The word “Christian liberty” is used in two almost contradictory ways. One use invokes it as a shield against accountability — “I have liberty in Christ; don’t bind your traditions on me.” The other use names the profound freedom Christ actually purchased: freedom from the guilt…
James 1:27 gives the only definition of religion that God accepts: “Pure and undefiled religion in the sight of our God and Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world.” Between this and the religion…
The consequences of sin extend further than any human being can trace them. They begin in the ruin of the individual who sinned — the loss of dominion, the weakening of every capacity, the severance of companionship with God. They spread outward to the earth itself…
The Holy Spirit is a divine person — not a divine influence, not a force that can be poured like a liquid, not a vague spiritual energy. The evidence is convergent: the masculine personal pronoun used for him in contexts where the neuter grammatical gender would…
“Do they not blaspheme the honorable name by which you have been called?” (James 2:7). The name by which the church has been called is the name of Christ. The names the New Testament gives to those who bear that name — disciples, servants, soldiers, saints…
The New Testament church is often misrepresented — as a man-made movement, as cold, as opposed to the heart and the Spirit — but Scripture answers every charge: we plead for Bible religion that engages the whole heart and obeys the gospel the Spirit revealed. The…
The outline locates the sermon’s weight not on Peter’s failure but on the look of Jesus. The denial is real; its causes are traceable; its consequences are painful. But the sermon’s conclusion is not condemnation — it is recovery. “This was the real beginning of all…
The call to repent is not a single appeal at the beginning of the Christian life — it is the fundamental note of the entire gospel, sounded by every prophet, by John, by Christ, by the apostles, and by the Risen Lord writing to seven churches….
Division in the church is the most frequently condemned sin in the New Testament — more often and more severely denounced than covetousness, idolatry, adultery, drunkenness, or hypocrisy. The reason is theological: the church is the body of Christ, and to divide the body of Christ…
Revelation and inspiration are distinct acts in a related chain: God reveals truth about himself; inspiration ensures that revelation is accurately recorded and transmitted in human language. Divine revelation comes in two forms — general (through nature) and special (through direct communication, visions, prophets, and ultimately…