Category: Evangelical Calvinist

I just listened to a Credo Podcast featuring Matthew Barrett, J. V. Fesko, Fred Sanders, and Scott Swain. The title of the podcast is: Is Natural Theology in Conflict with the Gospel: Credo Alliance. You can go and listen to it for yourself (only approx. 30 minutes), by clicking on the linked title. They all affirm the value of a natural theology; in the history often identified as the Two Books of Revelation (i.e., general/natural and special/revealed). What somewhat surprised me as I listened to each of them present their thoughts on this particular locus was how they seemingly, and…

The economy of God is the only real drama out there. It is characterized by the sobriety of Jesus Christ. The Man of sorrows acquainted with grief. To be steadfast immovable in a world of the transient requires a life lived grounded in union with Jesus Christ (unio cum Christo) by the Holy Spirit. Athanasian Reformed

TF Torrance often refers to what he calls ‘The Latin Heresy,’ when discussing Western theology; especially with reference to its fountainhead, Augustine. The Latin Heresy for TFT entails the neo-Platonist dualism that funds Augustine’s theology, and all other theologies that follow Augustine’s categories. For TFT, this dualism involves a competitive relationship between God and humanity; such that, humanity is thought in abstraction relative to God’s life, rather than finding its concrete ground therein. This shows up most clearly in Augustine’s doctrine of election. JND Kelly masterfully describes this, The problem of predestination has so far only been hinted at. Since…

Barth attempts to offer a Biblical Angelology. In the process he surveys some of the most primary developments on an angelology, in the history, as those were offered by Dionysius and Thomas Aquinas. Just on that level his treatment is interesting and rewarding. But in the midst of that, since he is slavishly beholden to the Protestant ‘Scripture Principle,’ he also identifies what I also take to be primary to a truly Christian presentation on the angels. As is typical, especially with reference to my own interests, Barth rightly recognizes the role that a prolegomena/hermeneutic will end up having on…

Longtime pastor and seminary Dean, John MacArthur, is currently on his way to be with the Lord. It was announced at his church, Grace Community Church, in Sun Valley, CA, that JMac has come down with a pneumonia that he isn’t expected to survive (like only days left). This is sad news, but also points-up, once again, that this life truly is but a vapor. May we hold his family and close friends up in prayer at this time. Relatedly, I have been a longtime critic of JMac’s, online in particular. I started out my blogging career in 2005 bantering…

My recent readings in Barth’s Church Dogmatics have me engaging with his development on a doctrine of nothingness (i.e., sin and evil). The particular section I am reading has been exceedingly edifying. The passage I am going to share from him is a summarizing type of statement of what he has been treating heretofore. As I was reading this section it gave me great hope to ponder the present and forthcoming realities, as those relate to Christ’s victory over nothingness-sin-evil, and all that entails eschatologically. It is hopeful to ruminate on the concrete victory of Christ vis-à-vis the despair and…

I wrote these for other social media outlets of mine. I thought I’d share them here as miscellanies.  People reject Barth out of hand simply because they’ve been told that Barth is ultimately a liberal (still). But these same people have never actually read Barth enough to know whether that be true or not. Coming from someone, an evangelical conservative Christian (me), who has both read Barth and Barth literature extensively, and published on Barth, these people are simply living in a willful land of ignorance. Granted, Barth’s 𝑜𝑒𝑢𝑣𝑟𝑒 is extensive. But there are ways into Barth that can introduce you…

… This means that in spite of all his undeniable efforts to move away from Pietism, Barth was clearly too closely attached to it to be able to attack the innermost bastion of Pietism held by his reviewers. In the following section we will elaborate on the decisive point where he was still closely attached to Pietism in spite of everything.” -Eberhard Busch, Karl Barth & the Pietists, trans. by Daniel W. Bloesch (Downers Grove, Illinois: IVP Academic, 2004), 65. This is probably another reason I have so resonated with Barth over the years. My background, of course!, as an…

The relationship between philosophy and theology remains a varied thing, at least for me. In the Barth[ian] tradition there are a variety of takes on this relationship just the same. Barth himself sees a relative value to having an understanding of the various philosophies blowing about, whither and thither. But in the main, for Barth et al., an untoward appropriation and deployment of any philosophy vis-à-vis a Christian theology, ends up presenting a highly delipidated theology that bears no resemblance to the genuine article as Self-revealed in the prosopon (face) of Jesus Christ. Of note, as Barth is engaging with…

Given what’s going on with Israel and Iran I jotted down some thoughts (elsewhere online) on Israel and how ethnic Israel continues to relate to the Man from Nazareth, Jesus Christ. There is a right-wing movement among some so-called MAGA people who are highly antisemitic, or we could more accurately say: supersessionist. They have bought into the old rhetoric that Israel as a nation ceased to exist in 70AD, never to reunite again. But her ethnicity has always been vouchsafed in the Man from Nazareth (see Jeremiah 31). Her ethnicity transcends itself in its purpose as the Messiah bearer for…