The congregation was facing particular pressures and Hebrews 10 reflects this. The pastor wrote, “But recall the former days when, after you were enlightened, you endured a hard struggle with sufferings, sometimes being publicly exposed to reproach and affliction, and sometimes being . . . Continue reading →
You know that Hebrews 11 is the “faith” chapter of Hebrews. Perhaps you’ve been told that you should have faith like Noah, Abraham, Moses, and David. Well, you should perhaps but not in the way that you may have been told. WSC . . . Continue reading →
Hebrews 12 is a vital chapter in the book. In it we get a clearer sense of the challenges they faced, the persecution they were experiencing for Christ’s sake, and the temptation they had to overcome by God’s grace. The pastor invokes . . . Continue reading →
Steve Baugh helps us wrap up our study of the book of Hebrews this season. We’re studying Hebrews 13 in this episode. He’s an expert in the 1st century background of the New Testament and Greek and he brings those skills to . . . Continue reading →
Earlier this year the Rev. Greg Reynolds (DMin), gave the DenDulk lectures at Westminster Seminary California. He’s pastor of of Amoskeag Presbyterian Church in Manchester, New Hampshire; author of The Word Is Worth a Thousand Pictures: Preaching in the Electronic Age (2001); and editor of Ordained Servant: . . . Continue reading →
Over the years we have recorded Office Hours episodes in different ways. For the last two seasons we’ve experimented by using a technique that was used in the early 70s, putting one voice predominantly in one speaker and another voice predominantly in . . . Continue reading →
Kelly Kapic is Professor of Theological Studies at Covenant College. This is a sort of lost episode. Kelly was on campus campus in February, 2010 to talk with our students about theology and piety. That spring we renovated the Office Hours studio . . . Continue reading →
Charles Telfer, Westminster’s soft-spoken language prof, is widely traveled both geographically and theologically. He began his spiritual journey as in the American mainline. From there, like a lot of other people, he moved on to Buddhism and thence to neo-Pentecostalism and finally arriving . . . Continue reading →
In season 5 of Office Hours we’re focusing on the biblical, Christian, confessional doctrine and practice of sanctification, the process of being made holy, of being brought into gradual conformity to Christ by the grace of the Spirit through dying to sin . . . Continue reading →
In the medieval and Reformation periods the West had an agrarian economy. In the Modern period we had an industrial-manufacturing economy. By the 1980s we had a service economy. Today, according to Jim Gilmore and Joe Pine (Strategic Horizons LLP), we live . . . Continue reading →
The doctrine of sanctification is a hot topic right now in evangelical and Reformed circles but the church had a doctrine (or doctrines) of sanctification for centuries before the current discussion. Indeed, one way to understand the Reformation is as a response . . . Continue reading →
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 →
In the Reformation and in the period of Reformed orthodoxy, there was no question whether the Christian faith is true. There were great and important questions debated between the Reformed churches and theologians with the Roman communion, the Lutherans, the Anabaptists, and . . . Continue reading →
This past summer Yale University Press released Darryl Hart’s Calvinism: A History. Darryl is Adjunct Professor of Church History at WSC, where he served as Academic Dean from 2000–03. He is Visiting Professor of History at Hillsdale College. This is a significant . . . Continue reading →
When we think of the Pauline epistles we probably think first of Romans or perhaps 1 and 2 Corinthians. Of course, where we’re reading is sometimes determined by controversy. There are lots of controversies associated with Romans and the Corinthian correspondence (election, . . . Continue reading →
Of the psalter (the 150 psalms) John Calvin (1509–164) wrote: “The varied and resplendid riches which are contained it this treasury it is no easy matter to express in words; so much so, that I well know that whatever I shall be . . . Continue reading →
There are different types of the psalms in the psalter (the 150 Psalms). In this episode, Bryan Estelle, Professor of Old Testament at Westminster Seminary California, returns to complete our discussion on how the psalter helps us to think about sanctification, the Christian . . . Continue reading →
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 →
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 →
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 →