Reformed Forum

Lane G. Tipton provides the biblical warrant for a transtestamental gospel that understands the organic unity of the Old and New Testaments. Tipton contributed a chapter to the recent Confident of Better Things: Essays Commemorating Seventy-Five Years of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church. Dr. Tipton is also the co-editor of Revelation and Reason: New Essays in Reformed Apologetics and Resurrection and Eschatology: Theology in Service of the Church: Essays in Honor of Richard B. Gaffin, Jr.

Participants: Camden Bucey, James Dolezal, Jeff Waddington, Lane G. Tipton

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Recent trends in evangelical theology have called into question the traditional understanding of God’s being. For centuries, theologians have maintained that God is immutable and simple, that is, not composed of parts. Yet many recent philosophers of religion have found the doctrine to be untenable. Dr. James Dolezal argues for the importance of retaining divine simplicity while he discusses his dissertation in this fascinating look at the classic doctrine.

Participants: Camden Bucey, James Dolezal, Jeff Waddington

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Christ the Center 1000

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Christ the Center 1000 Live in Austin, TX

Christ the Center 1000 Summit

The Orthodox Presbyterian Church was formed in 1936 out of the modernist-fundamentalist controversy at a time when figures such as J. Gresham Machen were struggling with liberal influences at Princeton Seminary and the mainline Presbyterian Church. Much has been written on those early years, but a significant gap in the history persisted until recently. For the OPC’s 75th anniversary, the Committee for the Historian has commissioned two books. The first is a collection of essays edited by John R. Muether and Danny E. Olinger titled Confident of Better Things. The second is Between the Times: The Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Transition 1945-1990 written by Darryl. G. Hart. Hart’s book wonderfully chronicles the OPC during the transition beyond the first generation as the young Reformed denomination sought to find its identity in a changing evangelical world. Today Dr. Hart visits Christ the Center to speak about this important period in American Presbyterianism.

Participants: Camden Bucey, Darryl G. Hart, Jim Cassidy

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Christ the Center 1000

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Nancy Guthrie comes on to talk about her upcoming book from Crossway, The Promised One: Seeing Jesus in Genesis. This is the first in a series titled “Seeing Jesus in the Old Testament: A 10-week Bible Study.” Nancy is the author of a number of books on the subject of Christ in the Old Testament including The One Year Book of Discovering Jesus in the Old Testament. Nancy is a well-known speaker on this topic as well as the topic of losing a child. Nancy and her husband David have ministered to countless couples who have gone through what she and David have gone through, and continue to provide resources through retreats and her autobiographical books on the subject such as Holding Onto Hope: A Pathway Through Suffering to the Heart of God.

Participants: Camden Bucey, Jared Oliphint, Nancy Guthrie

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Christ the Center 1000

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Christ the Center 1000 Live in Austin, TX

Christ the Center 1000 Summit

The Christ the Center panel had the privilege of interviewing Rev. Dr. Robert Davis Smart, senior minister of Christ Church (PCA) in Bloomington, IL, and author of the recently released Jonathan Edwards’s Apologetic for the Great Awakening. This is an excellent study of Edwards’s moderate defense of the First Great Awakening over against the criticisms of the “Old Brick” and future quasi-Unitarian Charles Chauncy. Smart points out that the big question was: Was the awakening a work of the Holy Spirit? Dr. Smart also discusses the relevance of Edwards and revival for today.

Participants: Camden Bucey, Jeff Waddington, Robert Davis Smart

Mentioned in this episode:

Christ the Center 1000

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Christ the Center 1000 Live in Austin, TX

Christ the Center 1000 Summit

Dr. Craig Biehl shares his work on Jonathan Edwards’ views pertaining to Christ’s merit. Biehl’s dissertation has been published as a book titled The Infinite Merit of Christ: The Glory of Christ’s Obedience in the Theology of Jonathan Edwards. Biehl and Jeff Waddington speak of the current state of Edwards scholarship and the need for a thorough analysis of Edwards own writings as opposed to studies treating primarily the secondary literature. What a thorough-going study yields is Edwards’s covenant theology and rich understanding of Christ’s work for his people. As an added bonus toward the end of the episode, Dr. Biehl discusses a short booklet titled What’s in the Box?: The Unreasonable Faith of Atheism and Agnosticism.

