More faithful men with the Lord

Most readers of this blog will have heard of the deaths of the founder of OM, George Verwer (b 1938) back in April and more recently of pastor and writer Tim Keller (b 1950) and now we hear that two Scots ministers have also died. Gordon Keddie has died in America and Donald Macleod (b 1940) in Scotland. I never heard Gordon Keddie (b 1944) but I read some of his very helpful exegetical work. He published several books. I know of his death through his brother John. I can see no online obituary at the moment. The other three I heard on different occasions, Verwer just once and the other two several times and always with profit. What blessings we have received from such men but now they are with the Lord which is far better.

You can find obituaries for these men as follows:

George Verwer

Tim Keller

Donald Macleod

Of course, early in March Ted Donnelly died in Ireland - another man from whose ministry I have benefitted.

See here for Ted Donnelly.

Day Off Week 11 2023

Couldn't really settle to anything today and so rather frittered my time. Up early taking a fridge.freezer and a dish washer to be dumped with one of my deacons (no, we didn;t dump him). Not so p[rodiuctive agter that, mainly reading.

Compel Them To Come In

Whitefield and Spurgeon, great evangelists both, were strong Calvinists. Some seem to forget that. This little hard back from Christian Focus by Dr Donald Macleod, who always writes so well, is on the free offer of the gospel and is well worth reading wherever you may stand on this issue. Beginning with a sermon by C H Spurgeon on compelling them to come in, which is reproduced as an appendix the book, it deals with arguments against the free offer from man's spiritual bondage, predestination, limited atonement and divine security but then goes beyond that providing chapters on delivering the free offer, knowing where the fish are hiding and on the messenger himself. The latter part of the book I found particularly stimulating. We need books like this.

10 theologians known by their double initial

1. F F Bruce (Frederick Fyvie)
2. D A Carson (Donald Arthur)
3. N T Wright (Nicholas Thomas)
4. B B Warfield (Benjamin Breckinridge)
5. D M Lloyd-Jones (David Martyn Lloyd-Jones)
6. A W Pink (Arthus Walkington)
7. J P Moreland (James Porter)
8. J I Packer (James Innell) 
9. D M Macleod (Donald M?)
10. A A Hodge (Archibald Alexander)

10 Characteristics of Scots atonement theologians by Donald Macleod

Good day looking at Smeaton yesterday with the other men at the John Owen Centre. Stumbled across this list from Donald Macleod on Scottish Atonement Theology (Dictionary of Scottish Church History and Theology) here. Such theologians are characterised by

1. A sustained, reverent reflection on the sufferings of Christ. 

2. A perception of the work of Christ in sacerdotal terms.

3. An insistence that the sufferings of Christ were penal.

4. A portrayal of the atonement as a satisfaction to divine justice.

5. The sufferings of Christ were vicarious.

6. The setting of the cross in a covenant framework.

7. The indispensable necessity of the atonement to salvation.

8. The unambiguous portrayal as a fruit and consequence of the love of God [the Father].

9. A prominence for the idea of victory not surpassed in any other Western tradition before Gustaf Aulen.
10. A belief in limited atonement, but stated very carefully.