David de Bruyn pastors New Covenant Baptist Church in Johannesburg, South Africa. He is a graduate of Central Baptist Theological Seminary in Minnesota and the University of South Africa (D.Th.). Since 1999, he has presented a weekly radio program that is heard throughout much of central South Africa. He also blogs at Churches Without Chests.
Restoring a right view of the affections may take many years of teaching and instruction. Most Christians exist with very foggy notions of ‘the emotions’… Read More »The Centrality and Nature of the Religious Affections
Probably the greatest difference between a thoroughly conservative Christian church and more nominally conservative Christian churches will be found in differences over the religious affections.… Read More »The Religious Affections and Beauty
Beyond the matter of exposing Christians to past and present examples of Christian piety, a pastor or leader within the local church can seek to… Read More »Teaching Piety
How can we conserve and promote true piety within the lives of the Christians in our churches? Phrasing the question differently reveals the size of… Read More »Exposure to Piety
Conservative Christian churches wish to weather the winds of secularism and pass on authentic Christianity to the next generation. This means conserving the gospel itself,… Read More »Conserving Christian Piety
Finishing worship well is as important as beginning it that way. Just as a call to worship consecrates the time for worship, so a benediction… Read More »Some Things To Consider Including In Your Worship – Benedictions
Restoring biblical worship in churches within a culture given over to various forms of narcissism, sentimentalism, consumerism and amusement is an uphill struggle. If a… Read More »Leading Corporate Worship
Biblical worship is the worship revealed in the Bible as pleasing to God. Since the Bible reveals God’s nature, will, and works, we should expect… Read More »Restoring Biblical Worship: Heeding God’s Prescriptions
Christianity is far more than salvation from sin and the knowledge of some Christian doctrine. Christianity claims to offer true worship to the only true… Read More »Restoring Biblical Worship
Churches that wish to be doctrinally thorough and promote theological literacy ought to have a pulpit that systematically teaches through Scripture, and support it with… Read More »Doctrinal Literacy – 2
How do churches teach Christian doctrine thoroughly and cohesively? I suggest four ways, the first two of which I’ll deal with in this post. First,… Read More »Doctrinal Literacy
Google ‘Gospel-centered’ and you will find thousands of churches and Christians who have adopted this nick as descriptive of themselves. No one wants to be… Read More »Doctrinal Thoroughness
Churches that wish to conserve and propagate the gospel must be willing to defend it. The gospel is attacked in several ways, and therefore its… Read More »Defending the Gospel
As important as understanding the gospel is, it is not sufficient. Churches must be committed to the gospel. That is, churches must be devoted to the… Read More »Being Committed to the Gospel
Since the gospel is the basis and boundary of Christianity, anyone interested in conserving Christianity ought to be interested in conserving the gospel. A cursory… Read More »Towards Conservative Christian Churches – Understanding the Gospel
A few weeks ago, I posted my opinion that the form of Christianity which omits certain distinctives is a truncated and emaciated Christianity. Conservative Christianity,… Read More »Toward Conservative Christian Churches
In the free worship tradition, almost nothing is as frowned upon as the idea of prayers that are read or planned. These are seen as… Read More »Some Things To Consider Including in Your Worship – Planned Prayers
In 1880 J.S. Curwen wrote Studies in Worship Music, an attempt to study the psalms and hymns sung throughout English churches of the time. The final… Read More »Some Things To Consider Including In Your Worship – Reiterations and Explanations of Hymns
I can’t imagine that readers of this blog attend churches where the Scriptures are never read during corporate worship. However, we may find that many attend… Read More »Some Things to Consider Including in your Worship – Stand-alone Scripture Readings
Our fathers had much to say about stillness, and by stillness they meant the absence of motion or the absence of noise or both. They… Read More »Some Things to Consider Including in Your Worship – Silence