Dr Paul Allen

I believe that once a person is authentically redeemed, is truly in Christ , that person will never be lost to Christ. That person has what we call eternal security—not because of the person’s innate ability to persevere, but I believe that God promises to preserve His own and that we have the benefit of our Great High Priest who intercedes for us every day. Now, at the same time, Christians are capable of gross and heinous sin. They’re capable of very serious falls away from Christ. They’re capable of the worst kind of denial and betrayal of our Lord. Consider, for example, Exhibit A—the apostle Peter, who denied Jesus with cursing. He was so emphatic that he uttered profanities to underscore the fact that he never knew Jesus. If you talk about somebody who didn’t seem to want to repent and who had turned away from Jesus, Saint Peter is your classic example. Yet his fellow disciple Judas also betrayed Jesus and turned away from Him, and of course, both of the betrayals were pre...

God has given you so many limitations because he loves you. If you’re like most people, you don’t feel loved by your limitations. You feel confined, stunted, trapped, and exposed by them. You feel discouraged by how weak you are and how many things you can’t do well or at all. You might even be tempted to resent God for equipping you with what looks like a stingy allotment of abilities. But that’s only because you’re mainly looking at yourself from the wrong perspective, which is looking too much at yourself. God gave you your finiteness, your very limited strengths and weaknesses, in order that you might know and delight in his glorious love for you in as many of its manifestations as you possibly can. You are so limited because you are so loved. Where We Experience Love Most Our finiteness itself is not a consequence of the Fall , even though the corruption that infects it is ( 2 Peter 1:4). God created humans incredibly limited from the very beginning because we we...

Wesley understood entire sanctification, or perfection in love, then, as a continuum of grace and response that leads persons from the guilt and despair of their sin to the knowledge of God and, by faith in His grace in Jesus Christ , to the crisis moment of the justification and the new birth. The life of sanctification springs from the regenerated life created by the new birth and continues as the Holy Spirit through His gracious ministry calls them to moment-by-moment obedience to the will of God, which is the expression of His holiness and love. In this part of the Christian’s progress in obeying the will of God and conforming to the mind of Christ, the remains of the rebellion and fallenness create conflict and often depression.  The nature is still corrupted by a systemic illness that makes a free and ready response to the love of God a source of contention in the inner volitional being. The volitional powers have to be cleansed from the effects of the Fall, which ...

Previously, we dug through  1 Cor. 12:23 , which contains the first of two occurrences of the term “ modesty ” in the ESV .  We saw that in  1 Cor. 12:23 , the term translated “modesty” carried an idea that wasn’t  primarily  one of appearance, but rather  overall demeanour .  To be clear, the term included appearance but involved  more  than just appearance. Today, we’ll look at the second occurrence of “modesty” in the ESV, which is found in  1 Tim. 2:9 . 1 Tim. 2:9  – Again, I’m going to set the verse within its immediate context of  1 Tim. 2:8-15 I desire then that in every place the men should pray, lifting holy hands without anger or quarreling;   9  likewise also that women should adorn themselves in respectable apparel, with  modesty  and self-control, not with braided hair and gold or pearls or costly attire ,   10  but with what is proper for women who profess godliness—with...

When it comes to Christian theology , just about all roads lead through Romans. Paul’s letter to the Romans is arguably the single most important piece of literature in the history of the world.  And chapter 8 is perhaps its greatest section. And Romans 8:31–39 is the climax. It is actually an inference from everything Paul says in Romans 5:1–8:30 about the glorious results of our justification. It’s as if the apostle takes a deep breath as he thinks back over Romans 5:1–8:30 , and then asks God’s people, “What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us?” ( Rom. 8:31 ). That second question is rhetorical, so it has the force of a proposition: Since God is for us, nothing can be against us. Paul then supports what he asserts with four proofs. Proof 1: God will graciously give us all things (Rom. 8:32). Paul is arguing from the greater to the lesser. If God gave us the greatest gift (i.e., he did not spare his own Son but gave him up...

Church advertisements can be interesting. I’ve seen things like, “Business healing services,” one that advertised a concealed weapons class, and “You have a friend request from Jesus : Accept? Ignore?” But one that confused me the first time I saw it was “ Spirit-filled .” What does that mean? And are only some churches Spirit-filled? Or all of them? Or partially filled? What’s the difference between a Spirit-filled and non-Spirit-filled church? Generally, the advertisement intends to mean that the Holy Spirit ’s power and presence are observable in that local church. Praise God if that’s true. But, assuming accurate advertising, what ought we expect from such a church? What will that look like? Here are 11 pieces of evidence of the Spirit’s power and presence in a local church: 1. A focus on the biblical Person and work of Christ. Previewing the New Covenant ministry of the Holy Spirit, Jesus indicated the christ focus he would have: John 14:26 “But the Helper , ...