Archives For Systematic Theology

Short answer: No.

Longer answer: I tried to unpack this in a radio interview on 7/14/2009: Are Millennial Views Essential? I had recently highlighted (1) Tom Schreiner’s move from an amillennial to a premillennial position and (2) Mark Dever’s argument that it’s a sin to sever cooperation with other believers over certain types of eschatological issues.

Even longer answer: Peter Hubbard, teaching pastor of North Hills Community Church in Taylors, South Carolina, wisely walked his church through this issue in September 2009. Continue Reading…

CCCI read this book three months ago, but I’ve been waiting to highlight it because I wanted to see what my wife thinks of it:

J. Wallace Warner. Cold-Case Christianity: A Homicide Detective Investigates the Claims of the Gospels. Colorado Springs, CO: Cook, 2013.

Jenni recently listened to the audiobook, and we agree:

  1. This is an edifying book with a creative, engaging angle.
  2. The first half is far more engaging than the second half. (I carefully read the first half but ended up skimming the second half.)

We enjoy listening to detective stories (e.g., here and here), and Warner fills the first half of the book with interesting stories that illustrate how to investigate what other people claim to be true.

The author has been a detective for nearly 25 years, and he earned a master’s degree in theology from Golden Gate Baptist Theological Seminary.

What initially caught my eye are the glowing endorsements from people like Greg Koukl and J. P. Moreland and the foreword by Lee Strobel. Continue Reading…

gaggingD. A. Carson, The Gagging of God: Christianity Confronts Pluralism  (Fifteenth Anniversary Edition; Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2011), 184–88:

[P]artly under the impact of postmodernism, the various “schools” of Christian apologetics have an opportunity to draw closer together than they have usually been in the past.

At the risk of oversimplification, let us restrict ourselves to presuppositionalism, rational presuppositionalism, and evidentialism. All three labels are loaded, and various proponents mean slightly different things by them. Moreover there is a tendency, especially among more popular writers, to caricature the other positions. Thus:

(1) The presuppositionalist may charge the evidentialist with superficiality. You can line up evidence to support the truth of Christianity until you have exhausted yourself by your efforts, but no amount of evidence is sufficient to compel belief. Did not Jesus himself say that even if someone came back from the dead, they would not believe? Evidentialism simply does not understand the implications of human finitude or the profound noetic effects of the Fall—and both limitations are exacerbated by postmodernism. Continue Reading…

ware_2Bruce A. Ware, The Man Christ Jesus: Theological Questions on the Humanity of Christ   (Wheaton: Crossway, 2013), 81–84:

The impeccability of Christ by virtue of his impeccable divine nature united to his human nature has nothing directly to do with how he resisted temptation and how it was that he did not sin. Yes, Christ was impeccable, but his impeccability is quite literally irrelevant to explaining his sinlessness. The common evangelical intuition seems to be this: if the reason Christ could not sin is that he is God, then the reason Christ did not sin must likewise be that he is God. My proposal denies this symmetry and insists that the questions of why Christ could not sin and why he did not sin require, instead, remarkably different answers.

swimming_5To understand better the distinction here invoked between why something could not occur and why it did not occur, consider with me two illustrations. Continue Reading…

chaseSam Storms calls this book “refreshingly honest, ruthlessly biblical, pastorally sensitive, and above all else, altogether persuasive”:

Mitchell Chase. Behold Our Sovereign God: All Things from Him, Through Him, and To Him. Brenham, TX: Lucid, 2012. [Kindle: $2.99]

It’s dedicated to John Piper and endorsed by Sam Storms, Tim Challies, Jim Hamilton, and Bruce Ware. Continue Reading…

heaven_cover“Dan Barber and Robert Peterson’s Life Everlasting is clear, timely, and important. It is biblical, too, both in content and in structure, as it refrains from speculation and highlights the Bible’s own key themes of heaven.”

That endorsement by Chris Morgan sums up this book well:

Dan C. Barber and Robert A. Peterson. Life Everlasting: The Unfolding Story of Heaven. Explorations in Biblical Theology. Phillipsburg, NJ: Presbyterian & Reformed, 2012.

  • 238 pp.
  • 19-page PDF available here (includes the table of contents)
  • Endorsements by Darrin Patrick, Sam Storms, Stephen Wellum, Stephen Nichols, and others

The authors give a road map to the book: Continue Reading…

ConCoverUnion with Christ is a massively important theme that connects various elements of Paul’s theology.

When I was first deciding on a dissertation topic, my pastor at the time, Mark Minnick, suggested “union with Christ.” I gave it serious thought, but I ended up going another direction. But until this month I have been unaware of a resource that comprehensively treats this topic.

The most comprehensive online bibliography on union with Christ that I’m aware of is by Phil Gons.

And now this is the most comprehensive book:

Constantine R. Campbell. Paul and Union with Christ: An Exegetical and Theological Study. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2012.

  • 480 pp.
  • The 19-page sample PDF available here includes the 9-page table of contents. I love how Con outlines the book; it makes his argument much easier to follow.
  • Endorsements by Don Carson, Peter O’Brien, Doug Moo, Mike Bird, Mike Horton, Howard Marshall, Francis Watson, and Morna Hooker
  • Video:

Continue Reading…