Here is a wonderful essay by D.A. Carson, offering some preliminary guidelines to answer the question, “What parts of the Bible are binding mandates for us, and what parts are not?” He sets up the problem like this: “Greet one another with a holy kiss”: the French do it, Arab believers do it, but by and large we do not. Are we therefore unbiblical? Jesus tells his disciples that they should wash one another’s feet (Jn. 13:14), yet most of us have never done so. Why do we “disobey” that plain injunction, yet obey his injunction regarding the Lord’s Table? If we find reasons...

Here’s an interesting analysis of a “problem” that is, in truth, a crisis. Thanks to Justin Taylor for this post. David Nienhuis, a professor at Seattle Pacific University, has a helpful piece in the Modern Reformation on the problem of evangelical students “familiar” with the Bible but still essentially illiterate. Here’s an excerpt on how it happened: Christians schooled in this rather anti-intellectual, common-denominator evangelistic approach to faith responded to the later twentieth-century decline in church attendance by looking not to more substantial catech...

Thanks to Trevin Wax, here is a list of Michael Horton’s series of reviews on N.T. Wright’s book on Justification. Introduction Justification and God’s single plan: The Covenant and History Justification and God’s people Justification and God’s Righteousness: Imputation and Future Hope Justification and God’s Righteousness: Covenant and Eschatology Justification, Faith, and Faithfulness: The Works of the Law Justification and the Testimony of Paul Justification and Romans “Works of the Law” – Soteriology and Ecclesiology Conclusion ...

Question: Can you tell me what double predestination is and if it’s biblical? If predestination means God chooses before the foundation of the earth, who will be his (the elect), those who will go to heaven. If this is true, how can it also be true that the rest are not predestined to go to hell? There are only 2 alternatives. If man only goes to hell by the sin in the world, and the fact he chooses not to believe, then does this mean those who are not in the predestination group can still believe and go to heaven in addition to the elect? Answer:  I think we need to come to a definition of...

Acts 20:7 reads, “On the first day of the week (μια των σαββατων), when we were gathered together to break bread…” (ESV). There is an obvious question for the Greek newbie as to why μια is translated as “first” when we learned it as “one,“ and why σαββατων is translated as “week” when we learned it as “Sabbaths”? Why “first day of the week” and not “one of the Sabbaths”? Part of the key is in the nature of the word σαββατον. It is not as straight forward as one might expect. A quick perusal of BDAG show these options. 1. “the...