Where are today’s Rembrandts, Bachs, Durers, Miltons, Handels, Bunyans, Herberts, and Donnes, the great believing scientists, spokespersons for liberty, justice, education, and the simple workers and home-builders who translated the Reformation’s God-centered theory into daily practice? Columbia University historian, Eugene F. Rice, observes that the Reformation brings us face to face with “the gulf between […]
Like the ancient Gnostics faced by the early church, today’s society has adopted an escapist, anti-materialistic, anti-intellectual, anti-institutional, anti-sacramental spirituality. This tendency has been evident both in the secular, Greek strain of Western history (Plato, Neoplatonism, etc.) and in the religious adaptations of that strain (mysticism, much of monasticism, the abundance of taboos designed to […]
It is not surprising that a Christian’s particular view of end-times and the return of our Lord Jesus Christ would have a dramatic effect upon how one understands the role of the individual Christian’s involvement in the world around him or her. Those who hold to a more pessimistic view of the future, and who […]
To many, the mainstream evangelical subculture is a confining ghetto. Creators, intellectuals, workers, entrepreneurs who would otherwise involve themselves in their callings and in the production and enjoyment of good art, literature, architecture, or cuisine are exhorted to leave aside worldly things and seek those things which are above. While this causes some to become […]
From the first-hand accounts, Oxford’s Gillian Lewis notes: “The city of Geneva possessed a significance which was symbolic and mythical. Her friends saw her as the mirror and model of piety, a haven of refuge, a roosting-place for fledglings, a stronghold to train and dispatch abroad soldiers of the Gospel and ministers of the Word.” […]
Professor of Theology, Wycliffe Hall, Oxford and member of the Oxford University Faculty of Theology. Dr. McGrath has been hailed as “one of the very best scholars and teachers of the Reformation” (London Times) with numerous books for both academic and lay audiences. MR: Has the Reformation produced more than its fair share of cultural […]
A young reformer who had grown increasingly critical of the departure of the Reformed Church and the nation from their theological moorings, Kuyper was encouraged to enter politics, which he did in 1874, when he was elected a member of Parliament. The church at this time was already sliding toward liberalism, having tolerated Arminianism and […]
Away with the caricatured scapegoating of the Puritans! Ryken’s work draws from the Puritans’ own writings to dispel the popular myths surrounding them. J. I. Packer in his foreword to the book sums it up nicely: “[T]he typical Puritans were not wild men, fierce and freaky, religious fanatics and social extremists, but sober, conscientious, and […]
