Four Details About Assurance
As we continue our series (part 1, part 2) on assurance, we come to four basic details about it that are so important to consider. It is possible for a Christian to have an assurance of his salvation. We…
Tag Faith
Confession and Pastoral Theology: Confession as Pastoral Promise
So the pastor of the church you attend says the church is “confessional”. He explains that this means the church requires its ministers, and perhaps even members, to subscribe to a common doctrinal standard underneath the authority of Scripture. You…
Good Works and Sola Fide
In my last article I discussed that the puritans believed that good works are more than the fruit of faith, justification and salvation in that they are the way to eternal life and an antecedent condition of glorification. The minority…
Samuel Rutherford on the Covenant of Grace
Samuel Rutherford (1600-1661) is often regarded as the finest Scottish theologian of the mid-seventeenth century. I’m not sure I entirely accept that. For me, at least David Dickson and James Durham were on a par with him, if not his…
Wilhelmus à Brakel on Damnation by Faith
Can faith damn us? The Dutch “Puritan” theologian Wilhelmus à Brakel (1635-1711) argued that the first sin of Adam and Eve was unbelief. To state this differently, they exchanged faith in the Word of God for faith in the word of the…
Church is Not a Volunteer Organization
Several months ago, I wrote an article entitled “Jesus is Head of the Churches,” in which I sought to describe the practical implications of Christ’s headship in our churches. Over the course of this last year, worship in various places…
Sources of Assurance
We continue our series on the blessed but difficult subject of assurance of salvation (see part 1). Assurance or certainty about a truth in general may come in various ways, such as seeing or hearing something with your eyes and ears,…
“Great Disputes”: The Conditionality of the Covenant of Grace
Obadiah Sedgwick (1599/1600-1658) was one of the most respected and influential of the English Presbyterians of the seventeenth century. He was a leading member of the Westminster Assembly and took a prominent part in its debates. Barbara Donagan comments that…
Assurance of Salvation
Paul commands us, “Examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith; prove your own selves. Know ye not your own selves, how that Jesus Christ is in you, except ye be reprobates?” (2 Cor. 13:5). It is a responsibility of…
Saving Faith, Part 3, the Holy Embrace
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…