New Year And New Book

Well it is now ot9 (is that how you spell 09?). My wife and I were talking yesterday about how when we were kids we expected there to be flying cars and personal rocket packs to get around by this time. Well there is one thing that never changes... the Gospel! It was, is, and will always be the power of God that saves all who believe. The 1689 gives a clear and concise statement on the power of the saving grace of God.

Chapter 11 Paragraph 3: "Christ by his obedience, and death, did fully discharge the debt of all those that are justified; and did by the sacrifice of himself, in the blood of his cross, undergoing in their stead, the penalty due unto them: make a proper, real and full satisfaction to Gods justice in their behalf: yet in asmuch as he was given by the Father for them, and his Obedience and Satisfaction accepted in their stead, and both freely, not for any thing in them; their Justification is only of Free Grace, that both the exact justice and rich Grace of God, might be glorified in the Justification of sinners."

To go along with the quote here are a few passages of Scripture to meditate on: Isaiah 53:5-6, Romans 3:28, 8:32, 2 Corinthians 5:21, Ephesians 1:6-7, 2:7, Hebrews 10:14, 1 Peter 1:18-19. May the Lord richly bless the study of His Word.

On a different topic I have chosen a new book of the month. This book contains the collected writings of one of the twentieth century's foremost reformed theologians. I have read several selected works of his and this one volume is an excellent introduction to his writings. And he is a Baptist!

Roger Nicole was born in Germany in 1915 the son of a French Reformed Pastor. He came to the United States in 1938 where he earned degrees from Gordon Divinity School and Harvard. As an ordained American Baptist minister he pastored for many years in Massachusetts. He was a key figure in many of the theological controversies of the last century, including the debate on biblical inerency, American evangelicalism, and a founding member of the Evangelical Theological Society. Well you can read all about him and several of his essays in his book Standing Forth, January's Book of the Month