Weekly Article (Page 19)

“Nor is there salvation in any other, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.” (Acts 4:12) Salvation is solus Christus, “by Christ alone”—that is, Christ is the only Saviour. Martin Luther said that Jesus Christ is the “centre and circumference of the Bible”—meaning that who He is and what He did in His death and resurrection is…

For none of us lives to himself, and none of us dies to himself. For if we live, we live to the Lord, and if we die, we die to the Lord. So then, whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord’s. (Romans 14:7-8) If we, then, are not our own but the Lord’s, it is clear what error we must flee, and whither we must direct all the acts of our life. • We are not…

“…but Christ is all and in all.” (Colossians 3:11) The simple focus of my life is to be like Christ. That is why I must let the word about Christ dwell in me richly, as Colossians 3:16 says. That is why I must gaze at the glory of Christ, 2 Corinthians 3:18, so that I can be changed into his image. That is why Christ must be fully formed in me, Galatians 4:19. That…

“Be my strong refuge, to which I may resort continually.” (Psalm 71:3) If you’ve wearied a friend with your tears or known the shame of crying hopelessly about that thing for the thousandth time, you begin to understand the power of the psalmist’s declaration and request in Psalm 71:3. In this prayer he utters three petitions for deliverance, recounting the rich history…

“I will love You, O LORD, my strength. The LORD is my rock and my fortress and my deliverer; My God, my strength, in whom I will trust; My shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold.” (Psalm 18:1–2) As finite creatures, we use language that has limits when it comes to portraying God’s attributes. But these limits do not make human speech worthless as an…

It is a common phrase, and I am sure you have heard it many times over. It acknowledges that only God’s grace keeps me from experiencing the deepest, ugliest scandal. But I don’t much like the phrase. I grant that there is a sense in which I am completely dependent upon the grace of God so that if…

“O LORD, make me know my end and what is the measure of my days; let me know how fleeting I am! Behold, you have made my days a few handbreadths, and my lifetime is nothing before you. Surely all mankind stands as a mere breath!” (Ps. 39:4-5) In these verses, we are reminded again of how brief our lives are. With current medical advancements, we might think…

Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you completely, and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.—1 Thessalonians 5:23 Not a single one of us is a perfect repenter. And not a single one of us ever will be. I do believe we cooperate in the work of our sanctification, working out what God has worked in (Phil.…

The universal lordship of the Messiah finds its roots in passages such as Psalm 110, wherein the God of Israel, the Creator of all things, tells the Davidic king who is also David’s Lord to sit at His right hand in the place of supreme authority. Jesus alludes to this important event when He…

‘The Word was made flesh’ (John 1:14) The real difficulty lies, not in the Good Friday message of atonement, nor in the Easter message of resurrection, but in the Christmas message of incarnation. The really staggering Christian claim is that Jesus of Nazareth was God made man — that the second person of the Godhead became the ‘second man’ (I Cor.…