A Brief Clarification of Calvinism, Arminianism & Hyper-Calvinism

D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones once observed that "the ignorant Arminian does not know the difference between Calvinism and hyper-Calvinism." The good news is that not all Arminians are ignorant. The bad news, however, is that such ignorance is not limited to Arminians.
Throughout evangelical history, where evangelical Calvinism as spread among Bible believing Christians, charges of hyper-Calvinism inevitably arise from those who do not know the difference. That pattern is being repeated today both within and beyond the borders of the Southern Baptist Convention. Examples of such careless accusations are not hard to find.
One of the most recent and most egregious came in the exhibit hall during the recent Southern Baptist Convention in Houston, Texas. On Monday, June 10, 2013, the day before the convention actually began, Baptist21 interviewed the president of Louisiana College about the treatment of some Calvinistic professors whose contracts were not renewed by the administration. In the course of responding to questions that he had been sent in advance, Dr. Joe Aguillard (though he probably would not identify himself as an Arminian) proved Lloyd-Jones' point.   Continue at Founders

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Effectual Calling and Regeneration

Effectual Calling 

As we now proceed to consider in detail what exactly it is the Holy Spirit does to us in the application of redemption, I would remind you that I am not insisting that the order which I shall follow is of necessity the right one, and certainly not of necessity the chronological one. 

‘So how do you arrive at your order?’ asks someone. My answer is that I mainly try to conceive of this work going on within us from the standpoint of God in eternity looking down upon men and women in sin. That is the way that appeals to me most of all; it is the way that I find most helpful. That is not to detract in any way from experience or the experiential standpoint. Some would emphasise that and would have their order according to experience, but I happen to be one of those people who is not content merely with experience. I want to know something about that experience; I want to know what I am experiencing and I want to know why I am experiencing it and how it has come about. It is the child who is content merely with enjoying the experience. If we are to grow in grace and to go forward and exercise our senses, as the author of the epistle to the Hebrews puts it ( Heb. 5:14 ), then we must of necessity ask certain questions and be anxious to know how the things that have happened to us really have come to take place. 

My approach therefore is this: there is the truth of the gospel, and we have seen already that it is a part of the work of the Holy Spirit to see that that truth is proclaimed to all and sundry. That is what we called the general call — a kind of universal offer of the gospel. Then we saw that though the external or general call comes to all, to those who will remain unsaved as well as to those who are saved, obviously some new distinction comes in, because some are saved by it. So the question we must now consider is: What is it that establishes the difference between the two groups?   Continue at Monergism

Battling Depression . . . Together

In 1954, speaking of spiritual depression, Martyn Lloyd-Jones said, "I have no hesitation in asserting that one of the reasons why the Christian Church counts for so little in the modern world is that so many Christians are in this condition."

It's striking to hear of how common the struggle was in his day. Depression is no stranger to the great leaders in church history (in fact, it affected quite a lot of them), but neither is depression uncommon in the church today.

So what do we, as a church, do about it? We recently asked biblical counselor Ed Welch. Here's what he said.

Ed Welch is a speaker at our upcoming National Conference. Visit the event page to learn more and register.

For more on the theme of depression see —

• Ed Welch, book, Depression: Looking Up from the Stubborn Darkness
• Ed Welch, booklet, Depression: The Way Up When You Are Down
• John Piper, book, When the Darkness Will Not Lift
• John Piper, book, When I Don't Desire God, chapter 12: "When the Darkness Does Not Lift"
• John Piper, book, Future Grace, chapter 24: "Faith in Future Grace vs. Despondency"

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Other videos from our trip to CCEF and Westminster Theological Seminary —

• The Heart of Sinful Anger (David Powlison)
• Is Sanctification Complex or Simple? (David Powlison)
• How Christ Died To Sin, And Why It Matters (Richard Gaffin)
• Learning About Sanctification From Fyodor Dostoyevsky (David Powlison)
• Why Pornography Robs a Man of His Humanness (Ed Welch)
• The Blessed Struggle Against Fear and Anxiety (Ed Welch)
• God's Aim in Election, and Our Personal Holiness (Richard Gaffin)
• Fear, Anxiety, and Growing in Sanctification (Ed Welch)
• Can I Grow in Holiness Without the Local Church? (David Powlison)

 Credit: Desiring God

Theology Gone To The Head

Yes theology can be a dangerous thing. That is no fault of theology itself. The fault lies with the sinful heart of man. The proud sinful heart of man to be precise. We've all encountered such individuals who have all the right theology. They can expound and defend the doctrines of grace with precision. They have all their theological I's dotted and T's crossed. They love to talk about all the major doctrines and are very great at proclaiming them. They are passionate about the discussion on supralapsarianism and infralapsarianism. They go into depth on the ordo salutis. They love all the five solas. They cherish and adore the creeds and confessions. To simplify, they have the mind of a theologian but the heart of Pharaoh.

