…to support his kids’ school! And since it’s also my kids’ school, I share that same goal.

Just like last year, The Cambridge School is having a super-raffle. No macrame plant-holders or peanut-butter-coconut cream pies here; this raffle has 50 prizes, ranging from $100 all the way up to a 3-year lease on a BMW 528i. Accordingly, tickets are $25 each. To sweeten the pot, the raffle imposed a cap of 5000 tickets, so each ticket has a 1/100 chance of winning some prize, and if fewer tickets are sold, then the chances of winning are commensurately better.

The early-bird drawing has already occurred (Nov 6), and the grand prize drawing is coming up fast (Dec 5), and coming up even faster is the deadline for purchasing tickets: 4pm (Pacific), Dec 2. It is possible to print out a form, and fax it with a credit card number for instant purchase; or you still have a day or two to mail a check and have it arrive on time.

So please help out a good cause and buy a ticket or four. I wish you good luck providence!

But triadalism is actually the key to two-kingdom theology:

So we don’t work with only two categories: sacred and evil. There’s a third one: common. In this respect, the believer’s sphere of activity overlaps with that of his or her non-Christian neighbors. They share common blessings and common woes. Yet the holy nation that Christ is creating by his Word and Spirit is a remnant from all cultures, across all times and places. It is holy, not common, because it is claimed by God as the cherished object of his saving grace. Through his gospel, signified and sealed to us and to our children in baptism, the covenant community is that holy commonwealth that began with the announcement to our first parents after they had sinned.

Enjoying God’s creation is common. In its commonness, it is a remarkable testimony to God’s goodness, power, and other invisible attributes, as Paul tells us in Romans 1 and 2. However, hearing God’s gospel is holy and hearing and receiving it makes us holy, as Paul says in Romans 3 (and chapter 10). A great concert may witness to God’s glory in human creativity, but God delivers his saving Word in the covenant assembly. God is omnipresent and his creative power is evident through everything that he has made. However, the question for sinners is where God has promised to be present in grace and mercy.

God still separates one holy day out of six common ones. God still separates specific activities: preaching of the Word, public prayer, confession and declaration of pardon, administration of baptism and the Supper, singing the Word of Christ, and the fellowship of saints, from the common activities of work, friendships, and entertainment. So all of life is indeed blessed and upheld by God’s common grace, but there remains a distinction between the common and the holy; common grace and saving grace; that which is honorable, God-glorifying, and helpful to our neighbors and that which is redemptive.

Whoa! I step away from the interwebs for just a week (to prepare for this), and something happens!  In trying to catch up, an observation occurred to me that I didn’t see in Clark’s or Hart’s re-responses, so I wanted to post it before somebody else does.  (I also wanted to claim this post-title before anyone else — I can’t fathom how Clark failed to capitalize on the term “hit-job”; but I have to admit Hart has won the catchy-title-contest hands-down!)

Like many, I am shocked that Frame would jump to Osteen’s defense:

when Osteen presents a message that almost entirely lacks a focus on justification, Horton replies with an emphasis entirely lacking in sanctification.

In this quote, and the rest of his remarks about Horton v. Osteen, Frame reminds me of the father of the bride from Holy Grail: “Let’s not bicker and argue about who killed who…” Osteen is weak on Justification, Horton is weak on Sactification (Frame claims), but if Horton were just not so devoted to bickering and arguing, maybe Horton and Osteen could team up; Horton would bring his Justification, and Osteen would bring his Sanctification, and wouldn’t everything be rosy!

Setting aside the unwarranted accusation that Horton cares nothing for sanctification, Horton’s point (which Frame seems to miss or discredit) is that Osteen’s attempt to bring Sanctification, without a foundation of Justification is precisely works-righteousness!  So if Osteen is lacking justification, he’s also lacking sanctification.  There’s nothing excusable or half-right about that, and Horton is right to lock and load Gal 1:6-9 and set sights on Osteen.

My opinion of Frame has fallen another notch.

Mike Horton explains why “semper reformanda” has much more in common with modernity than Protestantism:

Nevertheless, Reformed churches belong to a particular Christian tradition with its own definitions of its faith and practice. We believe that our confessions and catechisms faithfully represent the system of doctrine found in Holy Scripture. We believe that to be Reformed is not only to be biblical; to be biblical is to be Reformed. As important as it is to keep “Reformed” in the phrase, an even more dangerous omission is often found among more liberal Protestants who also leave out the “according to the Word of God” clause. And usually it is “always reforming,” instead of “always being reformed.” In this view, the church is the active party, determining its own doctrine, worship, and discipline in the light of ever-changing cultural contexts. Progressivism becomes an end in itself and the church becomes a mirror of the world.

Does the WHI redesign seem to anybody else to be a little, um, transformational? And with the latest episode right up there titled “The Narcissism Epidemic”, the whole page almost looks like a self-parody.

[Update: 9/18] I talked to Horton last week, and when I asked him about it, he said, “Oh that, yeah, that’s gone now.” And indeed, the White Horse Inn has switched to the kinder, gentler image below:

Accompanying the image is a more finely nuanced paragraph, which explains better what they were getting at with the “we are a movement” thing:

We believe that many Christians today are malnourished and misled, due at least in part to the fascination with cultural fads and doctrinal indifference. We hope to enlarge the demand for faithful churches by provoking many Christians to rethink their captivity to a faith and practice distorted by the culture of marketing, consumerism, therapy, and moralism. In short, we want to see a second Reformation, and you can play a big role in this cause!

Ahhh, that’s better!

Yeah, Michael Horton came to this town.

Michael Horton spoke about his book, Christless Christianity at a local bookstore (the publisher’s store) and took questions from the audience.

I was there. So was Zrim. We sat together. No, neither of us asked him a question.

I entered a drawing and won second prize: a copy of Christless Christianity. I knew I had it in me. Zrim was jealous and tried to steal it from me.

Then I hung around to quickly say hi to the Hort. Here’s what happened: I shook his hand and then proceeded to say about a hundred different things. I spoke a mile a minute. I don’t even remember everything, it was mostly just me name-dropping and blabbering like: “hey I know this person you know so lets talk about how cool I am for knowing them and how much we have in common because we’re in the same denomination and how long I’ve been listening to you and reading you and that thing you said at that one conference was so spot-on and my favorite book of yours is…blah blah blah blah blah!”

I said a hundred things, he said a couple of things. I walked away immediately thinking, “what on earth did I just do?”

But Michael Horton is a class act and he was very gracious. Maybe he didn’t even noticed how ratcheted up I was.

I know you folks who go to church with him or study under him think that this story is rather silly and that I had no reason to get flustered. You’re probably right. In fact, I know you’re right. But Michael Horton is truly a theological giant and I get nervous around giants the first time I meet them.

My grandkids are going to tell the story about how their grand-pops flubbed up his first meeting with the Michael Horton. Although, by the time the story gets to my grandkids it will probably be that I tripped him, fell on him, and accidentally stabbed him with my pencil. So be it. I have a Horton story.

Come to think of it, my grandkids will probably also tell everyone that I blogged with Steve Zrimec.