Mea Culpa

I must apologize to anyone who has commented on my blog for the last 4 years or so. It seems that Blogger did not inform me of comments awaiting moderation, and these have piled up, unknown to me. I have now realized this, and am taking steps to rectify the problem so that it hopefully will not happen again.

On the new disclaimer

This blog is my personal blog. All views and articles expressed and written here are solely my own, and do not necessarily reflect the views of my church or denomination or anyone else. Most posts are written for my own personal edification, and are not written in response to any external situation, unless otherwise and explicitly stated. Nobody should be reading into them anything other than what is explicitly stated, unless otherwise confirmed by me in writing.

In my interactions with others, it is sometimes amazing how many times people have oftentimes not understand or make false associations when it comes to communication. Communication by words implies words in its literary context. The larger context is basically the collection of posts on my blog, which can be called the "canonical context." Interpretation of texts in context implies interpreting what I say and write according to proper rules of hermeneutics. It does not mean interpreting what I say according to a foreign context, as like how the book The Pooh Perplex does to the classic children's story of Winnie the Pooh.

So, in the interest of actually aiding understanding, I have placed a disclaimer on the top of my blog. And I will here breakdown what the disclaimer means.

Nobody should be reading into them anything other than what is explicitly stated, unless otherwise confirmed by me in writing.

It is sometimes amazing how people seem to read all sorts of connotations into what I have said or not said. Let me put it here bluntly: If I did not say something explicitly, there is a 90% chance that I did not mean what you think I meant implicitly. This is how my mind words: I have at one time 4 to 5 thought processes running concurrently in my mind, most of them in the background. And these thought processes are oftentimes independent of each other. One could be about Critical Race Theory, another about Soteriology, another about the current document I am working on. If I post consecutively one tweet about Critical Race Theory, another about Soteriology, and another about the document I am working on, it DOES NOT MEAN that the three are in any way connected! It only means I have all three topics in mind. Putting these three, or any permutation of stuff, together, as if they have something in common, is to misunderstand and misinterpret what I am trying to say.

Therefore, unless something is explicitly stated, or confirmed by me, chances are that any "reading between the lines" is just eisegesis. If I didn't say it, I didn't mean it, period! And in fact, I am sure that such interpretations and associations will not pass muster in any court of law, so perhaps everyone should be a little more logical and rational here.

Most posts are written for my own personal edification, and are not written in response to any external situation, unless otherwise and explicitly stated.

My blog is primarily for myself. From the very beginning, its primary purpose was for me to put my thoughts into words. Only secondarily it is for communication and interaction. Also, it is not uncommon for me to ruminate on various topics for a long time before expressing them. In this light, my recent tweet about wishing to do something about church order did not arise out of the blue. Rather, it was something I was considering for the last 2 months in private, and only now when I am more seriously considering it did I tweet about it. This of course does not MEAN that everything I have ever posted and will post has been in the works for a long time. Rather, this is to say that one cannot ASSUME that anything I write is in response to any external circumstance. It might be, it might not be, but unless I explicit state why I saw what I say, any guesses by anyone is probably wrong, so just don't.

This blog is my personal blog. All views and articles expressed and written here are solely my own, and do not necessarily reflect the views of my church or denomination or anyone else.

So far, I have seen how the disclaimer has been interpreted in really astonishing ways. Remember, if I did not mention anything explicitly, chances are your interpretation is wrong! So just for some people who have some really strange interpretations: This disclaimer was NOT written because I have a disagreement with my church or denomination, or anyone else. This disclaimer was NOT written because my views necessarily diverge from my church or my denomination. This disclaimer was written not because (with the false association) that I have a different view of church order from One Covenant Church or the Orthodox Presbyterian Church. All of these false interpretations of the disclaimer, and any others, should be discounted immediately. If you don't know why I did what I do, ASK. Don't ASSUME.

The reason why this disclaimer was written is to distanciate myself and my blog from my church and my denomination. I do not wish for anyone to think that whatever I have written is necessarily the view of my church or denomination. It might be, it might not be. But I have no wish for anyone to go and pester them about what I have written. Anyone has a problem with me or what I write, please feel free to contact me on my blog, via email or in person. Don't pester others about what I have written. The buck stops at me; that is all! There is no real occasion for my disclaimer other than I have no wish to implicate anyone in anything I have written, good or bad. You have a problem with me, talk to me mano a mano. Leave my church, pastor(s), and denomination out of it.

