Monday
Jul022007
Book Review: By Faith Alone
Monday, July 2, 2007 at 5:18PM 
Answering the Challenges to the Doctrine of Justification, edited by Gary L. W. Johnson and Guy P. Waters.
This is a book of essays—nine in all (ten, if you count the introduction by Guy Waters)—answering recent challenges to the historic Reformed understanding of the doctrine of justification by faith alone, concentrating on the New Perspective on Paul and the Federal Vision, but also engaging the classic Arminian position and Mormonism. Individual essay authors include
- Cornelis P. Venema
- T. David Gordon
- Richard D. Phillips
- C. FitzSimons Allison
- David VanDrunen
- R. Fowler White and E. Calvin Beisner
- John Bolt
- Gary L. W. Johnsons
As might be expected from a book that consists of essays by various authors, the book is a little uneven. Some essays seem to be written with the interested lay person in mind, and others assumed much more prior knowledge on the part of the reader. In addition, since the essays were originally intended to stand alone, there is a fair bit of repetition of ideas and arguments.
