Author: Fred Sanders
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Learning from William Ames
They called him by the Latin name Guilliamus Amesius, but if we talk about this British-born theologian at all now, we call him William Ames (1576-1633). Dust him off and read him. Here are some lessons I learned from Ames years ago that have stuck with me ever since. Ames was educated at Cambridge…
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Happy Birthday, Alfred Edersheim (1825-1889)
Today (March 7) is the birthday of Alfred Edersheim, the nineteenth-century Bible scholar who really made the grand tour: He was born in Austria, converted from Judaism to evangelical Christianity in Hungary, studied theology in Edinburgh and Berlin, was a missionary to Jews in Romania and a preacher in Scotland. He was ordained in the…
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Paul's Dramatic and Tragic List of Sins
In First Timothy 1:8-11, Paul gives a striking list of the kind of people that the law was given in order to restrain: The law is not for the just, but for the lawless and disobedient, for the ungodly and sinners, for the unholy and profane, for those who strike their fathers and mothers, for…
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The Vision of the Bible Institute (Biola 1912)
In the summer of 1912, the Bible Institute of Los Angeles had been in business for four years, and was about to make major changes. They were putting up an important building in downtown Los Angeles, and hiring the most famous evangelist in the world, R. A. Torrey, as their first academic dean. That July,…
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Sin Safari
A cartoon tour of the bestiary of sin, exploring the terrible fauna of hamartiology. In issue 4 of Dr. Doctrine’s Christian Comix (InterVarsity Press, 1999), I did my best Dr. Seuss imitation to explore the doctrine of sin. You may need to click through to a larger image to read the text well.
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Biola's Founders (104th Birthday)
Last week Biola celebrated its 104th birthday, and I got to speak in the Founder’s Day chapel service about the three most important founders: Lyman Stewart, T.C. Horton, and R. A. Torrey. Thirty minutes is not enough time to do them justice! But the audience was good, and spirits were high, and I shared as…
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Tom Smail (1928-2012): "The Spirit is Given from the Cross"
Tom Smail, evangelical and charismatic British theologian of the Trinity, died last week (Feb 15). A few obituaries have appeared from those who knew him or studied with him. I knew him only from his remarkable books, which were always exquisitely balanced between tradition and creativity. As something of an evangelical-charismatic statesman, Smail tended to…
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Foreword to Harrower's Trinitarian Self and Salvation
Scott Harrower of the Melbourne School of Theology has just published a book called Trinitarian Self and Salvation: An Evangelical Engagement with Rahner’s Rule (Wipf & Stock, 2012). About a decade ago, I wrote my own “evangelical engagement with Rahner’s Rule,” so Scott asked me to write the foreword for his project. I really appreciated…
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R. T. France (1938-2012), New Testament Scholar
Last week, R. T. France passed away. There are notices of his passing at several Bible blogs, including this one at the Evangelical Textual Criticism site. France taught in numerous places over the years, and wrote many helpful works. Evangelical Bible scholars can testify to his substantive contribution to the field. I want to praise…
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Notes for a Doctrine of Creation
Just a few thoughts here, brief notes on how a doctrine of creation ought to be handled in systematic theology. I state them as theses, as if I am declaring how every theologian ought to handle the doctrine. But really I’m talking to myself in public. 1. Work backwards. The doctrine of creation occurs early…
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The Economic Trinity Communicates the Immanent Trinity
When Kevin Vanhoozer intervenes in the recent discussion of the doctrine of God, he does so by making several strategic moves. But the move behind them all is his insistence that we’ve got to get the doctrine of the Trinity right. And “getting it right” means describing the relationship between the economic and immanent Trinity…