The Scriptorium Daily

Month: July 2009

  • John Quincy Adams and the “Energy Divine”

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    by

    Fred Sanders
    in

    John Quincy Adams (born this day, July 11, in 1767) was a Christian of an unusual kind. Raised to be Unitarian, he tended more to the Calvinist side of Congregationalism. As anti-Trinitarianism became more pronounced among the American political class, Adams clearly distinguished his own complex views about the deity of Christ from what he…

  • Helpful New Series from InterVarsity Press

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    by

    Greg Peters
    in

    For those familiar with the Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture (ACCS), you’ll know how helpful of a tool it can be when studying a passage of Scripture. The good news is that the publisher of the ACCS, InterVarsity Press, has recently launched two new series: Ancient Christian Doctrine and Ancient Christian Texts. The former will…

  • John Calvin, 500 Years Old

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    Fred Sanders
    in

    Tomorrow is John Calvin’s quincentennial birthday! He was born July 10, 1509. We’ll have a headline post from Allen Yeh on his legacy. Meanwhile from the archives, some older Scriptorium essays on Calvin: 1. The Reluctant Reformer: How Calvin got bullied into the active ministry. 2. The Terrifying Presbyterian John Calvin Mask. Print it out,…

  • Who Divided the Bible into Chapters?

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    Fred Sanders
    in

    Stephen Langton, who died on this day (July 9) in 1228, is the man most responsible for putting the chapter divisions into the Bible. Langton was one of the most prominent churchman of the thirteenth century, famous in his own time and chronicled by biographers such as Matthew Paris. He rose from being a popular…

  • Today Jonathan Edwards Preached His Most Famous Sermon

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    Fred Sanders
    in

    It was on July 8, 1741 that Jonathan Edwards preached the sermon for which he is most famous, “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God.” Edwards had already preached a different version of the sermon a month earlier at Northampton, Massachussetts, but he had strengthened the sermon in a number of ways before preaching…

  • Premillennial, Not Near-Sighted

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    R.A. Torrey
    in

    Q: Will those who really believe in the imminent coming of the Lord spend their time in building big structures, even for Christian work? A: There is no reason why those who believe that the Lord may come at any time should not build the very best buildings they can for the most effective carrying…

  • Thomas Hooker and the Poor Doubting Christian

    Thomas Hooker and the Poor Doubting Christian

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    by

    Fred Sanders
    in ,

    The colonial Puritan Thomas Hooker died on this day (July 7) in 1647, in the Connecticut that he was instrumental in founding. History books have always had a hard time placing Hooker in the flow of American history. They would like to portray him as a champion of democracy, tolerance, and pluralism who found the…

  • J. H. Sammis

    J. H. Sammis

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    Fred Sanders
    in ,

    Today (July 6) is the birthday of John H. Sammis (1846-1919). Sammis is the author of one of the most famous gospel songs, Trust and Obey: When we walk with the Lord in the light of His Word, What a glory He sheds on our way! While we do His good will, He abides with…

  • DECLARE

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    Jamie Campbell
    in ,

    It seems appropriate on July 4th Weekend to take a look at the document that resulted in a holiday filled with fireworks, pool parties, and barbecues that citizens of the United States have come to know and love. When I was growing up, Independence Day was one of the few times that my family would…

  • Cranmer Prays to the Trinity

    Cranmer Prays to the Trinity

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    Fred Sanders
    in ,

    Can you pray to the Trinity? Of course, the very definition of Christian prayer is that it is trinitarian: We pray to God the Father, in the name of Jesus the Son, by the power of the Holy Spirit. That’s the logic of mediation that’s built into Christian prayer, no matter what words we use…

  • Martin Hengel (1926-2009)

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    Fred Sanders
    in

    TheoBlog reports that Martin Hengel, New Testament scholar, has died in Tübingen at the age of 82. Hengel’s scholarly accomplishment was great. His 1973 inaugural lecture in Tübingen was published in English in expanded form as The Son of God (Fortress Press, 1976). In that programmatic work he declared some of the guiding principles that…

  • Why I Don’t Pray for Celebrities

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    Fred Sanders
    in ,

    I don’t pray for celebrities because they aren’t real people. Celebrity deaths come in threes, they say, and recently Ed McMahon, Farah Fawcett, and Michael Jackson have died. There have been obituaries and retrospectives, and some scrambling to figure out how we are supposed to feel about these deaths of people we never met but…