Monthly Archives: July 2010

Why I Love MY Church (It’s All About ME)

By D. G. Hart | Published: July 19, 2010

A couple of comments recently suggested that it’s all negative all the time at Oldlife. So here’s a list of reasons why I love my congregation and its ministry. We sing from a hymnal (and a good one at that). We pray at least six times during an average service (eight or nine with a… Read More→

Posted in Shock and Awe | Tagged , , | 22 Comments

Moderation Coalition

By D. G. Hart | Published: July 16, 2010

Is it just me, or has a pattern emerged among the leaders of the Gospel Coalition – namely, to regard Reformed Protestants as extreme? First, Ray Ortlund compared TR’s to the Judaizers in Paul’s Galatia. The Judaizers in Galatia did not see their distinctive – the rite of circumcision – as problematic. They could claim… Read More→

Posted in Piety with Excitement, Piety without Exuberance | Tagged , , , , , | 25 Comments

Forensic Friday

By D. G. Hart | Published: July 16, 2010

For even though the law requires perfect righteousness from believers, they refer the demanding law to Christ, in whom they have become the righteousness of God; that is, a righteousness that is acceptable to God (Col. 1:14). If the law demands that believers shall pay for their sins, they refer the law again to Christ… Read More→

Posted in The Hinge | Tagged , , , | 4 Comments

Missing the Forest for the Pericopes

By D. G. Hart | Published: July 15, 2010

I have yet to read T. David Gordon’s book, Why Johnny Can’t Preach, but I’m tempted to wonder if part of the reason for Johnny’s homiletical ineptness is that he feels constrained to preach one paragraph at a time. Mind you, I have nothing against the lectio continuo, that is, preaching and reading through entire… Read More→

Posted in Shock and Awe | Tagged , , | 13 Comments

Two Kingdom Tuesday: Macadam or Concrete?

By D. G. Hart | Published: July 13, 2010

Does Christianity involve a conviction about roads and their construction? To hear some critics of 2k, the problem with distinguishing between a spiritual and an earthly kingdom is that it creates a vacuum of neutrality. Something is either sacred/religious or secular/non-religious. By granting a sphere that is not religious is to create a bogey that… Read More→

Posted in spirituality of the church | Tagged , , , , , | 59 Comments

Koyzis Sees the Light?

By D. G. Hart | Published: July 10, 2010

At the First Things blog for evangelicals (is this a form of putting born-agains in a ghetto?) — Evangel — David Koyzis, frequent critic of 2k theology, raised objections about celebrating July 4th in church. More than two decades ago I walked into the building of a megachurch near Chicago on the Sunday nearest the… Read More→

Posted in Paleo Calvinism, spirituality of the church | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment

Forensic Friday: Reformed and Lutherans Make Music

By D. G. Hart | Published: July 9, 2010

Reformed Protestants these days tend to be absorbed with the Three Forms of Unity and the Westminster Standards and for good reason. These are the confessions of most extant Reformed and Presbyterian communions. But as the current project of Jim Dennison indicates, the confessional output of Protestantism was vast and many of the Reformed churches’… Read More→

Posted in The Hinge | Tagged , , , , | 1 Comment

Where’s Waldo Wednesday

By D. G. Hart | Published: July 7, 2010

From Calvin’s sermon on Ephesians 1: 7, “In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses….” Now it remains to be seen how God receives us into his favor by means of our Lord Jesus Christ. That is what St. Paul means by adding that “in him we have redemption through… Read More→

Posted in Application of Redemption, The Hinge | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Two-Kingdom Tuesday: The Gospel Makes the State Liberal

By D. G. Hart | Published: July 6, 2010

I have been kicking around for a while the way that some have kicked around the doctrine of the two kingdoms. (I myself prefer to call it the spirituality of the church, following the Old School Presbyterian tradition, which receives constitutional status, for instance, in the OPC’s Form of Government (3.4), which reads: “All church… Read More→

Posted in spirituality of the church | Tagged , , , , , | 89 Comments

Westminster Seminaries’ PR Problem (and Covenant Seminary’s Teflon)

By D. G. Hart | Published: July 5, 2010

Now that Glenn Beck seems to have moved on from the faith of the founders to the faith behind the Pledge of Allegiance, taking stock of the minor celebrity of a Westminster Seminary president courtesy of the talk-show enfomationist is possible. What stands out is how little controversy Peter Lillback’s ideas about the faith of… Read More→

Posted in Miscellany, Westminster | Tagged , , , , , , | 19 Comments