A Toolkit for Confessions: Symbolics 101 (Recovering Our Confessional Heritage)

A Toolkit for Confessions: Symbolics 101 (Recovering Our Confessional Heritage)As confessional Christians, we are convinced that our Confession of Faith summarizes the system of doctrine contained in the Holy Scriptures. We recognize that it is a human product, the fruit of centuries of Bible study and theological formulation, but I wonder if sometimes we forget that it is not a modern document in the strictest sense of the term. In fact, it could easily be argued that it is a late medieval production, published at the very end

“As confessional Christians, we are convinced that our Confession of Faith summarizes the system of doctrine contained in the Holy Scriptures. We recognize that it is a human product, the fruit of centuries of Bible study and theological formulation, but I wonder if sometimes we forget that it is not a modern document in the strictest sense of the term.

In fact, it could easily be argued that it is a late-medieval production, published at the very end of that era, just as the Enlightenment was to overwhelm European intellectual life. For this reason, it must be approached cautiously. If the perspicuous Word of God requires careful contextual study and interpretation, how much more so a document of human formulation?

In reality, proper understanding of the Confession requires several things of us—familiarity with theological development throughout the preceding centuries, acquaintance with contemporary theological thought (especially in its Reformed variety), and an unwillingness to import twentieth- or twenty-first-century ideas into its words and phrases. This book is intended to assist the interpreter in doing these things.”

Publisher: RBAP
Type: Paperback
ISBN: 9780996519816

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James Renihan is President, Professor of Historical Theology of International Reformed Baptist Seminary. After a ministry of church planting in central Massachusetts, Dr. James Renihan and his family moved to Escondido, CA in 1998 to begin serving as Dean of the newly formed Institute of Reformed Baptist Studies. He led that work for 20 years, and when it became IRBS Theological Seminary in 2018 was appointed the first president. He has served as a pastor of churches in Massachusetts, New York and California. He is a graduate of Trinity Evangelical Divinity School (PhD), Seminary of the East (MDiv), Trinity Ministerial Academy, and Liberty Baptist College (BS). His academic work has focused on the Second London Baptist Confession and the broader Puritan theological context from which it arose.

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"When we first arrive at a destination like a famous museum or cathedral it is easy to be overwhelmed. We may look for a guide who will be able to help us understand the background, history, and significance of the place. Our best guides both inform our minds and engage our attention. When we come to the Second London Confession of Faith, we may be grateful to have just such a guide in James M. Renihan’s A Toolkit for Confessions. Renihan provides us an accessible and instructive introduction to the background, history, context, structure, and contents of the 2LCF. Baptist readers will especially benefit from this study of an important but often neglected part of the Baptist confessional and theological heritage. Baptist and non-Baptist readers alike will appreciate the ways in which Renihan shows how the 2LCF constructively relates to the broader family of Reformed confessions. A Toolkit for Confessions is a welcome and valuable addition to the growing body of literature on the confessions and catechisms of the seventeenth century." Guy Prentiss Waters, Ph.D, James M. Baird, Jr. Professor of New Testament, Reformed Theological Seminary