Seeker, Franchise, Or Reforming: Moving Beyond Some Current Models In Reformed Church Planting To Recover The Whole Mission

The need is great, the mission is great but our God is greater and his grace is greater than all our sin and weakness. Pray for the harvest. Organize for the mission (to plant churches) and ask yourself where your congregation falls in the seeker — franchise — reforming continuum: is there a passion for the whole mission? Continue reading →

What To Do About Halloween On The Sabbath?

There are three major questions here: Halloween, the Sabbath, and how Christians ought to relate their faith in Christ to their life in the broader culture. Continue reading →

John Piper, Future Grace: The Purifying Power of the Promises of God, rev. ed. (New York: Multnomah, 2012)—A Thorough Review

Pastor John Piper is well-known for his role in sparking the “young, restless, and Reformed” movement, mainly through his emphases on God’s sovereignty and serious expository preaching. There are no doubt numerous present members of Reformed churches who ended up there because of initial investigations of Reformed theology that began with hearing or reading John Piper. Personally, Piper was my first exposure to a thorough and biblical explanation of predestination in some of the appendices of the 2003 edition of Desiring God, which I was told to read shortly after becoming serious about my faith. Continue reading →

Therapeutic-Gnostic Pentecostalism?

If the mainstream of American evangelicalism has become entirely captive to what Christian Smith, in 2009, called “moralistic therapeutic deism” much of the rest of it has become a subsidiary: Gnostic therapeutic pentecostalism. Continue reading →

Is The Neo-Evangelical Coalition Worth Saving?

Yesterday Trevin Wax crystalized the case for preserving the neo-evangelical coalition, which emerged after World War II and in so doing, for Reformed confessionalists, he has also made the case against the neo-evangelical coalition. What is that coalition and what are its attractions . . . Continue reading →

What If Students Were Praying In Jesus’ Name?

A local paper reports that that the Thomas More Society, which specializes in religious liberty litigation, has sued the State of California over its inclusion of an Aztec prayer  in the curriculum as an activity. Continue reading

Are Mental Images Of God Unavoidable?

Q. 109. What sins are forbidden in the second commandment? A. The sins forbidden in the second commandment are, all devising, counseling, commanding, using, and any wise approving, any religious worship not instituted by God himself; the making any representation of God, . . . Continue reading →

Reaching Romania With The Reformation

Soon, it was clear that Romania needed a Reformed church. Corcea contacted several churches in Europe for support and advice, and received an answer from Rev. Andrea Ferrari, pastor of the Reformed Church Filadelfia in Milan, Italy (also a URCNA mission). Continue reading →

What Is And Is Not Gossip?

In recent months, I have had several people speak with me about situations going on around them. Each of these parties were godly Christians seeking counsel about difficult matters involving others. Each time, they would pause and say something like “I don’t . . . Continue reading →