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Search results for: “baptism of christ”

  • "Self-Salvation Means Despair:" Moule's Paraphrase of Galatians

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    Fred Sanders
    in

    H.C.G. Moule was the Bishop of Durham just after the death of Queen Victoria. He wrote wonderful commentaries on many books of the New Testament, but never did a full-length treatment of Galatians. What he did publish was an itty-bitty 60-page devotional book called The Cross and the Spirit: Meditations on the Epistle to the…

  • The Structure of Matthew’s Gospel

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    Fred Sanders
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    The Gospel According to Matthew is intricately structured. A simple outline can capture the basic shape of the book well enough to assist a good reading, but a little more attention shows that this book has several layers of order, all helpful. Consider some of the layers of organization in Matthew, starting with the simplest…

  • G. Campbell Morgan

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    Fred Sanders
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    George Campbell Morgan (born this day, December 9, in 1863) used to be more famous than he is now. Best known as the pastor of Westminster Chapel in London, he also worked in the United States with Dwight L. Moody’s many projects, and taught widely in Bible Institutes. One contemporary called him “the hardest working…

  • Review of Gordon Smith’s Transforming Coversion

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    Greg Peters
    in

    In Transforming Conversion: Rethinking the Language and Contours of Christian Initiation (Baker Academic, 2010), Gordon Smith, president of reSource Leadership International, presents a compelling case for why the church must take seriously not only the salvation of humankind but the conversion of humankind as well. What’s the difference? Well, for Smith evangelicals have been bequeathed…

  • Unperplexed About the Church

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    Fred Sanders
    in

    There’s a series of books called Guides for the Perplexed, which is a Rambammish series title that promises to help you sort out your confusion. I don’t know how all the other books in the series are, but here’s one that really delivers on the promise: The Church: A Guide for the Perplexed, by Scriptorium’s…

  • Hit 'em With the Rock of Ages

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    Fred Sanders
    in

    “Rock of Ages” is a great hymn, one of the best. Here is the bad news: It was written out of spite, by a bitter and narrow-minded young man who couldn’t keep his personal hatred from over-flowing into his prayers and songs. Here is the good news: God rescued the hymn from the defects of…

  • Aimee Semple McPherson's Penchant for System

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    Fred Sanders
    in ,

    Today (Oct. 9) is the birthday of Aimee Semple McPherson (1890-1944), the bombastic and showy Pentecostal evangelist who made her mark on Los Angeles in the early decades of the twentieth century. At various times in my life, I’ve lived in the shadow of McPherson without knowing it: I grew up in a Foursquare church,…

  • Adoniram Judson (1788-1850): Three Yadanas and the Threefold Cord

    Adoniram Judson (1788-1850): Three Yadanas and the Threefold Cord

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    Fred Sanders
    in ,

    Today (August 9) is the birthday of Adoniram Judson, a great missionary who knew how to change his plans when the situation demanded it. For example, he intended to be a missionary to India, but when he got to India, missionaries were no longer welcome, and he ended up working in Burma. He wanted to…

  • 19 Books on the Church

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    Matt Jenson
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    The last few years, I’ve been reading and writing on ecclesiology. It’s a funny topic, one capable of being at one moment dull, at the next incendiary. There’s plenty out there that merely re-hashes standard material and parses terms ever more finely. Here, though, are a few of my favorite reads – an idiosyncratic list,…

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

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    Fred Sanders
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    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…

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

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    Fred Sanders
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    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…

  • Sleep Talkin’ Theologian: “How Long Will Ye Linger Between Two Cabinets?”

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    Fred Sanders
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    There’s a man in England, Adam Lennard, who talks in his sleep. He speaks very clearly, says truly bizarre things, and is recorded by his wife’s voice-activated digital recorder. His wife has begun blogging his nightly oracles, and their blog is suddenly the Next Big Thing: millions of readers, interviews on talk shows, merchandise, the…