Revival and Revivalism: The Making and Marring of American Evangelicalism 1750-1858, p. 17 Labels: Anecdotes from Church History
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