When You Fail to Distinguish Second and Third Use of the Law–A Response to Tullian Tchividjian
Last week, Jen Wilkin wrote a very helpful article on TGC entitled “Failure is not a Virtue.” The purpose of her article was to push back against those who advocate what she calls “celebratory failurism.” She says, “Celebratory failurism asserts that all our attempts to obey will fail, thereby making us the recipients of greater grace. But God does not exhort us to obey just to teach us that we cannot hope to obey.”
Put differently, Jen was concerned about those who view the law only negatively (as a means of exposing failure), and rarely discuss how Christians are empowered to obey it.
Just recently, Tullian Tchividjian has … Continue reading...
Missions and the Kingdom of God
What is “missions” anyway? I suppose most people would equate the missions enterprise with evangelism. It is about preaching the gospel in order to get conversions, we might think.
Now, this conception of missions is largely correct. It is certainly about evangelism. But, it also about more than this. Biblically speaking, the missions task is about the spread of the Kingdom of God. It is about the spread of God’s reign, his rule, his dominion, to the ends of the earth.
And as God’s Kingdom advances, the world is changed. People submit to his rule. Business practices follow the teachings of Scripture. Marriages are renewed and revived. Vocations are … Continue reading...
Are Christians Narrow-Minded and Intolerant?
When it comes to modern religious discourse, there is no greater sin than to claim your religion is the only one that is true. You can believe just about anything and receive a shrug of the shoulders from an unbelieving world, but say that you believe in one way to heaven and accusations of narrow-mindedness and intolerance are inevitable.
Years ago, there was a well-known interview between Oprah Winfrey and Tom Cruise about Scientology. Oprah was clearly skeptical of Cruise’s religious beliefs, but she then asked the million dollar question: “You don’t believe Scientology is the only true religion, do you?” It was easy to tell that the question was … Continue reading...
Mark Dever Giving the Harold O.J. Brown Lectures at RTS Charlotte
Two years ago we began our annual Harold O.J. Brown lecture series here at RTS Charlotte. This lecture series honors Dr. Brown not only because he was a faculty member here in Charlotte for the final decade of his career (and much loved by the students), but because of his larger and wider impact one evangelicalism in the United States. In addition to publishing many important books, Dr. Brown (along with C. Everett Koop) had a tremendous influence on the pro-life movement in the United States.
When Dr. Brown passed away in 2007, I gave an interview to Christianity Today about his career and legacy. See here for that interview … Continue reading...
One of the Best Apologetics Books in Years
Every once in a while a book is published that is so helpful, so original, and so needed, that it makes one wonder, Why was this book not written before now? James Anderson, associate professor of theology and philosophy here at RTS Charlotte, has written such a book: What’s Your Worldview? An Interactive Approach to Life’s Big Questions (Crossway, 2o14).
This is a wonderful little book for a number of reasons. (1) Target audience. Although this book is certainly for Christians, it has a strong evangelistic thrust to it. It is designed to be given to non-Christians. (2) Methodology: Anderson has written this book from a presuppositional … Continue reading...