Providence

Itinerating on the Water

Stephen Unthank
Mar 11, 2021
Our author, John, wants us not only to see the prophet Moses, whose rich memory is woven throughout the entirety of chapter six, but he also wants us to see He who is greater than Moses. Consider: the setting, we’re told, is the season of “the Passover, the feast of the Jews” (vs. 4), and just like...

Original Sin: Born This Way Podcast

Jonathan Master
Jan 25, 2021
Original Sin: Born This Way James and Jonathan tackle a foundational theological topic this week. The doctrine of original sin is integral to our grasp of many other biblical doctrines. How should we define original sin, and how is it different from the sins we commit daily? Guilt, corruption,...

A Peculiar Perspective on Suffering

Tessa Thompson
Dec 18, 2019
Editor's Note: This post is adapted from Laughing at the Days to Come: Facing Present Trials and Future Uncertainties with Gospel Hope (RHB, 2019 ). My once bright future suddenly seemed dark. The onset of a rare neurological disease was causing me to gradually lose my hearing, and there was no...

Against Open Doors

Aaron Denlinger
Jun 5, 2019
Much that passes for Christian decision making in modern Evangelicalism strikes me as a mixture of lazy moral reasoning and illegitimate efforts to discern those "secret things" (Deut. 29:29) that God has never promised to reveal to us. Scripture has much to say about the way we approach important...

The Underdog Must Win

Justin Poythress
Feb 1, 2019
David and Goliath. Field of Dreams. Star Wars. Rocky. The Sandlot. The Hunger Games. Underdog stories never get old. We can't help loving them. They also contain a distinctively American flavor, probably because this country only exists because the underdog triumphed. A few ragged colonies, against...

The 2018 Year in Review

Editors
Dec 31, 2018
As 2018 winds to a close, we want to express our deep and sincere gratitude to the many faithful readers of Ref21. We continue our commitment to call the church to a reformation that recovers clarity and conviction about the great evangelical truths of the gospel and that encourages their...

Reigning Omnipotent in Every Place

Ligon Duncan
Nov 29, 2018
When--in the Institutes of the Christian Religion (1.15.1)--John Calvin turned his attention to the creation of mankind, he did so with a view to further elaborate his assertion that we cannot have a clear and complete knowledge God unless we have a corresponding knowledge of ourselves . Calvin did...

Whate're My God Ordains is Right

Jennifer Weitz
May 31, 2018
May 10, 2018 was the most beautiful yet painful day of our lives. Our long-awaited daughter, Dayna Euphemia, safely entered into the world and became part of our family. This is our family's story about the pain, hope, sorrow and joy that have come with the twists and turns in the adventure that is...

Papist Wildlife and Providentialist Histories

Aaron Denlinger
Jun 6, 2016
Several days ago I was distracted from my mid-afternoon, back-porched task of grading college research papers by the presence of a pair of cardinals flitting around our yard. As I watched them doing what cardinals do, I began wondering whence precisely cardinals derived their peculiar name. My...

Edwards and Interpreting Providence

Thomas Kidd
Apr 19, 2016
Like many eighteenth-century Reformed pastors, Jonathan Edwards was confident in his ability to discern God's purposes in earthly events. For example, during a 1736 drought, he explained that God was chastising New Englanders for the "corruption in our hearts." Similarly, during a plague of crop-...