Monthly Archives: October 2007

Jackson House

So I’m here missing Jennifer and I realize I could have at least convinced Steve to spend the weekend here for the conversation.  He’s been my faithful supplier of ideas and thought on the last couple of trips I’ve taken.  This house is too big for silence to be comfortable.  It was designed for parties.
Lectures are tomorrow.  I’m hoping the airport delivers my bag tonight because I’ll look pretty silly on videotape talking about Church, Lord’s Supper, Baptism, and the Way of Faith in an old T-Shirt that advertises the Salty Dog Cafe.

And in local news….

Not that anyone will care once we start bombing Iran, but a town not two miles from us has been the source of some sensational scandal.  Jennifer and I have both received tickets from St. George’s finest.  It is a notorious speed trap where a cop was videotaped abusing a driver only a few days after Jennifer paid her ticket.

The whole thing is like the suburban version of an old West town run by corruption.  The city hall is simply a residence in a neighborhood–a rather small ranch home that is only noticeable because it has more blacktop around it than the average private driveway.

Just amazing.

How the rich eat the poor

“Many parts of industry are actually in a state worse than recession. If it were not for (Federal Reserve Chairman Ben) Bernanke putting huge amounts of money into the market, the stock market would probably be down much more than it is.

In other words, upper class and some middle class people are getting to spend new money and take away the buying power of the poorest among us.

In the last five years the dollar has lost at least a fifth of its value.  It is going to lose more than that in the next five.

Raising Christian Children

I wrote this short piece to show what it really means to believe in justification by faith alone rather than justification as a reward for acts of personal piety–specifically the claim that one must convert in order to be saved.

It is, of course, true that unbelievers must convert from unbelief.  It is also true that the life of faith is one of continual repentance–which is sometimes called “conversion.”  But when children are already believers, it is an act of Pharisaical pride to exclude them from the number of those we treat as Christians.

At that time the disciples came to Jesus, saying, “Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?” And calling to him a child, he put him in the midst of the and said, “Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.  Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.

“Whoever receives one such child in my name receives me, but whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a great millstone fastened around his neck and to be drowned in the depth of the sea….

Then children were brought to him that he might lay his hands on them and pray. The disciples rebuked the people, but Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of heaven.”

Upcoming Bucer Lectures, Baptism, and the WCF

I’ll be lecturing at the MBIBS this Saturday (as well as teaching and preaching at Auburn Avenue Presbyterian Church on Sunday). One of my lectures is on baptism and I am planning on asking about the following:

5. Although it be a great sin to contemn or neglect this ordinance [baptism], yet grace and salvation are not so inseparably annexed unto it, as that no person can be regenerated, or saved, without it; or, that all that are baptized are undoubtedly regenerated.

6. The efficacy of baptism is not tied to that moment of time wherein it is administered; yet, notwithstanding, by the right use of this ordinance, the grace promised is not only offered, but really exhibited, and conferred, by the Holy Ghost, to such (whether of age or infants) as that grace belongeth unto, according to the counsel of God’s own will, in his appointed time.

It is pretty clear hear that the grace conferred is defined here as that which guarantees final salvation.

I’m glad the Westminster Divines wanted to do justice to the Bible’s own language and the heritage of the Church. But I’m wondering if this expression is all that helpful. Does this not essentially tell us that baptism confers regeneration unless it doesn’t? (perhaps “at some point in time, unless it never does,” but there are other ways of taking the time reference).

I don’t doubt that baptism is tied in some way to the regeneration of the elect but this way of expressing things doesn’t give us much pastoral direction.

That’s why, when I talk about baptism and the Reformed heritage that has faithfully transmitted what the Bible teaches, I find it a lot easier to talk about it as “for the solemn admission of the party baptized into the visible church” (WCF 28.1).

By the way, here is a lecture on the life of Martin Bucer that was given by Rev. Steve Wilkins.

audio