The Priority
Although no fundamental issue of theology, or specifically of soteriology, would be at stake if regeneration were giving the priority in the application of redemption, yet the evidence shows that the call occupies this position. If we fail to accord to it the place which the exegetical considerations demand, we miss a great deal of the emphasis of Scripture and are also liable to overlook what belongs to its specific and distinguishing character. The key passage evincing its priority is Romans 8: 29, 30. There are so many indication of order in this passage that we are compelled to regard the apostle as enunciating the order: calling, justification, glorification, in verse 30, and also establishing calling as the act of grace directly joined to predestination, and as that which in the realm of application brings the latter to expression. Other passages, particularly those in the Pauline epistles, create the strongest presumption in favour of the conclusion which Romans 8:29, 30 would require (cf. 1 Cor. 1:9; Gal. 1:15; 2 Tim. 1:9; 1 Peter. 2:9; 5:10; 2 Pet. 1:10). (John Murray on “The Call†in Collected Writings, vol. 2, pp. 161-62.)
Old Life 
Curious Darryl, what you do with the fact that it is in the effectual calling that union with Christ comes (according to the Confession & Catechisms) and that the other benefits flow from that? I am not saying that the other benefits come simultaneously (that’s another discussion for me) but union does come before the rest.
Would you agree with the Westminster Divines on that?
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This is playing ‘gotcha’ with the Westminster Standards, which anybody can do with with any document drawn up by man. It evinces a lack of valuation for what the Standards are teaching and a lack of seriousness in general.
Westminster Confession of Faith, chapter 10, speaks of “effectually drawing them to Jesus Christ” which is exactly what regeneration accomplishes. No language of union. Language of new heart, renewed will, enlightened mind to understand the things of God.
Anything serious can be vulnerable to trollish or lawyerly game-playing. It’s here where serious men of God kick the trolls out of the church or whatever environment the trolls are invading, including blogs. *That* is exactly what *is not* happening.
It’s a lack of confidence and lack of conviction on the part of Reformed pastors and teachers, and the trolls have sensed it all along and because this lack hasn’t gone away the trolls havn’t gone away.
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Wow Christian, I was asking a question for which I was looking for dialogue…not accusations of playing games. I am not sure what ‘button’ I pushed with you but since you jumped…
Larger Catechism # 66: What is that union which the elect have with Christ? Answer: The union which the elect have with Christ is the work of God’s grace, whereby they are spiritually and mystically, yet really and inseparably, joined to Christ as their head and husband; which is done in their effectual calling.
It seems to me that there is no playing ‘gotcha’ with the standards. At least, I am not playing any kind of game. I am trying to make sense of the literal language.
Shorter Catechism # 32: What benefits do they that are effectually called partake of in this life? Answer: They that are effectually called do in this life partake of justification, adoption, and sanctification, and the several benefits which in this life do either accompany or flow from them.
If you look at the Puritans before the Westminster Divines and even someone like Beza, you will find that they see effectual calling as the moment when we are united to Christ.
So, my point (and my question), was not to take away priority from effectual calling (or even from justification) but to ask the question of whether or not the original post had a problem with this sort of language from the Divines – where effectual calling and union are connected and out of that comes all the other benefits.
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Actually, Reformed theology determined, if one has to place it, that ‘adoption’ is the point of union with Christ.
Again, if you want to know what the Standards mean by effectual calling you go to chapter 10 of the Westminster Confession of Faith. The language in the catechisms is short hand and understood in good faith by anyone who knows the confession, knows the Bible, values both, and is serious about it all.
The overall point here is false teachers are using ‘union’ to vitiate justification by faith alone. If you aren’t following that, sorry. That is the source of my impatience with all of this.
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And for the record, regeneration is the unspoken aspect of redemption that both the false teachers *and* the Reformed types they are currently trolling don’t want to talk about. It’s a ‘third rail’ of theology and the false teachers take advantage of that. Once you start talking about regeneration you get intense pronouncement of resentment from both sides. “Are you suggesting I’m not regenerate???” “Can you look into my heart???” Or the more mocking: “So tell us, what exactly did you ‘experience’ in this regneration you speak of? Did Jesus strike you down as you were walking down the road (ha ha ha ha hahahahahahah, good one!)”… So both sides really demand to have ritualism replace the Word and the Spirit regarding how regeneration is effected, when it is effected. The false teachers know this is their main ‘breach’ in the wall they are exploiting, and they *don’t even have to mention it*, but can just grin silently as they go about doing their thing, never-ending.
