The Riddleblog

B. B. Warfield on "False Religion and the True"

Warfield’s sermon on Acts 17:23 was first published in The Power of God Unto Salvation (218-254) and reprinted in Bibl ical and Theological Studies, 560-580. You can also find it online here. It is well worth a read, since much of what Warfield finds in Paul’s challenge to the Greco-Roman pagans in Athens applies today.

Warfield’s text, “what therefore you worship as unknown, this I proclaim to you,” leads him to discuss Paul’s approach to pagan Gentiles during his Gentile mission. Below are a few excerpts.

Warfield distinguished between Paul’s approach to pagan Gentiles (as he does here) and those Jews familiar with the Old Testament.

These words give the gist of Pau l's justly famous address at Athens before the court of the Areopagus. The substance of that address was, to be sure, just what the substance of all his primary proclamations to Gentile hearers was, namely, God and the judgment. The necessities of the case compelled him to approach the heathen along the avenue of an awakened conscience. . . . The peculiar circumstances in which (this sermon) was delivered have imprinted on this address also a particular character of its own. Paul spoke it under a specially poignant sense of the depths of heathen ignorance and of the greatness of heathen need. The whole address palpitates with his profound feeling of the darkness in which the heathen world is immersed, and his eager longing to communicate to it the light intrusted to his care.

Given the similarities between the Greco-Roman audience gathered on the Areopagus and our own age (ignorance of the things of God, the angst of our age, the triumph of the subjective over the possibility of finding objective truth), Warfield describes Paul’s preaching as bringing light into darkness. “Heathen” is a great term to describe many of the unbelievers of our age, and I wouldn’t mind seeing it come back to common usage.

Warfield describes Paul’s passion to approach the pagan intellectuals of his day (who were much like the podcasters and influencers of our own) by challenging them at the very point where their self-perceived “wisdom,” is merely a cover for their ignorance of the things of God.

[Paul] was in Athens, as it were, in hiding. But he could not keep silence. He went to the synagogue on the Sabbath and there preached to the Jews and those devout inquirers who were accustomed to visit the synagogues of the Jews in every city. But this did not satisfy his aroused zeal. He went also to the market place—that agora which the public teachers of the city had been wont to frequent for the propagation of their views—and there, like them, every day, he argued with all whom he chanced to meet. Among these he very naturally encountered certain adherents of the types of philosophy then dominant—the Epicurean and Stoic—and in conflict with them he began to attract attention.

To read the rest, follow the link below

B. B. WarfieldKim RiddlebargerNovember 14, 2025Acts 17:23, Mars Hill, Warfield on Paul in AthensComment

Elders Matter — The Mars Hill Debacle Is Proof

The Mars Hill/Mark Driscoll debacle is well known. Many have listened to Christianity Today’s excellent podcast series, The Rise and Fall of Mars Hill. The fall of Mars Hill is but another incident in a long series of scandals plaguing American evangelicalism. Why do such things happen over and over again?

My response . . . A bad or non-existent ecclesiology. Throughout today’s American Christianity there is little if any regard paid to the biblical model of church government (Presbyterian/Reformed), which is rule by a plurality of elders, approved by the congregation, whose role is, in part, to keep watch upon the life and doctrine of the pastor and their fellow elders.

I wonder if there was ever a moment in the early days of these entrepreneurial churches when the founding members asked themselves, “how did the church in the New Testament govern itself?” Probably not, or else the question was quickly dismissed as an appeal to mere tradition, something too cumbersome or unnecessarily inefficient. Groups like this often view its charismatic leader as taking on (even if indirectly) the role of an apostle. The leader appears to have a direct link to God, which allows the group members (better— “followers”) to let the leader unquestionably assume the role of arbiter of the group’s doctrine, the gifted one who determines the group’s mission and “casts its vision,” as well as the primary decision maker should there be differences of opinion. Without a biblical ecclesiology in place, the visionary leader is able to get his way through manipulation and guilt, and if necessary, will remove any and all who oppose him. Yet nobody blinks. In the end, the once loyal followers are left embittered and wonder, “how did God let this happen?” We have seen this story play out over and over again, often in the media.

To read the rest of this essay, follow the link below.

Wisdom from ConfessionsKim RiddlebargerAugust 31, 2021ecclesiology, Mars Hill Comments

"For the Sake of the Gospel" -- Paul's Apologetic Speeches in the Book of Acts

I am one of the first people to acknowledge that the contemporary debate over apologetic methodology between the “evidentialists” and the “presuppositionalists,” however unpleasant, nevertheless can be a vital and healthy exercise. It is very important to have a biblically based and carefully honed apologetic methodology in place before confronting the learned paganism of our age. In those instances when this is the goal of the evidentialist-presuppositionalist debate, it ought to be greatly encouraged.

I am perplexed, however, that the parties to this in-house debate spend little time analyzing the Apostle Paul’s apologetic speeches in the Book of Acts. It is here, in Luke’s record of the ever-extending reign of the Risen and Exalted Christ, that we are given a clear picture of how the Apostle Paul sought both to proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ and defend the Christian truth claim, and this not only in the synagogues of the major cities of Greece and Asia Minor—before Jews and “God-fearing” Gentile proselytes—but also before magistrates as well as in the marketplaces of those Roman and Greek cities where little or nothing was known of the God of Israel and the inspired texts of the Old Testament.

To read “For the Sake of the Gospel” — click here