The Caner scandal only grows

Dr. James R White has an update on the situation here. The entire conduct of Ergun Caner, even just his lawsuit against Jason Smathers contrary to the biblical commands of 1 Cor. 6: 1-8, is despicable.

Prayer request for US Sgt Bergdahl

The OPC General Assembly has called for a day of prayer for the release of US Sgt Bowe Bergdahl, who is a Taliban POW and a non-communicant member of the OPC. This has nothing to do with American wars or the American military, but solely for the safety and release of a Christian brother.

Ministery in an Asian American context

An interesting interview on the topic of ministry and Asian-Americans can be seen here. My comment is to say that instead of catering to Asian-American context, I think transcending the entire race issue is more preferable, plus the shedding of stereotypes.

As a Chinese Singaporean, and I realize that I am probably in the minority in my opinion, the last thing I want is "contextualization" (which goes both ways). It is ridiculous in my opinion to force assimilation of people from different cultures, which simply breeds resentment and conflict. What is pleaded for is understanding and toleration (originally understood as celebration of non-moral differences), and an understanding of both sides to dialog and engage the other in mutual respect.

I do not respect a minister who contextualized his message that he essentially alters the emphasis of his message to become a Gospel message filtered by culture, regardless of whether it is Chinese, American, Singaporean or other cultures. The Gospel message is meant to transcend cultures not to find its expression through the lens of culture. Will there be difference in messengers preached in different cultures? Sure, but the message is transcendent to the extent that the cultural elements can be easily removed and adapted to another culture if necessary. My two cents worth: If the message can only be understood within the culture and need to be extensively reworked apart from it, thus instead of the culture being mere points of contact for an eternal timeless message it is integral to it, the message is over-contextualized.

Put it this way, I am not interested in hearing pastors speaking "my culture". I am more interested in preachers bringing the transcendent truths of God to bear upon me and my culture.

The Church exists apart from the cultures of this world although present in it. Pastors and elders ought to reflect that in how they run the Church and preach their sermons.

Christianity and Liberalism Revisited conference

I have been busy recently with a ton of school work. Anyway, the Christianiy and Liberalism Revisited Conference is ongoing, and you can see the lectures via live-streaming. As I have volunteered to help out (as a student volunteer) in the conference, I have free registration for the conference. I will be blogging some summaries of the lectures here albeit not live.

Hebrew Alphabet Rap

It was shared with me here an interesting rap going through the Hebrew Alphabet, or rather Abjad. Hilarious!

Diaprax: The Hegelian Dialectic in action

Here is an interesting lecture on the Diaprax (Dialectical praxis).

[HT: Possessing the Treasure]

The implosion of global Anglicanism and a falling away from the Faith

With the break-up of global Anglicanism due to the crisis in the ECUSA caused by the embrace and celebration of deviant sexuality by her leaders, the newly formed ACNA (Anglican Church in North America) and the Global South coalition are still trying to resolve the mess formed in the aftermath of the schism and total apostasy of the ECUSA (although it has already apostatized much earlier, but this it seems is the straw that broke the camel's neck for a lot of Anglicans — Says a lot about the importance they place on orthodoxy as compared to orthopraxy). The Roman Church, seeing an opportunity, has seen fit to poach some sheep as Anglicanism continues to fracture with the release of the document Apostolic Constitution ANGLICANORUM COETIBUS.

In response, the 'Global South Primates Steering Committee' has issued a statement as follows:

1. We, under-shepherds of the one, holy, catholic and apostolic church of Jesus Christ, bring greetings to the faithful in the Anglican Communion. Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. For in his great love for us, we are no longer foreigners and aliens, but fellow citizens with God’s people and members of God’s household, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone. In him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord. And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit (Ephesians 2: 19-22).

2. The Vatican announcement on Apostolic Constitution gives us an occasion in making the following pastoral exhortation.

3. We welcome Pope Benedict XVI’s stance on the common biblical teaching on human sexuality, and the commitment to continuing ecumenical dialogue.

