Living in Light of Two Ages
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Monday, May 12, 2008 at 09:11AM 
The audio from Ken Samples' most recent Academy lecture from his series, "A Little Lower Than the Angels: The Christian View of Man - Part VI," has been posted on the Christ Reformed website (www.christreformed.org).
Here's the MP3 version -- http://links.christreformed.org/realaudio/A20080509-ViewOfMan.mp3
Here's the streaming version -- http://links.christreformed.org/real/20080509.m3u
Monday, May 12, 2008 at 07:20AM 
"Teachings that pointed the way beyond the dysfunction of the human mind, the way out of the collective insanity, were distorted and became themselves part of the insanity. And so religions, to a large extent, became divisive rather than unifying forces. Instead of bringing about an ending of violence and hatred through a realization of the fundamental oneness of all life, they brought more violence and hatred, more divisions between people as well as between different religions and even within the same religion."
OK, who said that? Leave your guess in the comments section below. Please, no google searches!
Kim Riddlebarger
This quote comes from Eckhart Tolle's book -- "A New Earth 2005." Tolle is Oprah's latest new age guru.
Friday, May 9, 2008 at 11:12AM 
Thanks to Nathan Pitchford, who sends along this link to a free download (pdf) of his "Categorized Scripture List" dealing with the people of God. This list is taken from the ESV, and is very helpful for those reconsidering their dispensationalism. Click here: http://www.monergismbooks.com/pdfs/pog_003.pdf .
For a mere $3.95 this same material can also be purchased in an attractive booklet from our friends @ monergism.com. Click here: What the Bible Says about THE PEOPLE OF GOD :: Booklets & Tracts :: Monergism Books.
Nathan has another very helpful list of Scriptures dealing with the doctrines of grace. It can be found here: Click here: What the Bible Says about THE DOCTRINES OF GRACE :: Booklets & Tracts :: Monergism Books
How about Jihad by lawsuit? A successful business owner in the UK is being sued because she won't allow an employee in her "alternative" hair-salon to wear her Muslim headscarf. Of course, the costs from the lawsuit will probably put her out of business. Click here: Pajamas Media » Pig Tales, Pigtails, and Islamism
The contentless (or theologically liberal) Church of England is losing members so fast that by 2035, there will be more Muslims in the UK than Christians. I'm surprised it will take that long. Click here: Practising Muslims 'will outnumber Christians by 2035' - Telegraph
Finally, how would you like to have this modern day Noah living next door? Lets just hope mated pairs of critters don't start showing up! Click here: 'Ark' Still Awash With Unanswered Questions
Friday, May 9, 2008 at 11:07AM Ken Samples continues his series "A Little Lower than the Angels" -- A Christian view of man.
The lecture will be held @ Christ Reformed Church in Anaheim, the lecture is free of charge, and begins @ 7:30PM. For more information, Click here: Christ Reformed Info - Schedule of Academy Classes and Author's Forums.
Thursday, May 8, 2008 at 02:40PM 
Synod rejects the error of those . . .
IV Who teach that in election to faith a prerequisite condition is that man should rightly use the light of nature, be upright, unassuming, humble, and disposed to eternal life, as though election depended to some extent on these factors.
For this smacks of Pelagius, and it clearly calls into question the words of the apostle: We lived at one time in the passions of our flesh, following the will of our flesh and thoughts, and we were by nature children of wrath, like everyone else. But God, who is rich in mercy, out of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in transgressions, made us alive with Christ, by whose grace you have been saved. And God raised us up with him and seated us with him in heaven in Christ Jesus, in order that in the coming ages we might show the surpassing riches of his grace, according to his kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith (and this not from yourselves; it is the gift of God) not by works, so that no one can boast (Eph. 2:3-9).
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The fourth error to be rejected is very popular today. This is the idea that God elects those who, through natural ability and spiritual insight, place themselves in a position to receive grace from God. This, of course, is utterly Pelagian, and amounts to an outright denial of sola gratia (grace alone). It also denies the biblical teaching about election as set forth in articles one through nineteen of the Canons.
