Christians can strain the relationship with God through our sin. But if we are repentant, we don’t need to fear that we will be removed from God’s family. 

Christians all love the idea of being forgiven. We love to sing of our sins being paid for and know how kind our God has been to us. That is 100% correct. If we trust in Jesus, we are secure knowing that Jesus paid our penalty for us.
This has led many to struggle to understand why Christians should keep God’s law or try to deal with sin. After all, logically, if we are forgiven by what Jesus has done, then our future is secure. It doesn’t depend on us, we are constantly told, it all depends on Jesus. So this should mean, we reason, that we can live however we want. God loves us. Why worry about sin and law at all?
The idea that we can live however we want because of God’s grace is not a new one. Paul deals with it at length in Romans, for example, way back in the first century after Jesus. And in our modern individualistic age, we are very tempted to follow the same line of reasoning. We’re saved by grace, so that means I can live how I want and I am still forgiven!
I think the logic of adoption helps us a great deal when it comes to understanding why how we live as Christians is so important. Let me explain.
Adoption is when a couple decide to accept a child into their family. That child is not theirs genetically, but usually due to some significant problems in their biological family, they are looking for a safe place to belong. When this child is adopted, it is not due to their worthiness. It is due to the gracious act of their new parents. They have a new legal status due to what their parents have done. That’s what Jesus has done for us. When we come to trust in Jesus, we then have a different status before God, and we are part of God’s family. We have that status by grace alone.
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Written by Rev. Benjamin Glaser |
Monday, October 11, 2021
We must remember that architecture communicates much truth. It speaks loudly to what is important. Where the pulpit is in the house of the Lord says something to those who are listening.

We’ve all heard the jokes about Presbyterian’s being anti-fun, the so-called frozen chosen. The seen, but not heard denomination. The post you are about to read is going to sound like it came from the official spokesman of the “Presbyterians against anything nice” coalition. Maybe it’s true, maybe I am the grumpiest Presbyterian alive, but my goal here today is not to get hits or cause trouble. Rabble rousers are boring people. Men who seek out controversy don’t have enough to do and they aren’t really seeking to win converts to their position. They just like to see the fight.
At the end of the day I’m really a harmless little fuzzball who just wants Presbyterians to be Presbyterians, Baptists to be Baptists, and Anglicans to be Anglicans. Good fences make good neighbors. If you know where the other person stands it makes it easier to know where you stand.
The topic I’d like to get into today is about the meeting space. Some call it the “sanctuary”, others the “preaching hall”, and whatever you want to call it is fine by me. I’m not interested in getting into arguments over words. There are legit reasons why some people demur from the sanctuary term, and why others like it as a description of where we meet for worship. Christians who are members of long-standing congregations likely are used to a more traditionally-expressed term than church plants and/or younger churches. But regardless of where you meet or what you call it there are certain things as Presbyterians we should expect to see, and not see.
In this brief piece I want to talk about some of the reasons behind the austere look favored by the Reformed, where it came from, and why it matters. To be sure there is a sense in which in the New Testament it doesn’t matter where we meet with God’s people. As men and women who descend from Covenanters who hid in vales and caves to lift up the psalms to the Lord and be fed by His word we should acutely feel that. This is also a very American, if not Western, question. I’ve never been to the nations of Africa, but it is a safe assumption through pictures and the witness of native believers that what is expected in Malawi is different than what is to be understood in South Carolina. Part of the beauty of Presbyterian worship is that you don’t need a fancy place with a bunch of pomp and circumstance. All you need is a Bible and Christians. The Scriptures contain the text for instruction and the book of songs to sing, the people have the voices to raise to Heaven.
What more do you need?
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Too many Christians behave and speak obnoxiously at times, and then when the world responds with hatred, we automatically attribute that hatred to our faithfulness to Christ.

