The language of ‘covenant’ has a much wider history in the church than merely those churches and congregations that self-identify as ‘covenantal’. Some include it merely as a reflection of the contractual dimension they see in how Christians relate to…
Around 392 AD, 57-year old Aurelius Prudentius Clemens, native of Spain, decided to examine his life. The years had flown by, and he found himself suddenly old. He was, in reality, old according the standards of his time, and his…
“I know what the Bible says, but how can I forgive that man, after everything he has done? And he isn’t even sorry.” It is a familiar question or comment, and perhaps the second most common and difficult that…
I will officiate at a wedding ceremony today. My wedding sermons aren’t really sermons but meditations. They are short but calculated. I view the wedding meditation as the last effort on the heels of pre-marital counseling to sink the arrow…
Facing the opposition of a government that equated religious syncretism with peace, Peter Plancius persisted in pointing out the doctrinal errors of fellow pastor Jacob Arminius. It was not, as some historians think, a needless fastidiousness. Arminius’s teachings implied a…
When you recite the Apostles’ Creed you join with Christians across time and space in affirming the basics of the Christian gospel. First appearing around AD 390 the creed is an apt summation of the history of creation, providence, and…
In 841, Dhuoda’s world fell apart. William, the son she had nurtured and loved for fourteen years, had just left for Aachen (in today’s Germany), to live at the Frankish court. It had been a sudden decision, made by Dhuoda’s…
My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand. John 10:29 I have benefitted greatly from the teaching ministry of the late R.C. Sproul. …
Jesus is simultaneously the master theologian and the perfect pastor. He sets the deepest of truths before his people, but in a way that pastorally meets their deepest needs. This should give pause for thought for thought on different fronts.…
Ephrem was still a young man when his quick understanding, knowledge of Scriptures, literary skills, and love for the church captured the attention of the local bishop. Jacob had been bishop of the Christian community of Nisibis (a commercial center…