4. At the same time we believe that the proposed Anglican Covenant sets the necessary parameters in safeguarding the catholic and apostolic faith and order of the Communion. It gives Anglican churches worldwide a clear and principled way forward in pursuing God’s divine purposes together in the one, holy, catholic and apostolic church of Jesus Christ. We urge churches in the Communion to actively work together towards a speedy adoption of the Covenant.

5. In God’s gracious purposes the Anglican Communion has moved beyond the historical beginnings and expressions of English Christianity into a worldwide Communion, of which the Church of England is a constitutive part. In view of the global nature of the Communion, matters of faith and order would inevitably have serious ramifications for the continuing well-being and coherence of the Communion as a whole, and not only for Provinces of the British Isles and The Episcopal Church in the USA. We urge the Archbishop of Canterbury to work in close collegial consultation with fellow Primates in the Communion, act decisively on already agreed measures in the Primates’ Meetings, and exercise effective leadership in nourishing the flock under our charge, so that none would be left wandering and bereft of spiritual oversight.

6. As Primates of the Communion and guardians of the catholic and apostolic faith and order, we stand in communion with our fellow bishops, clergy and laity who are steadfast in the biblical teaching against the ordination of openly homosexual clergy, the consecration of such to the episcopate, and the blessing of homosexual partnerships. We also urge them, as fellow Anglicans, to continue to stand firm with us in cherishing the Anglican heritage, in pursuing a common vocation, in expressing our unity and common life, and in maintaining our covenanted life together.

7. In the closing words of the Anglican Covenant: With joy and with firm resolve, we offer ourselves for fruitful service and binding ourselves more closely in the truth and love of Christ, to whom with the Father and the Holy Spirit be glory for ever. Amen.

“Now may the God of Peace, who brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, the great shepherd of the sheep, by the blood of the eternal covenant, make you complete in everything good so that you may do his will, working among us that which is pleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be the glory forever and ever. Amen.” (Hebrews 13.20, 21)

25th October 2009

Global South Primates Steering Committee:

Chairman: The Most Revd Peter J. Akinola, Nigeria
Vice-Chairman: The Most Revd Emmanuel Kolini, Rwanda
General Secretary: The Most Revd John Chew, Southeast Asia
Treasurer: The Most Revd Mouneer Anis, Jerusalem and the Middle East.

Members:
The Most Revd Stephen Than Myint Oo, Myanmar
Bishop Albert Chama, Dean of Central Africa

Compare this statement with the Response from the Council of Church Society which can be accessed here.

Response from the Council of Church Society to the plans by the Church of Rome to receive disaffected Anglicans.

According to its own doctrinal standards and history, the Church of England's true nature is that of a Protestant, Reformed, Evangelical and catholic (in other words, universal) church. Orthodox Anglicanism is therefore defined by reference to these characteristics only, which are set out in the Thirty-nine Articles and the Church of England's submission to the over-arching authority of Scripture alone. Church Society seeks to defend and promote these defining characteristics, especially the Gospel of salvation by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone which is at the heart of the message and mission of the Church of England.

While acknowledging the correct stand taken by Anglo-Catholics against theological liberalism (the features of which do not represent true, Biblical Anglicanism), it should also be noted that the true doctrine of the Church of England does not embrace any of the teachings or practices which characterise the Church of Rome. For instance, the Church of Rome is fundamentally flawed in its claims about its own nature and authority and in its teaching about the means of salvation.

A proper rejection of theological liberalism should therefore not be accompanied by a turning to the Church of Rome and its unbiblical teachings and practices. Rather, both theological liberalism and the unscriptural teachings and practices of the Church of Rome are contrary to the Bible and to the historic doctrines of the Church of England as a Protestant, Reformed, Evangelical and catholic church.

The longing of Church Society is that all Anglicans, whether in England or elsewhere, would see and understand both the destructive nature of theological liberalism and the false nature, teachings and practices of the Church of Rome.

We grieve that the Church of England, along with our nation, has fallen so low in its spiritual and moral condition. We pray that God would pour out His Spirit on both church and nation.

We rejoice that salvation is by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone and we pray that the Church of England will return to full adherence to its doctrinal standards, acknowledging the supreme authority of the Bible as God's Word and seeking to shape its teaching and practices by what He has revealed.

