It is the beautiful, searing light of God’s holy law that will bring clarity and conviction, to us and to others. Lovingly, uncompromisingly spoken in language conversant with the times, that light shows the way to the life-giving grace of the Lord Jesus, the only Savior of people, cultures, and nations.

There’s a lot to be upset about in our day and age, and with our culture. And now that political season is ramping up, there are votes to be gained and even more money to be made by generating needless anger and weaponizing legitimate grief. It is an especially crucial time for those who name the name of Christ to live, act, and bear public witness in a manner worthy of his gospel.
Addressing cultural woes in a godly way is as difficult as it is necessary. It’s powerfully tempting to become lazy and self-righteous in the process—refusing to thoroughly study situations we’re upset about, decrying nuance as code for compromise, or fancying ourselves above the fray so as to criticize all the people we think aren’t nuanced enough in their commentaries. Even when we think we’re being humble and compassionate toward people or groups that upset us, our disclaimer “There but for the grace of God go I …” can really mean “Thank you, Lord, that you have not made me like other men…” (Luke 18:11). Especially for us increasingly aged folks who’ve lived a materialistically and socially privileged life, some of our studies, sermons, and certainly our social media posts—composed ostensibly in zeal for holiness – amount to little more than screaming “Get off my lawn!” at those we blame for stealing the moral peace, societal power, and material prosperity we believe we once had.
When we pine for what we consider to be the relatively cut and dry, clear-thinking days in which we grew up, or for certain holiness-minded epochs of church history we read about, we might be revealing that our evaluation of the present is less Scripturally studied than we think, and that our understanding of the past suffers the same lack of Scriptural perspective. Church historian Carl Trueman writes “…it is truly very hard for any competent historian to be nostalgic.”[1]
The Reformed orthodox dogmatician and cultural analyst Herman Bavinck (1854-1921) warned against repristination, the retrospective glamorizing of the past coupled with the effort to recreate those conditions in the present. He considered that effort to be not only unbiblical, but essentially un-Reformed. Surveying dire spiritual conditions in his own day in view of the confessional, Reformed heritage of his people, Bavinck encouraged his contemporaries,
“To the alarming fact that unbelief is increasing on all hands, the Reformed do not close their eyes. They do not wish to repristinate, and have no desire for the old conditions to return…As children of their time they do not scorn the good things which God in this age has also given them; forgetting the things that are behind, they stretch forward to the things that are before. They strive to make progress, to escape from the deadly embrace of dead conservatism…”[2]
Read More
Related Posts:

Though the internet, cell phones, social media, etc., can be wonderful tools, they can also dull us. If you are spending hours gazing at some cyber person you do not know and who does not know you, be it as pernicious as pornography or as silly as a sports star, you will lose your heart for the real flesh and blood people around you. Redeem each timely opportunity that the Lord has given you by serving others. Walk wisely by being alert and making the most of every situation the Lord brings across your path.

Why is our nation unraveling at the seams? Why is the social perversion of transgenderism being hoisted on us with missionary zeal wherever we turn? Why is there so much division over politics, race, and morality in our land? Why is so much hatred spewed against Christianity and the church? Why were hundreds of teenagers rioting and ransacking the streets of Chicago Saturday night?
I am a simple man with perhaps a simplistic answer. But I believe it must be attributed in large part to the internet. Has not the internet released the inhibition of mankind’s lust with the fiery fury of hell?
The Pew Research Forum tells us 95% of teenagers have smartphones, and that’s why we’ve become so dumb. Over half of 15-17 year-olds say they use the internet almost constantly, and you have to wonder if the rest are just lying. Clearly, these teenagers are not using it to read, but rather to be on their top sites of YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, and Snapchat. As a result, our land is increasingly visually-oriented and instantaneously connected. Or, in other words, insidiously idolatrous.
A generation ago, Neil Postman spoke about about the dangers of television (which almost seems quaint now) in his book entitled Amusing Ourselves to Death. He warned then – and we should warn far more loudly now – of the danger of leaving behind a text-based, reading culture for a visually stimulating one. After all, he reminded us that “amusing” literally means “not thinking.” If anything describes this age, surely it is that we have lost our ability to think clearly.
Yet the waste of mind and time is the opposite of the commands of Scripture. In Ephesians 5:15-16, we read:
Look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise but as wise, making the best use of the time, because the days are evil.
Wisdom sees where each step leads. Wisdom knows that the multiplied daily decisions people make have a profound impact on their souls. In Ephesians, Paul instructs the church on how to live out the gospel.
Read More
Related Posts:

Among the Reformed confessions, however, particularly within what have been called “The Three Forms of Unity,” (The Belgic Confession, the Heidelberg Catechism, and the Canons of Dort), we can find carefully reasoned articulations of biblical truth pastorally aimed at the heart in ways that still speak to the masses. 

If you’re a Protestant Christian, imagine that someone you don’t know asks you to explain in one sentence (no run-ons!) why your church doesn’t pray to Mary or the saints. How would you respond? As you think it over, let’s think about the historical, theological, and present-day significance of what just happened, and what an opportunity you’ve been given.
This person has invited you to engage in polemics, the advancing of biblical doctrine against unbiblical distortions of it. And although you’d be doing it here informally, the effort to persuade someone of our Lord’s teaching is always a serious undertaking. In our radically post-Christian culture, and amidst so many revelations of abuse in the church, it’s also an extremely sensitive one. Today, the way eternal truth is presented is especially consequential, and we in Reformed circles need to be especially careful.
There can be a tendency among confessional, Reformed, orthodox Protestants to be attracted to the spirited, occasionally aggressive, sometimes personally insulting words the original Reformers launched against their Roman Catholic counterparts. But when we view the Reformers’ explosive rhetoric as justification for us to “go and do likewise” in our teaching, preaching, and online posting – whatever the topic and whomever the target – we tend to ignore the crucial differences between their circumstances and ours. Theirs was a literally life and death struggle to proclaim the gospel; those whom they opposed in writing represented an organization that condemned them to hell in official church declarations and commissioned the torture and assassination of their ministers. We should blush at imitating the Reformers’ heated polemics if we haven’t passed through such flames ourselves. And it’s not just the temperature of their historically conditioned language that should give us pause.
In our present-day efforts at theological persuasion, we should hesitate to use antiquated language and technical terminology that does not translate to our times. However much we rightly admire the linguistic styles and structures of Reformed writings from centuries past, the effort to rhetorically recreate conditions long gone actually runs afoul of the principles and practice of Reformed confessionalism. Repristination is not Reformed.
The Reformed confessions were written to carry old truth into contemporary times. They spoke with relatable language to situations the church was presently enduring.
Read More