Andy Naselli

Thoughts on Theology

Andy Naselli

The Wages of Spin by Carl Trueman

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Wages of SpinToday I took a break for a bit of pleasure reading and scanned a little volume that’s been on my reading list for months: Carl Trueman’s The Wages of Spin: Critical Writings on Historic and Contemporary Evangelicalism  (Mentor, 2004).

The more I hear and read Trueman, the more I like him. His sharp wit puts him in a class of his own. A couple of the short essays at the end are especially entertaining jabs: “Boring Ourselves to Life” (pp. 175-80) and “Evangelicalism Through the Looking Glass: A Fairy Tale” (pp. 187-90). Well done.

On a related note, Mark Dever discusses The Wages of Spin among other things in “A Sweeping Conversation with Carl Trueman” (Feb. 21, 2006).

Packer on De-Godding God

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“It was, I think, Voltaire who first observed that ever since God made man in his own image man has been trying to return the compliment. Whoever said it, it is true, and many theological mistakes have been made through likening the God of infinite power, holiness, goodness, and wisdom to finite and fallen humanity.”

These are the stirring opening words to J. I. Packer‘s essay “The Love of God: Universal and Particular,” in Still Sovereign: Contemporary Perspectives on Election, Foreknowledge, and Grace (ed. Thomas R. Schreiner and Bruce A. Ware; Grand Rapids: Baker, 2000), 277-91.

Carl Trueman on “Evangelical”

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“[John] Owen’s theology is a salutary reminder that we should not allow the current decline in church attendance and status to turn a blind eye in our evangelical ecumenism to the real problems that exist with the evangelical world. I confess here that I am no longer entirely happy being called an evangelical. Where evangelicalism happens to coincide with biblical, historic Christianity, I do not repudiate the description; but in general consider it to be an unhelpful term, if not misleading and meaningless. That it now embraces those, who, for example, hold to positions on God’s knowledge of the future that are Socinian, it has ceased to be a distinctively Christian term.”

—Carl Trueman, “John Owen As a Theologian,” in John Owen: The Man and His Theology: Papers Read at the Conference of the John Owen Centre for Theological Study, September 2000 (ed. Robert W. Oliver; Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R Publishing, 2002), 63.

Recommended: Trueman’s five-part lecture series on the life and theology of John Owen (available here).

Blomberg MP3s on NT Introduction

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BiblicalTraining.org is now offering an “Introduction to the New Testament” course on MP3 by Craig Blomberg (Theopedia | Wikipedia). The first half, Gospels and Acts, is currently available in some thirty-five MP3s (available for free downloads). Blomberg, author of a number of books and articles on the Gospels, has recently penned From Pentecost to Patmos: An Introduction to Acts Through Revelation (Nashville: Broadman & Holman, 2006).

Kevin Bauder on "The Use of Scripture in Theology"

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“The Use of Scripture in Theology” is another first-class mini-series of short essays by Kevin Bauder.

Note: Central Seminary emails these essays every Friday afternoon. You can join the mailing list (as well as access the archives) here.