In the Pelagian scheme, grace is merely incidental to our salvation. Grace is understood as the communication of right information about what God requires of us, so that the creature can do (using their natural ability) what is necessary to be saved. This road is paved with human ability, and inevitably leads to the dead-end of works-righteousness.
Unfortunately, this very flawed idea is all-too common in American Evangelicalism. In large measure, it was bequeathed to us by one Charles Grandison Finney, who wrote in his Systematic Theology, “Regeneration consists in the sinner changing his ultimate choice, intention, preference; or in changing from selfishness to love and benevolence; or, in other words, in turning from the supreme choice of self-gratification, to the supreme love of God and the equal love of his neighbor. Of course the subject of regeneration must be an agent in the work” [Systematic Theology, p. 224].
This is simply amazing! If we jiggle the lever in the right way, and use the right means, we don’t even need the grace of God to be saved. According to Finney, even after the Fall, we still possess sufficient natural ability to do what God requires of us. We must be agents and subjects in this work.
The logical consequence of this is that our salvation does not at all depend upon God. Rather, it depends upon us. As the Princeton theologian B. B. Warfield once remarked in response to Finney, this is not theology at all, this is ethics. As Warfield put it, “we said that God might be eliminated entirely from Finney’s ethical theory without injury to it: are we not prepared to now say that [God] might be eliminated from it with some advantage to it.” Sad, but true.
The denial that our salvation begins in God with his gracious decree of election leads to a host of errors and skewed practices. Finney is the father of American Revivalism, characterized by the frontier tent-meeting and the sawdust trail. Finney’s revivalist legacy is most clearly seen today in the countless stadiums filled with people being urged to “let God” do this, that, or the other. Finney is also the father of the alter call and the “evangelistic meeting” which takes place apart from the normal preaching and sacramental ministry of the local church. It was the stress upon the “new measures,” as Finney called them, that largely served to displace the sacramental and preaching ministry of the church, for the technique-oriented evangelism of modern America.
In fact, it could be argued that the church growth movement--especially those forms which seek to entice so-called “seekers” to church by removing those things from the church service which offend them (in other words, anything distinctly Christian)--can be traced back to Finney’s new measures. Now, however, the "new measures" come to us couched in the language of marketing and sales, target groups and demographics. Whether it be Rick Warren, Joel Osteen, or even Billy Graham, there is no doubt that one branch of each of their respective intellectual family trees, traces back to Charles Finney. And even if other branches in that same family tree can be traced back to Protestant forebears, these historic Protestant traits are now most certainly recessive. No doubt, Finney’s theological family tree and familial characteristics now dominate much of the American church.
Again, we need to remind ourselves that the Bible (summarized by the Canons) does not approach this subject from the perspective that everyone is entitled to a chance at heaven, and already possesses the natural ability to get there, if only they will. The Scriptures do not begin with human freedom, as the Pelagian argues. The Scriptures begin with the fall of Adam into sin, and the consequences of that event upon the entirety of the human race. To put in Dwight Moody's terms, this means that we lost our vote and our freedom in the Fall! And because the entire human race fell with Adam, we are everything that the Scriptures say about us--dead in sin, unwilling and unable to come to Christ through the mere exercise of our will.
Therefore, we must begin this discusison where the Bible does–with the fact of human sinfulness, and with the idea clearly in our minds that no one deserves to go to heaven, and that not one of us can do anything to get there. To start with the presupposition that unless we have free will to choose God whenever we wish, or else Christianity (and by implication - God) would not be fair, we miss the point. God does not owe sinners anything. And if we are thinking this way, we have imbibed way too deeply from our democratic and egalatarian culture. We are not approaching things, as we should, from the perspective on human nature given us in the Holy Scriptures.
As we have said repeatedly throughout this series, the degree to which we argue that we contribute something to our salvation is the degree to which we deny sola gratia. It was Charles Spurgeon who said, “he that thinks lightly of sin, thinks lightly of the savior.”
