Reformation21

[For the explanation of this series and the first post, see here ; see here for installments two and three . There will be a final application post tomorrow.] Even as the 1960s came toward a close, Nelson Bell continued to advocate what he took to be racial moderation. " Forced segregation was...

[For an explanation of the series and the first post, see here ; for the second post, see here ] Other churches were not as interested in dialogue. Second Presbyterian Church, Memphis, Tennessee, drew national attention for its refusal to admit mixed-race groups to corporate worship services. One...

[For an explanation of this series and the first post, see here .] Even with Taylor and Bell's moderation on racial issues, there were those in conservative ranks who were determined to maintain racial integrity. W. A. Gamble, stated clerk of Central Mississippi Presbytery and sometime contributor...

Over at Justin Taylor's blog at the Gospel Coalition, I contributed to a historians' forum that sought to answer certain questions on southern evangelicals and their failures on Civil Rights. My answer particular focused on southern Presbyterian conservatives, many of whom would form the...

Like most Americans, I was astonished by the brazen and inept lies told by NBC anchorman Brian Williams about his faux exploits while covering the war in Iraq. Moreover, I find his precipitous fall (which surely is accelerating even as I write) to be sadly instructive about men in general and the...

I'm off to South Africa tomorrow for a few weeks, then to North Carolina and South Carolina, then to the China, and then to Hong Kong, all for teaching and preaching purposes (Jas. 4:15). So the flurry of posts of late are to keep up my contractual obligations to the Top Men here at Ref21. Recently...

Without a hint of shame or embarrassment or any sort of profound internal conflict, Jesus openly admits he is--or at least was, while living under the conditions of the fall and fulfilling all righteousness for us--ignorant of at least one thing: "concerning the day and hour [of my return] no one...

Appreciating both Christ's divinity and his humanity is not easy. What does it mean to be both God and man? Looking at Christ's two natures helps us to understand not only the marvel of the incarnation, but the incredible humility of Christ, who "did not count equality with God a thing to be...

We tend, perhaps, to think of divine love as something akin to, albeit much greater than, human love. We tend, in other words, to assume that God's sentiments towards us are much bigger and stronger than, but fundamentally similar to, the sentiments we feel towards our most cherished friends and...

Pastors writing their own catechisms was standard practice in the Reformation and Post-Reformation eras. Luther, Calvin, Bucer, Beza, Ursinus, Ussher, Owen, Fisher, Cotton, Baxter, Ball, among many others wrote catechisms. Each catechism has similarities and differences. Moreover, a lot of...