Dogmatic Elder Reading

Posted by Pat Abendroth on 09/08/2010

How is that for a title that can be taken the wrong way? It is for impact alone, I assure you. Read on and see.

About seventeen years ago, I was assigned Louis Berkhof’s classic Systematic Theology as a textbook at Master’s Seminary. It was like getting reacquainted with a long lost friend last month when the elders of Omaha Bible Church began reading this same classic work. We are three or so meetings into our discussions and reflections which have been tremendous times together. I share this so you can know what we are reading this year (and likely next!) and so that you can pray for our maturity in Christ as we learn from one of his gifted teachers.

Here is a semi-random, but excellent sampling of Berkhof’s ability to think clearly about culture and Christianity:

“Every Church has its dogmas. Even the Churches that are constantly decrying dogmas have them in effect. When they say that they want a Christianity without dogma, they are by that very statement declaring a dogma. They all have certain definite convictions in religious matters, and also ascribe to them a certain authority, though they do not always formulate them officially and acknowledge them candidly. . . . A Church without dogmas would be a silent Church, and this is a contradiction in terms. A silent witness would be no witness at all, and would never convince anyone” Louis Berkhof, Introductory Volume to Systematic Theology in the new combined edition of Systematic Theology), 31.

- Pat Abendroth

God, the Gospel and Glenn Beck

Posted by Pat Abendroth on 09/01/2010

When American Evangelicals forget the gospel, bad things happen. Bad things like swooning to be led in spiritual revival by someone whose religion is patently antichristian.

Russell Moore of Southern Seminary posted an important response to this event that is worth reading. You can find it here.

http://www.russellmoore.com/2010/08/29/god-the-gospel-and-glenn-beck/

Pat Abendroth

How Easily We Confuse Law and Gospel

Posted by Pat Abendroth on 08/13/2010

“There cannot be a greater difference in the world between two things than there is between law and grace. And yet, strange to say, while the things are diametrically opposed and essentially different from each other, the human mind is so depraved, and the intellect, even when blessed by the Spirit, has become so turned aside from right judgment, that one of the most difficult things in the world is to discriminate properly between law and grace. He who knows the difference, and always recollects it—the essential difference between law and grace—has grasped the marrow of divinity. He is not far from understanding the gospel theme in all its ramifications, its outlets, and its branches, who can properly tell the difference between law and grace. There is always in a science some part which is very simple and easy when we have learned it, but which, in the commencement, stands like a high threshold before the porch. Now, the first difficulty in striving to learn the gospel is this. Between law and grace there is a difference plain enough to every Christian, and especially to every enlightened and instructed one; but still, when most enlightened and instructed, there is always a tendency in us to confound the two things. They are as opposite as light and darkness, and can no more agree than fire and water; yet man will be perpetually striving to make a compound of them—often ignorantly, and sometimes willfully. They seek to blend the two, when God has positively put them asunder” - Charles Spurgeon.

- Pat Abendroth

Moving Toward Independence!

Posted by Pat Abendroth on 08/11/2010

Earlier this month we announced that the South Campus of Omaha Bible Church will become an independent local church by September of 2012. Rather than being thought of as a campus of Omaha Bible Church, from this point forward our South Campus location will now be a church plant, for the most part functioning independently of Omaha Bible Church, yet still having financial and leadership ties.

This is a unanimous decision by the Elders, that included the leadership of both North and South Campus locations. It is exciting news and is a great work of our God who enabled a ministry committed to the centrality of Jesus Christ and his gospel proclaimed through the expository preaching of God's Word to happen through the prayers, hard work and dedication to the ministry by many in the Omaha Bible Church family. God has blessed the ministry at South Campus in a wonderful and gracious way over the past two years, providing spiritual leadership and financial viability, so it seems that in the providence of our God the time is right to pursue this new direction.

- Pat Abendroth

Saying "Amen" to Dorothy Sayers

Posted by Pat Abendroth on 08/06/2010 | 1 Replies

“We are constantly assured that the churches are empty because preachers insist too much upon doctrine — ‘dull dogma,’ as people call it. The fact is the precise opposite. It is the neglect of dogma that makes for dullness. The Christian faith is the most exciting drama that ever staggered the imagination of man — and the dogma is the drama. . . . This is the dogma we find so dull — this terrifying drama which God is the victim and the hero. If this is dull, then what, in Heaven’s name, is worthy to be called exciting? The people who hanged Christ never, to do them justice, accused Him of being a bore — on the contrary; they thought Him too dynamic to be safe. It has been left for later generations to muffle up that shattering personality and surround Him with an atmosphere of tedium. We have very efficiently pared the claws of the Lion of Judah, certifying Him ‘meek and mild,’ and recommended Him as a fitting household pet for pale curates and pious old ladies.”

Quote of Dorothy Sayers, by Michael Horton in The Gospel-Driven Life (Grand Rapids, Mi.; Baker Books, 2009), 63-64.