The Scriptorium Daily

Category: Blog

  • Notes from a Theology Flyover at 50,000 Feet

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    Fred Sanders
    in

    What if you could survey the entire scope of Christian doctrine at once: a brief enough summary to show the whole thing at a glance, but with enough detail to see the various parts and how they relate to each other? As a stand-alone experience, that wouldn’t be especially valuable: it would be too much…

  • Philippians: Sweet and Unsystematic

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    Fred Sanders
    in

    Philippians is among the sweetest books of the New Testament. It is a short letter from Paul to a congregation that he obviously feels and expresses great affection toward. In 1898, JB Lightfoot, the Bishop of Durham, said that Philippians is “not only the noblest reflexion of St. Paul’s personal character and spiritual illumination, his…

  • Organizing the Doctrine of Scripture

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    Fred Sanders
    in

    There is a lot of material to cover in the doctrine of Scripture: everything from its deep background in God’s will to redeem us and reveal himself, to the “business end” of the doctrine in providing a user’s guide to the English Bible an ordinary believer holds in his or her hand. In between are…

  • Happy Birthday, A.T. Pierson

    Happy Birthday, A.T. Pierson

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    Fred Sanders
    in ,

    Today (March 6) is the birthday of A. T. Pierson (1837-1911), one of the most influential figures in the history of conservative Protestantism. An American evangelical, Pierson had an extensive teaching ministry throughout the English-speaking world; the most famous post he held was that he took over the pulpit of the Metropolitan Tabernacle as C.H.…

  • Wesley’s System of Zeal

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    Fred Sanders
    in

    I’m not sure what came over John Wesley, but one day he got positively excited about the idea of showing the organic, systematic structure of Christian faith. This kind of passion for understanding structural relationships was not his normal way of working: he was a preacher and a world-changer, not a theological ponderer or chart-maker.…

  • Corrie Ten Boom: “Where Are You Hiding the Jews?”

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    Fred Sanders
    in ,

    In an age when Hitler has become a punch-line, a youtube “downfall” meme, and the barometer of when an argument has reached its limits (reductio ad hitlerum), it’s hard to feel the weight of the armed anti-semitism of the mid-20th century. After decades of classroom ethics dilemmas like “If lying is always wrong, would you…

  • Church Membership: Salvation, Sacrament, Strategy, or Seriousness?

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    Fred Sanders
    in

    Here is a brief thought project prompted by several years of teaching the new members class at my home church (an Evangelical Free Church of America congregation that appeals to serious-minded conservatives). This is not the way I teach the subject in the class, but it is how I’ve been connecting some of the dots…

  • Review of Morey’s Embodying our Faith

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    Greg Peters
    in

    Tim Morey’s Embodying our Faith: Becoming a Living, Sharing, Practicing Church (InterVarsity, 2009) is an enjoyable read. As a reworking of his Fuller Theological Seminary D.Min. thesis, Morey’s text is engaging, his writing style friendly and his content engaging. In seven chapters, Morey gives a well-reasoned defense for what he calls an “embodied apologetic,” that…

  • “All Our Works, O God, Thou Hast Wrought In Us” (Wesley)

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    Fred Sanders
    in

    John Wesley (1703–1791) launched a religious movement, but he didn’t write a theology. Instead, he preached a lot. His masterpiece is the Standard Sermons, and that’s where you have to look to find out what he was about as a world-changing preacher. Just look at the first paragraph of his first sermon, and you can…

  • Pannenberg Trinity Sermon: Transcendence in the Midst of Our Lives

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    Fred Sanders
    in

    Kent Eilers at the Theology Forum blog recently posted part of a 1972 sermon by Wolfhart Pannenberg. As Eilers points out, Pannenberg has a public image as a high-level academic theologian who cultivates dialogue with the most rigorous contemporary thought, so it’s hard to picture him going to the pulpit and speaking to a non-academic…

  • Cajetan’s Birthday

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    Fred Sanders
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    Today (February 20) is the birthday of Thomas Cardinal Cajetan (1469-1534), an Italian Dominican cardinal active during the Renaissance and early Reformation era. His birth name was Giacomo de Vio, but when he became a Dominican he took the name Tomasso (perhaps after the famous Dominican Thomas Aquinas, whose work he would devote himself to…

  • Winston Churchill on George Washington and Abraham Lincoln

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    Paul Spears
    in , ,

    America has been blessed many times throughout its history with remarkable leaders. Winston Churchill, who many know as the Prime Minster of Great Britain during WWII, was keenly interested in American history. He was interested in American history partly because his mother was an American, but fundamentally because he believed that history gave insight on…