Over the centuries, the church has always wisely reminded us that theology, at its most fundamental level, is praise. Theology is not chiefly a matter of theory and, we hope, never a matter of speculation. We are everywhere reminded by the great ancient and medieval doctors and especially by the reformers that our minds are, […]
Thoughtful new candidates for church membership might wonder about it. Skeptical undergraduates are fond of mentioning it. And to the smartly dressed folks who ring your doorbell with complimentary copies of Watchtower and Awake!, it is something of a mantra: "The word 'Trinity' is not in the Bible." And indeed it is not. How, then, […]
Because of their use in baptism, our Lord’s words at the very end of Matthew’s Gospel are among the most familiar in the New Testament. Meeting with his remaining eleven disciples, the resurrected Jesus told them: All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all […]
I believe in God, the Father Almighty … And in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord …I believe in the Holy Ghost … (The Apostles' Creed, ca. 4th-5th c.) Since its earliest days, the church has discussed, fought over, debated, professed ignorance of, conducted heresy trials about, but always ultimately confessed, the Trinity, the […]
Christians have long been suspicious that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS) is a heretical sect, in part because of a faulty view of God. Recently, however, some evangelical theologians have begun espousing views that are similar to traditional LDS teachings. MR asked noted Mormon philosopher David Paulsen to explain to our […]
When I received a Th.M. in church history from Westminster Theological Seminary in 1982, I was a ministerial candidate of the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA) and had been a member of the Tenth Presbyterian Church of Philadelphia for nearly five years. I had also served on the editorial staff of Eternity magazine. So I […]
For many Protestants, the phrase "Daily Office" is foreign. It could as easily refer to the place where the mayor of Chicago works as to a system of set times for daily prayer. To make up for this ignorance, Arthur Paul Boers's book, The Rhythm of God's Grace, is an accessible introduction to the lost […]
Just how much history does the Bible contain? Not much, according to a productive group of scholars, who have earned the title of "minimalists" or even "nihilists" by some because of their skeptical views on the historicity of ancient Israel as recorded in the Bible. These academics, as one of them says, contend that, "theology […]