'doctrine' Tagged Posts
The Essentials of the Doctrine of End Times
When it comes to the doctrine of end times, there is no hiding the fact that believers have differing views. The three major millennial views (Amillennial, Premillennial, and Postmillennial) each have godly, gifted, and gracious adherents. In this post, I would like to point out four key areas of agreement between the views. This is not to suggest that we ignore the…
Guarding Sound Doctrine (1 Timothy 1:1-11)
READ 1 Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by command of God our Savior and of Christ Jesus our hope, 2 To Timothy, my true child in the faith: Grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord. 3 As I urged you when I was going to Macedonia, remain at Ephesus so that you may charge certain persons not to teach any different doctrine, 4 nor to devote…
Guarding Against Departure of Doctrine
We need to remember that a church’s doctrine is not to be limited to their current situation. We are to recognize that we stand in line with centuries of historical truth. Every church potentially is less than a generation away from compromise, so it is essential that we know how to guard against departure of doctrine. After his opening greeting in his first letter…
Why is Doctrine Important?
The word doctrine will create various responses from people. Some think controversy, legalism, or truth and for some they are just indifferent to the word! What is doctrine? When it comes to defining doctrine I am talking about Christian doctrine, which is a body of belief or teaching that is drawn from Scripture. We can put this body of belief into categories like, the…
Civil Authority and the Christian
Be subject for the Lord’s sake to every human institution,whether it be to the emperor as supreme, or to governors as sent by him to punish those who do evil and to praise those who do good. For this is the will of God, that by doing good you should put to silence the ignorance of foolish people. Live as people who are free, not using your freedom as a cover-up for…
The Priority of Preaching
It is sad to see how many pastors have departed from giving preaching a priority in their ministry. Preaching in many cases has been substituted for performance related activities (drama or music) or a placating to societies priorities. To stand before a congregation and proclaim what God has said in His word has been considered by some to be old fashioned and irrelevant.
Thinking Theologically
Photo by Jacob Bøtter. Used under the Creative Commons license. Recently I preached a sermon on Jesus’ death, as part of our doctrinal series on the gospel. At one point I explained four different models of the atonement. All four models come from the Bible. First, Jesus’ death is an example for us to follow (1 Peter 2:21). Second, Jesus’ death is a demonstration of…
Hanging our hats, like Jesus
Christians are a diverse lot. Even self-confessed ‘Reformed’ Christians are a diverse lot. There’s lots of doctrines, practices and issues we’ll hang our hat on when we’re forced to. Others will hang their hat whether they’re forced to or not. (I’m more in the latter category.) Even here at Hills, we’re a diverse bunch. Complementarian and Egalitarian, Premillenial and…