The statement was agreed by the Council at its meeting on 4 November 2009.

No prizes for guessing correctly which statement is more in line with the teachings and tenor of Scripture.

[HT: Reformation Anglicanism, Reasonable Christian]

An exposè of "Antithesis"

This would be my last word on the cyber-terrorist, liar and anti-Christian watchblogger anonymously called "Antithesis". This is an unfortunately logical necessity, which is certainly not edifying for those who know nothing about the issue. However, for those who know of this controversy, this would hopefully be of help in this regard. The paper exposing "Antithesis" (AT) for the perpetual liar that he is can be found here.

It must be stated that AT and gang has been lying almost all the time (almost 100% of the accusations on that blog is false) that he justly can call himself the Son of the Devil. Anything that is said by them must be suspected for spin. Back last year, AT has the audacity to complain to the pastor and elders of my church. However, as I have stated in my exposè:

The first order of the day of course was to attempt to use my church and my pastor, Rev. Paul Goh, against me. Needless to say, my pastor was not at all impressed with the juvenile and unfounded untruthful lies made about me. It seems that AT is particularly vicious and complained to the session (of elders) in my church, who met to discuss the issue. After examination, they dismissed all charges as being false, noting that AT does not even has the courage to reveal himself and therefore does not even deserve any response whatsoever. All of this was conveyed to me by my pastor, of which I am thankful.

This is not to boast, but the fact of the matter is that my church has examined all of AT's accusations on me and have found them all to be false, exonerating me of the charges. It is of course granted that it was not as serious as a church trial, for the simple reason that they do not take the accusations of cowards who take pot shots of other from behind the anonymity of their keyboards seriously. But even then, the accusations were serious allegations and they conducted their investigation seriously at least on my side in questioning me on my beliefs and stands.

AT through his deplorable actions has manifested an attitude that is consonant with being a reprobate. He and his gang-members are wicked and depraved, irrational and haters of God and of men. May God have mercy upon their souls.

On the CREDO500 conference

During my trip to Sibu, Sarawak, Malaysia over the weekend, I met up with Pastor Jonah Tang to discuss various issues, especially the upcoming CREDO (Chinese Reformed Evangelical Discussion Online) 500 blog conference to be held over the months of September and October. With less than a month left, and many things still to be completed, I would be focusing my energies on that task, thus leaving little time for anything else. This blog therefore would be less frequently updated especially in this month.

With this, here is the latest announcement (translated) on this upcoming CREDO500 blog conference:

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The schedule of the 500th Calvin anniversary blog conference has been tentatively proposed. The 19 articles we have received for the conference will be distributed into two groups — the first group having the theme 'The legacy (lit. continuance) of Reformed theology', and the second having the theme 'The Reformation and John Calvin (lit. The Reformation era's John Calvin)'. The conference will now be prolonged till October 2009, with the intention of giving at least two days for discussing each article, and having a rest from our discussion on the Lord's Day (Sunday).

The names of our contributors have been mostly finalized, barring unforeseeable last minute changes. Also, a new article by Daniel Chew analyzing the 'New Evangelical Calvinism' is specially included. [Note: The inclusion was suggested by Pastor Jonah, not me - DHC]. The names of the reviewers on the other hand would be confirmed and listed in the near future. All reviewers are to hand in their reviews before 1st Sept. In the event that more time is needed, please get back to us at credo500@gmail.com.

The Chinese section of the conference would be headed by Pastor Jonah Tang, while the English section would be headed by Daniel Chew. Publication wise, both articles and reviews would be separately published - one volume in Chinese and a separate volume in English, for the convenience of our Chinese and English readers. [Note: A mixed language volume would only be accessible to readers of both English and Chinese, which is not ideal - DHC]. It is hoped that we would be able to publish the articles in a book by the end of this year; all who desire to help out in the English to Chinese translation work are welcome to contact us.

