When I hear religious talk about the messy and broken in life, I usually assume it refers to someone's sexual history. @Presbyterianism

Can I know if I am saved?

In keeping with Reformation principles and against both forms of one-sidedness, therefore, we must maintain that faith and the life of faith is much too rich to be reduced to “naked assent” (nudus assensus) to the article concerning the forgiveness of sins; it also essentially includes certainty.

This certainty, which relates both to the objective grace of God in Christ and to the believer’s subjective participation in it, is not an external additive to faith but is in principle integral to it from the start. It is not obtained by looking at ourselves but by looking away from ourselves to Christ. It is grounded in the promises of God, not in changing experiences or imperfect good works.

Doubts and fears do certainly arise from time to time in the believer’s heart (Matt. 8:25; 14:30; Mark 9:24), and believers must certainly fight against them throughout their lives. However, they can only wage that struggle and only prevail in that struggle by the power of the faith that holds on to God’s promise, rests in the completed work of Christ, and is thus by nature certain.

Therefore, the various acts of faith, such as knowing, assenting, trusting, and so forth, acts that in turn must be distinguished from the fruits of faith or good works, are not the steps or stages of faith that succeed each other in time but activities that themselves, and in connection with each other, can be either weak or strong.

There are children and youths, men and fathers in Christ. But those who embrace the gospel with a true faith are, in proportion to the vigor with which they do this, also certain of their own salvation, and vice versa. The one thing is most closely connected with the other and rises and falls with it. So then faith is and remains by its very nature an unlimited and unconditional trust of the heart in the riches of God’s grace in Christ.

Today it is essentially still the same as what it was in the days of the Old and New Testaments, a believing against hope (Rom. 4:18), the assurance of things hoped for and the conviction of things unseen (Heb. 11:1), a deep-seated confidence that with God all things are possible (Mark 10:27; 11:23–24), that he who raised Christ from the dead (Rom. 4:24; 10:9) still raises the dead, still saves sinners, and forever calls into existence the things that do not exist (4:17). -Herman Bavinck @Presbyterianism

Southern Baptists are their own worst enemies.

Fuller, Spurgeon and Gill were able to be Baptist without believing in soul competency or throwing money at parasitical church bureaucrats. @Presbyterianism

Straight Outta Compton

Joel Beeke's publisher sent out this photo of men from Compton, Lynwood, and Watts in South LA meeting to study one of his books.

The ad copy doesn't mention that South LA used to be an historically black area, memorialized in a 1996 film. It was ethnically transformed by migrants from Latin America.

Nor does it address the question of what ministers should do with the undocumented and beneficiaries of toxic immigration policies.

Instead of simply declaring newcomers a a mission field at our door, we need to face serious challenges as the Church. @Presbyterianism

Saint Jason

Now when they had passed through Amphipolis and Apollonia, they came to Thessalonica, where was a synagogue of the Jews: and Paul, as his manner was, went in unto them, and three sabbath days reasoned with them out of the scriptures, opening and alleging, that Christ must needs have suffered, and risen again from the dead; and that this Jesus, whom I preach unto you, is Christ. And some of them believed, and consorted with Paul and Silas; and of the devout Greeks a great multitude, and of the chief women not a few.

But the Jews which believed not, moved with envy, took unto them certain lewd fellows of the baser sort, and gathered a company, and set all the city on an uproar, and assaulted the house of Jason, and sought to bring them out to the people. And when they found them not, they drew Jason and certain brethren unto the rulers of the city, crying, These that have turned the world upside down are come hither also; whom Jason hath received: and these all do contrary to the decrees of Caesar, saying that there is another king, one Jesus. And they troubled the people and the rulers of the city, when they heard these things. And when they had taken security of Jason, and of the other, they let them go.

I checked SermonAudio and there aren't many sermons in the Lessons from the Life of Jason vein. Is it because paying the city authorities to go away isn't how we think the story should end? @Presbyterianism

That tweet is testimony to Tim Keller's failure to influence the Big Apple despite over 30 years of trying. He also wasted millions in other people's money. Sad.

Kellerism was kind of a cargo cult. People thought if they behaved like bicoastal elites, they would be welcomed into those circles. Social class doesn't work that way. At the end of the day, they were still Middle Americans from Nashville, Dallas or Asheville.

