Glossary
reprobation: The doctrine that God predestines some people for damnation.
(See double predestination.)resurrection: In Christianity, the doctrine that God will bring the dead to
life and has done this already with Jesus. This is not to be confused with the
doctrine of the immortality of the soul, according to which the soul lives
on after being separated from the body in death. Most Christian theologians
combine the two doctrines but do not confuse them.Revivalism: Religious practices focused on preaching that aims at bringing
about the experience of conversion, characteristic of Wesleyan and Methodist
churches beginning in the 18th century as well as certain Reformed circles in
the United States, especially those indebted to Jonathan Edwards (of whom
Charles Finney is representative).righteousness: Until the 20th century this word was the standard English
translation for the terms for “justice” in Latin justitia or Greek dikaiosyne.
In theological usage, therefore, it is simply equivalent to the word “justice.”
(It is important to be aware that the word “righteous” was never used
theologically as an equivalent to “self righteous,” though that has become its
primary usage in contemporary English.)sacrament: From the Latin term sacramentum, which translates the Greek
term mysterion or “mystery,” originally referring to any secret or hidden
meaning. By the Middle Ages this term came to have a specialized meaning
referring to seven sacred rites of the church (Baptism, Eucharist, Penance,
Con¿ rmation, Extreme Unction, Ordination, and Matrimony), which were
authorized by dominical institution to serve as outward signs conferring
the inner grace they signi¿ ed and hence were called as “means of grace.”
Protestants typically reduced the number of rituals to two (baptism and
eucharist), while still practicing most of the others but not calling them
sacraments. And they often rejected the notion that sacraments were a means
of conferring grace. Many Protestant groups reject the term “sacrament”
altogether and prefer to call baptism and Eucharist “ordinances.”