At the heart of Reformed Theology, at the heart of Luther and Calvin’s struggle, and in Knox and Jonathan Edwards, were men who were awakened to the greatness, to the majesty, to the holiness, and the sovereignty of God. By contemplating the holiness and sovereignty of God, they were driven to develop their doctrines of the grace of God. Because until you meet a God who is holy and is sovereign, you don’t know what grace means. I don’t think we are ever going to see a healthy evangelical church until the evangelical church is solidly Reformed, where it takes biblical Christianity seriously with a right concept of a sovereign God.

Continue reading this quote by R. C. Sproul - from his series “A Blueprint for Thinking.”

“The amount of misrepresentation to which Calvin’s theology has been subjected is enough to prove his doctrine of total depravity several times over.”

J. I. Packer, “John Calvin and Reformed Europe,” in Packer, Honouring the People of God, p. 19.
(HT)

John Piper for the last year or so has been studying and writing a defence of the doctrine of justification as a response to N. T. Wright and objection to the New Perspective on Paul.  Dr. Piper just posted an excerpt from the conclusion of his book “The Future of Justification“, which will be relased this November:

Our only hope for living the radical demands of the Christian life is that God is totally for us now and forever. Therefore, God has not ordained that living the Christian life should be the basis of our hope that God is for us. That basis is the death and righteousness of Christ, counted as ours through faith alone. All the punishment required of us because of our sin, Christ endured for us on the cross. And all the obedience that God required of us, that he, as our Father, might be completely for us and not against us forever, Christ has performed for us in his perfect obedience to God.

This punishment and this obedience (not all obedience) is completed and past. It can never change. Our union with Christ and the enjoyment of these benefits is secure forever. Through faith alone, God establishes our union with Christ. This union will never fail, because in Christ, God is for us as an omnipotent Father who sustains our faith and works all things together for our everlasting good. The one and only instrument through which God preserves our union with Christ is faith in Christ—the purely receiving act of the soul.

On a related note, the PCA (Presbyterian Church in America) at its General Assembly just adopted the recommendations of the Federal Vision Committee.  The committee report is available here (PDF).  An MP3 of the Federal Vision Committee Discussion: mp3 (20 MB).

Grace
Unmerited favor toward those who deserve wrath.
Unmerited favor toward those who because of sin wouldn’t desire to ask
Unmerited but given, inherited our sinning

Grace
Is salvation from predestination, Christ gave his life to change our
destination
Is good health, when we deserve bad
It is unmerited favor to those who deserve wrath.
Is good relationships with God and with others
Is the reason we call each other brothers.
Grace forgets mistakes and gives new air to breathe
It the reason we sing, we pray and we read
Grace is the warm breeze when it’s cold and the cool breeze when it’s hot
Grace would be everything but some things it’s not

Dr. Sam Storms notes 2 theological issues with the Baptist Faith & Message 2000: one concerning the issue of justification, and another about the ministry of the Holy Spirit.