Bridge of Reason

  1. Where Are You? When we think about communion with God we too often think of some religious practices. We go to church to commune with God, we see the sacraments of baptism and communion, the formal act of worship, as giving us access to God. Even in our private devotions we adopt a certain posture and attitude towards God, we tend to get religious. Hands together softly so, Little eyes shut tight. Father just before we go Hear our prayers tonight. We are all your children here, This is what we pray, Keep us when the dark is near and through every day. Even as we believe we may ‘boldly approach the throne of grace’ (Heb.4:16) yet we are, like our first parents, aware of our sinfulness (Gen.3:10). As did Adam, we hide from God, even as we hear his voice seeking us out, ‘Where are you?’ (Gen.3:9) Before the Fall we see a very different picture. Here we witness how it was in the beginning, with God expecting to enjoy open communion with Adam, the communion of the garden. ...

Faith and works are a perennial issue in explaining the gospel. The cults insist we are saved by a combination of faith and works. The world likewise imagines a great set of weighing scale, our sins on one side, our good works on the other. The world follows the thinking of Aristotle, who argued a man must love his neighbour and then love God; out of that love for my neighbour will spring my love for God. He would argue that if we are to gain eternal life we are to first obey. Any number of Scripture verses lend themselves to this view:; Mt.7:21; Ro.2:6; 1 Cor.3:14; 2 Cor.5:10; Js.1:22; Js.2:18-20. The Bible is replete with injunctions to ‘work out your salvation,’ (Philip.2:12-13). It may come as a surprise to Jehovah’s Witnesses then, who think Christians don’t witness, to Mormons too, who believe we have an easy-believism, that Christians are ever aware of these verses, striving to obey them. I have been reading Tyndale in recent months. He is incredibly helpful with this subject...

Correctly Handling the Word of Truth Departing from Iniquity Pursuing Righteousness Repenting of Error Last time we looked at The Complete Rule of Faith , summed up in four points: The Knowledge of God in Christ, Escape from Corruption by Grace, Adding Virtue to Faith, Trusting the Word. Peter’s message has an urgency we might easily relate to today as the New Testament warnings of error from within the body seem so apposite. Listing the qualities that keep us from being ineffective or unfruitful in the knowledge of Christ, he warns: ‘For whoever lacks these qualities is so nearsighted that he is blind, having forgotten that he was cleansed from his former sins.’ (2 Peter 1:8/9) This blindness, this lack of fruitfulness, may well be the result of a lack of true conversion. It is possible to appear to have all the trappings of a ‘reformed’ life but for that reformation to be merely external, cleaning up one’s act without having a truly changed he...