Resources from 1998
The doctrine of predestination has fallen on hard times. Not that it was ever very popular. Given today's theological climate, most Christians probably think that predestination-to the extent that they think about it at all-is an abstract, philosophical notion invented by a few cranks in the past. (1) In reality, though, most of the famous […]
When in 1618 the Reformed theologian J. H. Alsted (1588-1638) declared that the Protestant doctrine of justification is that "article of faith by which the church stands or falls" (articulus stantis et candentis ecclesiae), he was only repeating what all Protestants had learned from Martin Luther and what all true Protestants and evangelicals still believe. […]
Duke historian Grant Wacker tells us that in the winter of 1887, a group calling itself the Evangelical Alliance for the United States met in Washington, DC. It was an appropriate site for a noble assemblage of scholars, pastors, college presidents, and other leaders who were intent on recapturing the moral, spiritual, and political clout […]
As C. S. Lewis' oft-repeated line has it, "God likes matter. He invented it." Christianity has always affirmed God's own verdict concerning the work of his hands. Human work (vocation) was established before the Fall as an expression of the image-bearing status of the Great King's royal servant. The principle of flourishing, which God had […]
The contemporary debate over apologetic methodology, however unpleasant, can be a vital and healthy exercise for it is crucial to have a biblically based and carefully honed apologetic methodology in place before confronting the learned paganism of our age. When this is the goal of an evidentialist-presuppositionalist-classical apologetics debate, it ought to be greatly encouraged. […]
One of the primary objections to apologetics within Lutheran circles this century is the critique (offered especially by Bultmann and his followers) that Luther's central conviction that a man is justified by grace through faith and his concomitant refusal to confuse Law with Gospel eliminated for him all uses of objective evidences in "defend-ing" the […]
