The Importance of What We Do in Secret by Derek Thomas | Ligonier Ministries Blog – According to Jesus, it is what we do in secret that matters most. Jesus is not suggesting that the outward is unimportant—far from it. “What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can that faith save him?” (James 2:14).
Heidelberg Catechism 122: What It Means To Say “Hallowed Be Your Name” – Our familiarity with the Lord’s Prayer (Matthew 6:9–13) might give us the impression that it is rudimentary. It is not. Right at the outset we are confronted with a challenge. The first petition is not quite what we might think. There is depth and complexity to the first petition that we might miss.
Teaching Our Children the Raw Parts of Scripture – As a pastor, I sometimes have parents express concern about that to which their young children are being exposed in church. Whether it is a reference to the Old Covenant sign of circumcision going on the male reproductive organ or some part of a biblical story being discussed in Sunday School–there is no way to avoid exposing our children to the raw portions of Scripture in a biblically faithful church.
Faith and Mental Illness – "Mind over matter" betrays a pagan rather than biblical view of human beings. We've all heard stories of the Christian Science or neo-Pentecostal family that fatally withheld medical treatment from a child in expectation of a miraculous recovery. As much as we—that is, more traditional Christians—shake our heads at such folly, much of evangelical Christianity differs only in degree. It's amazing that at a time when many churches, including evangelical ones, turn the gospel into a form of personal therapy, psychiatry itself is seen as somewhat threatening.
1689 Confession & Theonomy – Is our confession of faith compatible with theonomy? Nope.
On Fencing the Lord’s Table – Of all the phraseology that we used in Reformed churches, among the most misunderstood is that of “fencing the table.”