PRTJ Vol 55 Issue 02

Is Jesus Truly God? How the Bible Teaches the Divinity of Christ, by Greg Lanier. Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2020. Pp. 144. $16.99 (softcov­er). ISBN: 978-1433568404. [Reviewed by Marco Barone] When we study the incarnation of the Word, we approach the mys­tery of mysteries, looking into the unfathomable abyss of Jehovah’s mightiest miracle: the second person of the Godhead assumed the human nature and became a true man, like us in all things but sin, for our salvation. Such a wonderful event requires an explanation within the boundaries of Scripture’s claims and of what can be deduced from Scripture by good...

Reformation Anglican Worship: Experiencing Grace, Expressing Gratitude, by Michael P. Jensen. Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2021. Pp. 190. $35.00 (hardcover). ISBN: 978-1433572975. [Reviewed by David J. Engelsma] To the Reformed believer, the Anglican Church is an anomaly. In relation to the Roman Catholic Church, on the one hand, and to the Reformed Church, on the other hand, it is neither fish nor fowl. I refer not to the contemporary worship of the largely apostate modern Church of England, which has embraced praise bands, which occasion­ally features a female preacher, and whose sermons comment, utterly mistakenly, on world events (as once I...

The Covenant Theology of Jonathan Edwards: Law, Gospel, and Evangelical Obedience, by Paul J. Hoehner. Eugene, OR: Pickwick Publications, 2021. Pp. xxxii + 330. $42.00 (softcover). ISBN: 978- 1725281578. [Reviewed by David J. Engelsma] The reader of this journal will readily understand that this volume leaped off the book table into this reviewer’s hands and clamored to be reviewed in the journal to which he is permitted access. The publisher did not send a copy for review. But the reviewer became aware of the book at a Puritan conference. He bought it. It is not the theology of Jonathan Edwards...

A Beginner’s Guide to New Testament Studies: Understanding Key Debates, by Nijay K. Gupta. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2020. Pp. 196. $24.99 (softcover). ISBN: 978-0810097575. [Reviewed by Douglas J. Kuiper] Nijay Gupta, professor of New Testament at Portland Seminary, presents a beginner’s guide to New Testament studies. Emphatically, this is a beginner’s guide: “This textbook aims to aid the uninitiated in understanding, in a simple way, some of the most important and hotly debated issues in academic study of the New Testament” (xi). And: “It is written for relative newcomers to the world of New Testament studies, not experts”...

Zwingli: God’s Armed Prophet, by Bruce Gordon. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2021. Pp xvii + 349. $32.50 (hardcover). ISBN: 978-0300235975. [Reviewed by Douglas J. Kuiper] Biographies of Martin Luther and John Calvin abound. Of the reformer Huldrych (Ulrich) Zwingli (1484-1531) they do not. Another English biography of Zwingli is always welcome. Besides, Zwingli’s significance cannot be overstated. Although he began to understand the true gospel about the same time as Luther, Zwingli did so com­pletely independent of Luther. And in some respects he went further than Luther: “Nothing in Luther’s reforms matched the zeal with which the worship...

Amillennialism, by William Bunting and David McAllister. Northern Ireland: Assembly Testimony, 2020. Available free at assemblytestimony. org. Pp. vi + 138. N.p. (softcover). [Reviewed by David J. Engelsma] Out of Northern Ireland, especially of late, has flowed an abun­dance of witness to the truth of the gospel, including the future fulfill­ment of the gospel in the (one) coming of Jesus Christ. Out of Northern Ireland has also come Amillennialism, a short book perpetuating and defending the heresy of premillennial dispensationalism. The value of the book for the Reformed reader is that it sets forth the full theology of dispensationalism in...

Seeing God: The Beatific Vision in Christian Tradition, by Hans Boersma. Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 2018. Pp. 487. $55.55 (hardcover). ISBN: 978-0802880192. [Reviewed by Marco Barone]   Introduction This book by Hans Boersma (Anglo-Catholic professor of the­ology at Nashotah House, an Anglo-Catholic Seminary in Nashotah, Wisconsin), is both a dogmatic elaboration and an historical account of the doctrine of the beatific vision, that is, the meaning of the biblical statements that the saints will see God (e.g., Matt. 5:8). The Introduc­tion ably summarizes the conclusion of the author’s investigation: The beatific vision is a vision of God’s very...

Grounded in Heaven: Recentering Christian Hope and Life on God, by Michael Allen. Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 2018. Pp. 186. $18.00 (softcover). ISBN: 978-0802874535. [Reviewed by Marco Barone] This book attempts to refocus Christian eschatology and ethics “upon communion with God, or the beatific vision (the classical im­age of the eschatological presence of the Almighty)” (8). This goal is unintelligible without mentioning first a tendency that Allen calls “eschatological naturalism.” Allen’s introduction indicates that this theological tendency is primarily represented by the Neo-Calvinist and Kuyperian heritage, with Abraham Kuyper and Herman Bavinck as their most famous exponents. The...

What is the nature of true preaching? For now, the question is not, What is the content of true preaching? The content of true preaching is the gospel. That man has not truly preached who has not set forth the gospel. The following article will develop that point more fully. The question now is, What is the nature of the preaching of the gospel? The question is relevant. For one thing, every week God’s people sit under the preaching of the gospel. What is it under which we sit? And why do we do sit under it? Second, the question...

In October 2021 the faculty of the Protestant Reformed Theological Seminary presented a conference on the doctrine of preaching. That the conference treated the doctrine of preaching means that it did not touch on matters of style and delivery, but rather on the nature and content of the preaching, as set forth in Scripture and the Reformed confessions. The four main articles in this issue of the Protestant Reformed Theological Journal contain the written version of those speeches. The first article underscores that the preaching of the gospel, by one who is properly called to that work, is the voice...