Think Wink.

I think Piper had it right when he stated the gospel like this in Desiring God: Meditations of a Christian Hedonist,

The wisdom of God has ordained a way for the love of God to deliver us from the wrath of God without compromising the justice of God…The death of Christ is the wisdom of God by which the love of God saves sinners from the wrath of God, all the while upholding and demonstrating the righteousness of God in Christ (pg. 61-62)

The texts that most clearly shows this are first 1 Corinthians 1:23-24,

We preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.

Christ’s death is that wisdom that enables God’s love to save us from his wrath. The question is, how did Christ’s death accomplish that for us? To answer this, I turn to Romans 3:23-26,

All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God…God put forward [Christ Jesus] as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.

Christ came to vindicate the righteousness of God. God in the times past had passed over sins when he saved people. Their sins were not punished, as his righteousness requires. Instead, God forgave them and passed over them in his “divine forbearance.” He allowed his hallowed and sacred name to be dishonored in order to love and save sinners. Thus to vindicate his name, Christ was sacrificed. On Christ were laid the sins of those who had come before. Thus God “might be just.” God now has the way to forgive our sins and still maintain that just standing in Christ. God “might be the just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.”

In his wisdom, God made a way to love us into heaven without dishonoring his name and righteousness.

Another look into euaggelion

When I think of “euaggelion” or “gospel”…

The “euaggelion” of Peace

This is the final and concluding post on the arguments of preterism as concerned with the Olivet Discourse in R. C. Sproul’s book The Last Days According to Jesus. In this post, I seek to distinguish between full/radical/consistent preterism and partial/moderate/inconsistent preterism. The primary difference between the two is this: full preterism sees all of the eschatological and prophetic passages in the New Testament as already fulfilled. They believe that the resurrection has already occurred as well as the New Heavens and New Earth of Revelation 21-22. Partial preterism believes that certain events have already been fulfilled but other events (i.e. resurrection, final judgment, eternal state) are yet future. To distinguish the two positions more definitively, I expound upon the opposing views of the resurrection.

Read more

The Christian Carnival CLXXV (175): Trekkie

The Second Coming Debate

The Gospel of the Glory of Christ pt 3

This past weekend, my sister had some bad allergies. We gave her some medicine but it didn’t seem to work. To make it worse, she had some strep before this happened. She had a really bad asthma attack yesterday and she had to go to the ER. The doctors discovered a major infection in one ear and a minor one in the other. She also had an infection in her eye. To combat this she has been given antibiotics. Her strep that she had before was gone, although she is going to have to have her tonsils taken out. The doctors are worried about the asthma though. She doesn’t have pneumonia, which is a blessing. However, they are nervous that her lungs aren’t giving her enough oxygen. So we have to take my sister to a lung specialist. Please pray that Olivia is okay that God will heal her asthma and her infections. She is my princess and is very dear to my heart.

A second request is on the heels of a recent conversation I had with Gideon, a coworker who I have been sharing the gospel with. Last week, he asked me about sin; namely if I was a sinner or he was a sinner. I answered yes and showed him 1 John 1:8-10, “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us…If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.” He was shocked by this revelation to know that everyone is a sinner. He asked me how then anyone can be saved. I had already shown him that being a sinner means you go to hell. So I took him to Ephesians 2:1-10. Pray that the love of God will save this man’s soul, through the word of God, from the wrath of God that vindicates the righteousness of God.

A Prayer Request

Calvinism and Prayer

Prayer