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A La Carte (3/26)

Monday March 26, 2007 Music: C.T. has a long and interesting article about the Passion movement. Science: Discover has several articles featuring twenty things you didn’t know about a variety of topics. How about this: “A pair of brown rats can produce as many as 2,000 descendants in a year if left to breed unchecked.” Shudder. Books: Ray Fowler points to John Calvin lite. The Rev. William Pringle assembled his ‘One Hundred Aphorisms, Containing, Within a Narrow Compass, the Substance …

Book Review – The Reformation

I love church history. I consider it absolutely tragic that so few contemporary Christians have any real sense of their heritage. They know a little bit of New Testament history, can list hundreds of today’s best and worst teachers, but know almost nothing of the 2000 years between. The Reformation: How a Monk and a Mallet Changed the World is one of a long line of books authored by Stephen Nichols, professor at Lancaster Bible College in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. Nichols …

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Church History

I made it home just a little bit later than I had hoped (but earlier than I had expected) and am now ready to turn around and head right back to the United States, this time driving 1000 miles to my parents’ place in Atlanta. We’re off to a late start, but that couldn’t be helped. While I was flying home from L.A. yesterday I read Stephen Nichols’ The Reformation: How a Monk and a Mallet Changed the World. I …

A La Carte (12/21)

Thursday December 21, 2006 Persecution: Random Responses posts a short video explaining just who it is that makes your Christmas lights. More here. People: Carl Trueman says R.J. Rushdoony was a Holocaust denier. Ian disagrees. Church: Jollyblogger posts a great African-Anglican zinger. Music: Christianity Today reviews the new Switchfoot album and gives it 4.5 stars. Humor: Andrew provides the “Top Ten Signs You May Not Be Reading Your Bible Enough.” Money: Yahoo tells us how money makes our heads spin. …

Books and Beliefs

Last month, in an article entitled By Our Books Shall We Be Known, I discussed some commentary Al Mohler wrote based on an essay that appeared in The Chronicle of Higher Education. The purpose of the article was, quite simply, to show that there is a lot you can tell about a person by the books in his library. Mohler said, “To a great extent, our personal libraries betray our true identities and interests. A minister’s library, taken as a …

Seminar 1 – Phil Johnson – Is The Reformation Over?

It has become quickly apparent that this conference exists not merely to equip pastors, but also to serve and honor them (and perhaps even spoil them a little). At the close of the earlier session one of the organizers announced that there was an area for “shoe-shining and everything else a pastor needs.” I don’t know too many pastors that need to have their shoes shined (or who need to travel to Los Angeles to have them shined, at any …

Book Review – Testing The Claims of Church Growth

There is little reason to describe the author’s purpose in writing Testing The Claims of Church Growth, for the title makes it self-evident. My initial interest in this book was based on the description which says, “For 13 years prior to entering the ministry, Rev. Rodney E. Zwonitzer was a high-level corporate marketing executive for Westinghouse, Storage Technology, and United Technologies Mostek. Now he lays bare the real basis for Church Growth, finding that it is not in the Bible …

Defining My Terms: Calvinist And Reformed

I have once again dipped into my site’s archives to update and refresh an article I posted in the past. In the past few days there has been much discussion in the forum and in my inbox about how we can define “Calvinist” and “Reformed.” I covered this very topic last year, but since that was over 500 posts ago, I have edited it and will repost it here, hoping it will stimulate some discussion and clarify the definitions. I …

Movie Review: Luther

I entered the theatre fearing the worst. I saw little reason to expect that a movie being distributed in the mainstream markets would be able to do justice to a character so reviled as Martin Luther. While he is a hero to many, to far more he is a villain – sectarian, racist, arrogant and divisive; a man who tore the Christian world apart and whose legacy remains to this day. I am happy to say that my fears were …