Tucker Project

I Corinthians 15:1-8 (ESV):

“Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand, 2 and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you—unless you believed in vain. 3 For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, 4 that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures, 5 and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. 6 Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep. 7 Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles. 8 Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me.”

1 Corinthians 15:13-19 (ESV):

“13 But if there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. 14 And if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain. 15 We are even found to be misrepresenting God, because we testified about God that he raised Christ, whom he did not raise if it is true that the dead are not raised. 16 For if the dead are not raised, not even Christ has been raised. 17 And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins. 18 Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. 19 If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied.“

How does one become an historian? Well, the path is not an easy one. But then the learning of no skill or art is easy. It does not come through merely much reading. Nor does it come through merely much writing. There have been all kinds of journal-writers—currently prolific bloggers—but neither much writing nor much reading in themselves doth an historian make. There must be reading and there must be writing, but being prolific in either or both does not guarantee good history.

There must be discernment. There must be reflection. But before anything else there must be an attitude that takes time to be careful and precise, an attitude that is revealed in the small things of the craft. In fact, how one tackles those small things reveals the ability to handle the larger. If, with regard to the small things, the seemingly unimportant things, there is simply the desire to get them out of the way as soon as possible to make way for the truly “significant things,” the faculty of a good historian is lacking. Such an attitude is not perfectionism—an impossibility in this life for fallible humanity—though it is the desire to make everything written the best and most precise it can be.

Without precision, the faculty of taking care to be exact and right, the interest in details, there can be no good history-writing. If such a faculty is naturally present, it must be honed. If it be not present, it must be learned.

Dr. Michael A.G. Haykin is Professor of Church History at Heritage Baptist College and Theological Seminary in London, Ontario. (Original post here)

“I mean you can say you believe in the authority of scripture. So you tell me what’s most powerful: your cleverness or the Bible? You tell me what’s the most powerful. I’ll tell you when you stand up and speak what you [actually] believe. If you tell me the Bible is far more powerful and you get up in the pulpit and preach a little sermonette on a coffee machine as I’ve seen them do, or on a t.v. sitcom, what you’re telling me; that you believe the Bible is the most powerful, and what you’re doing is contradicting what you’re telling me. You don’t have any integrity. And I’m going to opt out for the fact that when you get up there in front of those people that you care to reach you’re going to use what you think is best. And if you use you and not God’s word then it doesn’t matter what you tell me about the Bible. I know by what you do what your real conviction is.” John MacArthur

The “theological bullies” over at the Pyromaniacs have absolutely the best graphics of any blog. This time I think they’ve outdone themselves….

from the post “Is Spiritual Growth Automatic?”

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