Therein lies the danger. These men can speak of the truth but their hearts seem far from humbled by them. They have the right doctrines but their hearts are cold and and as hard as stone. They act pompously when others disagree with their cherished non essential doctrines. They demonstrate no fruit of the Spirit and lack love for the brethren, which mind you is the main way Christ said that all will know we are His (Jn 13:35, 1Jn. 4:7-21). They seems to especially eschew anyone that is outside of their theological camp. That which is meant (theology) to take the sinner before the throne of Christ and humble Him before the almighty and then others, is distorted to puff up the sinner. It is theology gone to the head. It is dangerous and quite obnoxious. The Apostle Paul puts it this way:  Continue at Reformed

Preachers on Preaching

Here are ten reminders for those who preach and teach the Word of God … as confirmed by some of history’s greatest preachers.

1. Effective ministry consists not of fads or gimicks, but of faithfully preaching the truth.

Charles Spurgeon: Ah, my dear friends, we want nothing in these times for revival in the world but the simple preaching of the gospel. This is the great battering ram that shall dash down the bulwarks of iniquity. This is the great light that shall scatter the darkness. We need not that men should be adopting new schemes and new plans. We are glad of the agencies and assistances which are continually arising; but after all, the true Jerusalem blade, the sword that can cut to the piercing asunder of the joints and marrow, is preaching the Word of God. We must never neglect it, never despise it. The age in which the pulpit it despised, will be an age in which gospel truth will cease to be honored. . . . God forbid that we should begin to depreciate preaching. Let us still honor it; let us look to it as God’s ordained instrumentality, and we shall yet see in the world a repetition of great wonders wrought by the preaching in the name of Jesus Christ.

Source: Charles Spurgeon, “Preaching! Man’s Privilege and God’s Power,” Sermon (Nov. 25, 1860).

2. Preaching is a far more serious task than most preachers realize.

Richard Baxter: And for myself, as I am ashamed of my dull and careless heart, and of my slow and unprofitable course of life, so, the Lord knows, I am ashamed of every sermon I preach; when I think what I have been speaking of, and who sent me, and that men’s salvation or damnation is so much concerned in it, I am ready to tremble lest God should judge me as a slighter of His truths and the souls of men, and lest in the best sermon I should be guilty of their blood. Me thinks we should not speak a word to men in matters of such consequence without tears, or the greatest earnestness that possibly we can; were not we too much guilty of the sin which we reprove, it would be so.

Source: Richard Baxter, “The Need for Personal Revival.” Cited from Historical Collections Relating to Remarkable Periods of the Success of the Gospel, ed. John Gillies (Kelso: John Rutherfurd, 1845), 147.  Continue at Nathan Busenitz

Assurance: Every Believer's Birthright

was listening to a sermon by D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones not long ago in which he pointed out that assurance is one of the most prominent subjects in the New Testament. Virtually every New Testament epistle was written to address some doubt, answer some question, settle some uncertainty—all of them aimed at stimulating or reinforcing the assurance of believers. Scripture encourages us to have assurance. It is not inherently brash or presumptuous to be confident in your faith.

Shortly after reading that comment by Lloyd-Jones, while doing some research on a totally different theme, I had occasion to review The Canons and Decrees of the Council of Trent. Trent was the Roman Catholic Council that was convened in the mid-1500s in order to hammer out an official response from the Roman Catholic Church to the Protestant Reformation.

And let's be candid: the Protestant Reformation had embarrassed the whole Roman Catholic hierarchy in a major way, because in addition to the many doctrinal errors and patently unbiblical and extrabiblical teachings the Reformers challenged, they also shone the bright light of biblical truth on centuries of exploitation of Papal power, gross corruption of the priesthood, spiritual abuse for material profit (including the sale of indulgences and the sale of church offices and political favors for money). Underneath all of this was the most shocking kind of moral rot that went right to the top in the Papal hierarchy. The Roman Catholic Church was totally corrupt.  Continue at Phil Johnson

Martyn Lloyd-Jones on the Gift of Prophecy

Was Martyn Lloyd-Jones a continuationist?

