by Peter Phillips
Introduction:
I would like to open our study by telling you a story about a man. It’s a famous story about human depravity, grace, and redemption—called Les Miserables, by Victor Hugo. Les Misérables is set in the Parisian underworld and specifically focuses on a man named Jean Valjean, who is sentenced to prison [...]
Archive for January, 2009
A Brief Study of Repentance
Posted in Soteriology on January 31, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
Monergism or Synergism?
Posted in Soteriology on January 31, 2009 | 17 Comments »
Who provides the decisive impulse towards God in salvation, God or the determinative choice of man? Arminians, Wesleyans and Calvinists will answer this question differently. What is Calvin’s view and is it compatible with an Arminian interpretation of grace?
Implicit or Transitory Faith?
Posted in Christology on January 31, 2009 | 2 Comments »
Alas Christology!
I have chosen to place the following comments with “Christology,” because for Calvin, the object of faith is Christ.
Calvin says, “Faith rests not on ignorance, but on knowledge. And this is, indeed, knowledge not only of God but of the divine will,” and “By this knowledge, I say, not by submission of our feeling, [...]
The Holy Spirit and Prayer
Posted in The Trinity on January 31, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
What indeed, is the role of the Holy Spirit in prayer? Upon completion of reading Bruce Ware’s book on the Trinity, I began to reflect on this very issue, and I can share with you one brief thought. Ware’s contention is that we need to think of everything about Christian living through a Trinitarian lens. [...]
General and Special Providence
Posted in Knowledge of God on January 31, 2009 | 1 Comment »
Calvin divides God’s providence into “general” and “special,” as he does with revelation. How do we understand the relationship between providence and revelation given Calvin’s division of the two? Do they work alongside each other? Does one necessitate the other?
Calvin cites Job as the example of how God permits evil to happen for the sake [...]
The Visible and Invisible Church
Posted in Ecclesiology on January 31, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
How does Calvin’s doctrine of predestination function in his theology if it is neither the center of his theology nor a speculative deduction from his doctrine of providence?
Calvin’s doctrine of predestination reinforces the doctrine of justification by faith alone by identifying God’s sovereign grace as the cause of justification and thereby assuring believers of their [...]
Covenant or Dispensational?
Posted in Scripture on January 31, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
As we discussed in an earlier class, hermeneutics plays a central role in how we understand OT and NT Theology. Is Jesus Christ Calvin’s only hermeneutic when reading the Old Testament? And if so, is he justified in this approach?
Do we see New Testament authors doing the same thing? If Jewish exegetical method (e.g. Midrash [...]
The Peculiar Work of the Holy Spirit?
Posted in Pneumatology on January 31, 2009 | 1 Comment »
Calvin says, “What else is it, then, than to do injury to the Holy Spirit if we separate faith, which is his peculiar work, from him? Since these are the first beginnings of piety, it is a token of the most miserable blindness to charge with arrogance Christians who dare to glory in the presence [...]
What is Heresy?
Posted in Heresy/False Teaching on January 28, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
What is Heresy?
by: Peter Phillips
Roughly, I would define heresy as false teaching that would not be in keeping with Christian Orthodoxy. Biblically, the term (αἵρεσις) was used to point out sects within Judaism or even pejoratively of Christians by 1st century Jews. Paul used the term to speak of those professing believers that taught false doctrine [...]
The Doctrine of the Atonement
Posted in Calvin's Theology on January 24, 2009 | 1 Comment »
