Last week I wrote an article on the topic of Lent. Here is part of my conclusion:

The church calendar is not a restaurant menu. That is, there are not a la carte items. You can’t pick and choose your favorites and leave the others out. You can’t have Easter without Lent. You can’t have Christmas without Advent. Like the five points of Calvinism, they all go together. In the church you eat what you have been served — all of it.

When I wrote that, I had in my sights the inconsistency of those who like to pick and choose from the church calendar that which suits their fancy. To me, at least, it’s not consistent to take the parts of the calendar one likes – usually Easter and Christmas – and reject the other parts; and it just … Read More »

You probably noticed the bulletins changed colors again. That is not an attempt to be stylish or even to mix things up. Rather, it reflects the changing of the church calendar. Last Wednesday was Ash Wednesday, the day when millions of Christians attended church and were reminded of their mortality — the dust that marks their foreheads reminding them that they, too, are dust and that it will be to dust that they will return (Gen. 3:19). More importantly, though, Ash Wednesday is the first day of the 40-day season called Lent. Actually, it’s really not 40 days but 46. Don’t believe me? Go to the calendar and count. Begin with Ash Wednesday and end with the day before Easter. It’s 46. Why all this talk about 40 days then? Go back to the calendar and count the Sundays of … Read More »

Throughout this section the Apostle has been talking a lot about a concept he tries to capture with the word “flesh.”

Romans 7:5 – For while we were living in the flesh, our sinful passions, aroused by the law, were at work in our members to bear fruit for death.
Romans 7:14 – For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am of the flesh, sold under sin.
Romans 7:18 – For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in  my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out.
Romans 7:25 – Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin.

Reference … Read More »

Living in a post-Christian world means that often our cultural calendars are in conflict with the church calendar. One such example of this happens every year after Thanksgiving. After Thanksgiving most Americans begin to celebrate Christmas or the Christmas season as it is often called. You hear familiar carols in the mall, sales and advertising are in full swing, and gatherings of friends and families and co-workers abound. Then December 26 comes and all the decorations and Christmas talk are put away until next year. This is how we generally celebrate Christmas in our culture.

This is not how the church celebrates Christmas. Christmas on the church calendar begins December 25 and runs for 12 days after that. Think here, “On the first day of Christmas my true love gave to me…” Now you know where the 12 Days of Christmas … Read More »

You’ve heard it said before — especially those of you who cut your theological teeth on the Scofield Reference Bible — that in the New Testament God saves sinners by grace but in the Old Testament salvation is by works. Ironically, there is some truth to that. Just keep reading for a line or two more. Before the fall in the garden God related to Adam by way of a covenant of works.

To him was given the promise of eternal life as the reward for perfect obedience to the laws and commands of God. In this way God’s law was given for the justification of the righteous. God’s law can either justify or condemn. This, of course, is the problem after the fall. None are righteous, not even one and therefore God’s Law only condemns. When it speaks, we do … Read More »

With the Reformation fresh in our minds I thought it would be good for us to consider a crucial element of the Reformation, namely the doctrine of justification. We will use Buchanan’s The Doctrine of Justification as our guide if you would like to follow/read along.

In the Word, sacraments, and prayer, we are brought back to the source of our life…

Justification is an act of God’s free grace, wherein he pardons all our sins, and accepts us as righteous in his sight, only for the righteousness of Christ imputed to us, and received by faith alone (WSC 33). Speaking of this, Buchanan noted that this is “surprising, startling, and affecting us strangely, as if it were almost too good to be true (p. 2).

So important was this that Martin Luther described it as articulus stantis vel cadentis — the article of faith … Read More »