Old Gif: Open Road: And more here: A Song I Really Like for Some Reason: Friday Funny: The Future of the British Right: HT: Samuel Cherubin: And more here. And Another Podcast Also: Featured Product: Doors of the Sea: Review:From time to time at Mablog, I do a detailed review of a book, working through … The post Content Cluster Muster [07-25-24] appeared first on Blog & Mablog ..read more

“The new life I am talking about consists of a Father transplant . . . Certain covenant members have God for their father in one senses (John 8:37), and the devil for their father in another (John 8:44). Other covenant members have only God for their Father (John 8:42). If God is your Father, in this sense, then you love Jesus, pure and simple, and the devil is not your father in any sense.” The Auburn Avenue Chronicles Vol. 2, p. 826 The post Life in the Father appeared first on Blog & Mablog ..read more

Introduction The last month has seen a number of remarkable and momentous events. We may begin with Joe Biden’s disastrous debate performance, the pressure on him to step down, and the palace intrigue that resulted in him bowing out of the race, but not stepping down from the presidency, and then topped off by his weird disappearance and reappearance. And then on the other side, the close-call near assassination of Donald Trump and his triumphant fist in the air, followed by the Republican platform backing away from its long-standing commitment to life, followed hard by the selection of JD Van ..read more

“The reason for stating it this way is that a theological dilemma is created if we postulate that every baptized Christian is given all of Christ, in the same ways and in the same respect, and that some of them ‘commit suicide.’ If this is the case, and if some covenant members can in fact commit that spiritual suicide, then this has to mean that Christ is not our perseverance, and that it has to come to us (if it comes to us) in some other fashion. If it comes from within ourselves, then this pushes us in an Arminian direction. If it comes from God, then God is doing something salvific for t ..read more

Apolitical Pastor What concerns us is our pastor’s insistence on remaining unpolitical. He has mentioned in sermons that he wants to be focused on the gospel and not politics. I suspect he would be horrified if he knew our family views ourselves as Christian Nationalists, but we don’t even know for sure because he doesn’t talk about these things to the congregation. The Sunday after the assassination attempt, the event wasn’t even mentioned from the pulpit. Our pastor did pray for our nation, but very generally and with no reference to any significant events, and since he prayed the usually-e ..read more

“This, in my view, confused the difference between the early creeds of the Church—which distinguished Christian from non-Christian—and the confessions of the Reformation era—which distinguished Reformed from Lutheran, and so on. There is no such thing as an ‘in-house’ heretic. Heretics ought to be rejected by every Christian communion, and not just by one or two of them.” The Auburn Avenue Chronicles Vol. 2, pp. 824-825 The post Creeds and Confessions appeared first on Blog & Mablog ..read more

Introduction Over the last few weeks, a few different things have happened that have set off various comment threads, in which Internet Randos have arisen to take me to task for continuing to be a boomer about the Jews. Along with some other stuff. As this is clearly an outrage not to be borne, I thought I would I say a few things about all of that here. Some of these comments were asinine enough that I was tempted to answer them directly and individually—before remembering my rule about checking their number of followers, and then subtracting their mom and likely number of sisters. When that ..read more

Good and godly marriages are made out of the raw material of good and godly Christians. Marriage can be a great help in our sanctification, but it is not the foundation of our sanctification. Another way of saying this is that you can’t make a good omlet with rotten eggs. When it comes to certain basic attitudes, such as selfishness, or gratitude, or stubbornness, or tenderheartedness, vices and virtues both, marriage amplifies what you are. It does not transform what you are, at least not automatically. Rather it takes whatever you are, plugs it into the amplifier, and turns it up to eleven ..read more

Introduction Even given the tumultuous time we have had over the last few years, and the attention that it has brought us, it would still be too much for us to say that “all eyes are on Moscow.” That is simply not true. But it would be accurate for us to say that more eyes are on us than used to be the case, and that more eyes are on us than we are accustomed to. On the assumption that you have taken to heart the exhortation you have heard from Pastor Toby today, which is that you need to be faithful within your radius, within your reach here locally, you are still going to be affected by what ..read more

[In response to Scott Clark’s claim he doesn’t need to meet with me because he “can read English”] “The blunt answer, which cannot really be softened, is ‘no, he cannot read English.’ Let me take one example that Clark likes to use. He says that FV teaches that baptism puts everyone in a state of grace, which is then maintained by the believer through his own covenantal faithfulness. Is that not a fair summary of what Clark says I teach? Well, here is some English for Clark to read. I think that such doctrine is bad juju. I believe that it would be what theologians of another era might call a ..read more