The Gospel Coalition Canada seeks to renew the church by the Gospel. As part of that effort, we have released a number of podcasts on our site. Paul Carter hosts Into the Word, which helps listeners to read and understand the Bible. We have just started a bi-monthly podcast on worship called Worship God. The In & Through podcast seeks to dive deeper in and through the Word. Later this year, we will release a weekly podcast on prayer.
Today, however, we want to announce a new weekly podcast called Into Theology.
Theology
In this podcast, we want to invite you to read great Christian books with us. We will provide reading plans for works of theology. At the end of each week, we release a podcast that discusses that week’s readings. In this sense, we want to start a theological reading plan for great works of theology.
It is impossible to praise God without also uttering the praises of the Father, of the Son, and of the Spirit. — John Calvin
Theology seeks to know and to enjoy God and his creation. For this reason, theology seeks to know God through Jesus Christ by the Spirit. And the Holy Spirit has guided Christians for centuries in this pursuit of knowing God. We can learn from faithful theologians of the past who can help us know and enjoy God and his creation.
That is why we read theology. Will you join us?
Calvin’s Institutes
For the first theological work, we have selected John Calvin’s Institutes of Christian Religion. We recognize that it is a large book! But given the nature of the book, you can start reading it at any time and at any point. Even if you are two months behind, you can still jump into the Institutes and join us!
It is not about reading every word of this book but about intentionally stretching our minds and hearts to know and love God in Jesus Christ by the Spirit.
So will you read Calvin with us?
For by a kind of mutual bond the Lord has joined together the certainty of his Word and of his Spirit so that the perfect religion of the Word may abide in our minds when the Spirit, who causes us to contemplate God’s face, shines. — John Calvin
For Calvin’s Institutes, we will use this READING PLAN. And each week, we will host a podcast discussion on the readings for that week. On July 17th, we will release the first episode of Into Theology that will introduce Calvin’s Institutes.
Then we will start the reading Book One of the Institutes on July 20th, 2020! That should give you enough time to get your copy of the Institutes before we start reading the Institutes together! We will remind you every Monday of the week’s readings through our social media channels, but you can also download the plan above on your own.
While any version of the Institutes will work, we like the Battles translation which you can find here. If that is too costly, consider the cheaper version Beveridge here. In short, find any version you can and get reading!
Podcast
Please listen in, submit questions, and let us know what you have learned! It is called Into Theology partly because we can all get Into works of Theology together. And don’t worry if you are behind on the readings. Just start where you can, in whatever week, and learn alongside us.
Theology is the lifelong pursuit of knowing and enjoying God and his creation. You are never too far behind to start now and never too far ahead to have no need to start.
Click here to listen to our teaser for Into Theology podcast. And subscribe on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.
Reading plan
Download the reading plan by clicking here. Also, join the Into Theology Facebook group.
