In part one of four in our series on the Establishment Principle we will see what the Establishment Principle is and how it relates to the nature of the Church as well as what it is not. In part two we will demonstrate the Establishment Principle from the many prophecies of Scripture. In part three we will elucidate, on… Read More Establishment Principle, Part 1: What it is, What it isn’t
John Brown of Haddington The Absurdity and Perfidity of All Authoritative Toleration of Gross Heresy, Blasphemy, Idolatry, and Popery. Letter II, pgs. 101-103. The obligation of lawful promises, oaths, vows and covenants, as well as of human laws, respecting moral duties, however distinct, is no more separable from the obligation of God’s law, than Christ’s… Read More The Obligation of Lawful Oaths | John Brown of Haddington
The judicial law of Israel, the laws whose subject matter concerned Israel as a civil body, is expired with the state of that people and is no longer binding except for its general equity (WCF 19:4). “Proper law” (lex propria) recognizes the authority of magistrates to make positive human laws based upon the moral law of God… Read More Lex Propria – Proper Law
Wilhelmus à Brakel The Christian’s Reasonable Service Vol. 2, pp. 168-180 The Relationship of the Civil Government to the Church This generates another question: Does the civil government have any authority at all with regard to the church? If yes, what does or does this not consist of? We wish to preface our answer to… Read More The Relationship of the Civil Government to the Church
Voluntaryism/the Voluntary Principle is the belief “that the only relation that ought to subsist between the State and the Church — between civil government and religion — is that of entire separation; or, in other words, its advocates maintain that nations, as such, and civil rulers in their official capacity, not only are not bound, but are not at… Read More Voluntaryism: The Real Origin of Romish and Priestly Domination
Russell Moore, president of the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC), has recently published an article lauding the distinctly American value of religious pluralism. Given that the stated purpose of the commission which he heads is to be, “the moral and public policy agency of the nation’s largest Protestant denomination,”… Read More First Amendment or First Commandment? Choose whom you will serve.
David Dickson Truth’s Victory Over Error pp. 185-189 CHAPTER XXIII. Of the Civil Magistrate Question I. Hath God armed the Civil Magistrate with the Power of the Sword for the Defence, and Encouragement of them that are God, and for the punishment of Evil-doers? Yes (Rom. 13:1-4; 1 Pet. 2:13-14). Well then, do not the… Read More The Duty of Civil Magistrates | David Dickson
That this Author saith, God commanded those that transgressed his holy Law with an high hand, and presumptuously to be killed, lest they should live and profane his holy things; I defend not: But sure Erastus erreth, who will have all such to be killed by the Magistrate under the New Testament, because they were… Read More The Judicial Law, as Judicial, has been Abolished | Samuel Rutherford
The following is an excerpt from A Godly and Learned Exposition of Christ’s Sermon in the Mount by William Perkins, which can be found in volume 1 of his works and read online here. “Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. For verily I… Read More An Exposition of Mat. 5:17-20 | William Perkins
The following is an excerpt from Lex Rex by Samuel Rutherford. You can buy it here. Question IV Whether the King Be Only and Immediately from God, and Not from the People That this question may be the clearer we are to set down these considerations: — 1. The question is, Whether the kingly office itself come from… Read More The Origin and Limits of the King
Purely Presbyterian 