There seems to be a common misconception among many Christians that if the world hates them, it’s incontrovertible proof that they must be doing something right. They must be faithfully following Jesus.
It is true that the world hates those whom Christ has chosen out of this world (John 15:18–25). It is true that the world hates Christians because it hates Christ.
What is the logical fallacy known as “affirming the consequent”?
The problem is that many Christians commit a logical fallacy when thinking about this issue. They assume that if the world hates them, then it must be the case that they are faithfully following Jesus. Let me lay out the statements to make this easier to see.
True Conditional Statement:
If you faithfully follow Jesus, then the world will hate you. (If P, therefore Q).
Logically Fallacious Conclusion:
The world hates me, therefore I must be faithfully following Jesus (Q, therefore P).
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The pro-life movement is tired of district attorneys refusing to enforce pro-life laws and activist federal judges holding pro-life policies up in court for years on end. A new approach is working. No wonder those who promote abortion are so up in arms over its ingenuity.

Right now, more than 100 babies are being saved from abortion every day in Texas. The Texas Heartbeat Act is currently enforceable, even as the abortion industry and Biden administration attempt to thwart it. There has been much legal back-and-forth and misrepresentation of this life-saving law, particularly on the unique way in which it is enforced. Let’s cut through that confusion.
The Texas Heartbeat Act prohibits elective abortion after the preborn child’s heartbeat is detected. Those who commit an abortion after this biological marker in the child’s development, as well as those who knowingly aid and abet in that illegal abortion, can be sued. The lynchpin that has allowed the law to take effect is that the state is not allowed to enforce the law; rather, it is the responsibility of private individuals to hold the abortion industry accountable for following the law.
So far in Texas, we are seeing the abortion industry comply with the new law. Eighty-five percent of abortions that previously would have been occurring in our state are now illegal. More than 100 babies per day are being given a chance at life. There have not been any credible assertions of violation. This means that the unique threat of private lawsuits under this law is successfully saving babies.
Civil penalties are the most effective in pro-life laws because the abortion industry is profit-driven. The industry profits off killing preborn children and does not want to lose money. So it complies with pro-life laws (even as it fights them in the courts). That is why the Texas Heartbeat Act uses civil remedies — because it incentivizes compliance from the abortion industry.
Not Vigilantism
Despite the assertion by pro-abortion advocates and media, this is not vigilantism, and the civil remedies are not a bounty. The threat of a lawsuit and paying out at least $10,000 for a violation is the consequence set up under this law for engaging in an illegal activity, namely, performing an abortion after the baby has a heartbeat.
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Written by Scott R. Swain |
Monday, October 11, 2021
Any attempt to retrieve classical Christian teaching about God must not only retrieve the scriptural foundations of such teaching. It must also retrieve the form that scriptural teaching takes, i.e., the glad tidings of the Lord’s reign (Isa 52:7).

