You asked for it, you got it. The Heidelcast is back after an 11-month hiatus. Did you miss me? Episode 130 was part of the series on the doctrine of God. If the Lord permits, we will get back to that series . . . Continue reading →
The German expression, Der Kulturkampf (The Culture War), originally referred to the attempt by Otto von Bismarck (1815–98), the German politician who created the modern, unified Germany, to suppress the Roman Catholic Church in Germany because he feared that Romanism in Germany . . . Continue reading →
Search for the phrase “all of life is political” and one finds not a few results. We expect such a sentiment to be very popular among mon-Christians, whose hope is focused on this life and this world. Remarkably, however, Christians are among . . . Continue reading →
On this date in 1959 the state of Nebraska executed the death sentence upon Charles Starkweather, an admitted, notorious spree killer and mass murderer. Certainly, when “Charlie” (as he was known) was captured after a shootout in Douglas, Wyoming there was little doubt and by the end of his trial it was certain that he had committed a shocking and brutal series of murders in and around what was then a sleepy college town and state capitol, Lincoln, Nebraska. The only real question that remained through the trial, which persists to this day, is whether Caril Ann Fugate, whose family Charlie murdered, accompanied him willingly during his spree, whether she cooperated in or even committed some of the murders, or whether she was a hostage (as she later claimed) and suffered from Stockholm Syndrome. Continue reading →
In the period between the early post-apostolic church (e.g., the 2nd and 3rd centuries AD) and the Reformation (beginning in the early 16th century AD) the church came to develop some unbiblical and therefore unhelpful and unhealthy ways of relating creation and . . . Continue reading →
James Anderson is among many calling attention to the case of a teacher who has been fired by the West Point, Virginia school board for refusing to submit to their demand that he refer to students who belong biologically to one sex . . . Continue reading →
John Millbank is a theologian and the leader of an influential school of thought known as Radical Orthodoxy. Radical Orthodoxy: A New Theology was published 20 years ago by Millbank, Catherine Pickstock, and Graham Ward. According to R. R. Reno, the Radical . . . Continue reading →
Judging by what one sees in the media, Americans seem to be at war with one another. Political violence seems to be a rising problem. We are not yet witnessing the sorts of bombings and mass protests that marked the late 1960s . . . Continue reading →
These Sections teach the following propositions: 1st. God alone is Lord of the human conscience, which is responsible only to his authority. 2d. God has authoritatively addressed the human conscience only in his law, the only perfect revelation of which in this . . . Continue reading →
Our older Reformed writers regularly mentioned “two kingdoms” in different ways. E.g., in the opening line to his 1576 Exposition of the Apostles’ Creed (translated into English and available in the Classic Reformed Theology series) Caspar Olevianus (1536-87) employed the distinction in . . . Continue reading →
Now it is certain that our Lord did not want to change anything about the government (police) or the civil order, bus without reviling it in any way, he made his office, for which he came into the world, that of forgiving . . . Continue reading →
Broadly, in evangelicalism, there are two stances toward the Ten Commandments or the moral law. For many, if not most evangelicals, it is believed that the Ten Commandments are so uniquely Mosaic, so identified with the Mosaic epoch in redemptive history, that . . . Continue reading →
Since Roe v. Wade (and Doe v Bolton) in 1973 those who believe that the constitutional protections to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” extend to humans in utero (in the womb) have been called “pro-life.” Since 1973 it has been . . . Continue reading →
The deeper problem here is hermeneutical. O’Donovan—and following him, Smith—fail to give sufficient attention to the Bible’s covenantal storyline, and how that storyline affects the authority of church and state. Specifically, the lessons of the kingdom of Israel transmit directly to Christ . . . Continue reading →
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” So begins the second paragraph of the . . . Continue reading →
Mark Tooley, of the Institute on Religion and Democracy, weighs in on the June 25 patriotic worship service held by First Baptist Church in Dallas. First Baptist is the home of Robert Jeffress, whom you might know from his frequent appearances on . . . Continue reading →
The moral law (to begin first with it) is contained under two heads, one of which simply commands us to worship God with pure faith and piety; the other, to embrace men with sincere affection. Accordingly, it is the true and eternal . . . Continue reading →
Hoeksema insisted that the Christian church, “as the manifestation of Christ’s body on earth, is universal in character; hence the church as an institution could not raise the American flag nor sing the national hymns.” The flag could be flown in the . . . Continue reading →
In early June (2017) Russell Vought appeared before a committee of the United States Senate as the president’s nominee to serve as the Deputy Director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB). During the hearing, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vermont) questioned Vought . . . Continue reading →
In the United States, Memorial Day is day for remembering those who died in the service of the US military. It began as Decoration Day in 1868, on which day 5,000 people decorated the graves of Union and Confederate soldiers at Arlington . . . Continue reading →
