We need to be convictional and civil in everything we say and write and Tweet both inside the church and out in the Public Square.

When the lockdowns and stay at home orders first started to impact the large group gatherings of local churches, the conversation very quickly moved to matters of loyalty and legality.

As a new faith in a hostile world the early disciples had many run-ins with the law and there is much that we can learn from their example. Chief among those gleanings would be the following 5 observations.

Controversy sharpens the mind. The church didn’t clarify the doctrine of the Trinity until its substance was being challenged and denied. The same could be said with respect to the doctrine of Christ and later with the doctrine of Scripture. The same may be said today with respect to the doctrine of civil authority.

The terms in this passage could not be any clearer: God commands his people to be subject to the governing authorities. To resist those authorities is to resist God.

I want to go deeper, I want to feel the refinement of my character, I want to see and savour the person of Jesus Christ as taught and revealed and celebrated in the length and breadth of Scripture. And that was a struggle for me this year – as I imagine it was for many others.

In 2020 we found ourselves thinking and talking about a variety of things that we hadn’t thought or talked about a great deal in the past: What is sphere Sovereignty? Under what conditions may I defy the civil magistrate? Should I wear a cloth mask? Am I being groomed for future totalitarian overtures? I don’t recall any of those things being dealt with in my seminary curriculum and yet I found myself giving pastoral counsel on all of those things over the course of this most unusual year. …

These are difficult times and we are processing new situations and crises. Let’s resolve to extend grace and mercy to those who arrive at different conclusions about the factors involved in these various decisions.

A time may come when Christians in North America will need to be prepared to pay a price for their principled disobedience to the state – but is now that time?

The message of Hosea is a hard one for us to wrap our heads around. God is saying that because of their long and stubborn persistence in sin, he is resolved to punish them severely – though not finally. He will undertake a drastic pruning – but not so as to END Israel, but actually, so as to save them.

The message of Hosea is a hard one for us to wrap our heads around. God is saying that because of their long and stubborn persistence in sin, he is resolved to punish them severely – though not finally. He will undertake a drastic pruning – but not so as to END Israel, but actually, so as to save them.

The message of Hosea is a hard one for us to wrap our heads around. God is saying that because of their long and stubborn persistence in sin, he is resolved to punish them severely – though not finally. He will undertake a drastic pruning – but not so as to END Israel, but actually, so as to save them.