Theology is discourse concerning God: God in his being, attributes, persons, and works; God and all things in relation to God, from whom and through whom and to whom are all things (Rom 11:36). The principal subject matter of Christian theology has a proper name, “Yhwh,” which is the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit (Matt 28:19). The fundamental claim of Christian theology regarding its principal subject matter is “Yhwh reigns.” This fundamental claim at once identifies God as king and describes the nature of his relation to all that is not God. Christian theology in its breadth and length and height and depth is one long commentary on the claim that the Lord reigns, a commentary designed to aid the church’s own varied expressions of this claim in prayer, proclamation, and praise.
Christian theology in the 20th century was not always eager to affirm God’s regal status. In many instances, in fact, Christian theology sought to deconstruct the claim that the Lord reigns. The deconstruction of the “royal metaphor” (what its critics called it) was central to the revision of “classical theism” (a label also invented by critics of traditional Christian teaching concerning God). Critics of this teaching offered a number of reasons for rejecting or redefining the royal metaphor. It was, they claimed, rooted in antiquated pre-modern approaches to biblical interpretation. It contradicted modern scientific understanding of the nature of the universe. It provided warrant for numerous forms of tyranny and oppression. This picture of the God-world relation, its critics argued, had held the church captive far too long. A Christian theology come of age and alert to the requisites of human flourishing needed to abandon the royal metaphor in favor of a more wholesome and humane conception of God. As a result of this critical judgment, the story of 20th century theology was, in large measure, the story of more or less revisionist proposals regarding the doctrine of God.
The purpose of the present article is not to address modern criticisms of traditional Christian teaching, at least not directly. I mention these criticisms only to observe that the critics were right about one thing: traditional Christian teaching about God is tied intrinsically to the royal metaphor, the claim that Yhwh, the triune God, reigns. Accordingly, any attempt to retrieve classical Christian teaching about God must not only retrieve the scriptural foundations of such teaching. It must also retrieve the form that scriptural teaching takes, i.e., the glad tidings of the Lord’s reign (Isa 52:7).
The central theme of Book Four of the Psalms (Psalms 90-106) is the kingship of Yhwh. These psalms are therefore an instructive place to begin in considering the scriptural portrayal of divine kingship. Psalm 93, the first instance of the claim, Yhwh mlk, “the Lord is king/the Lord reigns,” in Psalms 90-106, provides a helpful entryway into this portion of Scripture and this article of Christian teaching.
Psalm 93:1 opens with the announcement, “The Lord is king,” “The Lord reigns.” The psalm expounds the significance of this announcement in three phases. First, Psalm 93:1-2 grounds the enduring stability of the world in the divine king’s eternal being and transcendent power. Second, Psalm 93:3-4 considers creational sources of opposition to the Lord’s kingship–the mighty floods–only to conclude that creaturely opponents to God’s reign pose no ultimate threat. Third, Psalm 93:5 acclaims the enduring stability of God’s “testimonies” and God’s “house,” two central privileges enjoyed by the divine king’s covenant people.
(1) Ps 93:1-2. The first section of Psalm 93 begins with praise of the divine king’s transcendent power, drawing on the imagery of an Ancient Near Eastern king’s royal attire: the Lord “is robed in majesty; the Lord is robed; he has put on strength as his belt” (Ps 93:1). The section concludes with praise of the divine king’s eternal being: “you are from everlasting” (Ps 93:2; cf. Pss 90:2, 4; 102:24-26). According to the middle frame of this section, the divine king’s eternal being and transcendent power are the source of the world’s enduring stability. Because God the eternal, almighty king reigns, “The world is established; it shall never be moved” (Ps 93:1). Moreover, the psalmist expresses further confidence that the world will stand secure in the future because God’s reign stands uncontested since the beginning of creation, when God established his throne in the heavens: “Your throne is established from of old” (Ps 93:2; cf. Pss 103:19; 104:3).
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Yes, debate critical race theory, but let’s keep our eyes on the prize. We should spend far more time in the pursuit of excellence—implementing reading instruction that would improve literacy outcomes for kids of all races. That would erase the stain of racism far more than endlessly debating critical race theory.

With a new school year underway, parents, teachers and children anxiously return to classrooms amidst an ongoing coronavirus pandemic.
But this year, school board members, teachers, academics, politicians and parents continue to argue over critical race theory and how to enact its version of equity.
Last week, the U.S. Conference of Mayors adopted a resolution to support the teaching of critical race theory in public K-12 schools. The resolution initially listed among its sponsors liberal mayors like Chicago’s Lori Lightfoot, Portland’s Ted Wheeler and Louisville’s Greg Fischer.
Over the summer, Oregon governor Kate Brown suspended a requirement for students to demonstrate reading, writing and math proficiency in order to receive a high school diploma, in a supposed effort to build “equity.” The governor’s office said the new standards for graduation would aid the state’s “Black, Latino, Latinx, Indigenous, Asian, Pacific Islander, Tribal, and students of color.”
These efforts by politicians to push critical race theory distracts from a real analysis of educational achievement in their states and cities. The real issue in American education is a failure to enable the majority of students—regardless of race—to achieve academic excellence or even, in many cases, basic skills.
We have a national crisis of education that most Americans aren’t paying attention to. Our school systems produce a small group of high-achieving students at the top and a massive group of low-achieving students at the bottom.
America has fallen into a multi-generational crisis of illiteracy. In terms of raw numbers, more white students are reading below grade level than Black students. Of the 1.8 million students who took the ACT in 2019, 36 percent did not achieve college readiness in any of the four subjects. That means about 650,000 American students, despite spending thousands of hours in school, were not prepared for college-level work in a single subject. And that number does not include the millions of students who did not take the ACT. Even worse, 19 percent of American high school graduates are functionally illiterate, unable to read well enough to manage daily tasks.
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Sin isn’t just a series of errors or poor judgments with momentary consequences. Sin is taking you somewhere. It’s leading you down a path of decay, a path that ends in spiritual death.

