Deerfield, IL — The 2019–2020 recipients of the John Stott Award for Pastoral Engagement are Gavin Ortlund, Wesley Vander Lugt, Ryan O’Dowd, Mike Woodruff, Ben Dockery, Matt O’Reilly, Greg Gilbert, and Rafael Bello. This year, the Creation Project is focusing upon the topic of divine action, and these churches will be engaging the topic in ways…

In comparison to many modern exegetes, the Reformers had a broader hermeneutical lens when reading the Old Testament, and were more open to finding types, figures, and applications for their particular contexts in the Old Testament. This can be seen in the interpretation of Ezekiel 34:1-31, where Lutheran theologian Martin Chemnitz (1522-1586), like many of…

This third year of the Creation Project is focused upon theological anthropology, with consideration given to questions of the origin, nature, and ultimate purposes of human life. In his 1993 award-winning book, The Contemporary Christian, John Stott writes: Millions of people do not know who they are, nor that they have any significance or worth. Hence…

In a previous post I mentioned that I drafted an “Elder Affirmations about Creation & Evolution” to articulate for the leadership of our church a set of convictions that we share in common and that might provide an outline for a teaching position for our church. I received several inquiries about this document and thus…

I recently received a phone call from a fellow pastor asking for help. “I’m preaching through Genesis 1­­­–11,” he anxiously explained to me, “and I need some advice on the whole creation and evolution thing.” The sound of his voice let me know he was worried about how this might go down in his congregation….

  The final chapter of John Stott’s classic text, Between Two Worlds, is devoted to two personal characteristics which he judged to be essential to the task of Christian preaching: courage and humility. It is through the balance of these two traits that Christian preachers can faithfully execute their stewardship as ministers of the Gospel. He…

“In the beginning,” Genesis declares, “God created the heavens and the earth.” In contrast with other origin accounts, Genesis presents a sovereign God whose speech creates a good, beautiful, and ordered world. But how does Genesis, this “primitive” text, relate to the claims of modern science? Is Genesis to be read as divinely revealed science…

Johann Spangenberg (1484–1550), a Lutheran pastor, authored one of the best selling postils1 of the sixteenth century, the Postilla Teütsch, which helped to prepare children to understand the lectionary readings. In this post on Luke 5:1-11 for the Fifth Sunday after Trinity, Spangenberg asserts that Christ’s words penetrated the hearts of the disciples—not merely their…

And he said to me, “Son of man, stand on your feet, and I will speak with you.” And as he spoke to me, the Spirit entered into me and set me on my feet, and I heard him speaking to me. —Ezekiel 2:1 Reflecting on Ezekiel’s call, John Calvin (1509–1564) advises ministers of God’s…

I’ve noted that despite an almost universal conviction that witches exist and are able to do terrible things, there are significant numbers of believers who are not personally afraid of witchcraft. This is what I’ve been writing on thus far and what my research conducted among evangelical mission church leaders in northeastern Congo (DRC) has found. These…

Wolfgang Musculus on Ephesians 4:5 Baptism is initiation and consecration in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, and it is incorporation into the church and the communion of saints. This is why there is not one baptism for one person and another for another, but all are baptized in the…

The Dhongo form an ethno-linguistic group who live in the Territoire (County) of Faradje in the Haut-Uélé District in the Democratic Republic of Congo. They are neighbors of my Lugbara people and share some “experiences” of witchcraft with this Lugbara people that I previously mentioned, in my “Aula: A Baby Disease Caused by a Witch.”…