 

“Although charismatics and Pentecostals have both claimed him as an advocate of their views, a careful reading of ML-J establishes that they have misunderstood him.” So states Dr. Eryl Davies in his Themelios article entitled, Dr D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: An Introduction.

Davies substantiates his statement (in part) by pointing to a section of Lloyd-Jones’s Christian Unity in which the Doctor (as he is often called) elaborates on the nature of New Testament prophecy.

Here’s what Lloyd-Jones said:

A prophet was a person to whom truth was imparted by the Holy Spirit.  . . .  A revelation or message or some insight into truth came to them, and, filled with the Spirit, they were able to make utterances which were of benefit and profit to the Church. Surely it is clear that this again was temporary, and for this good reason, that in those early days of the Church there were no New Testament Scriptures, the Truth had not yet been expounded in written words. 

Try to imagine our position if we did not possess these New Testament Epistles, but the Old Testament only. That was the position of the early Church. Truth was imparted to it primarily by the teaching and preaching of the apostles, but that was supplemented by the teaching of the prophets to whom truth was given and also the ability to speak it with clarity and power in the demonstration and authority of the Spirit.

But once these New Testament documents were written the office of a prophet was no longer necessary. Hence in the Pastoral Epistles which apply to a later stage in the history of the Church, when things had become more settled and fixed, there is no mention of the prophets. It is clear that even by then the office of the prophet was no longer necessary, and the call was for teachers and pastors and others to expound the Scriptures and to convey the knowledge of the truth.    Continue at Nathan Busenitz

3 Steps to Breaking the Cycle of Self-Pity

The late Martyn Lloyd-Jones has been counseling me the past few days through the re-publication of his sermons on Psalm 73 by Christian Focus entitled Faith On Trial. If you are a regular reader of this blog then you know how many times I have referenced this psalm in the past year and how the Lord has been using it in my own heart. The Holy Spirit has magnetically pulled me back into it time and time again. One of the powerful lessons of this psalm is the diagnosis and cure of self-pity, which is never productive. What Lloyd-Jones says is so helpful that I will quote large portions.

“The trouble with this man was that his thoughts had been turned in on himself and so had got into a vicious circle. We start thinking about things in this way, we become miserable and unhappy, and we do not want to see anybody. We do not want to mix with God’s people. We become preoccupied with our troubles—the hard times we are having, the feeling that God is not fair to us and that we are being treated very harshly. We are miserable and feeling very sorry for ourselves, and there we are, going round and round in circles of self-pity. Self is always the centre of this problem. The first thing to do, therefore, is to stop this preoccupation with self and stop turning round and round in circles on the natural level! But how does one break out of the vicious circle? I suggest that there are three main things here.”

1. Put first what the psalmist put first – literally going to the house of God. “What a wonderful place God’s house is. Often you will find deliverance by merely coming into it. Many a time have I thanked God for His house….The house of God has delivered me from ‘the mumps and measles of the soul’ a thousand times and more—merely to enter its doors…we go to the house of God, and to our amazement we find other people there before us…the healing process is going on, the cure is being continued….We look around the congregation and suddenly find ourselves looking at someone whom we know has had an infinitely worse time than we have been having…it puts our problem into a new perspective immediately [see 1 Cor 10:13].   Continue at Paul Tautges

Ligon Duncan on Lloyd-Jones

The new 40th anniversary edition of Preaching and Preachers contains essays from several contemporary preachers, including a piece from Ligon Duncan entitled “Some Things to Look For and Wrestle With.” Zondervan has given me permission to reprint that essay below. Ligon’s comments serve as a good introduction to the book and are full of wisdom in their own right. 

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I received my first copy of D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones’ Preaching and Preachers as a gift from a family in my home church as I was just beginning my studies in seminary. My copy was from the fourteenth printing of the first edition. I had been introduced to Lloyd-Jones as a teenager through his Studies in the Sermon on the Mount (my mother had worn bare a copy of the original two-volume edition) and through the preaching ministry of my boyhood pastor who had been deeply edified by Lloyd-Jones’ sermons. Indeed, many of the “Gospel men” in the old Southern Presbyterian Church and in the nascent reforming movements of the early 1970s were profoundly affected by Lloyd-Jones through his preaching at the Pensacola Theological Institute at the McIlwain Presbyterian Church in August of 1969 (as Hurricane Camille was crashing ashore in Mississippi).

