Reformed and Presbyterian voices on theology, discipleship, and the church in our time.
458 articles from 147 issues, 1995 to 2026
Bonhoeffer was not always bold. In autumn 1933 he fled to London, weary and anxious, and Karl Barth answered with a sharp letter. Richard Burnett asks what that exchange teaches about finding courage to stand.
Why does the word evangelism make so many mainline Christians anxious? Raymond Hylton turns to the Great Commission in Galilee, arguing that witness rests on Christ’s authority, not on our management of outcomes.
Reflecting on Paul’s final letter, Douglas Pratt traces the word “entrust” in 2 Timothy and asks whether the church is investing in the next generation of pastors and leaders to whom the gospel will be handed on.
What is doctrine for? Seminarian Jonathan Sundermeier turns to Calvin’s Institutes to argue that theology’s highest end is piety: reverent love of God that is formed by knowing him and issues in joyful obedience.
St. Christina the Astonishing tried to flee the stench of sinners; Isaiah collapsed in terror before the Holy One. Sara Jane Nixon argues that the content of God’s holiness is love, a holiness that draws near to sinners rather than away from them.
Right belief or right worship? Doctrine or doxology? Drawing on Chesterton, Athanasius, and Calvin, Richard Burnett presents orthodoxy as a costly, moving equilibrium, never stuffy and never still, that has carried the church through every storm.
Spiritual autobiographies remind us how the Spirit sustains faith through the long road. Drawing on Schweitzer, C.S. Lewis, and J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings, Douglas F. Fletcher names ten weapons against evil and reflects on perseverance as a gift God himself secures.
Why did Constantine summon the bishops to Nicaea, and how did the church remember the moment afterward? Andrews traces the council through the eyes of Eusebius and Theodoret, the historians who first preserved its witness for the centuries that followed.
The Council of Nicaea was 1,700 years ago, but Small argues its disputes still live in pews and pulpits unrecognized. He examines what the Creed affirms and what it refuses to believe, drawing on Barth and Christopher Morse to recover the necessity of confessing both.
Herbert's most famous poem stages a soul drawing back from divine love and the patient persistence with which Love draws it forward anyway. McDonald reads the poem alongside Herbert's pastoral writings, finding the same Reformed conviction running through both: only refusal can shut us out.
Cyre traces the wedding scene that runs from Eden through the prophets to Revelation: the Father giving his Bride to the Son, Christ vowing eternal faithfulness to his Church. Every human marriage is an echo of that union, and our identity flows from being part of it.
Gen Z talks about romance as an unbearable rulebook crushing them. Kosari hears the same paralysis in our churches, where marriage has become an idol no one can quite picture. She turns to Isaiah 52, where the Lord woos his Jerusalem out of captivity, for a different vision.
In print, to anyone who asks.
"Sustained by readers."
Theology Matters is sent in print to anyone who requests it, sustained primarily by readers like you. Tax-deductible.
Give a Gift