Part I: The legacy of Reformed Theology (7th - 28th Sept 2009)

I. Scripture and Tradition

Sept 7th Mejlina Tjoa, Scripture and Tradition (Response: To be confirmed)

Sept 9th J.J Lim, The Place and Necessity of Creeds and Confessions in The Modern World (Response: To be confirmed)

II. Scripture and Theology

Sept 11st Daniel Chin Choy Wong, An Analysis and Critique of Signs and Wonders (Response: Daniel Chew)

Sept 14th David Chong, Evaluate the "New Perspective" on Paul's Exposition of the Doctrine of Justification by faith alone (Response: Tsun-En Lu)

III. Scripture and Counseling

Sept 16th Gideon Teo, The Tradition of Counseling and Physiology through the eyes of Richard Baxter and Archibald Alexander (Response: Andrew Teo)

Sept 18th Andrew Teo, Reclaiming The Biblical Care of Souls in The Body of Christ (Response: Gideon Teo)

IV. Scripture and Apologetics

Sept 21st Benjamin Ho，Francis Schaeffer and Reformation (Response: Mejlina Tjoa)

Sept 23rd Daniel Chew，Evaluating The Purpose Driven Paradigm: Recapturing The Vision of The Centrality of The Gospel (Response: Peter Wong)

V. The Gospel and Culture

Sept 25th Linus Chua, Reformation and Education (Response: David Chen)

Sept 28th Tsun-En Lu，John Rawl’s Justice as Fairness and The Pluralistic Society (Response: David Chong)

Part II: The Reformation and John Calvin (5th - 23rd Oct 2009)

I. The historical legacy of John Calvin

Oct 5th Yao Hing Wong, Calvin's life and place in history (Response: To be confirmed)

Oct 7th Jack Sin，The Spiritual Influence and Legacy of John Calvin to The Modern World (Response: To be confirmed)

Oct 9th Daniel Chew, New Evangelical Calvinism: An analysis of the Calvinist Resurgence (Response: To be confirmed)

II. Joh Calvin's theology of God's Sovereignty

Oct 12nd Alex Tseng, Karl Barth's Doctrine of Election (Response: Joel Tay)

Oct 14th Ang Lai Hoe, Biblical Consistency of Calvin’s Work on Election (Response: To be confirmed)

Oct 16th David Chen，Has Turretin been faithful to John Calvin’s Doctrine of Election? (Response: Alex Tseng)

III. The practical theology of John Calvin

Oct 19th Fook Seong Ten, Calvin's Institutes and the Practices of Piety (Response: Lemuel Hii)

Oct 21st Zhi Yong Wang, Calvin and the Psalms: Singing the songs of Jehovah (Response: To be confirmed)

Oct 23rd Cathy Tan，The quest for Calvin's essence of worship: Passion and love of God — A journey away from ritualistic worship (Response: Paul Gao)

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Do note that translations of Chinese article titles are tentative and liable to change.

Posts of interest (July 11 '09)

Here are some interesting articles:

"Apostle Troy Brooks" condemns Dr. James White to hell

Question: Who ordained Brooks as an "Apostle" and by what authority does he condemn Dr. White?

Calvin on Birthdays: Don't overdo it

By the way, happy belated 500th birthday to John Calvin

A Guide to Godly disputations by John Newton

Comments, and a brief book review

As those who have accessed the blog recently may have noticed, I have switched back to the default Blogger commenting system. The previous one wasn't working, with serious character limits per post (not even reaching the theoretical limit of ~5000 characters per comment; maybe not even 1000 characters), and a nightmare scenario whereby all previous Blogger comments on any post were hidden by the IntenseDebate system. The number of comments per posts sometimes weren't showing up properly on the blog's main page, while notification was rather reliable but not 100% as what I had expected. Commenting oftentimes was a headache all by itself with comments posted lost somewhere in cyberspace and not appearing in the blog post's meta even though the IntenseDebate system showed that it was posted.

Due to all this, I have decided to discontinue using the IntenseDebate system, as it did more harm than good.

On other news, I have just finished reading an interesting book entitled New Covenant Theology by Tom Wells and Fred Zaspers.

Here is my brief review of the book which I have posted on Amazon.com among others:

This book by Wells and Zaspel is indeed an excellent book on the growing New Covenant Theology paradigm. It outlines and attempts to show from Scripture the rightness of its position, which is claimed to be the natural teaching of the text of Scripture when interpreted in context.