I read Lloyd-Jones’ preaching in written form before I read Preaching and Preachers. From the first, I was greatly impacted by the power of his sermons, even in printed form. Sentences and paragraphs from these sermons still grip me, utterly. I only heard audio recordings of his messages later, and the medium of his voice added a layer of effect that I had not been able to appreciate before.  Continue at Ligon Duncan

Unexceptional Christians

Here is a great, challenging quote from Martyn Lloyd-Jones. It is drawn from his Studies in the Sermon on the Mount and it does away with that false notion that the heights of Christian experience are reserved for the few and exceptional Christians who take on Christian work as their vocation.

Read the Beatitudes, and there you have a description of what every Christian is meant to be. It is not merely the description of some exceptional Christians.

I pause with that for just a moment, and emphasize it, because I think we must all agree that the fatal tendency introduced by the Roman Catholic Church, and indeed by every branch of the Church that likes to use the term ‘Catholic,’ is the fatal tendency to divide Christians into two groups—the religious and the laity, exceptional Christians and ordinary Christians, the one who makes a vocation of the Christian life and the man who is engaged in secular affairs.

That tendency is not only utterly and completely unscriptural; it is destructive ultimately of true piety, and is in many ways a negation of the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. There is no such distinction in the Bible. There are distinctions in offices—apostles, prophets, teachers, pastors, evangelists, and so on. But these Beatitudes are not a description of offices; they are a description of character. And from the standpoint of character, and of what we are meant to be, there is no difference between one Christian and another.  Keep Reading >>>

Are We Too Healthy?

I love to read biographies. I find history and particularly the lives of those who have walked before us fascinating. One of the things I cherish most about a good biography is learning valuable lessons from another’s experience. It’s important to learn from the past and to recognize that most problems have a way of coming full circle. This seems to be the case when it comes to the health of the church and of individual believers.

Dr. David Martyn Lloyd-Jones was a Welsh preacher who lived and preached in London England during the twentieth century. He was a fascinating man who was on the verge of becoming a world-renowned physician before abandoning medicine to pursue his divine calling to proclaim the Word of God and the gospel of Jesus Christ. Throughout his life he proved to be a stalwart for the faith, defending it against the liberal thinking of the day. His uncanny ability to carefully diagnose problems and to remedy them with sound biblical logic and principles was unrivalled. When the “evangelical” church was caving to the currents of the culture, Lloyd-Jones stood boldly to “preach the Word… in season and out of season (2 Tim. 4:2).

His concern for the superficiality that seemed to characterize the evangelical church caused him to reflect upon the reasons and solution for such a plight. He believed that the hallmark of a true experience of God was a sense of awe, and accompanying it, a sense of unworthiness. While he strongly warned against the dangers of morbid introspection, self condemnation and professions of constant failure, he did not shy away from stating that the weakened state of the church was a result of a defective sense of sin and a defective doctrine of sin. Consider the following quote:   Keep Reading >>>

Spiritual Depression: Seeing Clearly

Lloyd-Jones titles chapter 4 of his book, Spiritual Depression, “Men as Trees, Walking.”  He calls our attention to Mark 8:22-26, an account of Jesus healing a blind man in two “attempts.”  I put the word “attempts” in quotation marks because Lloyd-Jones argues that the first attempt, which resulted in the blind man seeing of sorts (men walking as though trees), was not successful at producing perfectly restored sight.  Lloyd-Jones argues that this miracle was a parable of sorts.  He says it’s placed here in Mark’s gospel as a lesson to the disciples, “to enable the disciples to see themselves as they were” (p. 39).  Lloyd-Jones contends that the disciples were beginning to see Jesus, but they were not yet seeing as fully as they ought.  They were in process.  Their understanding was not yet whole.  They were, like the man in Mark 8, blind and not blind.

In this sermon/chapter, Lloyd-Jones describes the problem this way:

I am concerned about these Christians who are disquieted and unhappy and miserable because of this lack of clarity.  It is almost impossible to define them.  You sometimes talk to this type and you think: “This man is a Christian.”  And then you meet him again and you are thrown into doubt at once, and you say: “Surely he cannot be a Christian if he can say a thing like that or do such a thing as that.”

Whenever you meet this man you get a different impression; and you never quite know whether he is a Christian or not.  You are not happy in saying either that he does see of that he does not see.  Furthermore, the difficulty is that not only do others feel like this about these people, they feel it about themselves.  Let me pay them that tribute, they are unhappy because they are not clear about themselves.  … [T]hey are as troubles about themselves as other Christians are about them; they feel they are, and they feel they are not Christians.  They seem to know enough about Christianity to spoil their enjoyment of the world, and yet they do not know enough to feel happy about themselves.  They are “neither hot nor cold.”   Keep Reading...

