Ref21 Blog

On Saturday last I had the privilege of preaching at the Scottish Reformed Conference, an interdenominational preaching event billed as 'Scotland's premier preaching and teaching conference'. The chairman, Rev David Carmichael of Abbeygreen Church of Scotland began proceedings by opening with...

Mark Johnston, whose sermons on the Apostles' Creed we are featuring just now was on Premier Radio yesterday on the topic of cessationism, here. The program can be heard as streaming audio or podcast. [Go to the link above and...

At home in the UK this weekend (a good weekend -- seeing the mighty Gloucester finish top of leage for the third time in six years, at least in the regular season), I picked up a copy of Andrew Marr's excellent...

Many readers of this blog are familiar with Martyn Lloyd-Jones' instruction to preaching the Gospel to ourselves. In his book, Spiritual Depression (pp. 20-21), Lloyd-Jones said:Have you realized that most of your unhappiness in life is due to the fact...

Today, in my morning worship, the section of scripture was Romans 9-11 and smack dab in the middle of it, of course, were these words from Romans 10:14. There were a number of thoughts that struck me:1) While we rightly...

My good friend, Joe Holland, pointed out to me (in a "down" moment at Presbytery yesterday) a fascinating piece in Thomas Boston's Memoirs (Vol. XII of The Complete Works of Thomas Boston [Tentmaker, 2002]): "Having been advised before to cut...

Recently, I read a lamentable statement from the leader of African-American pastors inside the PCUSA.  It was lamentable because it made the gospel and the spiritual mission of the church secondary to social and political concerns. This morning I came...

The Christian calendar practiced by most evangelicals today is extremely illuminating.  What it shows is our generally weak appreciation for the fullness of Christ's saving work.  Two big holidays occupy our minds completely: Christmas and Easter.  So we focus on...

It seems increasingly to me that one of the challenges facing theologians and preachers in the Reformed tradition is to explicate the statement of the Westminster Confession of Faith that 'neither are the forementioned uses of the law contrary to...

The latest 9Marks interview by Mark Dever: "Phillip Jensen discusses Australian Anglicanism, dealing with success, his lack of regard for the academy, training ministers, and more."...

Well Chris Larson of Ligonier sent me a joke I couldn't refuse to pass along.   What do you get when you cross a mafia 'Don' with a postmodernist?                     ...

Here's a post on how to get a free audio download of a some key writings by Martin Luther....

The Covenant Seminary family was saddened by the news this past Friday that founding professor of Old Testament, R. Laird Harris, had gone to be with Jesus. Dr. Harris, who was recently honored by having the exegesis prize named for...

From a notice by Matthias Media:The Sola Panel is a new blog by a bunch of Reformed Evangelical friends who love the five 'solas' of the Reformation, and who want to work together to promote a Bible-driven passion for theology,...

Paul Helm has a new post online, looking at John Piper's The Future of Justification. Here is his summary:The first is to draw attention to what I believe is one of the most significant methodological points that Piper makes, but...