John Owen didn’t write the following for no reason:
“As among all the doctrines of the gospel, there is none opposed with more violence and subtlety than that concerning our regeneration by the immediate, powerful, effectual operation of the Holy Spirit of grace; so there is not scarce anything more despised or scorned by many in the world than that any should profess that there hath been such a work of God upon themselves, or on any occasion declare aught of the way and manner whereby it was wrought… yea, the enmity of Cain against Abel was but a branch of this proud and perverse inclination.”
– John Owen, A Discourse Concerning The Holy Spirit
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Darryl
To summarize Murray: the Call not Regeneration has priority.
That’s fine: most of us (at least the confessional “usâ€) arguing for union, do not want to state anything else. The call, as CNH has demonstrated is the temporally uniting foundation in redemption, not justification, not regeneration. Murray is right Romans 8:30 carries great significance in this discussion. An example of synecdoche, Paul is arguing for the eternal aspect (predestination), the pre-faith temporal aspect (calling), the faith-based-temporal high point of redemption (justification) and the post-faith eternal aspect (glorification). It is important that we understand why Paul chose these particular aspects of the ordo and not some of the others, which he easily could have. The focus on justification should be obvious – he’s writing a letter to a group of believers where the gospel and particularly the doctrine of justification are under attack. He wants to place justification in its correct ordo context and use it within the ordo as the central teaching of, not only the book of Romans, but of the Christian’s experience – the life of faith.
But you’ll also notice that by emphasizing justification in this part of the ordo (by identifying IT as the part for the whole – logical priority over sanctification etc), Paul also set it in its context. It is not the fountainhead as some are arguing but redemptive activity takes place before it and after it. If anything, there is a logical progression from predestination and calling TO justification and not the other way around. (Indeed if we are to follow our catechisms, which I know you do, then our union precedes our justification SC 31 – “effectual calling is the work of God’s Spirit … he doth persuade and enable us to embrace Jesus Christ, freely offered to us in the gospel†and then SC 32 “they that are effectually called do in this life partake of justification …â€. Thus, using other Scriptures (Eph 1 in particular) and the summary of such in our standards, we can build a systematic picture of where justification resides in relation to the other aspects of redemption. Though it is of central and critical importance and non-negotiable in its content and necessity, it is not the fountainhead of other redemptive benefits.
Blessings
Matt
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Christian
“Actually, Reformed theology determined, if one has to place it, that ‘adoption’ is the point of union with Christ. ”
That’s a bold statement – care to back it up?
Matt
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I did in another thread quoting Richard Muller’s Dictionary of Greek and Latin Theological Terms where he discusses scholastic Reformed theologians correlating union with adoption.
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Page 314, almost at the very the bottom of the page, Dictionary of Latin and Greek Theological Terms – Richard Muller.
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Ok, Christian, so Muller has taught you that union and adoption are connected. But the Catechisms, in short shrift, tie it to effectual calling. Are you following Muller or the Confession? Furthermore, what do you do with those who preceded the Confession, but in many ways laid its groundwork, who connect effectual calling with union?
What is so important to you that union cannot come with effectual calling and must come after justification? I don’t understand your anger but, to be honest, in reading your comments I can practically visualize you angrily tying away at your computer, spit flying from your mouth as you rehearse these arguments against fictitious opponents.
I’m a confession guy both in practice and in vow. The confession is not at odds with the catechisms so I would not assume to read the confession as simply nullifying what is in the catechisms.
Do you have an actual argument or just more pent up frustration?
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cnh, you seem new to this subject. Effectual calling and regeneration are pretty much the same thing, and in Calvin’s day regeneration as a theological term was used more broadly than it came to be used. I see some of that more broad use of the term in the catechisms. The point is, anybody with good faith can see this, and based on the chapter 10 of the confession one can see what the Westminster divines were saying on this subject. There is also the legal consideration re union, but, again, you seem new to this subject. Try not to overstate any emotion you think you see in my writing, also, by the way. You seem a bit easily freaked out regarding that. Calm down. You’re not in danger.
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Also, you don’t seem to know who Richard Muller is. When you cite Muller you are really citing history rather than Mr. Muller’s ‘teaching’. He’s not a systematic theologian. His dictionary is not based on his opinions either.
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Christian wrote,
“You seem a bit easily freaked out regarding that. Calm down.”
