The Perfect Saviour: Key themes in Hebrews

Dr. David Peterson draws our attention to an important new book.

(Get a copy.)

Making sense of Scripture’s ‘inconsistency’

“I find it frustrating when I read or hear columnists, pundits, or journalists dismiss Christians as inconsistent because ‘they pick and choose which of the rules in the Bible to obey.’

Most often I hear, ‘Christians ignore lots of Old Testament texts – about not eating raw meat or pork or shellfish, not executing people for breaking the Sabbath, not wearing garments woven with two kinds of material and so on. Then they condemn homosexuality. Aren’t you just picking and choosing what you want to believe from the Bible?’…”

– Tim Keller looks at the relationship of the Old Testament to the New. (h/t Tim Challies.)

Commended: The Faith we Confess

“The Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion found at the back of the Book of Common Prayer are the doctrinal standard of the Church of England.

… Anglican churchgoers, ordinands, and ministers still require some kind of exposition of the Articles which are nearly four and a half centuries old, in order to understand them and see their importance as an expression of the faith we confess today. Into the breach steps Gerald Bray with this well-written, historically-aware, and faithful unwrapping of each Article.”

– Lee Gatiss, review editor for Churchman commends (PDF file) Gerald Bray’s book on the Articles. (Availability.) Related: “a brilliant resource” – Mark Thompson.

Download the Introduction from The Latimer Trust.

Griffith Thomas on Original Sin

Church Society has posted the latest extract from W H Griffith Thomas’ classic work, Principles of Theology. This is the first section of his piece on Article IX of the Thirty Nine Articles.

The Wisdom of the Cross (2)

“In part one of this series I considered Paul’s question to the church in Corinth concerning wisdom, Hasn’t God made the world’s wisdom foolish? (1 Cor.1:20). There I concluded that Christian wisdom is neither a matter of gaining kudos amidst worldly fashions nor the desire we have for God to do something spectacular to make us feel like we are on the winning side. Instead, we seek a world-view that rests on God’s actions for us in the cross of the Lord Jesus.

Next, I’d like to add Job’s question to the mix: In Ch.28:12 Job asks, Where shall wisdom be found?…”

– Dr David Höhne continues his series at the Moore College Faculty blog.

The Atonement — Visual Theology

Tim Challies has published another chart in his ‘Visual Theology’ infographic series, this one to help explain what is meant by the Penal Substitutionary Atonement. See it here.

Audio file: The Thirty Nine Articles

A few years back, Lee Gatiss at The Theologian took the time to record a reading of The Thirty Nine Articles. It’s very helpful to hear them read.

You can find the audio here as a 9.5MB / 28 minute mp3 file.

(Or you can read the Articles here.)

 

What Joy in Hell?

“Whatever we do or do not know about the details of hell, it is clear from Jesus’ teaching that it is so terrible and terrifying that we should do all in our power to avoid it. …”

– In his weekly column, Dean of Sydney Phillip Jensen turns to a topic many gloss over.

Thinking Christianly about singing and music

Rob Smith, Sydney singer / songwriter (among other things) has recorded a number of videos to help us think Christianly about singing and music and their place in what we do in church. Helpful and encouraging.

Each segment is 2 to 4 minutes in length.

1. Introduction
2. Christian music
3. The importance of singing
4. Singing and praise
5. Honouring God in song
6. Singing and the Holy Spirit
7. Singing and emotion
8. Singing and prayer
9. Singing and proclamation

Also, check out Rob’s invitation to the concert coming up on Saturday 21st July at St. Barnabas’ Broadway (tickets).

Heavenly tours?

“Travelling to heaven and back is where it’s at today. Don Piper spent ninety minutes there and sold four million copies of his account. Colton Burpo doesn’t know how long he was there, but his travel diary has surpassed 6 million copies sold …  There have been others as well, and together they have established afterlife travel journals as a whole new genre in Christian publishing…”

– Tim Challies has serious misgivings about popular books you’ll find at some Christian bookshops.

An important contribution to a vital debate

An important book, which meets a desperate need, is due to be launched next week.

“Sometimes we all just wish this debate would go away. Christians aren’t preoccupied with this subject, they’re preoccupied with Jesus. However, this is the form in which the gospel of Jesus is under most direct challenge just at the moment and we need the courage and the resources to take our stand on the teaching of Scripture.” – Mark Thompson

ACL President Dr. Mark Thompson explains why the book is important:

“The debate about homosexual behaviour and the concerted attempt by the gay lobby and others to gain legitimacy by rebadging homosexual liaisons as ‘same-sex marriage’ is quite intense at the moment. A culture bankrupt of any moral compass increasingly accepts the gay lobby’s caricature of Christians who take the Bible’s teaching on the subject seriously as bigots and homophobes.  Read more

Too much singing?

Over at Meet the Puritans, Lee Gatiss has been sharing some wisdom from 16th century reformer Peter Martyr Vermigli. Here’s his latest observation:

“In his commentary on Judges, Vermigli has this arresting application concerning music and singing in church. He writes:

Almost everywhere in the papal religion they think they have worshipped God sufficiently in the Church when they have sung and shouted loud and long… There are many priests and monks who think they deserve well of God because they have sung many psalms… Another vice to be removed is that there should not be so much singing in church as to leave almost no time for preaching the Word of God and holy doctrine. We can see this happening everywhere in a way, for everything is so noisy with chanting and piping that there is no time left for preaching. So it happens that people depart from church full of music and harmony, yet they are fasting and starving for heavenly doctrine.

This reminded me of an article by my friend Vaughan Roberts on the same subject, here. Though it is interesting that Vermigli was writing well before the modern charismatic movement. That, it seems, has more in common with early modern Roman Catholicism than we might have thought. How interesting too that Vermigli had such an influence over Cranmer and the composition of the English Book of Common Prayer which like Vermigli (died 1562) is celebrating an anniversary this year (1552, 1662).”

– from Meet the Puritans.

Credo Magazine — May 2012

The latest issue of Credo Magazine is available online. Executive Editor Matthew Barrett writes:

“the title of this May’s issue of Credo Magazine is ‘Chosen by Grace’.

Timothy George starts us off by taking us into the mind of the colossal reformer Martin Luther, exploring how he understood the doctrine of predestination, particularly in light of his famous debate on the bondage of the will with Erasmus.

Then, Paul Helm navigates new territory, investigating the contours of Calvin’s first controversy on predestination with Bolsec.

Next, I look at three Pauline passages that support the unconditional nature of election, demonstrating that God’s choice is not made on the basis of anything within the sinner, including faith.

Bruce Ware follows with a piercing article on the relationship between election and suffering, showing that suffering is a means ordained by God to spread the gospel for the salvation of his elect.

And finally, Fred Zaspel concludes by introducing us to B. B. Warfield’s understanding of predestination and providence, and the relationship between the two.”

The 75 page issue is  20MB PDF download from this page.

‘A table of the Lord’

Dr Barry Newman has been blogging on the meaning of the expression in 1 Corinthians 10: 21 –

“Focussing on the phrase, ‘a table of the Lord’, the aim of this blog series is to present a case that suggests that this phrase has nothing to do with any practice associated with a sacrament…”

– Barry has now posted the full series as a single PDF file on this page. You can follow his arguments and see what you think.

The uniqueness and sufficiency of Christ

Dr Mike Ovey, Principal of Oak Hill College, preached on Hebrews 1:1-4 at the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans Conference in London this week.

Watch his most encouraging, edifying and challenging exposition – at the GAFCON website.

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