Posts by Don Johnson
Bible Reading and Vain Vows
Every year around the first Sunday of the year, I pass out Bible reading schedules to the people of our church. I had it in my head that I did the same thing here on P&D each year, but in searching for it I found the last one was posted at the beginning of 2020.…
Read MoreWhy December 25?
No doubt you’ve heard the widely repeated story that the Christian celebration of Christmas is a form of syncretism, where the church decided to accommodate the celebration of Christ’s birth to the pre-existing pagan holidays. Commonly cited precedents are either the feast of Saturnalia or the celebration of Sol Invictus. The theory goes that by…
Read MoreThe Fundamentals of Sanctification and Cultural Fundamentalism
Previously, I posted a piece called, “The Fundamentals of Sanctification.” The basic proposition of that article is that the Bible gives us a fundamental understanding of sanctification: sanctification means putting off the old man and putting on the new man, it means separating from the world and clinging to God, it means rejecting the old…
Read MoreThe Fundamentals of Sanctification
Why is it that conservative, Bible-believing churches will have similar stands on cultural expressions and social behaviour? No two churches are exactly alike, but if churches hold a high view of the Bible, emphasize obeying the Scriptures, seek to preach what the Bible says, and so on, they will tend to hold to similar “standards,”…
Read MoreLogos 10: A pastoral review
Thanksgiving Day in Canada dawned with the news that Logos 10 was released! I rushed to my computer and got the download started. Alas, I was one of a few afflicted by some kind of bug and had issues. Logos technical support quickly identified the problem, issued a fix, and in a few hours, I…
Read MoreShould Hispanic Churches in the US Preserve Spani… | Christianity Today
Villanueva has seen how Spanish worship has deepened his faith and blessed the church, but he doesn’t believe churches should make it their goal to preserve language or cultural practices. “After living in America for a while, I was able to observe that the Hispanic church had barricaded itself, on the one side thinking that…
Read MoreVanderbilt Medical Center Suspends Gender-Transition Surgeries for Minors following Backlash | National Review
Vanderbilt University Medical Center’s transgender clinic in Nashville has temporarily suspended gender-transition surgeries for minors after a wave of backlash. Source: Vanderbilt Medical Center Suspends Gender-Transition Surgeries for Minors following Backlash | National Review
Read MoreThe Queen Is Dead. Long Live the King
I appreciated Kevin Schaal’s post yesterday in response to the death of Queen Elizabeth II, Queen of Antigua and Barbuda, Australia, The Bahamas, Belize, Canada, Grenada, Jamaica, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Solomon Islands, Tuvalu, and the United Kingdom. That’s quite a list, but…
Read MoreBook Review: The Voyage And Shipwreck Of St. Paul
One of the best books I’ve read in a long time comes to us as a reprint of an 1880 revision of a book first published in 1848. Smith, James. The Voyage and Shipwreck of St. Paul: With Dissertations on the Life and Writings of St. Luke, and the Ships and Navigation of the Ancients.…
Read MoreAre You Humble?
The question is impossible. If you answer, “Yes,” you are most likely lying or else deceived. If you answer, “No,” you are under conviction, even if your answer is honest… which it would be. Pride is one of the fundamental sins, if not the fundamental sin. Fundamental in that it is involved in the first…
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