It is really very simple. Either God saves sinners who are dead in sin through his sovereign election, calling them forth from the grave when they could contribute nothing, or else sinners have something good within them is that not somehow tainted, corrupted, polluted our damaged by the fall. As we have seen, the Scriptures teach the former rather than the latter. To add anything we do to grace alone, is to deny grace alone! You cannot have it either way.
As Calvin puts in the Institutes, “Whatever mixture men study to add from the power of free-will to the grace of God, is only a corruption of it; just as if anyone should dilute good wine with dirty or bitter water.” Since we are sinful from head to toe, from hair to toenail, whatever our contribution we might add to God’s grace, only can serve to pollute, not to activate the grace of God!
And so when we look to as answers for questions like, “Why does God save this one rather than that one?” we do well to do as Canons remind us, recall to mind the words of the apostle Paul recorded in Ephesians 2:1-10: 1 And you were dead in the trespasses and sins 2 in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience— 3 among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. 4 But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, 5 even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved— 6 and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, 7 so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. 8 For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, 9 not a result of works, so that no one may boast. 10 For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.
It really is that simple. God saves sinners. God does not tell sinners what to do so that they can save themselves.
Thursday, May 8, 2008 at 08:19AM 
So, even though Jeremiah Wright's political rants are offensive, I can't judge him, because he's my "brother in Christ" . . . Wait a minute! Wright's politics are one thing--and I for one, really don't care what his political views are. But shouldn't I determine what he "confesses" about Christ before declaring him "my brother." There's a step missing here somewhere. Click here: Jeremiah Wright, Evangelicals' Brother in Christ | Christianity Today | A Magazine of Evangelical Conviction
Talk about the ultimate nanny state . . . Can you imagine living in a nation ruled by Islamic clerics? But in this case, the Islamic clerics are actually the sane(r) ones, as they pressure their apocalytpic President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, to back off in his devotion to the Mahdi (the "hidden Imam") whom Ahmadinejad believes is secretly directing Iran while still hidden in a well. Click here: Iran clerics rebuke Ahmadinejad over 'hidden imam'
Sorry, but the church is not a family business. We have the Osteens, the Schullers, and now the Falwells. Come to think of it, since these are "ministries" and not churches, maybe the family business model does work. This is what happens when a "ministry" is built on personalities, and the founder either dies, or gets too long in the tooth to continue. Junior must step up, and take dad's place to keep the ministry going. That's how family businesses work. Click here: RNS Feature: "A year later, Falwell sons assume father’s mantle"
Yup, the Vatican has gone high tech. Now, you can get your very own text message from Pope Benedict XVI. Click here: Pope goes digital to better connect with youth | Technology | Reuters
Wednesday, May 7, 2008 at 09:14AM 
Select Bibliography for the Book of Revelation
Introductory Guides to the Book of Revelation
Vern S. Poythress, The Returning King: A Guide to the Book of Revelation (P & R) -- Highly recommended basic guide. Good background material, theological content. Best place to start.
Michael Wilcock. The Message of Revelation, The Bible Speaks Today (IVP) -- Part of the IVP “Bible Speaks” series. Good for personal study. Includes study/discussion questions.
Commentaries on Revelation
Simon J. Kistemaker, Revelation (Baker) -- Solid Reformed amillennial approach to the text, part of the series of commentaries begun by William Hendricksen.
G. K. Beale, The Book of Revelation: A Commentary on the Greek Text (Eerdmans) -- The best academic commentary on Revelation in print, period! But it is for advanced readers and quite expensive.
William Hendricksen, More Than Conquerors: An Interpretation of the Book of Revelation (Baker) -- For many years the Reformed standard, now outdated.
Dennis E. Johnson, Triumph of the Lamb: A Commentary on Revelation (P & R) -- The best all-around commentary on Revelation. If you plan to buy only one book on Revelation, this should be it.
Specialized Studies
Richard Bauckham, The Theology of the Book of Revelation (Cambridge) -- Very good topical treatment of the major themes running throughout Revelation.
