Deus Misereatur

  (This was my weekly letter to my congregation on Wednesday, 21 February 2024) This morning in my devotional reading, I was working through 1 Corinthians 8. Though I’ve read these words a huge number of times over the years, today one verse caused me to stop and take stock.  Paul wrote, “ Thus, sinning against your brothers and wounding their conscience when it is weak, you sin against Christ ” (1 Corinthians 8:12). What struck me is a couple of things. First, in God’s saving work, we are – by grace alone – united (hitched, bonded, ingrafted) to Christ so much so, that what happens to us happens to him, and what is his becomes ours (think of Galatians 2:20, for example). As Sinclair Ferguson put it, “through union with Christ all that is his by incarnation becomes ours through faith” (“The Christian Life,” 110). Let that percolate in your heart for a while. Your fear, anxiety, tears, and so forth, he feels. And his “ Peace, be still ” is yours. Second, the way we treat one an...

The Good Name: The Power of Words to Hurt or Heal Samuel T. Logan, Jr. New Growth Press www.newgrowthpress.com ISBN: 978-1-64507-028-3; September 2019;  $17.99 Are you, like me, deeply concerned about the heavy “shock-and-awe” approach that is being taken on social media? Are you alarmed by the vitriol and venom poured out through broadcast and print? Are you beginning to become distressed with the ways the social environment is increasingly becoming anti-social and how it is impacting your congregation and community? If so, then there’s a new book out that may well be a helpful part of the remedy. Samuel T. Logan, Jr., ordained minister in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church, one-time president of Westminster Theological Seminary-PA, emeritus professor of church history, and associate international director of the World Reformed Fellowship, has recently published a helpful resource, “The Good Name: The Power of Words to Hurt or Heal.” This 192-page softback takes up G...