Very few, if any, awake one morning and decide all of a sudden, “Today is the day I’m going rogue....
Defending
Melissa Kruger – Fruitful Vines: 7 Reasons to Read the Bible in a Year
I spent last week cleaning up the remains of tomato vines from my garden. It’s easy work because...
Chris Brauns – 7 Benefits of Systematic Long-Term Scripture Memorization
Andy Naselli recently wrote two pieces that encourage and equip believers to memorize whole books...
R. C. Sproul – Perfectly Human
Over the past two centuries, much has been written in evangelical circles on the deity of Christ. This has been good and necessary, for many people deny that Jesus is the Son of God incarnate. Sometimes I fear, however, that this emphasis on Christ’s deity has led to...
Michael Oard – What Caused the Ice Age?
Secular scientists have challenged creation scientists to explain the Ice Age. Also, they claim that there were numerous ice ages, possibly up to fifty, at intervals of 100,000 or 40,000 years over the past 2.6 million years. Bible believers need to respond to this...
Joseph Franks – High Law … High Grace … High Worship
The Law comes from our good God. The Law comes as a good gift from our good God. The Law is a good presentation of God’s standard of goodness. It tell us that which is really good in the sight of God. The Law is a good magnifier of our non-goodness. It does a...
John Piper – 1 Peter 2:11–12, Part 1: Your Old Passions War Against You
There are desires inside of you that want to destroy you. They will try and lure you to anything and everything except God and His glory. In this lab, John Piper teaches us to fight remaining sin in our own hearts. He end by giving two strategies for abstaining from...
Gavin Ortlund – 5 Strategies for Daily Bible Reading
I’ve always been amazed by Jesus’ response to Satan’s first temptation: “if you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread” (Matthew 4:3). I picture Jesus there, looking at the stones. His ribs are poking out, and his body is worn away after 40...
John Piper – 1 Peter 2:9–10, Part 2: Why You Exist in the World
Can you explain why you exist in the world? When God created you, and then saved you and made you new, why did he do it? The Bible gives us unbelievable clarity. In this lab, John Piper explains the purpose of your life. We exist not to call attention to ourselves,...
Joe Holland – Christian Knowledge and Action
You’d think Pavlov invented it, that characteristic sound of a new instant message, the "buh-ding." That’s what Jack heard in his cubicle that morning, before caffeine had cleared the fog in his head. He clicked over to his messenger application as routinely as if...
Justin Taylor – A Crash Course on the Muslim Worldview and Islamic Theology
Adam Francisco (who has a Ph.D. in Islamic-Christian relations from Oxford University) is professor of history at Concordia University in Irvine, California. His work on the history of Islam is nuanced and informed. As one online bio notes, “He has a unique ability to...
Albert Mohler – Relativity, Moral Relativism, and the Modern Age
This intellectual revolution began with four lectures in late 1915 presented to the Prussian Academy of Sciences. The lectures were given by Albert Einstein, and before the end of the year Einstein would publish his argument for a “General Theory of Relativity.” Those...
Herman Bavinck – The Greatness of God
On the very first page of the Bible the absolute transcendence of God above His creatures comes to our attention. Without strain or fatigue He calls the whole world into existence by His word alone. By the word of the Lord were the heavens made, and all the host of...
John Piper – 1 Peter 2:9–10, Part 1: God Treasures You, But Not Because of You
When a person becomes a Christian, they take on an entirely different identity, the pinnacle of which is being God’s prized possession. In this lab, John Piper looks at two of the most explicit and most profound verses on Christian identity. What we learn should...
Scott Swain – What Is Doctrine?
When I was young, I only thought of my future: Whom would I marry? What vocation would I pursue? Where would I live? Now that I am the father of four children, I think only of their futures. As he approached the final days of his ministry, the Apostle Paul set his...
Avery Foley – Did Adam Step on an Ant Before the Fall?
Often Christians, pastors, and theologians who try to fit millions of years into Genesis 1 object to a literal, recent six-day creation by arguing, “So Adam never stepped on an ant in the Garden of Eden? That can’t be true. There had to be death before sin.” But is...
Aaron Armstrong – False Humility, Logical Fallacies and Being Bored with Certainty
There are some areas of life and the Christian faith where the smartest thing you can do is to hold your position with a certain… latitude. It tends to go wrong when you dig your heels in and you won’t recognize that there are other valid points of view. One that...
David Casas and Russell Fuller – God’s Image: The Difference Maker
Are we just another animal? We can argue about DNA, brain size, and upright stature, but Genesis 1 emphasizes an infinitely greater privilege that sets mankind apart. Atheism views man as simply a material being like all other animals. In many ways, this is the...
John Piper – James 5:19–20, Part 1: Bringing Back a Wandering Believer
Some of the most heartbreaking moments in a Christian’s life are watching other believers wander away from the truth. In this lab, John Piper tackles a couple verses that help us understand a Christian’s identity and give us great hope in pursuing a wandering brother...
Francis Turretin – 21 Questions on The Doctrine of Scripture
The Necessity of Verbal Revelation QUESTION 1: Was revelation by the word necessary? Affirmative. I. Since the word of God is the unique foundation (principium) of theology, its necessity is properly investigated at the very beginning: was it necessary for God to...
Douglas Wilson – Surveying the Text: Ezekiel
Introduction: In taking a book of the Bible a week, we are not really doing justice to any of them. We can certainly give an orientation. We can describe the basic themes. We can perhaps give you a taste for the book, such that you want to pursue a deeper reading on...