Richard Bauckham, The Climax of Prophecy (T & T Clark) -- For advanced students, very insightful look at some of the structural and theological issues facing the interpreter of Revelation.
Colin Hemer, The Letters to the Seven Churches of Asia: In Their Local Settings (Eerdmans) -- Background information on the seven churches. Updates and replaces Ramsey
Mark Wilson, Charts on the Book of Revelation: Literary, Historical, and Theological Perspectives (Kregel) -- Very helpful material, indeed invaluable.
Tuesday, May 6, 2008 at 03:32PM 
The Twenty-Second in a Series of Sermons on Paul's Epistle to the Romans
God will not only save all of those whom he has chosen in Christ, he will also save all creation from the horrible effects of the fall of the human race into sin. In Romans 8:18-25, Paul’s focus moves from the individual dimension of sanctification to the cosmic dimension. In the last few sermons, we have seen how God redeems his people “in Christ” by removing from them the curse, condemnation, and bondage to sin. Now we will see how “in Christ” God redeems all of creation, thereby ensuring glorious freedom for all of God’s people, and all that God has made.
Once again, this section of Romans must be viewed against the backdrop of Paul’s eschatological contrast between the “already/not yet,” between “this age,” and the “age to come,” what we are “in Christ” vs. what we were “in Adam.” As we saw last time, in Romans 8:17 when Paul wrote–“Now if we are children, then we are heirs–heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory”–the apostle begins to contrast the suffering associated with this present age with the glory of the age to come. As believers share in Christ’s suffering, so too, creation groans under our feet. But for all those in Christ, present suffering will give way to eschatological glory and the creation itself will be liberated from the principle of decay. God will save his people and God will renew his creation.
A number of commentators point out that according to Paul’s eschatological categories, suffering belongs to “this present evil age” while glory belongs to the “age to come.” Because of the fall of the human race into sin, suffering is one characteristic of “the already,” while glorification in Christ is the mark of the “not yet.” Since our suffering will finally come to an end at the second coming of Christ, the Christian’s unquenchable hope in the midst of present suffering is that the glories of the age to come will become a reality on the Day of Christ Jesus. And yet, Paul’s point is that even in the midst of our sufferings which we must endure in this present evil age, even now, in some way, we participate in the glories of the “not yet” through word and sacrament. Therefore, the theme of glory and how we participate in it now and how it gives us hope for the future, dominates the balance of this entire chapter.
To read the rest of this sermon, click here
Tuesday, May 6, 2008 at 08:14AM 
I wonder if John McCain would like to rethink getting chummy with John Hagee. It is bad enough when politicians pander to preachers. It is far worse when ministers see themselves as political power brokers. Hagee sure does. Click here: A Turbulent Pastor | Newsweek Politics: Campaign 2008 | Newsweek.com
Another Bible-based theme park is going to open, this time in Tennessee. One of the backers is a former photographer for Penthouse Magazine. Lets hope the other backers don't let this guy design the Garden of Eden portion of the theme park. Click here: Bible Theme Park backer photographed women for adult magazines | Nashville is Talking
Some things are just wrong. Neil Diamond wants to be in the "Rock and Roll Hall of Fame"? For "Sweet Caroline?" Yeah, and Barry Manilow belongs in there as well. And why hasn't Grand Funk Railroad been inducted? Click here: NEIL DIAMOND - DIAMOND WANTS HALL OF FAME ACCOLADE
Speaking of music . . . Be careful not to have coffee or other liquids in your mouth when you scroll through this slide show--the fifty worst album covers of all time. Posting some of these is just plain cruel. My vote for the best album cover is ZZ Top's Tres Hombres. How can you look at the inside of that album cover and not rush out to the local Mexican food establishment for some beans, rice, enchiladas and a cold one? If you've seen it, and if you remember it, I'll bet you have Mexican for dinner! Click here: Worst album cover ever? Vote for your least favorite and add some comments -- South Florida Sun-Sentinel.co