Sound advice, you should give it a try. You are trying to evade what is laid out and no amount of appeal to Muller’s 4 vols is going to change that reality. If the catechism links union’s timing to effectual calling (LC 66) and if the sort of union they speak of is spiritual and mystical, real and inseprable and relates to our relation to Christ both federally as Head and maritally as husband then you have some explaining to do. You cant just keep saying, “late to the conversation” or “ever hear of legal union” or “don’t you read Muller”. It is possible that the anti-union crowd is overplaying the sources by trying to squeeze out of them more than they are willing to give and they would do well to show folks where they have clearly erred in their reading of LC 66 and other places.
You write,
“He’s not a systematic theologian. His dictionary is not based on his opinions either.”
Yes, he is an airtight dictionary without personality or presupposition. Why arent my copies of Muller in alphabetical order if it is simply a dictionary? Why the historic as well as systematic preambles before the quoting of the sources? Let’s not be naive.
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Um, I’m referring to a specific book titled Dictionary of Latin and Greek Theological Terms, not his more recent four-volume work.
And, again, everything is personality with you types. You have to attack names. For instance when a historic doctrine of the 16th century is being referenced you say “This whole Klinean notion of…” Muller is merely citing history. Quarrel with the history if you want, but that is a different can of worms for you.
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“You types”?
I’m sorry, have we met? Do I know you? Oh, I see the old “people are categories’ thing left over from modernism…no wonder “you guys” cant do good Biblical theology, you are too worried about finding the “principle” buried underneath all those extranous historical events and people. Now that we know what “type” you are, we can add a spot to the dictionary of theology that God…err…Muller left and all will be well.
I dont know you, but I bet your not much fun to have a beer with and I imagine you dont like fiction. But it’s just a hunch.
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And again, you still have answered the confessional language of LC 66. I guess that is what “all you guys” do. Wait, who are all you guys again?
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Christian
You really display little grace with those who disagree with you. You sour every post to which you contribute. In the interests of us all – stop it. In case you had missed the fact, and I suspect you may have, I am now the third person on this entry to highlight your gracelessness. Perhaps you should consider the wisdom of a multitude of counselors?
Strange that you are the one accusing everyone of not knowing, or loving or following the confession as you do, but then look to a source outside the confession to support your position. That’s simply poor work. I’m not bound by Muller, I am by the confession.
Matthew
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The current false teachers (Federal Vision and fellow travelers) don’t even recognize individual regeneration by the Word and the Spirit, so this thread is ironically ‘off the reservation’ according to the very people and their novel views you are wittingly or unwittingly defending.
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>In case you had missed the fact, and I suspect you may have, I am now the third person on this entry to highlight your gracelessness. Perhaps you should consider the wisdom of a multitude of counselors?
Look at any thread on this blog I am in and see this tactic you all are playing is the *first* tactic you play when you find yourself confronted by someone like myself who does not desire to play games with you and with these very serious doctrines of the faith.
Unfortunately blog and forum owners have fallen for your tactics over and over and have systematically banned all the non-lukewarm Christians on these subjects and allowed all the false teachers and their followers free reign to endlessly poison the waters.
Exactly where did I say the Holocaust was a good thing above? Quote it.
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Christian,
Is Dr. Gaffin a part of these false teaching travelers? The authors of question 66? Some of us are disagreeing with the actual arguments being made, not the big spooky ghosts that you find looming behind them.
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>no wonder “you guys†cant do good Biblical theology
No, Geerhardus Vos and Meredith G. Kline are lightweights in that area.
>I dont know you, but I bet your not much fun to have a beer with and I imagine you dont like fiction. But it’s just a hunch.
I don’t like beer. I like novels. They, as a genre, allow a true picture of human nature and the ways of the world to be presented. At their best.
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Christian,
You are blowing our cover. Up till now “us guys” had the wool pulled over Dr. Hart’s eyes (foolish man!) but by your revealing of our tactics (men, we must have another secret counsel today to change ‘tactics’) we must now be exposed for the sinister luke-warm bunch that we are.
And I thought we were asking union and ordo questions…little did I know how involved the whole thing was complete with secret societies, brown shirts and wiley tactics.
Dr. Hart, I am ashamed you did catch on to us sooner….sucker.
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correction – you “didnt” catch on
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Christian,
I am sorry I didnt get the team rosters to know who “you guys” picked…I called Vos right after the coin toss, so you cant have him…you guys got John Robbins. Skoda.
