Theological Treatises

  How To Sincerely Enjoy People who May  Not  Initially Be Inclined to Like you Very Much   Dedicated to dearly-loved lost people   On a somewhat regular (sometimes-annual) basis, the details of which are not pertinent to the goals of this little article, Lesley and I place ourselves in a situation wherein we end up spending a couple of weeks with a number of people, whom beforehand we did not know at all.  It almost always turns out that the vast majority of these people are not professing Christians, and they do not share our heartfelt values and passions.   Sometimes, when they discover that I am (or was, in my case) a pastor of a Presbyterian church, they might be a bit "put off," or maybe feel a little uncomfortable.  In some instances, this is not the case at all; and they are happy to engage issues and questions surrounding religion (and the like).   Our experience, on the whole, among these people has been very positive, enc...

  Love  Through  The Church   Dedicated to Spirit-filled church members   Is there anything  more  important for the church and even the world,  than  love?  This is a loaded question; but the most- savory  answer, is, "No."  Love is  premised  on living, regenerative  faith  in the gospel and Person of the Lord Jesus Christ. . . . But  true,  supernatural love is the ultimate  goal  of faith.   Almost everybody in any religious organization is going to talk about "love."  This is to be expected; and it is actually quite natural.  Human beings are created in the image of God; and God's very nature is that of love (1 Jn. 4:16).  Therefore, we should anticipate hearing a lot of verbiage relative to love.   But, what I would like to suggest, is that  authentic  love is a whole lot less  experienced,  than it is  chatt...

  Ministering To The Poor   Dedicated to all the God-lovers of Christ's church   One of the things I would like to achieve in the writing of these various papers, essays, and/or treatises, is to address themes that I have not seen covered by earlier writers (even the great ones of the church).  This is not meant to imply that these issues indeed  have not  been addressed--but simply that I have not come across them myself.   Today, I would like to talk about the important principle of  "ministering to the poor."   First of all, some Biblical definitions are necessary.  Sometimes the Holy Scriptures refer to  financially  or  materially  needy people as "poor."  Two splendid New Testament examples will suffice to prove this point.  The first one comes from our blessed Savior's lips, as His words are found in Jn. 12:8a, which renders this: "For the  poor  you always have with...

  The Absoluteness of Prayer in the Minister's Life   Dedicated to my dear brother and fellow-minister Bob Smart   The reason I use the language  "absoluteness"  of prayer in the minister's life, is because prayer is not merely to be considered a "requirement," or a "need"; and it would not be fitting to even enjoin something like, "The  importance  of prayer in the minister's life."   Every truly-called minister of the gospel, serving in Christ's faithful church,  is  a praying man.  There are  no  exceptions to this rule.  Any man who does not have an earnest and heartfelt desire to be in the presence of God is  not  an undershepherd of Christ and His church.  Prayer, for the true saints, is not something that has to be "wrenched" out of us.  It is not simply a duty, a responsibility, and/or something expected of us.  Every regenerated Christian churchman sincerely...

  CHRIST: THE CENTER OF THE UNIVERSE   Dedicated to all the church's great pastors/theologians/philosophers who have blessed my life so much   Most of us are probably familiar with what is called, "The Copernican Revolution"--where it was finally accepted that the earth revolved around the sun (and not the other way around).   In this little paper, I would like to remind us of the Holy Scripture's universal and constant insistence (Old Testament and New) that Christ, the  Eternally -Begotten Son of the Father, the Second Person of the Holy Trinity, is not only  at  the very heart of God's created universe, He  is  the epicenter of it.   The reason this is so, is because, even  before  the creation of the world, the blessed Trinity had, in the counsels of Their decrees, determined that it would be the Christ, the  eternally -begotten Son of the Father,  Who  would be the One  through  Whom the world woul...

A Very Short Essay On Church Leadership Dedicated to the faithful Officers with whom I have served in Christ's Church Books and articles on leadership sometimes make me a bit uncomfortable--because the spirit which seems to me to drive some of them appears quite counter to the supernatural and miraculous qualities required of those people called to serve the beautiful body (church) of Christ. As per the danger in the spirit mentioned above, I am not claiming to be an "expert" on this subject; and indeed, I have made enough mistakes in church leadership to write a textbook on what   not   to be and do. Still, by God's grace, I have learned a few things over the expanse of 36 years as the pastor of one (very special) church.  In this short essay, I will try to give some encouragement to my brothers (who serve in the church's formal offices); and to my brothers and sisters who minister for Christ faithfully in their callings in the church and in the world. It seems t...

A BRIEF SUMMARY HISTORY OF THE TRIUNE GOD   A Treatise By Rev. Mark J. Henninger, honorably retired/PNI (PCA); and lately pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church (PCA)/Peoria IL   Dedicated to my dear wife Lesley   Introduction:   Some may find it preposterous, that any mortal would attempt any kind of "history" of the one, true, and absolute Divine Being.  It might even be thought a bit disrespectful; or even virtually impossible.  But, because our loving Triune God has condescended to reveal Himself to us in creation and (even more so) in Holy Scripture, we are actually given a warrant (by Him) to embark on this project.   Language will be a constant and interesting challenge for us in this study--since, at once, it is inescapably-employed, and yet never totally capable of explaining the nature and ways of the one God who exists (necessarily) apart from the whole matrix of His creation.  We intend to deal with the wonder of the Inc...