Hyperbolic, isn’t it? “Sin is death” sounds like something you’d hear echoing from a bullhorn in a city that embraces noise as part of its culture. Philadelphia and New York come to mind (no offense, by the way; it’s just that I hail from a quiet fishing town in Canada). In the context of so much physical turmoil and death in our world, calling sin “death” seems almost offensive, as if we’re insulting people struggling with leukemia or COVID, the real death threats. How can we claim something so serious about a problem that seems more conceptual than physical?
It all depends on how you define life and death. What is life? If life is measured only in blood flow and heart beats, then “Sin is death” sounds ludicrous, like a misinformed battle cry of pre-modern street preachers. Sin might be a hindrance, a nuisance, or even a threat to moral flourishing in society at large, but death? Hardly.
But what if life has more to do with bonds than with blood? What is life is more deeply about a relationship than it is about our respiratory system? What is life is about an active (even if neglected or forgotten) bond of communion between us and the God whose breath gave us our breath? That would change our perspective on the whole “Sin is death” thing, wouldn’t it? And doesn’t Jesus refer to himself as the life (John 14:6)? Living would thus be a relationship with him, not a set of physical and mental animations.
And what is death? If it’s not just about the stillness of the body, the absence of animation, or the fading pulse beneath your skin, then what is it? Maybe if life is all about relationship, then death is really about the ending of that relationship, or at least the most dramatic change imaginable.
Sin as Death
Now, what struck me as I read Romans is just how direct Paul is in linking sin with death. He clearly views sin as more than a behavior problem that can be remedied by a pull-yourself-up-by-your-bootstraps mentality. Sin is far more serious. Sin is lethal.
What then shall we say? That the law is sin? By no means! Yet if it had not been for the law, I would not have known sin. For I would not have known what it is to covet if the law had not said, “You shall not covet.” 8 But sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, produced in me all kinds of covetousness. For apart from the law, sin lies dead. 9 I was once alive apart from the law, but when the commandment came, sin came alive and I died. 10 The very commandment that promised life proved to be death to me. 11 For sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, deceived me and through it killed me.Rom. 7:7-11
For Paul, sin kills. It brings death. This doesn’t mean that sin is an actual substance, some soul disease that spreads like wildfire. Sin is ethical, and it has no independent existence. It’s parasitic; it can’t exist on its own, so it follows around the good things of God’s creation and distorts them, deforming us in the process. As Bavinck put it in The Wonderful Works of God, sin is “a manifestation which is moral in character, operating in the ethical sphere.” Sin is moral and ethical. Yet, the fact that it’s moral and ethical doesn’t mean it’s not lethal. Paul’s language makes it clear that sin brings death. It destroys us.
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With the intensified crackdown against churches, both state-vetted and underground, there is no longer a safe place to be a Christian in China. Almost every province in China has seen an increase in Christian persecution over the last year.

