When I was younger, I used to think that God actually could lie if He wanted to, but He simply chose not to because of His goodness. I didn’t realize, and I think many people still don’t, that He literally cannot lie. Some theological errors can be avoided by understanding that God cannot [...]
Ligonier Ministries recently posted an excerpt from the late John Gerstner’s Primer on Justification. This article, taken together with things he has written elsewhere concerning the nature of faith, manifests an interesting and important inconsistency in Dr. Gerstner’s thinking about justification. Before turning to that problem, I want to make a few comments on the [...]
Steve Hays has claimed that what I recently said about justification is at odds with what Robert Sungenis has said about justification. But, in fact, there is no contradiction between what I have said and what Robert has said on this subject.
This post originally appeared at the Canterbury Tales blog.
Let me begin by saying that I am honored to have received a response from N.T. Wright in Christianity Today last month. He is a giant and he has probably influenced me more than any other living theologian (yes, even more than Ratzinger/Benedict XVI).
At the risk of [...]
Last week as I was preparing to go out of town for a conference, I received an interview request from Michael Spencer (aka IMonk) regarding the recent announcement by the Vatican concerning the establishment of Personal Ordinariates. These Personal Ordinariates will allow former Anglicans to enter full communion with the Catholic Church while retaining distinctive [...]
Dr. Scott Hahn’s Kinship by Covenant is a revised and updated version of his 1995 doctoral dissertation Kinship by Covenant: A Biblical Theological Study of the Covenant Types and Texts in the Old and New Testaments published for the Anchor Yale Bible Reference Library.
The great biblical scholar, David Noel Freedman (d. 2008), recognized that Scott [...]
Years ago while listening to Hank Hanegraaff’s Bible Answer Man radio program, a caller called in about “Christ suffering in Hell.” Hank rightly explained that “Christ suffering in Hell” is not a biblical doctrine, but noted that the doctrine was held by John Calvin. Hank respectfully disagreed with Calvin.
We can argue back and forth over [...]
There are certain charges which are worthy of a defense only on account of their frequent repetition. If someone refers to a Calvinist as a hopeless determinist, the well rounded Calvinist might decline to defend such an uneducated attack after hearing it once or twice, but there is a point at which the accused party, [...]
Augustine uses the term “infusion” (like the Council of Trent) and not “imputation” (like Luther and Calvin) when discussing God’s act of justification:
“For by this grace He engrafts into His body even baptized infants, who certainly have not yet become able to imitate any one. As therefore He, in whom all are made alive, besides [...]
It belongs to the natural order for lesser powers, like appetite, to be subject to greater powers, like reason. Since man is a rational creature, his appetite , for example, must be subject to reason although he cannot fully do so in this life. Nevertheless, the inevitable persistence of concupiscence must not deter our [...]