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Christian,
I don’t like beer much and I’m not the world’s greatest fan of novels, but I still know arrogance and intemperate language when I see it. I see it in you – NOTHING to do with your argument or your position, or mine for that matter (or Jesse’s or cnh’s) – though you seem incapable of recognizing that, but EVERYTHING to do with your attitude. Poor.
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>Is Dr. Gaffin a part of these false teaching travelers? The authors of question 66? Some of us are disagreeing with the actual arguments being made, not the big spooky ghosts that you find looming behind them.
If the Westminster divines could divine that 350 years from the time they were putting pen to paper a group of people were going to pounce all over their language in question 66 of the LC, disregard totally any influence of chapter 10 of the WCF, written on that very subject, then pretend that the term regeneration was not used differently in the history of the development of Reformed Theology than it came to be settled as being used, then they’d have been more careful. It’s a man-made document.
But having said the above, your ‘gotcha’ isn’t really much of a smoking gun, is it? What you want would dismantle the entire Westminster Standards at their marrow. We who actually value the doctrine presented by the Westminster Standards can afford to read it honestly and with the necessary care one needs to bring to a historic document, understanding language does not conform – or is not intentionally tightly written – to ward off all future periods of heresy/attack.
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Can I be on Vos’s side? Please don’t pick me last Jesse!
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Jesse, I didn’t say *you* were lukewarm. You’re obviously very revved up looking for a fight.
Matthew, how many times can you call somebody ‘without grace’ ‘bad attitude’ ‘behaving incorrectly’ before you sound like the beast you are accusing?
Without conceding you don’t have a trumped up charge against me in these accusations, personally, I’m never offended by someone’s attitude. Who cares? Like water off a duck’s back, as they say.
Chill. But don’t try to chill me.
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Matthew,
First, greetings. I heard much about you as the former minister of your parish came out this way and you took the charge in Georgia. Lord willing our paths will cross at GA or the like.
Second, for shame about the fiction, for shame…we can deal with the beer situation later. You see there are sins and there are transgressions…but anyway, all that for another day.
Christian,
Please read my above posts in light of the sarcasm with which they were delivered in hopes of having you see the strange leaps in your arguments. This “tactic” failed apparently, so I will get back to my work as lunch is over.
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>I am sorry I didnt get the team rosters to know who “you guys†picked…I called Vos right after the coin toss, so you cant have him…you guys got John Robbins. Skoda.
If you don’t want Kline as well, you can’t have Vos.
Anyway it’s great that you want Vos. Now read him.
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>Please read my above posts in light of the sarcasm with which they were delivered in hopes of having you see the strange leaps in your arguments.
I’m pretty much a hardened veteran of snarky forums full of intellectual types (I’m a great and foolish debater of evolutionists and atheists too!), and your claim of a running tactic in your posts falls flat, I must say. As, though, a roundabout way to call me a moron we’ll give you some points. If it makes you feel better.
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Christian,
Spoiler alert: We know that regeneration was used differently, as was conversion etc.
Please do us the favor, those of us who are not your faithful readers, and spell out for us how chapter 10 on “effectual call” is in any way undone by us reading chapter 10 and question 66 as mutually interpretive? You know, for us slow people.
And then tell us where these two events come in your ordo if at all
1. Legal Union
2. Vital Union
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Christian
Very good argument “how many times can you call somebody ‘without grace’ ‘bad attitude’ ‘behaving incorrectly’ before you sound like the beast you are accusing” – sounds awfully like one we used to use in primary school “… No! You are…”. Good stuff.
Didn’t I read somewhere about “…peace, patience, kindness, goodness … gentleness, self control…” or did I dream it?
Jesse,
Greetings also. It would be good to meet up sometime soon, where we could have a decent discussion without all this school-yard silliness. It all get rather boring after about 20 minutes! But still don’t pick me last!
Grace and Peace.
Matt
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Never said we didnt want Kline, but then again you dont know me…and you dont have the gift of mind reading.
And really, from the “you types” down, it was a running tactic. Again, your expertise does not lie where you claim. Hopefully your reading of historical sources is better than your proclaimed interpretive “snarkiness’ grid.
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Rev. Holst,
Stop acting desperate, it is unbecoming. I am trying to snag all Christian’s guys first and he doesnt want you, you are not “his type” (see there Christian, I did it again! See the quotation marks, dead give away).