Participants: Camden Bucey, Craig Biehl, Jeff Waddington, Jim Cassidy

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Christ the Center 1000 Live in Austin, TX

Christ the Center 1000 Summit

Christ the Center 1000

Christ the Center 1000 Summit

Dr. William Dennison discusses transformational eschatology and Christian higher education. Dr. Dennison’s has written two articles that become the subject of discussion. In The Christian Academy: Antithesis, Common Grace, and Plato’s View of the Soul, Dennison uses Plato’s view of the soul as a test case in the need for a fully biblical approach to higher education, and in Dutch Neo-Calvinism and the Roots for Transformation: An Introductory Essay Dennison provides a helpful introduction into the roots and early history of Dutch neo-Calvinism. Dr. Dennison is Professor of Interdisciplinary Studies at Covenant College in Lookout Mountain, GA and Professor of Apologetics and Systematic Theology at Northwest Theological Seminary in Lynnwood, WA. Dennison is the author of The Young Bultmann: Context for His Understanding of God, 1884-1925.

Participants: Bill Dennison, Camden Bucey, Jeff Waddington, Jim Cassidy

Mentioned in this episode:

Christ the Center 1000

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Christ the Center 1000 Live in Austin, TX

Christ the Center 1000 Summit

Dr. David Skeel, professor of corporate law at UPenn, discusses Christians in legal studies in addition to the ethics of bankruptcy. David Skeel is the S. Samuel Arsht Professor of Corporate Law at University of Pennsylvania Law School and the author of The New Financial Deal: Understanding the Dodd-Frank Act and Its (Unintended) Consequences (Wiley, 2010), Icarus in the Boardroom (Oxford, 2005), and Debt’s Dominion: A History of Bankruptcy Law in America (Princeton, 2001), as well as numerous articles and other publications. He has been interviewed on The News Hour, Nightline, Chris Matthews’ Hardball (MSNBC), National Public Radio, and Marketplace, among others, and has been quoted in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post and other newspapers and magazines. Skeel has twice received the Harvey Levin award for outstanding teaching, as selected by a vote of the graduating class, and has also received the University’s Lindback Award for distinguished teaching. In addition to bankruptcy and corporate law, Skeel also writes on sovereign debt, Christianity and law, and poetry and the law, and is an elder at Tenth Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia.

Participants: Camden Bucey, David Skeel, James Sweet

Mentioned in this episode:

Christ the Center 1000

Christ the Center 1000 Summit

Christ the Center 1000 Live in Austin, TX

Christ the Center 1000 Summit

Sean Michael Lucas, senior pastor of First Presbyterian Church in Hattiesburg, MS, speaks about his book Robert Lewis Dabney: A Southern Presbyterian Life. Dr. Lucas also previously taught church history and served as academic dean at Covenant Theological Seminary.

Participants: Camden Bucey, Jeff Waddington, Nick Batzig, Paul Maxwell, Sean Michael Lucas

Mentioned in this episode:

Christ the Center 1000

Christ the Center 1000 Summit

Christ the Center 1000 Live in Austin, TX

Christ the Center 1000 Summit

Jeff Waddington, Jim Cassidy, and Camden Bucey continue their discussion of adoption from the Philadelphia Conference on Reformed Theology. In this episode, the panel talks about John 1:12-13 and the right to become children of God. The conference, held annually at Tenth Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia, PA, is organized by the Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals.

Participants: Camden Bucey, Jeff Waddington, Jim Cassidy

Mentioned in this episode:

Christ the Center 1000 Live in Austin, TX

Christ the Center 1000 Summit

Christ the Center 1000

Christ the Center 1000 Summit