The visible church is an institution. Like any other organization the church has structure. Anyone who takes the Bible seriously realizes that the gathered community of God has leaders, doctrine, and rules for membership. As unpopular as it might be…
As a believer, if I always entertained thoughts and engaged in deeds that are suitable to one who enjoys life in Christ, then self-control would not be an activity with which I would need to be concerned. However, undergoing regeneration…
Editor’s Note: Taken from forthcoming book, Daily Doctrine by Kevin DeYoung, Copyright © 2024. Used by permission of Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers, Wheaton, IL 60187, www.crossway.org. As a Protestant pastor I’ve lost tracked of how many times a congregant…
Editor’s Note: Rob Ventura has provided us with a chapter from his forthcoming Mentor Commentary on the Book of Romans. We are thankful for the opportunity to share it with you. Our plan is to run segments of chapter 12 throughout the…
Would You Like to Sign Up for Membership?: A few days ago, I was shopping at a local grocery store with my family. After we picked up the groceries we needed for the week and were checking them out…
In Edith Wharton’s, The Age of Innocence, Newland Archer, the young man set in the ways of old New York, has a conversation with Countess Ellen Olenska, who has recently returned from Europe after leaving her wealthy husband for his…
One of the most important things to maintain, yet one of the hardest, is peace with others. From the time we get up in the morning until the time we go to bed at night we have many opportunities to…
Looking to the scripture we see God’s magnificent hand at work in all that occurs on Earth. However, our God does not merely involve himself in the grandest events: celestial formation, solar activity, cosmic phenomena, etc. But, he intimately involves…
Learning about the battle between popes and civil authorities in medieval Europe feels a bit like an episode of Oprah’s show: “You get excommunicated; you get excommunicated; everyone gets excommunicated.” Of course it famously culminated in Henry VIII finally not…
There are times within a disciplinary process that some in the church must be temporarily postponed from their normal opportunity to take part in the formal fellowship or service of the saints. The status of those so suspended is not…
