What is Christian Freedom?

Davenant Institute’s recent conference with Kevin DeYoung and Carl Trueman:

Ozzy Osbourne Has Died

As a long-time lover of rock’n’roll (Joan Jett’s I Love Rock’n’roll was one of the first songs I remember loving). I was grieved at the news of Ozzy Osbourne’s recent death. As a teenager longing to be a rock star, I learned to play guitar by pounding out the power chords to Black Sabbath’s Iron Man and War Pigs. I idolized his guitarists: Tony Iommi, Randy Rhodes, Jake E. Lee, and Zakk Wylde. They are some of the greats in rock’n’roll.

During the satanic panic in the 80s, Ozzy was labeled a devil-worshiper and accused of backwards masking that caused teens to commit suicide. I knew better. Ozzy sang songs about the folly of the occult (Mr. Crowley), the dangers of alcohol addiction (Suicide Solution and Demon Alcohol), the evils of war (War Pigs and Thank God for the Bomb), and warning kids not to make him a hero (Hero). I am not suggesting that everything Ozzy sang was morally upright, but he was not the villain that some censorious busy-bodies made him out to be although he was a deeply troubled man. His addictions and destructive lifestyle were cries for help that only find healing through Christ. 

Unfortunately, Ozzy seems to have never found the grace of God in Jesus Christ. The gods of this world – sex, drugs, fame, and wealth – Ozzy had in abundance, but these false gods failed him. As Ozzy understood, there is no rest for the wicked. In Christ alone, eternal rest is found.

One of my favorite Ozzy songs is Hero

Borders are Bublical But…

In this post, I respond to Andrew T. Walker’s recent article for World Magazine, Borders Are Biblical.

Walker correctly argues that borders are reflective of God’s providential order and that “borders reflect the wise administration of government and the rule of law.” He also points out:

“No matter what liberal bromides insist is true, borders are not synonymous with xenophobia, rank nationalism, nativism, or bigotry. Borders are a reminder that real people with appreciable differences have real responsibilities to those who share a common tradition. Borders are complementary to order, identity, and the shared responsibility that all citizens have toward one another.”

Thus far, yes, and amen.

So, on the matter of borders, I am in full agreement with Walker. However, I see two important weaknesses in his article. First, his target on the surface is the Biden administration. Yet, the Biden administration was not for open borders. He initially failed to enforce the border, but enforcement improved in the latter part of his presidency. Even if one were to insist that the Biden administration was effectively pro-open borders due to lax enforcement, it was not advocating for the abolition of borders, which appears to be Walker’s true target. The open borders position is a minority view and the abolition of borders is a minority within the open borders movement. So, who exactly is Walker arguing against? He risks obscuring the actual arguments in the immigration debate.

Second, Walker argues that “we should begin all immigration discussions with a commitment to the rule of law.” While I agree that the rule of law is an important principle and a commitment to it is necessary, it should not be the beginning of the discussion. The starting point ought to be the dignity and worth of every human being because they are made in God’s image. I say this not to devalue the rule of law but because the law is for human beings, not human beings for the law. Walker’s article even implies that the rule of law serves humanity and “is a precondition for justice.” I do not see a way to determine what serves humanity best or how to define justice without first defining humanity.

While Walker’s explanation of the value of borders is well-received, the target of his critique is unclear and his starting point for a discussion on immigration fails to prioritize real people.

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* I am not a proponent of open borders or the abolition of borders. I support a generous and orderly immigration policy that values immigrants and provides refuge for those who are fleeing persecution, war, genocide, and extreme poverty.

Anthony Burgess on Natural Theology

“This view [that the existence of God is knowable “through the light of nature and observation of the natural world”] is denied by Socinians and others. However,
Protestant authors assert that one may indeed attain knowledge of the existence of God through the natural world, but they may not fully grasp: the nature of this God, whether He is singular or what His attributes are.”

~ Vindicia Legis

Gavin Ortland on the History of Baptism

How Did Infant Baptism Begin? A Story of Five Centuries of Church History

Classical Theology Contradicts Arminianism

From Tom Hicks’ What Is A Reformed Baptist?

“…there is a very significant theological problem with the doctrine of predestination based on foreseen faith. It violates the doctrine of God’s independence, or self-existence. The biblical doctrine of God declares that God does not depend upon creation for any of His perfections. If any of God’s attributes depends on anything outside of God, then God would depend on things outside of God to be God. That is why classical theology teaches that every perfection that is in God is God. This is the doctrine of simplicity. Thus, God’s attribute of infinite knowledge, His omniscience, cannot depend upon creation, or else God depends on creation. If God’s decree of election depends on Goď’s knowledge of the choices of His creatures, then God is dependent on creation, and He is not God. Therefore, it is impossible that God foreknew what people would choose in the future based on an independent free will that originates contra-causally. Instead, the Bible is how God knows what they will choose (Isa. 46:8-11). God does not decree the future choices of men because he knows them. Rather, he knows the future choices of men because he decreed them. Thus, the Bible teaches that God’s knowledge is independent of his creation and does not depend on independent human choices.”

