Dr Paul Allen

God used human authors to write the sixty-six books of the Bible over a long period. Thus, the books of the Bible actually form one book, with one triune Author and one unified message of salvation. The Bible is one book because God the Holy Spirit is its Author (2 Sam. 23:2; Neh. 9:30; Heb. 3:7). The Father revealed Himself over the centuries to His people by His Word and Spirit (Isa. 59:20–21; 1 Peter 1:11; Heb. 1:1–3; 3:7).  Christ is the central theme of Scripture (Luke 24:25–27; John 5:39; Acts 17:3). The covenant of grace, which spans both the Old and New Testaments, is the primary way God reveals Christ and salvation in Him. Though this covenant is administered differently under the Old and New Testaments, Christ and the covenant of grace constitute a unified message of salvation from Genesis through Revelation. Westminster Larger Catechism 32–35 teaches us to partake of the covenant of grace in Christ alone. This was true in the Old Testament, which describes the old covena...

Those who reject Christ's claims will reject the Bible as a whole, so we are not surprised when we find non-Christians questioning the stories and teachings of Scripture. We are living in a funny age, however, when even many professing Christians want to cast the Bible in a negative light.  It is not uncommon for people who claim to be followers of Christ to question God's character or reject the truthfulness of entire portions of Scripture because they believe specific biblical stories and events contradict God’s mercy.  The invasion of Canaan is one of those stories that prompts many people, including many professing Christians, to question the Scriptures. Charges that “God commanded genocide” are frequently uttered.  Even after responding to the charge of genocide, however, we still need to consider how the story fits into the broader biblical revelation of the character of God.  THE PROBLEM IS US When we encounter something that troubles us in Scripture, we are t...

Jonathon cruse In Romans 4, Paul tells us that if we want to know how salvation works, we only need to look to Abraham. His story was recorded for our sake (vv. 23–24). How God worked with Abraham is how God works, period. And how did God work salvation for Abraham? Through faith. We cannot overstate the importance of faith. As Paul wrote in verse 16, “it [the promise] depends on faith.” The ESV supplies that word “depends,” but it certainly underscores the sense Paul is after—literally, the promise “comes through faith.” Why? Why is faith so important? Why does it matter so much in God’s plan of redemption? Here are three reasons. 1. Faith keeps the promise gracious. That’s what the text says: “It is through faith so it can be according to grace” (v. 16). Substitute any other word for “faith”, and the sentence becomes absurd. If salvation is through works, charity, service, church attendance, activism, intuition, or intellect, it cannot be “according to grace.” Faith—which itself is a...

Inside the walls of Jericho lived a woman who has forever been nicknamed by those who know of her as Rahab “the prostitute.” History has a strange way of remembering people, but in Christ, Rahab “the prostitute” would eventually become Rahab “a daughter of Zion,” and we can be confident that in heaven she is known by that better name. But the transitions from life in sin to salvation often happen on dramatic stages, and Rahab is no exception. Hebrews 11:30 actually records the destruction of Jericho before the salvation of Rahab. Jericho was something of the Las Vegas of the known world in Rahab’s era. The inhabitants of Jericho were violent, murderous, and idolatrous in the extreme. The evil of the city’s inhabitants was such that God had placed the entire city under His punitive ban; the whole city was to be destroyed.  Joshua 6:17 says, “The city and all that is within it shall be devoted to the Lord for destruction.” This particular type of judgment was the most severe. The Heb...

Luke Simmons Wait a second. . . . Those giant, beautiful warriors are elves? I was so confused watching The Lord of the Rings for the first time. I hadn’t read the books (gasp!) and was finding out the magical creatures of Rivendell were unlike any elves I’d ever heard of. In my understanding, elves were tiny—they lived in trees baking cookies or at the North Pole assembling toys. They scurried around more like ants than archers. But J. R. R. Tolkien’s elves (brought to life by Peter Jackson) were elegant, striking, powerful, and—I later discovered—immortal. It was the same word (“elf”) but a different dictionary. And a different dictionary because it was a different story. The only other time I felt as confused by words with such divergent meanings was when I started living around Mormons. This confusion demands a better approach to reaching them with gospel grace. Surrounded by LDS Neighbors I live in Queen Creek, Arizona, a Phoenix-area suburb, surrounded by neighbours who belong to...

