Faith | Books | Culture
When reformed theologians speak about the first cause and secondary causes, they do not mean sequences in time. They refer to two ORDERS of causality:
1. Divine (first cause);
2. Creaturely (second or contingent causes).
The reason why the first cause—logically prior, but of a different order than secondary causes—can concur with secondary causes is BECAUSE they are of a different order.
When Adam and Eve sinned, God exiled them from the garden, and through them, sin entered the world. Christ came to redeem sinners and make them into saints. But if Adam had not sinned, then would Christ have come? Could Adam have not sinned?
Here are some Augustinian considerations. [Read more…] about Could Adam not Have Sinned? Some Augustinian Considerations
Herman Bavinck once wrote, “There is so much narrow-mindedness, so much pettiness among us, and the worst thing is that this is regarded as piety.” Bavinck was referring to two Christian groups the separatist churches of the Grievers and Seceders. Both groups left the state church, but they could not get along.
Why? Not because of matters of orthodox doctrine. Both had it. But because of pettiness and narrow-mindedness. It is the old problem of Donatism, of a drive for purity that that cuts itself off from other people. We often feel holier than the body of Christ.
But Jesus accepts us just as we are by faith. And so the body of Christ should welcome one another just as Christ welcomed us (Rom 15:7). To do anything less is to miss the mark of Christ’s love and formation of his body, the church.
One reason why we often become petty and narrow-minded as Bavinck says is because we do not understand how God’s Spirit gifts the created world and people in it, even of unbelievers or believers whom we disagree with. We think we are at the centre of it all. We are not because any truth or goodness that we find in this world has its origin in God. [Read more…] about One Reason Why Pettiness Is Regarded as Piety
Christ reigns over all governments.
Christ is not waiting for politicians to submit.
Christ is not waiting for our Prime Minister to adopt biblical law so that he can be Lord of Canada.
Christ reigns. He is Lord. [Read more…] about Christ Reigns over All Governments Now
The reformed or Calvinist thinker Johannes Althusius (1557–1638) identified natural law (or common) as that law which God inscribed on the heart. Hence, it is common to all people, as God’s law in nature. God then uses our conscience to excuse or excuse us (Rom 2).
It is important to realize that this is the near-universal view of reformed thinkers from Amandus Polanus to John Calvin to whomever.
Natural law is not some law inside nature and apart from God, as Rushdoony believed, but rather it is the law of God inscribed upon our hearts as Paul the Apostle believed (Rom 2:14-15).
Where the rubber meets the road, however, is when it comes to obedience to God’s law. [Read more…] about On God’s Law in Nature
Most people believe in something like the soul. We know we live embodied lives. We also recognize that when we die, our bodies decompose. So if we live on, we live on without the body in some sense. Christians believe, however, in the resurrection of the body when we will once again reunite with our (then) immortal and incorrupt bodies.
But about in the meantime? What has the apostle Paul been doing for 2,000 years without his resurrection body? In what way or form has he lived? Some might say, he has not lived since his soul has merely slept, unconscious of life, until the resurrection. But that simply won’t do because of how the Bible talks about life, death, and life after death. [Read more…] about Do We Have Souls and Bodies?
