Elder's Blog Archives

The descent into hell — what does the creed mean?

Posted on April 6, 2026April 17, 2026 by Mountain Veteran Ministries

Every Sunday, millions of Christians recite the Apostles' Creed — and then stumble on the same five words: "He descended into hell." What does that actually mean? Did Jesus go to the place of the damned? Did He suffer there? Did He preach to the lost? The short answer is that the Church has...

The active and passive obedience of Christ

Posted on April 6, 2026April 17, 2026 by Mountain Veteran Ministries

Most Christians understand that Jesus died for their sins. Fewer have grasped that Jesus also lived for their righteousness. The cross deals with the penalty of what we have done. But there is a second problem the cross alone does not address: the absence of what we should have done. God does not...

The atonement theories — which one is right, or are they all needed?

Posted on April 6, 2026April 17, 2026 by Mountain Veteran Ministries

Christians agree that Jesus died for sins. They have argued for two thousand years about exactly how that death accomplishes what it accomplishes. Is it a payment to satisfy divine justice? A ransom to liberate captives? A moral example that draws the sinner upward? A victory over death and...

The hypostatic union — fully God, fully man

Posted on April 6, 2026April 17, 2026 by Mountain Veteran Ministries

Jesus of Nazareth got tired. He got hungry. He asked questions. He wept at a tomb. He sweat blood in a garden and cried out from a cross that God had forsaken him. And the same Jesus stilled a storm with a word, walked out of a sealed tomb, and received worship without correcting the worshipper....

Common grace — God’s goodness to the unbeliever

Posted on April 6, 2026April 17, 2026 by Mountain Veteran Ministries

Why does a cancer researcher who has never prayed a prayer in his life make a discovery that saves a million lives? Why does an atheist composer write music that stops you in your tracks and makes you feel something you can't name? Why does the rain fall on the field of a man who curses God as...

Perseverance of the saints vs. conditional security

Posted on April 6, 2026April 17, 2026 by Mountain Veteran Ministries

Can a true Christian lose their salvation? Few questions in Christian theology are more personal or more contested. Your answer determines where you go when you've sinned badly, how you read the warning passages in Hebrews, what you say to a believer who has walked away from the faith, and whether...

Justification by faith alone — what Luther recovered and why it still matters

Posted on April 6, 2026April 18, 2026 by Mountain Veteran Ministries

Martin Luther didn't invent justification by faith alone. He recovered it. The doctrine had been buried under centuries of accumulated religious machinery — indulgences, penance, purgatory, the treasury of merit — until a German monk read Romans and couldn't unsee what he found there. What he...

The ordo salutis — what order does salvation happen in?

Posted on April 6, 2026June 22, 2026 by Mountain Veteran Ministries

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