Blog - Page 158 of 318 - John H Armstrong

A Way of Looking at My Concern for Unity Among Christians

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:19:04-05:00April 8th, 2010|Categories: Justification and the New Perspective, Reformed Christianity, Roman Catholicism, The Church, Unity of the Church|

A friend wrote an email to me recently that expressed his continued thinking about the practical implications of my call to church unity. He wrote: “As it relates to doctrine, I thought about my concern for growth of character. I think that those in the Protestant camp struggled so much about the issue of good works. As I develop experience working with kids and parenting, I have come more and more to the realization of the importance of character formation.”

That is a profoundly helpful insight. So many evangelicals have forgotten that salvation is not about affirming a few solas but rather about trusting Christ in such a way that character formation becomes basic, even instinctive. My friend went on to write:

“Some Protestants focus so much on proclaiming that we are justified by the appropriation of Christ's death on the cross through faith that they are reactive against any suggestion that we need to mature in our character (sanctification). But the Scriptures seem to point to the importance of the fruit of the spirit. My point […]

Where is the Fault Line in Sports and the Church?

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:19:05-05:00April 7th, 2010|Categories: Baseball, Pastoral Renewal, The Church|

I read Sports Illustrated for several reasons. One is, of course, my love of sports. But there are a lot of magazines and papers that cover sports. Few do it with the journalistic excellence of Sports Illustrated. The March 29 issue brought this out in a remarkable way, with a fantastic story (“True Confessions”) written by one of the best sport’s writers of my lifetime, Frank Deford. I may say more about this article at some other point but today I want to comment on Joe Posnanski’s piece: “The Fault Line of Pro Sports.” Posnanski writes: “We live in a time when sports public apologies are judged more or less in the same way we judge figure skating performances. Did he sound sincere? How was the choreography? The artistic interpretation? Did he complete all the technical elements?”

Posnanski is writing, not about Tiger Woods as you might expect, bur rather about Texas Rangers manager Ron Washington, who recently admitted […]

Katyn

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:19:07-05:00April 6th, 2010|Categories: Film, History|

I frequently think about the history of Poland. It is a nation with immense pride and a people who have known incredible hardship, hardship beyond belief at times. Sadly, the only thing I knew about Poland, at least until I was a little older, were the crazy Polish jokes that circulate routinely. My guess is that Poles themselves tell jokes simply because it is a coping mechanism for all the suffering these people have known.

As everyone who looks at a map should know Poland is bordered by Germany on one side and the former Soviet Union on the other. This made Poland the center piece in the political chess game of World War II. The Germans came from the West and the Russians from the East. And as soon as the Germans were driven out the Russians began there oppression of the Poles which led to another four and a half decades of misery until the events of 1989. These events were brought about by a confluence of actions but none was more important than the […]

Burning the Future: What Do You Know About Coal in America?

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:19:07-05:00April 5th, 2010|Categories: Environmentalism, Film|

I have frequently noted that documentary films are almost always biased. This does not mean they are worthless, not in the least. It just means they take a stance, in advance of the making of the film, and then pursue demonstrating the rightness of that stance through the medium of film. This is not true of all documentary films but it is clearly true of most.

This is surely the case in Burning the Future: Coal in America (2008). Coal provides half of the electricity in the United States. This is fact. But how is this coal extracted from the ground and at what cost to people, nature and the environment? In the 2008 presidential campaign we heard both candidates talk a lot about “clean coal.” What is that? Most of us, I would guess, know next to nothing about coal and how it is used.

Consider, for starters, that 36% of […]

Easter Sunday

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:19:07-05:00April 4th, 2010|Categories: Christ/Christology, Church History, Church Tradition, Jesus, The Church|

The name Easter has been problematic for some Christians, especially over the last two hundreds years or so. No orthodox Christian denies the importance of the day, that is the celebration of Christ’s resurrection from the grave. Some think the event should be celebrated each Sunday, noting correctly that the very fact that we worship on Sunday is related to the first day of the week and Christ’s victory over sin and the grave. But should we celebrate one day as Easter?

The term Easter comes from the Germanic root “dawn” and came into Anglo-Saxon, perhaps, by way of reference to the spring and the goddess of the spring. This, in itself, is not a reason to reject the celebration at all, since it clearly pre-dates the Germanic root. But this has caused some Christians to quibble more than a little about Easter.