Is Your Church Family Really Loveless?

In his preface to Spiritual Depression, Geoffrey Thomas relays the brief account of a young woman who visited Dr. Lloyd-Jones with concern for the church.  The woman in question was involved in a long evangelistic campaign in London.  The campaign, sponsored by an American evangelist, was not supported by Lloyd-Jones.  Being attracted to the campaign and its methods, the young woman made two visits to Lloyd-Jones with two critiques.  She claimed (a) that the gospel was not preached at Westminster Chapel, and (b) the people of the church lacked love for one another.  Here’s how she remembers the second conversation, which took place in a dark period of her spiritual life:

Woman: “We don’t love one another in this church.”

Lloyd-Jones (tenderly): “Don’t say that.  It’s the devil that makes you say that.”

A couple questions come immediately to mind for me.

1.  How would one individual in a church be able to pronounce that the entire church is without love? 

How could any one person have data enough to conclude this?  And if the conclusion were accurate, we’d have to stop using the term “church” to describe that group of people.  For whatever we might call that body of people, we could not call it a “church” since love is a distinguishing mark of the church (John 13:34-35; 1 John 3:14-15).   Keep Reading...

Spiritual Depression: Its Causes and Cures

I’ve begun reading the book I most wanted to read during vacation, D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones’ Spiritual Depression: Its Causes and Cures.  Recently a new friend gave me a hardback copy published by Granted Ministries.  It’s a handsome volume with an insightful foreword by Geoffrey Thomas.

I know, I’m late to the Spiritual Depression party.  I’ve heard it quoted often.  Many people have shared personal testimonies about how much it’s helped them.  

And on the strength of the quotes (often extended), the personal recommendation of friends, and my general love and trust for Lloyd-Jones, I’ve recommended the book a number of times myself.  But until now, I’ve actually never read it.  I’m excited to be correcting that omission over the next couple days.  And along the way, I’m equally excited to hear the good Doctor’s original sermons that became this classic treatise on the Christian life.

So, over the next few days, Lord willing, I hope to post some reflections and thoughts as I read through the book.  Today, I want to offer a brief summary of Thomas’ biographical foreword and Lloyd-Jones’ brief preface.

Spiritual Depression: Its Causes and Cures, 1

Spiritual Depression, 2

Spiritual Depression, 3

Striking Similarities Between Two Extraordinary Expositors

One of my favorite preachers and Christian authors is Dr. Steve Lawson.  Pastor Lawson is a humble servant leader and so it is not surprising to observe the various ways God has chosen to use and bless this faithful jar of clay.  

Steve serves as the main teaching pastor at a local church in Alabama 

Dr. Lawson hosts a unique conference each and every year for bible expositors. 

Pastor Lawson has given me permission to republish the following article that originally appeared in the TMSJ. 

Martyn Lloyd-Jones
and John MacArthur 

Striking Similarities Between Two Extraordinary Expositors

In each generation, there is raised up by God one dominant voice in the church that speaks with greatest biblical authority and theological profundity, yet with far-reaching appeal. Through his prolific pulpit and pen, such a pivotal figure becomes the primary instrument that most influences the direction of God’s work around the world. Whether it be John Calvin in the sixteenth century, John Owen in the seventeenth, Jonathan Edwards in the eighteenth, or Charles Spurgeon in the nineteenth, every hour of human history has one such strategic leader who marries both depth and breadth of ministry, and most impacts the times in which he lives. For the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, a compelling case can be made that these two individuals are, respectively, Martyn Lloyd-Jones and John MacArthur.

Through Lloyd-Jones’ prolific Westminster pulpit in London, and later by the global distribution of his printed sermons, this formidable leader came to be widely regarded in his day as “the greatest preacher in Christendom.” Affectionately known as “the Doctor,” this brilliant physician-turned-preacher became the foremost expositor in the mid-twentieth century and was the leading influence in bringing about a resurgence of biblical preaching. “There is little doubt,” Eric J. Alexander writes, “that Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones was the greatest preacher the English-speaking world has seen in the twentieth century.” Through his strategic pulpit, only a short walk from Buckingham Palace, Lloyd-Jones spoke to the nation and impacted the evangelical church around the world.  Continue Reading...