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>Spoiler alert: We know that regeneration was used differently, as was conversion etc. Please do us the favor, those of us who are not your faithful readers, and spell out for us how chapter 10 on “effectual call†is in any way undone by us reading chapter 10 and question 66 as mutually interpretive? You know, for us slow people. And then tell us where these two events come in your ordo if at all 1. Legal Union 2. Vital Union
I suspect you were able to composed this latest comment because of the fact that you read my comments above. At least you’re learning, even if you don’t want to admit it.
As stated in my very first comment above WCF 10 uses effectuall calling language such as:
‘“effectually drawing them to Jesus Christ†which is exactly what regeneration accomplishes. No language of union. Language of new heart, renewed will, enlightened mind to understand the things of God.’
Legal union in the ordo salutis is adoption, which in Reformed Theology is an element of justification.
Now that you are hip to such distinctions why don’t you just simply learn them? I mean, cut the bluster and defending of wounded vanity, and just simply learn? The false teachers take advantage of ignorance in these matters. You don’t have to be convinced by me just be convinced by the study of Reformed Theology and your conscience and discernment.
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Matthew, don’t worry, I sense DGH is about five minutes away from coming into this thread and telling me to stop being a Viking imposing my danelaw on you poor souls. I want at least half the island, though, just so anyone who sees the light can have a place to go and not be called graceless and what not. Imagine that, Vikings graceless and behaving incorrectly…
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Or maybe it was because I taught on Calvin’s view of the Christian life as one of repentance…or read Muether on it in seminary when I think he was discussing Pilgrims Progress or …. but sure, you can be my teacher if you need your esteem built.
Adam, is that you? Bluster…sounds like you!
So were the authors of the LC tired when they clearly link mystical union with effectual calling…do tell O Master, My Master.
And if this is so clear, please show me the confessional teaching on it. That should not be tough, especially since you have already taught me all I know on these matters.
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And I noticed you dont have a place for vital union. Is that correct?
(dont tell but I read Horton on Covenant and Salvation too…I am hip to this jive, dig?)
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You crazy manly viking you…went all danelaw up in this place.
Good thing you did it from a distance, any closer and I would have caught a case of the shivers.
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Regarding the false teachers the issue is legal union. I’m big on law regarding my faith. I want to be standing on the Covenant of Redemption when any devil tries to stop me or fool me on the spiritual battlefield. But, again, see my comments above. It’s all there. Once one has experienced regeneration by the Word and the Spirit the resentments and attacks from the world, the flesh, and the devil commence, and also from nominal Christians who don’t cotton to any ‘regeneration’ by the Word and the Spirit. False teachers will never get any charity from me. Their followers need shocks to their system. Hope yours havn’t been *too* difficult…
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Low self awareness radar alert
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I have never seen a Viking dodge and backpeddle so much in a fight, is this Sister Christian by any chance.
Of course answering any of the straightforward questions listed above about LC 66 or vital union would require you to show yourself beyond the confession on many points so you huff and puff and apparently shock (though I think that might be you get shocked from working with wires while the lines are hot, this is not the place for do it your-self-ers) but you dont answer anything.
Let the reader understand.
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Christian, Jesse & Matt:
Wow, I apologize for not checking the blog recently. I was working on a paper that is overdue.
Christian, you wrote: “What you want would dismantle the entire Westminster Standards at their marrow.”
Saying it is so doesn’t make it so. You make assertions and don’t back it up. Please, explain to me. Teach me. How exactly would union coming with effectual calling, as the catechisms and many independent divines stated, dismantle the entire Westminster Standards? How can something they actually wrote dismantle their program? If they don’t mention it in Chapter 10, let me assure you, that it was in many of their independent writings.
What, please, does it do and how does it do it?
FYI, in case you think I am one of “those guys” – I am wary of Kline, enjoy Vos but stay very clear of Federal Vision and NPP. That said, if teams are being drawn up for some sort of RPG version of a theology smack-down…I will take Kline and Vos any day over what side you are on, Christian.
Pick me, Jesse. I like beer AND fiction!
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I’ll take….cnh. What kind of beer did you bring? If its light or from a macro brew I’m throwing you back.
