History

Obedience and Submission The eternal submission of the Son to the Father in the Godhead has been a topic of discussion for quite some time now. After the internet debate of 2016 , Glenn Butner was motivated to conduct a thorough investigation into the topic. Glenn has summarized his findings on the...

The writings of French reformer, theologian, and pastor John Calvin are often remembered by the Latin phrase “brevitas et claritas”. Calvin wrote to be understood, and avoided using more words than would be helpful. To get to the point then, in English, the phrase means “brevity and clarity”...

Incomprehensible but Knowable Words are important, and some of them carry meanings that can be crucial for our understanding of God; words that will eventually affect the way we live the Christian life. Incomprehensibility is one of these words. But what exactly does it mean? Jonathan and James...

While rereading Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol I recently read something I had forgotten. When Jacob Marley appeared to Scrooge his body was transparent, so that Scrooge could see not only the front of his long deceased partner’s waistcoat but the back of it too! But then this line appears, “...

Edmund Grindal and His Letter to the Queen In 1576, Archbishop Edmund Grindal joined the company of Puritans who offended Queen Elizabeth I. His most provocative statement was a reminder of her mortality. He was suspended from his duties for the rest of his life. The unwelcomed reminder came at the...

Ralph Erskine (1685-1752) was born ten years after his mother Margaret was pronounced dead. The pronouncement had been mistaken, but she would have indeed been dead if a greedy sexton had not laid his eyes on her precious ring. Under cover of night, the sexton disinterred her body. Finding the ring...

Not all the 16 th century Protestant Reformers agreed that church discipline should be considered one of the marks of a true church. Calvin, for example, spoke only of the pure preaching of the word and the right administration of the sacraments. The Second Helvetic Confession, like Calvin,...

What does it mean to be a reader? What’s actually happening when someone reads a text? Ever since the rise of post-modernism these kinds of questions have been in vogue. And though many of the popular answers today are new, the questions themselves are not. In fact, he Bible itself as well as many...

For Instruction, Doctrine, and Morals James and Jonathan have a few questions about biblical interpretation, and Keith Stanglin is the right man to answer them. He’s the associate professor of historical theology at Austin Graduate School of Theology, and has written The Letter and Spirit of...

Reading through Sinclair Ferguson’s book Some Pastors and Teachers feels akin, or so I imagine, to sitting down with the author and getting to hear first hand what it was that sharpened and formed him into the pastor, preacher, and theologian he is today. Each chapter excels at informing the reader...