The sick love of controversy — or the “unhealthy craving for controversy,” as Paul calls it in 1 Timothy 6:4 . The question is from a podcast listener named Brett. “Pastor John, hello! We live in an age of controversy. And that controversy-loving spirit has come into the church.  The Apostle Paul clearly warns us against people in the church who have a ‘diseased’ (nosōn) or ‘unhealthy craving for controversy and for quarrels about words, which produce envy, dissension, slander, evil suspicions, and constant friction among people who are depraved in mind and deprived of the truth, imagining that godliness is a means of gain.’ That’s 1 Timothy 6:4–5 . I wonder if you can lay out principles for what this ‘diseased craving for controversy’ looks like in the church today.” I’ll try to do that in just a moment — namely, lay out some principles to try to avoid what Paul’s denouncing in these verses. But first, let me say a word about what Brett calls our “age of controversy.” He’s right, ...

Words are weapons. They are either weapons used in the service of God and His kingdom—weapons that are brandished in love for God and our neighbour—or they are weapons used in the service of the kingdom of this fallen and sinful world—weapons wielded in the love of self and hatred of God and neighbour.  This is simply the reality of what words are.  This reality powerfully confronts us in our current context, and we struggle with how to wield our words. We live in the middle of a swirling vortex of political conflict, social unrest, clashing values systems, a culture war, and a global pandemic, and the power of words as weapons through social media has exponentially increased.  Through various forms of social media, words as weapons are used to mobilize, encourage, scare, advocate, anger, inform, judge, punish, reward, lament, and rejoice, all on a massive scale and with dizzying speed. How do we navigate through this daunting and sometimes overwhelming reality, and how ...

In his second letter to Timothy, the apostle Paul gives a long, scathing description of a group of people he calls heartless, abusive, brutal, and treacherous ( 2 Tim. 3:2–4 ). He then, in no uncertain terms, says, “Avoid such people” (v. 5). But didn’t Jesus spend time with sinners? Shouldn’t we do the same? Yes and no. Avoid Such People Paul isn’t talking about sceptics or people exploring Christianity. We shouldn’t avoid people who don’t identify as Christians. We should welcome them into our homes and invite them to know Jesus. Nor is Paul talking about people struggling with sin, as we all do. He’s talking about professing Christians who  embrace  their sin. They may have the appearance of godliness, but they’ve denied its power to transform their life ( 2 Tim. 3:5 ). These people go to church and may even consider themselves  more  spiritual than others because they’re open-minded. Unlike uptight Christians, they’re free from rules. They live a more enlightened...

Means of grace refers to the divinely established ways we encounter and commune with God as we learn and experience His grace through Christ’s redemption.  These include the ability to hear the Word as it is read (1 Tim. 4:13) and proclaimed (Rom.10:14–17),  The avenue to God in prayer (Col. 4:13) and supplication through Christ (John 14:13),  The sacraments or “visible words” of the Lord’s Supper (1 Cor. 11:26) and baptism (Acts 22:16; Eph. 5:26).  But do we think about these means as benefits themselves, reflecting the level of intimacy and access we have to God won for us by Christ and His covenant?  One way to appreciate these means is to reflect on the parallel means of grace before the era of the New Testament church. When we see the parallels, it can make us even more grateful for the benefits of the new covenant won by Christ’s work. Old covenant worship looked different from new covenant worship.   When reading Exodus and Leviticus, perhaps some of...

“O you of little faith . . .” The words run through the Gospel of Matthew as a kind of refrain, reminding us of the disciples’ wavering trust. And perhaps of our own. Four times, we hear this rebuke cushioned with tenderness, this tenderness steeled with rebuke. Do you see, disciples, how God feeds the ravens and robes the lilies? And “will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith?” (Matthew 6:30). Winds may blow and waves may rise on the fickle Sea of Galilee, but I will be with you — I, the storm-stilling Son of God. So “why are you afraid, O you of little faith?” (Matthew 8:26). Every wave will hold your feet if you only keep your eyes on me, Peter. But “O you of little faith, why did you doubt?” (Matthew 14:31). Do you remember, my twelve, how I fed thousands from a few leftover loaves? Then “O you of little faith, why are you discussing among yourselves the fact that you have no bread?” (Matthew 16:8). Why such tenderness in this rebuke? Because their faith, though littl...