(I want to begin by saying that I'm not quite sure about what I've written and have gone back and forth many times on this issue, so forgive me if I mispoke) As I said yesterday, Bonhoeffer is laid claim to by Conservative Evangelicals and Liberal Protestants as 'theirs'. This is because in a sense he was both. What do I mean? A Conservative Evangelical is merely a … [Read more...]
St. Augustine the Monergist on Grace and Free Will
So what's Monergism anyway? According to my alma mater (wikipedia): "Monergism describes the position in Christian theology of those who believe that God, through the Holy Spirit, works to bring about effectually the salvation of individuals through spiritual regeneration without cooperation from the individual." This post will contend that the gracious doctor taught … [Read more...]
Lutherans, Calvinists, Anglicans and the Unfair Gospel of Christian Bible
"We are accounted righteous before God, only for the merit of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ by faith, and not for our own works or deservings. Wherefore that we are justified by faith only is a most wholesome doctrine, and very full of comfort" - The Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion (Article XI) (Anglican/Church of England) "we are justified "freely" or "by grace" through … [Read more...]
Luther's Ecclesiology in the Genesis Commentary
From the little I've read so far, I've seen that Luther's ecclesiology was what one might call functional. The Church was neither an invisibile platonic form as the Reformed taught that each peculiar church agrees or disagrees with to some extent, neither was it the eschatologically present and glorified victorious church of Rome and the Papacy, or the holy flock of the … [Read more...]
Not What These Hands Have Done (Horatius Bonar)
Hymn 567 in the Lutheran Service Book was written by a Free Kirk Presbyterian by the name of Horatius Bonar. (This hymn is a great expression of the doctrine of justification which was taught by the Reformation, and hardly recognizable when compared to the Pelagian love songs one shudders at today. It's strange how the meaning of 'Free Church' changed from being more to less … [Read more...]