Upon examining the arguments for New Covenant Theology as outlined here (and also in [John G.] Reisinger's book Tablets of Stone), NCT appears to be the child of Biblical Theology with its idea of progressive revelation, and depends on it for its substance. While Biblical Theology is indeed important, the over-reliance on Biblical Theology at the expense of Systematic Theology creates theological problems and logical contradictions within the system. One such example of a logical contradiction is the teaching of OT believers being not part of the Church (p. 52), yet part of the Church (p. 63). A theological problem found in NCT is that OT believers are not saved by the Gospel (p. 31), but if so then they cannot be saved by God's grace through Christ's atonement for all believers either (Rom. 1: 16), not to mention that this explicitly contradicts Gal. 3:8

Since the topic of study is that of the biblical metanarrative and transcendental truth, the revelation of biblical truth in history (Biblical Theology) cannot be used to derive transcendental biblical truth (Systematic Theology). The outworking of God's truth in time is definitely important, but such cannot be used to infer anything about transcendental truths of God. NCT oversteps the boundary of Biblical Theology by making Biblical Theology the framework for understanding metanarrative truths when it is not designed to do so. Rather, metanarrative truths are to be attained through Systematic Theology done through logical inference from all of Scripture (Tota Scriptura), with the role of Biblical Theology limited to the HOW of its outworking in redemptive history. It must be said here that is is regrettable that this overemphasis on Biblical Theology with its teaching of the logical priority of Jesus' teaching, while true, is unwittingly used to undermine the authority of Scriptures by pitting the physically uttered teachings of the Incarnate logos (λογος) against the revelatory logos (λογος) or the entirety of Scripture, and thus make the "red letters" in the Bible to be of much higher authority and "more inspired" than the normal black letters of the rest of Scripture.

Credo500 -Short article

Credo500 (Chinese Reformed Evangelical Discussion Online-500) is a blog conference organized by Reformed-minded Chinese Christians in commenmoration of John Calvin's 500th birthday. The blog conference, of which I am still rather clueless how it will be done, will occur in May 2009, focused on 9 articles written by various peoples on various subjects related to the Reformed faith.

In an apparent reminder to us that the submission deadline is drawing near, a new post has been posted on the blog, which in itself is really interesting. Here is the article (in Chinese):

16世纪宗教改革的贡献, 相当于4世纪尼西亚会议中所奠定有关三位一体和基督二性的信仰基础, 以及1054年东西教会在和子论争议上的神圣分裂, 无疑是基督教教义史在近500年最重要的分水岭.

显然，改教运动可以追溯至早期教父，特别5世纪奥古斯丁对罪与恩典之成熟的观念。马丁路得在其根基上特然醒悟到因信称义之真理, 加尔文跟着建立起神主权的教义系统, 为当时及往后的教会开辟了一条回归圣经之正统路线.

然而, 随着人本主义的崛起, 自由主义, 反智主义，福音主义, 后现代主义, 灵恩运动, 普世合一运动, 新兴教会运动, 新正统神学, 新保罗神学云云后宗教改革现象的发展顺流而出, 逐渐地绕过宗教改革的宝贵信仰遗产，因而模糊了当时一些关键的核心教义.

另一边厢, 以神为本的思想路线随着17世纪英国的清教徒运动, 18世纪北美的属灵大醒觉运动, 20世纪初西敏斯神学院的护教运动, 以及20世纪末海内外华人教会兴起的归正福音运动, 则一脉相承地把今日教会与改教神学及历代正统基督教传统联系起来.

欣逢2009年,全世界归正群体在纪念加尔文诞辰500周年之际, CREDO500 由一群受归正神学造就的网友发起, 志在依循神本体系之旧路上继承发扬，故以<从加尔文看今日华人教会>的主题, 将在5月4-8日, 于部落格会议中发表并讨论参与者所呈上的一系列文章.

And here is my [attempt at] translation:

The 16th century Reformation is undoubtedly the greatest watershed movement in the last 500 years of the history of the Church. In its contribution to theology, it ranks near the 4th century Council of Nicea which codified the foundational doctrine of the Trinity and of the two natures of Christ, and also the Great Schism of 1054 between the Eastern and Western churches due to disagreement on the doctrine of the Procession of the Spirit from the Son.