09/17/2021 Washington, D.C. (International Christian Concern) – International Christian Concern (ICC) has just published a new report on persecution in China. In it, ICC lists and analyzes over 100 incidents of Christian persecution between July 2020 and June 2021, a period marked by a significant campaign by the Chinese government to forcefully convert independent religious organizations into mechanisms of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).
This forceful assimilation—also called Sinicization—has continued to intensify since it was introduced as part of the Four Requirements campaign launched in 2018. Since then, the government has only increased its attempts to use the Church for political purposes. It has gone as far as converting church buildings into propaganda centers and even regulating the content of sermons in order to promote communist party values.
Three-Self churches are part of the legal framework the CCP uses to systemically curb Christianity, including Catholicism. If a church is not registered as a state-sanctioned church, it is violating the law and the CCP can step in at any time to shut it down, prosecute individuals, and put enormous social pressure on attendees. As described in last year’s report, registered churches are at the mercy of laws that were passed entirely in contradiction to the constitution and enforced by multiple departments, bureaus, and agencies using them to suppress house church activity.
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From the Parable of the Talents you must see the hand of God in it all, for he is the one who has entrusted all these things to you. And behind the hand of God, you must see his confidence in you, his trust, his optimism. God is the one who has called you to walk this path, and he is the one who has called you to walk it faithfully. 

The Parable of the Talents is one of the best-known and best-loved of all the parables Jesus left us. It tells of a man who is going on a journey and, who, before he sets out, distributes his wealth among his servants for safekeeping. To one he gives five talents, to another two, and to another just one. (A talent, for sake of context, is about 20 years’ of wages for a laborer.) It tells how each of these servants responds to what is entrusted to him: Two of the servants invest the money wisely and double it, while the other simply buries the money and then later returns it as-is. The first two receive their master’s approval while the third receives his condemnation.
This parable leads to many legitimate applications and often challenges us to be faithful with what the Lord has entrusted to us, whether that is the gospel itself, or the gifts, talents, money, responsibilities, or opportunities we have been given. God entrusts us with so much and it falls to us, as his servants, to be faithful with it all. We can expect that as we are faithful, we will know God’s approval and reward. “For to everyone who has will more be given, and he will have an abundance.”
Hidden in plain sight is a simple observation: the servants are never offered a choice in their stewardship. The master does not come to them to ask, “How much of my wealth do you think you’re capable of handling?” He never checks in to inquire, “How would you feel about being given the full five talents? Do you think you can handle five, or would you prefer to have just two?”
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As the late Professor John Murray of Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia put it: “The work produced by the Westminster Assembly has lived and will permanently live. The reason is obvious. The work was wrought with superb care, patience, precision, and above all with earnest and intelligent devotion to the Word of God and zeal for His glory. Sanctified theological learning has never been brought to bear with greater effect upon the formulation of the Christian Faith. 

Let me take you back to seventeenth-century England—1643, to be precise.
King Charles I was increasingly hostile to the Puritans and their Reformed theology. And members of Parliament—many of whom were Puritans and Puritan sympathizers—were becoming increasingly aggrieved by the king. They were convinced that there was still a lot of work to be done in the Church of England, that it still needed to be reformed in light of Scripture.
Although the English Church had separated itself from Rome during the English Reformation more than one hundred years earlier, the Puritans felt it hadn’t gone far enough. So, with that in mind, Parliament called upon Reformed theologians to meet at Westminster Abbey. Their job was to advise Parliament on issues of worship, doctrine, government, and discipline in the Church of England.
Despite a royal proclamation prohibiting its meeting, the assembly first met on 1st July, 1643, at the Henry VII Chapel in Westminster Abbey, before later moving to the abbey’s Jerusalem Chamber.
This Westminster Assembly consisted of 151 men, which included twenty laypeople from the House of Commons and ten from the House of Lords.
The assembly lasted officially until 1649, although it continued to meet occasionally until 1652. And those present certainly did not slack during that time. Over the course of the six years between 1643 and 1649, they met 1,163 times.
The documents they produced are known as the Westminster Standards, namely:

the Westminster Confession of Faith
the Larger and Shorter Catechisms
the Directory for the Public Worship of God (which is a sort of liturgical manual)
and the Form of Presbyterial Church Government (which describes how churches ought to be structured and governed)

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