Be sure to plan to attend the annual Andrew Fuller Center for Baptist Studies conference. This year’s theme, Baptists and the Cross: Contemporary and Historical Perspectives could not be on a more pertinent and important topic. Hear speakers, Danny Akin, David Bebbington, Maurice Dowling, James Fuller, Tom Schreiner, Glendon Thompson, and Stephen Wellum as well as a number of PhD students and other parallel speakers including yours truly presenting:

“‘Binding his Ass’s Colt to the Choice Vine’: John Gill (1697-1771), Isaiah 53, and the Atonement”

You’ll want to be there! See here for more information and to register.

The Marrow Controversy of the 18th century Scottish Kirk had to do with the false teaching called neonomianism (i.e. new law). Neonomianism has existed historically in different forms. Pelagianism, Semi-Pelagianism, Arminianism, Amyraldianism, Roman Catholicism, New Perspective on Paul, and the Federal Vision theology judged out of bounds by NAPARC denominations are all expressions of neonomianism. Here are three excellent lectures from Dr. Sinclair Ferguson on the Marrow Controversy and the false teaching known as neonomianism.

Just wanted to share this: Christianity Today’s Books and Culture is currently offering a “premium” membership for the same price as a simpler 1-year subscription to the journal. The price is $29.95, down from the usual $49.95.

You get the journal subscription plus access to all articles from past issues on their site.

Today I finished reading Robert Letham’s recently published book The Westminster Assembly: Reading Its Theology in Historical Context. While I didn’t agree with all of Letham’s conclusions, I was nonetheless greatly helped in better understanding the doctrines I confess and the tradition with which I’m identified. I’m very thankful for his work.

Here is his summary of Puritanism:

The chief point at issue for the Puritans was whether the church has the right to bind consciences with anything other than the declarations of the Bible (18).

I’m about half way through Robert Letham’s recently published book The Westminster Assembly: Reading Its Theology in Historical Context. This is the third book in The Westminster Assembly and the Reformed Faith series edited by Carl Trueman. It is so good! This should be required reading for every officer in the Presbyterian and Reformed tradition. On the catholicity of the divines Letham writes:

All the Reformers, including Calvin, and the later Reformed orthodox operated in the context of their inheritance from the late Middle Ages. To understand them, it is necessary to have a grasp of the scholastic method, and of the history of medieval exegesis. The Assembly’s Reformed context establishes its Catholic credentials, for the Reformers were at odds, not with the Catholic tradition, but with its immediate representatives. Evidence abounds from Luther, Calvin, and their contemporaries. This is abundantly demonstrated from the minutes [of the Westminster Assembly], where the records we have show beyond the slightest doubt that every theological question was debated from the foundation of biblical exegesis, in dialogue with the history of exegesis reaching back to the early days of the church. So pervasive is the focus on biblical exegesis that it would be futile here to list the texts on which the debate turned–the evidence is literally overwhelming. However, it was not carried on in isolation; it took place self-consciously as part of the great tradition of the church (96-97, emphasis added).