Helping Those Who Suffer

In this sin-cursed world suffering is inevitable. Jesus said so: “In the world you will have tribulation” (John 16:33). Paul said so: “For it has been granted to you that for the sake of Christ you should not only believe in him but also suffer for his sake” (Phil...

Give to the Max 2018

Once each year Central Seminary uses In the Nick of Time to make an appeal. The reason is unique to our situation in Minnesota: the organization GiveMN features an annual giving event for all charitable organizations called Give to the Max. Central Seminary began to...

Courage In Today’s Fiery Furnace

God called Joshua to be courageous as he led the Israelites into the Promised Land (Josh 1:6–9). Joshua obeyed and enjoyed the fulfillment of God’s promises (Josh 23:14). I want to highlight 279 modern day Joshuas. These are all pastors of “illegal”...

Grappling With Grief

The phone rang at 5:30 a.m. on Sunday, January 13, 2008. The voice on the other end belonged to the male nurse who had cared for my father in a hospital during the night. He informed me that my 91-year-old father had passed away ten minutes earlier. While we had...

A Long Goodbye: Part Two

My wife’s casket was before me as I stood at the pulpit to present a tribute and the funeral sermon for the love of my life on July 18, 2018. Later, people asked how I could do that. The answer is a combination of God’s grace, long pastoral experience, and...

A Long Goodbye: Part One

I stood at the pulpit to present a tribute and the funeral sermon for the love of my life, my wife of fifty-three years, on July 18, 2018. Later, people asked how I could do that. The answer is a combination of God’s grace, long pastoral experience, and a desire...

Knowing God’s Will: Part Nine

Years ago I began an unsuccessful career in sales. My manager warned me that I would have to learn to help people past “Buyer’s Blues.” He explained that many people experience feelings of doubt, anxiety, panic, and guilt either immediately before...

Knowing God’s Will: Part Eight

If God has an individual direction for His children, then they ought to be able to discern what that direction is. Many Christians believe that the way to find God’s will is to pay attention to a kind of subjective inner sense, a feeling of peace that will...

Knowing God’s Will: Part Seven

In previous essays I have outlined several considerations that all believers should weigh when seeking to discern God’s leading in their lives. Obviously, they should avoid wrong ways of knowing God’s will, such as inner voices, dreams,...

Knowing God’s Will: Part Six

God knows exactly those choices that will bring the greatest good into your life. Perhaps those are not the choices that will result in the greatest apparent good, especially in the short term—I’ll have more to say about that in a future essay. But God knows who...

Knowing God’s Will: Part Five

A few months ago I received a phone call from a colleague, a former student who went on to serve in pastoral ministry for a decade. He told me that he was trying to decide whether to remain with his current pastorate or whether to go back to school. He thought that he...

Knowing God’s Will: Part Four

Throughout this discussion I have assumed that God has an individual will for each Christian and that His will can be discerned. To this point, I have described criteria for determining God’s will that are straightforward and objective. God’s leading never contradicts...

Knowing God’s Will: Part Three

John Buck is a manager for a national corporation where he has been advancing through the ranks. One day his boss stops by to offer John a new position as manager of a plant in a distant part of the country. The job comes with a pay increase of $15,000 per year. John...

Knowing God’s Will: Part Two

If God is not giving further revelation, then how can believers know His will for their lives? Some theologians have denied that God has an individual will for each believer, but their objections are not convincing. More often than not, their case against an...

Knowing God’s Will: Part One

Does God have an individual will for each believer? To suggest otherwise is effectively to deny either the infinity of God’s wisdom and knowledge, thereby verging upon Open Theism, or else to question God’s love for and personal interest in His children....

On Living the Liberal Life

Contemporary education emphasizes specialization. The more education you get, the more specialized it becomes. This trend produces scholars whose grasp of a tiny sliver of knowledge is exhaustive, but whose capacity to integrate that knowledge into the overall system...

About In the Nick of Time

Occasional Essays and Other Stuff for Christian Students Presented by the Research Professor of Systematic Theology of Central Baptist Theological Seminary of Minneapolis.

 

American Christianity needs Christian leaders. Christian leaders explain the Scriptures, bringing them to bear upon life’s urgent questions. Christian leaders exemplify the life of faith, finding their ultimate satisfaction in God alone. They unite intellectual discipline with ordinate affection, turning their entire being toward the love of God. These essays are dedicated to the task of inviting Christian students to become tomorrow’s Christian leaders.

 

—Kevin T. Bauder

 

“Be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine.”