This movement of reformation however can be traced back even to the early Church Fathers, especially to the 5th century where Augustine puts forward a mature view of sin and grace. Similarly, Martin Luther build upon that Augustinian foundation in coming to understand the true doctrine of Justification by Faith Alone, while John Calvin followed through with the setting up of a system of theology centered on the Sovereignty of God. Through their efforts, the way of reforming and returning back to the Orthodox truth of Scripture has been opened up for churches both then and now.

However, with the rise of Humanism, Libertarianism, Anti-intellectualism, Evangelicalism, Postmodernism, Charismatism, Ecumenism, Revivalism, Neo-Orthodoxy, the New Perspective on Paul and many other religious reform and restoration movements, the precious legacy of the Reformation has been slowly but surely neglected. Such results in the obscuring of certain foundational Christian doctrines which took center stage in that era, to the detriment of the Church.

On the other hand, the theocentric thread of theology runs through 17th century English Puritanism, the 18th century Great Awakening, early 20th century Westminster Seminary with its contention for the faith and the late 20th century revival of the Reformed faith in Chinese congregations around the world. All of these work together to link the modern Church to Reformation theology and the Historic Orthodox traditions of the Church.

With the advent of 2009, Reformed communities around the world are commemorating the 500th birthday of John Calvin. CREDO500 was started by a group of web-friends who are all impacted and nurtured by Reformed theology. God willing, through walking in the old paths, we will discuss under the theme "Calvin in perspective on today's Chinese congregation" the papers prepared by the contributors in the blog conference scheduled for May 4th-8th.

Hope the translation is suitable. Please inform me if there are any errors in it.

P.S.: I am better at translating Chinese to English; the converse is not as good.

The Occult, Mysticism and Hitler

Pastor John MacArthur in a sermon he gave detailing the occultic roots of Nazism.

[HT: Apprising Ministries]

Reformation in Chile?

Well, it seems that Chile has a new national holiday, Día Nacional de las Iglesias Evangélicas y Protestantes, roughly translated into 'National day of the Evangelical and Protestant Churches'. What's with Chile nowadays? Is there a large Reformed movement in Chile somehow?

[HT: Reformation21]

The ESV Study Bible: Reformed and Covenantal

Over at Reformation Theology, the blog ministry of Monergism.com (an excellent resource site I may add), the ESV Study Bible has been reviewed and found to be both unashamedly Reformed and Covenantal. This is most certainly good news indeed, and just whets my appetite for it.

The ESV Study Bible: A Review

The ESV Study Bible is out, and I am eagerly waiting to get a copy for myself. Unfortunately, it is not yet sold in Singapore, but it will come so I will wait for it. In the meantime, here is a good review of the Study Bible by Tim Challies.

John W. Robbins (1948-2008)

OK, enough aboout Dynamic Equivalence. Just to pass on the information from the Biblical Thought website that John W. Robbins, founder of the Trinity Foundation, went home to be with the Lord after months of battling with cancer by chemotherapy. Here is the unofficial statement from Tom Juodaitis regarding this sad state of affairs.

Dear Friends,

Thank you all for the outpouring of support and expressions of condolences to John Robbins’ family. We are very appreciative.

Many have asked about the future of The Trinity Foundation. I want to assure all that the Board of Directors and the Vice President are committed to continuing the work that Dr. Robbins began and continued for over 30 years. We will continue to publish The Trinity Review each month, as well as continue publishing books, especially the Works of Gordon Haddon Clark. We will continue to maintain The Trinity Foundation’s presence online (www.trinityfoundation.org), updating and expanding it as the Lord blesses.

Thank you for your concern, support, and especially your prayers.

In Christ,

Tom Juodaitis
Vice President
The Trinity Foundation
The Bible alone is the Word of God.
August 15, 2008

LibraryThing

Not too long ago, I decide to place some of my books up in my side bar under LibraryThing so as to help me consolidate my books. So far, I have placed 60+ books in there, but I guess more than half of my books have not been placed there yet, so anyway, feel free to see some of the books I have. I will be updating the list when I have the time to do so, which is probably when my new bookshelf arrives...

Note: You will notice that there are two lists there, one from Amazon and the other by LibraryThing. The one by LibraryThing is more comprehensive since there are certain books not sold by Amazon.com. That's all.