Category Archives: Theology

Meagre attempts to think God’s thoughts after him. Teaching old dogmas new tricks.

DeYoung on Catechisms

Posted on by under Theology

Catechisms have been around for a long time. Maybe so long you’ve forgotten they are around.

Depending on your background you may have grown up in a church that regularly used a catechism, such as the Heidelberg, the Westminster, or even Martin Luther’s. Maybe its time to revive the use of catechisms.

Kevin DeYoung wrote a book on using the Heidelberg Catechism today, called ‘The Good News We Almost Forgot“.

In an interview at First Things, he gave four good reasons for why you should use a catechism:

  1. It’s an intuitive way to learn about the faith. There’s almost a conversational element to reading through a catechism.
  2. When we use old confessions and catechisms were [sic] help teach our people that their faith is an old faith, shared by millions over many centuries. We also help them realize that other Christians have asked the same questions.
  3. Catechisms are ready made documents for Sunday school, new members classes, or even the occasional sermon.
  4. Catechisms guard us against faddishness and chronological snobbery.

The Gospel Coalition has sponsored a hybrid of the great, classic Reformed catechisms that they have put into an app and more. My family has been using it at home, and it is formatted in such a way that the kids can learn a shorter colour-coded version of each Q&A, but in the same thought flow as the longer version for adults.

College students in my church are using it too.

Its called New City Catechism. Get it. Use it. Grow.

Why You Should Attend the Calvary Grace Conference

Posted on by under Preaching, Theology
One of the things that happens when you do something for a while is that you start to de-prioritize it. When life is busy, the things that used to be special become commonplace. As the old saying goes, ‘familiarity breeds contempt’.
 

Same Old, Same Old

 
That can happen at church very easily. The same preaching. The same singing. The same arrangement of people in the pews. What was special and precious becomes common and even forgettable. Same old, same old.
 

Your First Love

Now we know that the church is not a social club, so our enjoyment and prioritizing of the church is rooted in something much more important—our love for Jesus. If we lose our ‘first love’ (Rev 2.4), then we will certainly lose our love for the church. But as we grow in our love for Jesus, we will love what he loves— the congregation of smelly, stubborn sheep( cf. John 10.11).
 

Conferences as Intense Spiritual Opportunities

 
The same is even true for specific things like conferences. A conference is an opportunity to have intensive focus on God’s word and his ways in fellowship with other people. A conference can provide a special season of growing in the Lord. This is the reason that I have wanted Calvary Grace to host a conference. It adds an annual time of intense spiritual opportunity for spiritual growth.
 

Conferences as Services to the Church

 
But there is also another reason. Conferences give a host church the opportunity to minister to other Christians (and even non-Christians) who might not enjoy very many spiritual growth opportunities. It is a chance to meet other brothers and sisters in Christ. And it is a way to stoke each others’ spiritual fires through mutual listening, sharing and serving.
 

The Powerful Relevance of Holiness

 
Maybe you’re thinking that, ‘I’ve heard all of these speakers before. There’s nobody new’. Well that’s true. But the topic of Holiness is so critical for our generation, that the content of the messages will certainly be powerfully relevant to your Christian life. Don’t let familiarity lead to contempt. Rather let prayer lead to expectancy.
 

Please pray for this weekend’s conference.

 

Pray for the speakers: Amanda, Christel, Jeff, Paul, Terry, Gavin and myself.
 
Pray for the volunteers in childcare, greeting, sound, setup, book table and more.
 
Pray for the people who will attend; who may not get to hear good teaching on a regular basis, who are starving, looking to be fed.
 
Pray for our Holy God to be glorified in his Triune majesty.
 
Finally, support the Calvary Grace Conference with your presence.
 
Who knows how God will use you this weekend
http://www.calvarygrace.ca/cgc-winter-conference-holiness-the-refiners-fire-in-a-facebook-age

The Inner Work: Is Spirituality Squishy and Subjective?

Posted on by under Soul, Theology

As a result of mysticism and falsehood there can be an aversion to dealing with the inner workings of the heart. Yet the Scriptures speak of this inner work often, even as it affirms the reality of God’s truth that exists whether we have an inner connection to it or not. Spirituality isn’t merely squishy and subjective. True spirituality deals with truth.

So the psalmist can say that God gets enjoyment, even delight “in truth in the inward being” and he teaches ‘wisdom in the secret heart’ (Psalm 51). There is the concern on God’s part that what occurs in the heart resonates with what is true or real or right.