Reading Recommendations from Petrus van Mastricht

In the first volume of his Theoretical-Practical Theology, van Mastricht argues that theology must be taught in order, that is a system. He then lists many Christians from the very beginning of Christianity who exemplify this truth.

• The eight books of Clement of Alexandria’s Stromata
• The four books of Origen’s On First Principles
• The seven books of Lactantius’s Divine Institutes
• The five books of Gregory of Nazianzus’s On Theology
• The books of Augustine’s On Christian Doctrine and his Enchiridion
• Rufinus’s Commentary on the Apostles’ Creed
• Theodoret’s Epitome of Divine Dogma (this does not appear to be available in English)
• Prosper of Aquitaine’s little book of Sentences (I am unable to find this)
• The four books of John of Damascus’s On the Orthodox Faith
• The four books of Peter Lombard’s Sentences (this book is available but it’s multi-volume  and costly), and what commentators on those books have written, such as Albert the Great, Thomas Aquinas, Scotus, Bonaventure, and others
• Thomas Aquinas’s Summa Theologiae.
• The work of those theologians who escaped from the papacy: Zwingli (uncertain which book), Luther (too many books to link), Melanchthon, Calvin, Bullinger, Musculus (unable to find an affordable edition), Aretius (uncertain which book van Mastricht means and little available in English), Vermigli, Ursinus, and Zanchi

Hidden in the Headlines

Hidden behind headlines of war in Gaza and Haitian immigrants, Christian brothers and sisters (and others of God’s image bearers, i.e. human beings) are suffering. The following stories exemplify the struggles of our fellow Christians.

Haitian Immigrants in Springfield, Ohio

Christians in Gaza

Classical Apologetics and Neutrality

Jeff Chavez offers an excellent explanation of a common criticism of classical apologetics. Read this brother’s post and subscribe for more solid classical theology.

Classical apologetics does not reason from a position of neutrality or completely “autonomous” reasoning, though it is sometimes accused of doing so. Let me cite three Classical Apologists who reject this neutral zone: To appeal to these things, whether natural revelation, natural law, common notions, or the light of nature, is not in any way […]

Classical Apologetics and Neutrality

Did Jesus Miraculously Appear in a Locked Room?

R.C. Sproul, in his booklet How Should I Think?, illustrates the difference between possible and necessary inferences with reference to John 20:19: “On the evening of that day, the first day of the week, the doors being locked where the disciples were for fear of the Jews, Jesus stood among them and said to them, ‘Peace be with you.’” Sproul asks, “Now, is it a possible inference from that text that Jesus, in His resurrected state, in His glorified body, was able to walk through doors that were shut?” He argues that this is a possible but not a necessary inference. In other words, there are other possible ways of understanding what happened here. One possible way is that Jesus could pass through doors, but another possibility is that he opened the door and went in. The text does not actually say that Jesus passed through a closed door.

While the text of John 20:19 does not give us a definitive answer, we can arrive at an answer theologically. I do not believe that Jesus passed through the closed door. Instead, he went through the door like anyone else would.

Here are some reasons for my conclusion.

First, Jesus had a true body even after his resurrection; thus, he was physical. The post-resurrection appearances of Jesus demonstrate that the same Jesus who died is the same Jesus who was raised. His body was no longer in the tomb because his true body was raised from the dead. He showed his disciples his hands and feet so that they would know he was not a spirit, that is, not immaterial. He also ate with them. Finally, he still had the marks of crucifixion in his hands and feet. There is little question that Jesus had a physical body based on these accounts. We know that, short of a miracle, a physical body cannot pass through a closed door.

Some may respond by pointing out that Paul explains that we will have a spiritual body (1 Corinthians 15:44), and since our glorified bodies will be like Christ’s, he too had a spiritual body, which was capable of passing through walls. However, this is not the best way of understanding the term “spiritual body.” “Spiritual” in this context is contrasted with “natural.” “Spiritual” probably means something akin to “supernatural.” Moreover, “spiritual body” understood as immaterial begs the question: what does “body” mean? If understood as an immaterial body, it seems to be an oxymoron. Christ does indeed, post-resurrection, have a supernatural body, but he does not have an immaterial body, a logical contradiction.

Second, this is not the type of miracle one would expect from Jesus. His miracles were signs pointing to his person or work. If Jesus did pass through the door, this stands out as an odd miracle because there is nothing for his disciples to learn from it. You could argue that it demonstrates Jesus’ power over nature, but then this seems a rather dull way of showing it after he fed thousands with very little food, calmed terrifying storms, healed lepers, exorcised demons, and rose from the dead. The passages that mention Jesus’ appearance in locked rooms do not even focus on how he got there, but that he, after dying, appeared to his disciples. I am unconvinced that Jesus miraculously entered the rooms.