Reformation21

Fake news. Social media outrage. Political polarization. Ideological bullying. These are just a few of the centralizing characteristics of our current social climate in the US. It should not surprise us, then, that our collective cultural head is spinning as we simultaneously attempt to hold...

Recently it was announced that Karen Pence - a private citizen who is not even occupying an elected office in the United States of America - is going to resume her teaching career at a Christian school. Part of this school's beliefs is that homosexual behavior is a sin, and they require their...

As everyone in the Reformed world surely knows by now, 2019 marks 400 years since the Synod of Dort wrapped up proceedings and bequeathed to the Protestant Reformed family of churches that glorious statement of Reformed doctrine known as the Canons of Dort. Commemoration and celebration of Dort and...

We've all given and received gifts this past year, and I imagine the majority of those gifts were probably intended to be used in some way, not just owned or placed on a shelf unopened. But it's likely you've had that awkward experience of giving a gift designed to be used, and somehow finding out...

Herman Melville's Moby Dick is an intense and rather gothic tale of seaman Ishmael's experience whaling under captain Ahab. It's a well-known story of obsession, revenge, mania, and ruin--the typically edifying material or a great American novel. As everyone familiar with American literature...

18 years ago, I heard a sermon on Matthew 27:46--Jesus' cry of dereliction on the cross, "My God, My God, Why have You forsaken Me?" At one point, the minister who was preaching this message said, "Jesus wasn't really forsaken; he just felt forsaken by his Father in his soul." I remember sensing...

Most pastors have heard the complaints of visitors coming from other local churches. It is not uncommon for believers to grow discontent with their circumstances and begin looking elsewhere for a new church family at some point in their Christian lives. In America, it is all too easy to leave one...

Throughout much of the history of the church, theological discourse was largely an in-house project. A broad house to be sure, but even during the upheaval and turmoil of the Reformation, both sides agreed with the basic tenants of historic Trinitarian Christianity. Scripture was viewed as...

Last week, Wyatt Graham published a post titled, " The Father Was Not Angry at the Son of the Cross ," in which he rightly explained that God the Father never stopped loving the Son--even when the Son hung on the cross. While there are many good and helpful statements in Wyatt's post--and, while he...

If you're a parent and a Christian, you've probably read your share of parenting books. Of the making of self-help parenting books, there is seemingly no end. If, like the writer of Ecclesiastes, you've been wearied by such study, Christina Fox's new book, Idols of a Mother's Heart , will be a balm...