If only the people who believed this nonsense would move on to something better. @Presbyterianism

Punch right. Engage left. @Presbyterianism

Whenever I hear of ressourcement, I release the safety catch of my Browning.

Ressourcement is a research strategy that uses historic sources as footnote fodder to support your pet issues and hobby horses. You know your reader has probably not read the sources carefully, so it's easy to misdirect someone with carefully chosen references.

In other words, you dig in old books to find people who sound like your own opinions:
- Some PC(USA) author quoting Calvin to support women's ordination.
- The internet troll trying to convince you that Westminster and Dordt support baptismal regeneration and final justification by works.
- The theonomist claiming the Reformers were presuppositional.

The term came over from French during the era of nouvelle théologie, the liberal movement in Roman Catholicism that paved the way for Vatican II. In some ways, it refers to how Rome has always behaved with historical sources. x.gd/2dpyZ @Presbyterianism

James Dobson died. He told Boomer Evangelicals how to raise their kids.

Dobson bears a lot of blame for the therapeutic turn in conservative churches.

Yet in politics he was always a notch better than other parachurch celebrities. He was one of the few who did not blacklist Pat Buchanan. At the end he was too conservative for his own organization. @Presbyterianism

How do Lutherans get food now that Schwan's is gone?🥸 @Presbyterianism

Actual PCA service in Boca Raton. A knockoff of what Calvary Chapel did 50 years ago to impress hippies.

This style is the liturgical tradition of the Baby Boom.

Making fun of it is too easy. Can’t you see you’re not making Christianity any better, you’re just making rock and roll worse?

To be fair, this is no more offensive than what Anglo-Catholics and High Lutherans do. The two sides of the worship wars cancel each other out.

For by His law it pleases Him to prescribe for men what is good and right, and thus to hold them to a sure standard that no one may take leave to contrive any sort of worship He pleases. -Calvin @Presbyterianism

A PCA elder from Orange County, CA, was removed from his office following his arrest on 18 felony counts of sexual assault involving a minor.

Police now want to know if Michael Maxwell, who had been on the session of Redeemer PCA, had more victims than one girl, who they say was abused from 2011 through 2018.

Pastor Josh Hahe told his congregation that while his family intends to remain at the church, Maxwell had been suspended from communion. He said that while the former elder had been a spiritual mentor to many, he believes the allegations are credible.

“You will not see Michael in church again without prior notification from me,” Hahne wrote in a letter.

Maxwell had also served as a deacon and Sunday School teacher. He has a wife and children.
archive.is/BdOff archive.ph/zVdAS x.gd/OhjwF @Presbyterianism

The law of the decalogue or Ten Commandments is a declaration of the law of nature and a picture of the image of God.

We also believe that this law is a declaration of the law of nature, which was written in the hearts of the first men perfectly, of others imperfectly and but in part. And therefore by this law is condemned whatsoever is not agreeable to that image of God, whereunto man was created, and is commanded whatsoever is agreeable to the same. -Jerome Zanchi @Presbyterianism

92. Q. What is the law of God?
A. God spake all these words, saying: I am Jehovah thy God, who brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.
I. Thou shalt have no other gods before me[....] (Exodus 20)

It is confessed by all that there are Ten Commandments, and they divided into tables.

But it is a question between us and the papists: How many precepts are to be assigned to each table?

We assign four precepts to the First Table, six to the Second. They [split] three to the First Table and seven to the Second.

The Lutherans follow them; they join together the Precept of not having other gods with that of not making graven image, And they divide the Last Commandment into two, so that one forbids the lusting after another man's wife, the other lusting after other things.

Of this opinion was Augustine, whom many others followed, but especially the Papists, almost all, and those [Lutherans].

Both thought that conjunction to be fit, that they might excuse their sacrilege by which they are wont to raze out of their books that commandment of not making nor worshipping religious images, that so also the number of the ten precepts may be manifest, even that appendix, as they call it, being also taken away. -Edward Leith @Presbyterianism

93. Q. How are these commandments divided?
A. Into two tables; the first of which teaches what must be our attitude toward God; the second, what duties we owe to our neighbor.