Jamie Dew and Steve McKinion – Natural Theology in Christian Thought
In this episode of Exploring Hope, Jamie Dew and Steve McKinion discuss natural theology in Christian thought.
Matt Brown – How to Successfully Argue Your Point But Miss the Gospel
Why are Christians so unkind to one another and the world? Why do we criticize, degrade, and dismiss? Why do we act like jerks? I have experienced the sting of Christian criticism many times as I’ve posted Scripture or encouragements online. I’m sure you’ve...
Lyndon Unger – Always Being Prepared To…What?
One of the key passages that comes up when talking about apologetics is 1 Peter 3:15-16. Every apologist out there cites it at some point, and everyone has a pretty similar take on it (seeing that many use the text to justify their very existence). It’s apparently a...
David Wood – Muhammad and the Messiah: Comparing the Central Figures of Islam and Christianity
“Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing.” (Luke 23:34) Jesus, during His crucifixion “May Allah curse the Jews and Christians, for they built the places of worship at the graves of their Prophets.” Muhammad, on his deathbed SYNOPSIS Although...
Tony Reinke – Lecrae Confesses Abortion, Invites Others into the Light
As the forty-second anniversary of Roe v. Wade draws near, we are reminded of how large and formidable the abortion industry has become in the United States. Planned Parenthood survives with a heavy dose of government funding, even as overall abortion numbers are down...
Robert Gagnon – The Closing of Discussion in the Public Square: Bowing to the New Social Orthodoxy
Sadly, most Christians in the United States, when it comes to recognizing the dangers to their civil and religious liberties, sleep the sleep of ignorance that the disciples slept at Gethsemane before the arrest of Jesus. It ought to be obvious by now how “sexual...
Timothy Paul Jones – Reza Aslan and “The Jesus of History”
“The more I probed the Bible,” Reza Aslan declares in the introduction to his bestseller Zealot: The Life and Times of Jesus of Nazareth, “the more distance I discovered between the Jesus of the gospels and the Jesus of history” (xix). The result of this discovery—at...
Sinclair Ferguson – The Authority, Sufficiency, Finality of Scripture
If God has given us the Scriptures to be the canon or rule for our lives, it follows that we must regard them as the supreme authority for our lives. Paul tells us that they are ‘breathed out’ by God. There can be no more authoritative word than one that comes to us...
Nicholas Batzig – The Importance of Being a Pastor/Theologian
I have a theory about why God seems to use pastor/theologians in the ways in which He does in the world. I have come to believe that God blesses the labors of pastor/theologians who give themselves to him and the work of the church in a way that He often does not do...
John Murray – Catechizing: A Forgotten Practice
It is surely an indictment of the Church today that in dealing with the subject of catechizing we have to begin by explaining the very meaning of the term. What was looked on as a necessary and beneficial practice by the early church and by the Reformers has now...
Tim Challies – 6 Great Reasons To Study Doctrine
I love doctrine. Doctrine is simply the teaching of God or the teaching about God—the body of knowledge that he reveals to us through the Bible. I guess I’m one of those geekly people who loves to learn a new word and the big idea behind it. But I hope I do not love...
Fred Butler – Hard Truths For Theistic Evolutionists (Part 3)
Genesis as absolute beginning out of nothing Christianity has historically affirmed that the first chapter of Genesis describes God speaking the material universe into existence for the first time out of nothing. What is traditionally called creation ex nihilo by...
Fred Butler – Hard Truths For Theistic Evolutionists (Part 2)
On Death, Dying, and Suffering Theistic evolution is the belief God brought about the present variety of life on earth by the process of evolution. In a manner of speaking, the very term “theistic evolution” is oxymoronic. A radical discontinuity exists between the...
Fred Butler – Hard Truths For Theistic Evolutionists (Part 1)
God’s Character and the Doctrine of Inspiration Theistic evolution has emerged in recent years as the “go to” explanation that attempts to accommodate the historical narrative of Genesis with the evolutionary theory of life. Even though theistic evolutionary...
Tim Ward – An Introduction to the Bible
When we say that the Bible is ‘the Word of God’, what we are actually claiming about it? It is to answer this question, which is both theological and also deeply practical and vital, that the branch of theology called ‘the doctrine of Scripture’ has been developed....
W. Robert Godfrey – What Does the Church Most Need Today?
What does the church most need today? In answering this important but rather general question, Psalm 81 is uniquely important and helpful. This psalm obviously contains beautiful promises and clear directions to help the people of God. But careful study of this psalm...
Thomas Watson – Christ’s Humiliation In His Incarnation
'Great is the mystery of godliness, God manifest in the flesh.’ I Tim 3: I6. Q-xxvii: WHEREIN DID CHRIST’S HUMILIATION CONSIST? A: In his being born, and that in a low condition, made under the law, undergoing the miseries of this life, the wrath of God, and the...
J. C. Ryle – Faith and Assurance
“I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith; henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at that day; and not to me only, but unto all them also that love His...
Graeme Goldsworthy – Is the Old Testament for Christians?
It is indisputable that even evangelical Christians demonstrate a neglect of and ignorance towards the first three quarters of the Bible. Ironically, the evangelical view of Scripture itself can make the problem worse. For the "modernist" is happy to dismiss as crude...
Daniel Doriani – The Importance of Sound Exegesis
A Bible scholar walks into a friend’s kitchen and sees a magnet fixing a diet plan to the refrigerator door. It reads, “‘For I know the plans I have for you,’ declares the Lord, ‘plans to prosper you … to give you hope and a future’ ” (Jer. 29:11, NIV). Is his dieting...