Reformed Theology

There is no shortage of biographies on the French Reformer John Calvin (1509-1564). Interest in the “Master of Geneva” has not waned since his remarkable career as one of the Reformation’s great pastor-theologians. Arguably, most of the interest has been polemical in one of two directions. In one...
Mathieu Majal Désubas – A Young Huguenot Martyr Huguenots in 18th-century France were well-aware of the dangers they faced by attending Protestant services. Many had been Protestants since birth, children or grandchildren of a generation that had enjoyed some freedoms allowed by the 1598 Edict of...
Nothing but the sight of death impresses on us so viscerally a sense of finality. As Christians, we are comforted by faith in the resurrection and the life to come, but death nevertheless strikes our limited and sin-affected minds with definitiveness. Do we think of our being made holy in Christ as...
Justification is not the gospel in its entirety. It was not enough for God to only justify us in Christ. He has also insisted on adopting us in Christ: “In love he predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ,…” (Eph. 1:5). The final purpose of divine election has always been...
Our English term conversion is not often used in our translations of the Bible. But lest we commit a word-concept fallacy, we should not conclude from this that the concept captured by our term conversion is infrequently found in Scripture. Far from it. Peter in his sermon recorded in Acts 3...
Jacques Lefèvre D’Etaples – An Early French Reformer The life of Jacques Lefèvre D’Etaples ran almost parallel to that of Martin Luther. Born around 1455 (28 years before Luther), Lefèvre died in 1536, when Luther was still teaching, preaching, and establishing churches. In 1512, when Luther...
Visitors to Geneva, Switzerland, will find at the heart of the Parc des Bastions – the largest historical park in the city center - an impressive monument with giant statues of the main protagonists of the Geneva Reformation: John Calvin, William Farel, Theodore Beza and John Knox (better known for...
Historic testimony to Luther is grand. Not only have many of his letters, books, tracts, and sermons survived, but so have his table talks. Table Talk is a collection of Luther’s sayings amongst his friends. Thankfully, they have been preserved for our benefit. There we see glimpses of the real...
It’s a common objection to the doctrine of particular redeeming grace: What about free will? With a free will can’t we desire God, and decide to follow him on our own initiative? But that argument begs the question; what needs to be proven is merely assumed. We need to know what Scripture teaches...
Elisabeth Cruciger – The First Lutheran Female Hymnwriter Elisabeth Cruciger is considered the first Lutheran female hymnwriter. Born around 1500 as Elisabeth von Mezerite to a noble family in Pomerania (a region in today’s Poland), she entered as a child the cloister at Marienbush Abbey, near...