JC Ryle wrote of the ‘mathematical parallelism’ that righteousness demands. Any lack of conformity to that is sin. And this need for parallel conformity to the truth and righteousness of God must be realized in the heart.

So there is an inward work in the heart, but it is far from a mystical ‘inner journey’. It is also far from the self-evacuation and attempted emptying of thought or consciousness. What God requires is exactly the opposite. It is an inward turning of the heart, the affections and attentions, toward what is real and true. It is a constant recalculating of the equations to test and prove that all of the principles involved are in their correct place and proportion.

The inward work is heart work, but it is not undefined and subjective. It is the systematic testing of the inward soul against the revelatory clarity of the Word of God, which is the revelation of truth and righteousness. It is then, the souls conformity to the living embodiment of this truth, even God, the Son— Jesus Christ.

Any lack of conformity, as a criminal sin, must be atoned for. But that is where Jesus Christ offers right standing to sinners (conformity of righteousness), as well as punishment absorption, like a sponge, (atonement for nonconformity). He also gives the promise of making us conform through the powerful inner working of his Holy Spirit. Though it is the task of a lifetime, it has a promised result, full conformity- that we will be holy as he is holy (1 Peter 1.16).

 

If you are wanting to learn more about what it means to be holy in a crazy, unholy age, then join me at our annual Calvary Grace Conference February 5-6, Holiness: The Refiner’s Fire in a Facebook Age.

Soft Persecution will clear out the Lone Ranger Christians.

Posted on by under Theology, World

Spiritual But Not Religious?

If you’ve been around Evangelicals at all you know that they speak often about persecution in the West, and maybe not enough about persecution of Christians around the world. Sometimes church folks can be almost embarrassing in the way they complain about difficulties in the workplace or at school as if they are on par with the persecution faced by Middle Eastern Christian believers for example, who have lost homes, limbs and even loved ones.

 

But there is a growing sense of ‘soft’ persecution, of the type that is not physically hostile, but it is ideologically so. It is the institutional removal of Evangelicals from participation in the public square. It is a sort of a Western, secular-branded policy similar to the one in Muslim countries called, dhimmitude. Minorities such as Christians must pay extra tax, and be excluded from various aspects of civil society. Now it seems that Christians may be treated that way in the liberal West.

 

Having fundamentals of human identity as male and female cast off by the whims of state legislators is one institutional way of marginalizing Christians. It’s a soft persecution.

 

Now take the state of the Evangelical church right now in Canada. Many have described the practice of the ‘circulation of the sheep’. That is the idea of people who claim to follow Jesus yet are disconnected from a local church, circulating from one church to the next. Their spirituality is a private thing, and they see little need for committing to other Christians in any lasting and meaningful way.

 

So there is this phenomenon of the “Lone Ranger Christians”. It’s a Christianese term for professing Jesus followers who don’t get along with the church. Any church. Now I don’t like the term Lone Ranger Christian because it’s bad press for the Lone Ranger who was a great guy. But the problem with the Lone Ranger Christian is that they have already given the game away before a hint of soft persecution has touched them. Their faith is only a notion, not a confession. They follow Jesus only in convenience, not conscience. And the summons of Jesus to ‘take up the cross and follow me’ is viewed as a conditional suggestion not a command.

 

For years now, well-attended Evangelical churches have catered to the Lone Ranger Christian by softening the commands of Jesus, and amplifying the creature comforts of attendees. When asked, a person will say that one of the mega-churches is ‘their church’, but they are on the margins of its fluid communal life, slipping in and out like one more latte stop.

 

Thankfully, there has been a renewal happening in Canadian churches that sees historic Christianity as offering something more. The Christian gospel has stability in a world of flux as well as a sense of the supernatural in a society of cold-pressed materialism. What is noteworthy about this renewal is that many young people are proving to be the surprising examples of maturity for some in the older crowd. It is a strange juxtaposition to see a Millennial modelling ‘churchmanship’ for a Boomer.

 

Although it is unwelcome, there is no need to fear persecution. Even the soft stuff, though difficult, will have a purpose. As Christians are institutionally shamed and economically or politically marginalized, one thing is certain, nobody will be a Lone Ranger Christian anymore. There will only be the solid, identifiable church confessors, and the former Evangelicals who capitulate faster than you can say, “Hi Yo Silver, Away!”