Office Hours Season 5: New Life In The Shadow Of Death

Office Hours: Sanctification And The Fruit Of The Spirit

by on June 23, 2014

If you’ve ever planted anything you did so because you hoped that what you planted would grow. When farmers plant seeds, they do so because the expect those seeds to die and to produce a new plant and from that plant new . . . Continue reading →

Office Hours: Sanctification And Virtue

by on June 9, 2014

One aspect of our new life in Christ to which modern evangelical and Reformed Christians have not always paid a great deal of attention is the matter of virtue. There are some good reasons for this. The medieval church came to think . . . Continue reading →

Right On Time: Godfrey On The Law And Sanctification

by on May 19, 2014 | 9 Comments

Well, obviously, the Reformed world is in the midst of a controversy over sanctification. To help bring some balance and perspective to the discussion the faculty of Westminster Seminary California has been discussing sanctification this season on Office Hours. In the providence . . . Continue reading →

Office Hours: The Pilgrim’s Prayer (2)

by on May 5, 2014

After the fall, believers wandered. They were pilgrims, looking for a another city whose builder and maker is God (Heb 11). They were looking for a heavenly city. Under the old, Mosaic covenant, believers were given colorful pictures of heaven and even the . . . Continue reading →

S. M. Baugh On The Pilgrim’s Prayer (pt 1)

by on April 14, 2014 | 8 Comments

Prayer is not as easy as it looks, especially when we are completely confused about those things for which we ought to ask. That was the situation in which the disciples found themselves. When they said to our Lord, “teach us how . . . Continue reading →

Office Hours: Horton On Calvin’s Doctrine Of The Christian Life

by on March 31, 2014 | 1 Comment

John Calvin is one of the most influential writers in the Reformed tradition, so much so that Richard Muller has argued that, in the modern period, Calvin has been over emphasized to the neglect of the rest of the Reformed tradition. Nevertheless, . . . Continue reading →

Office Hours: The Role Of Prayer In The Work Of Sanctification

by on March 24, 2014

Scripture teaches us that prayer is essential for sanctification. In 1Thessalonians 5:16-17 Paul says simply, “Rejoice always, pray without ceasing” (1 Thessalonians 5:16-17, ESV). He doesn’t elaborate. He doesn’t defend his exhortation. He just says it. I take it that, for Paul, . . . Continue reading →

Office Hours: Mike Horton On Sanctification And The Means Of Grace (2)

by on March 3, 2014 | 2 Comments

If Christians have often been tempted to mysticism (the quest to meet God without instruments, media, or means) they have also been tempted to magic, tempted to turn the sacraments into things they are not. The medieval Western church taught and the . . . Continue reading →

Office Hours: Sanctification And The Means Of Grace

by on February 24, 2014 | 12 Comments

It is easy to imagine that sanctification is the result of an immediate action by God upon the soul. By “immediate” I mean that the Spirit is thought to act without using means. In the history of the church more than a . . . Continue reading →

Office Hours: The Gospel Mystery Of Sanctification

by on February 17, 2014 | 3 Comments

Since the very earliest days of the post-apostolic church, in the 2nd century, there have been preachers who thought that the best way to produce godliness (sanctification) in believers is to pound it into them, as it were, with a hammer. It’s . . . Continue reading →

Office Hours: Bob Godfrey On Public Worship And Sanctification

by on February 10, 2014 | 3 Comments

When we think about sanctification, that gracious, gradual renewal of believers by  through faith, which results in our gradual conformity to the image of Christ, we may first think of private prayer and worship. Those are important and even indispensable to Christian . . . Continue reading →

Office Hours: Hywel Jones On The Spirit Of Sanctification

by on December 2, 2013 | 2 Comments

Sanctification is a necessity. That cannot be denied. It is the clear teaching of Scripture: “be holy as I am holy.” It is clearly taught not only in the Old Testament (Lev 11:44) but also in the New (1Pet 1:15). Nevertheless, it . . . Continue reading →

Office Hours: The Lordship Controversy Is Back

by on October 21, 2013 | 34 Comments

This is season 5 of Office Hours and we’re talking about sanctification: New Life In The Shadow Of Death. In this episode, Mike Horton, J. Gresham Machen Professor of Systematic Theology and Apologetics, and I time travel to the  “Lordship Controversy” that raged . . . Continue reading →