The point is not about the word but rather about the celebration of the greatest mystery […]

Holy Saturday

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:19:07-05:00April 3rd, 2010|Categories: Church History, Church Tradition, Jesus, Spirituality, The Church|

Holy Saturday is the one day, and the last in the Easter Triduum, that is least understood by Protestants. Growing up in a non-liturgical background I paid some attention to Good Friday, and a lot more to Easter Sunday, but Saturday seemed like a big hole in the whole week, a hole that was left unfilled until Sunday morning. That is no longer the case for me once I began to understand and study the occasion of Holy Saturday about ten years ago.

Holy Saturday commemorates Jesus’ burial, which of course is specifically mentioned in the creed as a part of the mystery of our salvation. This is also the day where the phrase “he descended into hell” is mentioned. The only liturgical service in Catholicism is the liturgy of the hours, though from the fifth century on daytime masses have been held. The Easter Vigil, as this day developed over time, became the evening service which prepared the church […]

Good Friday

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:19:07-05:00April 2nd, 2010|Categories: Church History, Church Tradition, Jesus, Spirituality, The Church|

Even the most non-liturgical Christians tend to recognize this day, Good Friday, as a special day. Some independent groups will do everything within their power to ignore it but even the big non-denominational churches will often celebrate Good Friday and Easter. I do find it more than curious that they pick and choose the days they want to celebrate and say the rest is neither important nor beneficial. This underscores, again, the radical anti-traditional nature of some evangelical Christianity. I grew up in this kind of faith but long ago began a journey away from it to where I now enter into Holy Week with great solemnity and deep joy. It has made a significant difference in my life I assure you.

The celebration of our Lord’s passion on the cross is held in the afternoon of this day, Good Friday. The common texts used for this occasion are Isaiah 52:13–53:12, Hebrews 4:14–16, and Hebrews 5:7–9, as well […]

Holy Thursday

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:19:07-05:00April 1st, 2010|Categories: Church History, Church Tradition, Jesus, Sacraments, Spirituality, The Church|

Today is Holy Thursday, or Maundy Thursday. Historically the liturgies of Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday of Holy Week do not differ much at all but today the week changes. Liturgically, Lent ends with the Eucharist on this day. This day is the first day of what has been called the Easter Triduum, the three-day period which solemnly celebrates the greatest mysteries of the faith—Jesus’ passion, death and resurrection. Many churches will commemorate Jesus institution of the Last Supper with his disciples this evening. This was, all agree, the point in history where Jesus instituted the meal that almost all Christians still remember him by regardless of what they call it, how they understand it, or how frequently they celebrate it. The readings associated with this day are understandable: 1 Corinthians 11:23–26 and John 13:1–15. My own tradition includes the washing of feet in the service of the evening. I had never participated in this until about five years ago and I have come […]

Lent: A Time for Conversion and Preparation

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:19:08-05:00March 31st, 2010|Categories: American Evangelicalism, Church History, Church Tradition, Lordship of Christ, Spirituality, The Church|

From the beginning it seems that Lent was a time for penitence. This word penitence troubles some evangelicals because they are reminded of the errors and bad teaching of the sixteenth century Catholic opponents of the Reformers. But the word penitence comes from the Latin word paenitentia, which referred to an attitude of repentance. Repentance, from the Greek word metanoia in the New Testament, meant to change one’s mind and thus the direction of one’s life. Very early in the development of dogma the practice of penitence did not have the idea of something that we could do to earn our salvation by doing works of penance. Modern Catholicism does not teach penance in this way either, even though it still clearly retains the idea that penance is a sacrament, known as the sacrament of reconciliation.

Some years ago I heard my friend Scott Hahn give two lectures in a Saturday seminar in a local Catholic parish in the […]

Lent and the Development of the Catechumenate

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:19:08-05:00March 30th, 2010|Categories: Church History, Church Tradition, Sacraments, The Church|

I sometimes am drawn into discussion about immediate baptism. Based on several accounts we have in the New Testament some Christians believe that as soon as a person professes faith in Jesus Christ they should be immediately baptized. Some traditions even insist that this be done so that a person who has believed will be sealed with the baptismal water and truly saved lest they die without baptism and perish. I still recall a dialogue with some evangelicals, in my childhood, who insisted that this had to be true since they had been taught what amounted to “baptismal regeneration.” Without water baptism a convert was in peril.

A story went around when I was a boy about a man who walked forward in such a church one Sunday to accept Jesus as his Savior. There had been an unusual freeze in that part of Texas and the baptismal pool had no water. He was told he would be baptized the next Sunday. That afternoon he […]