Facing Depression (and anxiety) Together

The other evening, in His kind providence, the Lord brought to me a gentle, empathetic counselor in the form of a small booklet that I had purchased at the Shepherds’ Conference this past spring. Facing Depression Together, from Matthias Media, is a practical beginner’s guide not only for those who struggle with depression and anxiety (often together, thus the author’s use of “D&A”), but also for those who desire to come alongside to minister God’s truth and grace to them as they battle these soul maladies.

This booklet is divided into two parts. The first is for the person who is struggling to trust God in the midst of dark valleys and the second for those who would learn to be more helpful to those who struggle. Finally, the booklet ends with a very brief review of D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones’s classic work, Spiritual Depression: Its Causes and Cure, followed by a one-page discussion guide for use in small groups.

Facing Depression Together is an honest look at the problem, primarily through the eyes of a fellow struggler, and helps us to renew our minds in a number of ways. Keep Reading...

Spiritual Depression

Pastor Steve Cornell at his Wisdom for Life blog recently posted some great quotes from D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones’ book Spiritual Depression. Read his original post, repeated below, at Spiritual Depression.

Quote # 1: Talking to Ourselves Is Good!

“I say we must talk to ourselves instead of allowing ‘ourselves’ to talk to us. Do you know what that means? I suggest that the whole trouble of spiritual depression in a sense is this, that we allow ourselves to talk to us instead of talking to our selves.

Am I just trying to be deliberately paradoxical? Far from it. This is the very essence of wisdom in this matter. Have you realized that most of your unhappiness in life is due to the fact that you are listening to yourself instead of talking to yourself?

Take those thoughts that come to you when you wake up in the morning. You have not originated them but they start talking to you, they bring back the problems of yesterday, etc. Somebody is talking. Who is talking to you? Yourself is talking to you.

Now this man’s (David in Psalm 42:5, 11) treatment is this: instead of allowing this self to talk to him, he starts talking to himself. ‘Why art thou cast down, oh my soul?’ he asks. His soul has been depressing him, crushing him. So he stands up and says: ‘Self listen for a moment and I will speak to you.’” Keep Reading...

Feelings and Emotions

One characteristic of modern Western Christianity is the focus on feelings and emotions.  Many people gauge their faith by their feelings; they also judge worship based on how it makes them feel.  The former can lead to depression (i.e. if you don’t feel saved maybe you’re not).  The latter can lead to superficial emotionalism divorced from doctrine (i.e. worship becomes a matter of getting a good feeling usually based on ambiguous emotional songs).  Lloyd Jones has a good word on this.

“Avoid the mistake of concentrating overmuch on your feelings.  Above all, avoid the terrible error of making them central.  Now I am never tired of repeating this because I find so frequently that this is a cause of stumbling.  Feelings are never meant to take the first place, they are never meant to be central.  If you put them there you are of necessity doomed to be unhappy, because you are not following the order that God himself has ordained.  Feelings are always the result of something else, and how anyone who has ever read the Bible can fall into that particular error passes my comprehension.” Keep Reading...

Seeking to Preach the Word in the Power of the Spirit

Today I'm off to the Westminster Fellowship in London, where I've been invited to preach and also give a paper on Word and Spirit in Preaching. Here's an excerpt from the lecture on seeking to preach the Word in the power of the Spirit:


Jesus taught that Christians should pray expectantly to the Father for the gift of the Holy Spirit, “If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him!” (Luke 11:13). Preachers are especially in need of the Spirit's work in their ministries.

The apostle Paul did not regard preaching in the power of the Spirit as being in any way automatic. He constantly urged the churches to pray for him, Keep Reading...

Call it a Comeback: Evangelicals, Liberals, and the Problem of Hell

In his 1971 IFES addresses on "What is an Evangelical?" Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones referred to the tendency of denominations to so lose their way that they end up becoming institutions whose beliefs, values, and practices run counter to the convictions and vision of their founders.  Lloyd-Jones summed it up in the epigrammatical words of Dean Inge, "institutions tend to produce their opposite."

At first blush the thought that evangelicalism could prove itself capable of reproducing, under different circumstances, the virulant strains of liberal theology seems, frankly, implausible.  How could those committed to the authority of Scripture and the supernatural Christ of the Bible descend into a world where long held dogmas were routinely thrown overboard?

Part of the answer is in understanding liberalism as a mood, and a mindset, as well as a particular set of denials.  Another part of the answer lies in the tension evangelicals constantly feel when they relate the "scandal of particularlity," all those non-negotiable hard edged truths of the Christian faith, to the desires, aspirations, and intellectual and moral boundaries of contemporary culture. Keep Reading>>>