Preaching to People?
Relatively early in my preaching career I had the opportunity to preach the opening sermon at a conference. The main conference speaker was a man that I consider to be one of the finest preachers of our times. After hearing…
Category Reformation21
Flavel and the art of the simple
I have been re-reading – and using as the basis of our midweek Prayer Meeting studies at the moment – John Flavel’s great work on ‘Keeping the Heart’. His meditations on Proverbs 4:23 were originally published under the title of…
How Do I Know If I’m Mortifying Sin by the Law or by the Gospel?
In Ralph Erskine’s sermon “The Strength of Sin” (see Works, 5:145ff–thanks to Tony Reinke for the reference) he has a section on the difference between gospel mortification and legal mortification. You can read the whole thing here. Below is an…
Hacked
It appears that ref21 went “down” yesterday and a message appeared suggesting liquidation, expiration and general nastiness. Rumors that Trotter’s blogs were the cause of it were only partially true. It does appear that the site was “hacked” (we were not…
A word to the unwise
It seems that my old sparring partner, CRT, has earned the ire of Scotland’s Free Presbyterians who, while essentially agreeing with much of his analysis of the Lloyd-Jones/Packer split, offer these words of commentary in their April magazine on our…
Let God and Let God: An Analysis of Keswick Theology
Let Go and Let God: An Analysis of Keswick Theology, by Andy Naselli has just been pre-released by Logos Bible Software. Among its many endorsers are Justin Taylor and Carl Trueman (see below). More information on the volume is obtainable…
What Does Paul Mean that He Preached “The Whole Counsel of God”?
From D. A. Carson’s essay, “Challenges for the Twenty-first-century Pulpit” in the book, Preach the Word: When Paul attests [in Acts 20:27] that this is what he proclaimed to the believers in Ephesus, the Ephesian elders to whom he makes…
Augustine and Pastoral Theology
Augustine is read widely in the secular academy as a philosopher foundational to understanding the development of western civilization and for his relevance in the modern disciplines of literature, psychology, politics, ethics and aesthetics. One gets the feeling however that…
Augustine and Pastoral Theology
Augustine is read widely in the secular academy as a philosopher foundational to understanding the development of western civilization and for his relevance in the modern disciplines of literature, psychology, politics, ethics and aesthetics. One gets the feeling however that…
Oliver Crisp: philosophy teacher gives an interview
First, a million apologies for the poor service of late. Gremlins in the software that were beyond Jeremy and myself’s ability to hunt and destroy. All seems to have been fixed however and as they say, normal service is now…