Just as bottles of distilled water offer drink that is free of poisonous chemicals and clogging minerals, so the Church’s confessions provide boiled-down, condensed, purified orthodoxy for healthy Body life systems. For instance, a seminary student being examined on the…
Many doctrinally solid evangelical churches would not self-identify as “confessional”. What is the value of historic confessions for this kind of typical evangelical church? If the church is already doctrinally orthodox, evangelical, and solid, why encourage such people to think…
Blessed with the gift of saving faith, the believer is now able to hear what he could not hear before, to believe sincerely what he rejected outrightly. The sheep hear the voice of the One they now know as “my…
In today’s church, there are a number of significant questions about the doctrine of assurance. Some argue that you cannot ever really know if you’re saved at all; others insist that if you made some kind of profession of faith,…
There are those who claim that the Westminster Confession of Faith is a scholastic document lacking in pastoral sensitivity but abounding in the dust of theological tomes. But is it? I don’t think so. In fact, I am convinced that…
Pastor Henry Cumings (1739-1823) was a Congregationalist pastor in Billerica, Massachusetts for his entire ministry. After graduating from Harvard in 1760, he later was honored with a doctorate by Harvard in 1800. He was an outspoken revolutionary leader who preached…
All the benefits of redemption are found in Jesus Christ. While Phillip Melanchthon, Martin Luther’s colleague and heir apparent, said “To know Christ is to know his benefits.” We could just as rightly say to know Christ’s benefits one must…
Any church that includes questions to ministers-elect in their ordination or installation to service will, in some shape or form, ask a question about the candidate’s commitment to the pastoral care of his people. This is very much in keeping…
What is God’s view on certain political matters or events? That is a question often asked . . . and often mocked. Centuries earlier, however, preachers and their audiences were more sympathetic with the notion that God might actually have…
As orthodoxy[1] itself has come under contemporary fire, religious and cultural forces persuade many to extend the theological fence posts. The logic? Exclusivity of the Christian faith is the cause of intolerance; intolerance is not tolerable, so therefore, change the…
