Now that Christ has come and has appeared among us—and especially now that he has completed his work of redemption—the occasion for fasting fades before us in light of our identity as a people who rejoice; for we are Christ’s bride, being . . . Continue reading →
HeidelQuotes
Replacing Pseudo-Neutrality With Divinely Ordained Natural Law
Abraham Kuyper offers one non-liberal route for the state to organize itself in a way that is supportive of the basic truths of the divinely ordained natural law within a system that is more tolerant of diversity than the Constantinian settlement. Kuyper . . . Continue reading →
Defining Our Terms In The Identity Culture Crisis
Think of the struggle we are witnessing in our culture over the question of identity. Today, people are on an endless quest of finding an identity in those things that they believe will make them happy. The culture tells people to turn . . . Continue reading →
When We Are Tempted To Save Ourselves
When you feel doubts about being God’s child because you have not shown God that obedience that you owe to him, know that the devil is very near you. He will attempt to falsify the gospel by convincing you that you must . . . Continue reading →
Irenaeus: On Serving A God Who Needs Not Man’s Love
4. And therefore does the Scripture say, “These words the Lord spake to all the assembly of the children of Israel in the mount, and He added no more;” for, as I have already observed, He stood in need of nothing from . . . Continue reading →
Will Abortion Test Americans’ Religious Fidelity?
The Dobbs decision has revealed fault lines in American Christianity. These fault lines lay just below the surface for a long while, but are now clearly exposed. As long as abortion was legal by Supreme Court decree, it was possible to identify . . . Continue reading →
Pseudo-Masculinity And The Qualities Of The Kingdom
Rather than being formed by the King of heaven, it can be tempting to soak up hours of the Joe Rogan podcast or to become imitators of Jordan Peterson. Rather than living out the ethical qualities of the kingdom (Matt. 5-7), some . . . Continue reading →
Haldane: Romans 2:13 Is Law, Not Gospel
As for the last of them, which answers first in this 13th verse, he says that it is not sufficient for justification before God to have received the law, and simply to be hearers of it; but that must be observed and . . . Continue reading →
Millennials And The Fallout Of Post-Political Evangelicalism
Young Evangelicals, we are told, leave the faith because Evangelicals have changed political and social behaviors. There is little evidence for that. What evidence that is offered—Trump’s supposed popularity—is more evidence of Evangelicals not changing their political habits than of them changing. . . . Continue reading →
Defined By Our Theology, Not Critical Theory
Yet perhaps one of the reasons why so many people—including Christians—have been drawn to forms of critical theory and their activism is that at times they see a lack of love and mercy in the church and abuses by those in positions . . . Continue reading →
Paul On Personal Law-Keeping And The Work Of Christ
The Mosaic law itself did not originate the notion of personal obedience de novo, since it recapitulated a more fundamental creational principle of righteousness through obedience to the Creator’s covenant stipulations. Further, the Mosaic law did not introduce a new way of . . . Continue reading →
Truth, Transgender, And Twitter Suspension
The other day, a friend wrote to tell me he’d been suspended from Twitter. Two of his tweets had triggered the ban on “promoting violence against, threatening, or harassing other people on the basis of race, ethnicity, national origin, sexual orientation, gender, . . . Continue reading →
Preaching To Soil
Pearls should not be cast before swine. This has its truth, but kingdom preaching pays no attention to this. Instead, the preaching here in this parable is undiscriminating, wild, even promiscuous. The Word is scattered randomly. There is no strategy, programming or . . . Continue reading →
Olevianus: The Kingdom And Its Benefits
Since, then, you say that the additional name “Christ” or “Anointed” implies that He came with the command of the Father to establish a royal priesthood, explain first what the kingdom of Christ is. A. A kingdom is a kind of rule . . . Continue reading →
Transgender Mania Grips Pre-Teen Girls
A quarter of the girls in my daughter’s class identify as transgender. Seven out of 28. When I said that on Twitter recently, I was roundly attacked for being a TERF who makes up ridiculous stories to harm trans people. While I . . . Continue reading →
Talking About Practice
The simple fact that a Reformed or Presbyterian church or missionary is engaged in the work of missions does not necessarily mean that the work is also being done in a Reformed fashion. With a view from the mission field of Germany . . . Continue reading →
The Covenant Of Works Engraven In Man’s Heart
The covenant of works, which may also be called a legal or natural covenant, is founded in nature, which by creation was pure and holy, and in the law of God, which in the first creation was engraven in man’s heart. For . . . Continue reading →
When The Only God Is Power
One of the great, idealistic hopes of the Enlightenment was that man would finally be free from God and the various biblical, pre-Enlightenment ideas that held man captive. Many envisioned a secular utopia. The French Revolution is just one example of such . . . Continue reading →
Read Thomas And See For Yourself
I was led to think that Thomas had been more or less mugged by Aristotle, indeed, I was given to think that Thomas was the source of much that ailed Christianity. In one tour de force, Van Til jumps from Aristotle, to . . . Continue reading →
A Chill Blows Through The Halls Of The Academy: Why A Tenured Prof Is Leaving UCLA
I’ve been a professor in the Anthropology Department at UCLA since 1996; I received tenure in 2000. My research has spanned topics ranging from nonhuman primate behavior to human personality variation. For decades, anthropology has been notorious for conflict between the scientific and political . . . Continue reading →