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CNH, I’ll say it again, I find the ordo in the Catechisms’ discussion of ordo to be not entirely orderly. For instance, the Shorter Catechism starts the application of redemption by talking about faith. The HS applies to us the benefits of redemption by working faith in us, thereby uniting us to Christ in our effectual calling. So is it faith, then union, then effectual calling? Then the catechism says, effectual calling is convincing us of our sin and misery, enlightening our minds, and renewing our wills and then we embrace Christ. So knowledge and regeneration proceed union (i.e. embracing Christ).
I’m not objecting to these answers. I just don’t find them to be definitive about the ordo.
Meanwhile, I keep wondering why the historia salutis, which was supposed to liberate us from ordo questions, has made us obsessive about ordo questions.
Matt, I don’t disagree that redemptive stuff happens before and after justification, no more than I deny that redemptive stuff happened before and after the death of Christ. But isn’t it possible to say that just as there is not salvation without Christ’s death, there is no salvation without justification. If you want to claim that union is crucial to justification, I see the point and take it. But so is the Trinity crucial to justification. What I am partly contending for is the idea that justification is central in a way that sanctification is not. And that is because it is possible for someone to be saved who is partially sanctified. There is no such thing as partial justification.
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No, not light beer…the darker the better. I tend to like beer that is too expensive for my budget so I have to make it myself. That just means that there’s plenty to go around!
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dgh, what do you think of Murray’s understanding of definitive sanctification? Wouldn’t that mean that there’s a sense in which a person cannot be saved who is partially sanctified? Correct me if I am wrong, but I don’t think union people (aka, “those people”) argue that a person is progressively sanctified all at once in their union with Christ. Do they?
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dgh, you wrote, “I find the ordo in the Catechisms’ discussion of ordo to be not entirely orderly.” So, as a “Old Life” confessional kind of guy…what do you base your understanding of the ordo on?
I am confused a bit. I agree with what you are saying: completely justified. Completely saved even if only partially sanctified (thief on the cross, right?). How does the placement of union hurt that? Furthermore, how does receiving the benefits simultaneously hurt that? In other words, if you are fully justified and adopted and sanctification begins all at the same time – what’s lost?
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DGH: The HS applies to us the benefits of redemption by working faith in us, thereby uniting us to Christ in our effectual calling.
“Thereby” means “thus”, or as RL put it, is a causative (“by this”). So:
The HS applies to us the benefits of redemption by working faith in us. By this, He unites us to Christ in our effectual calling.
So faith causes union (more precisely, causes reception of union).
The “in our effectual calling” is an appositive of the “working faith in us.” So:
The HS applies to us the benefits of redemption by working faith in us, which is our effectual calling. By this, He unites us to Christ.
JRC
P.S. My beer is root (IBC), though ginger is nice also.
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Darryl
Right, now we can get back to the real discussion without all this “reformed whodunnit” or … “didn’tdoit” – I don’t know.
My problem with what you have articulated is that it is true of all of salvation. Salvation is not possible without regeneration, calling, sanctification, perseverance, glorification. So the “Salvation is not possible without justification card” is applicable to ANY and indeed EVERY aspect of redemption. Salvation is not salvation with any one of these component parts. Fact. Now you say that salvation is possible without full sanctification – sure, but it’s not possible without partial sanctification. So we are back where we started.
If you take one block out, the wall falls, at least from where I am standing. Now don’t misread me, that is not to deny any such logical priority of justification. But you can’t use the ‘salvation is not possible…” play because it is true in every single aspect of redemption.
Does that make sense?
Blessings
Matt
PS Darryl, glad you could check back in … we picked up sides in your absence, apparently you and Kline are still awaiting to be picked. I’ll have a word with the skipper and see if you can join our team, Apparently the captain drinks beer AND reads novels. Cool. 😉
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Justification is the heart. You can be alive without a functioning brain. You can be alive without ability to move your limbs. You can’t be alive without a functioning heart.
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Muller goes on in that reference I cited earlier to say Reformed orthodox distinguished between the initial uniting (think one and done legal) and the ongoing union (think sanctification which happens in the rest of the life of the believer.
In the same article in that dictionary Muller also uses ‘regeneration’ as synonymous with the point of justification and adoption.
In my experience I don’t tend to think there was much time, if any, between being regenerated by the Word and the Spirit and having faith. It may have been a very innocent faith (not based on much understanding of doctrine), yet faith is faith.
Union is a snare and a delusion (I once read a review of a recording of a work by Mozart where the reviewer called the recording “a snare and a delusion” ha ha) when the motive for focusing on it is ‘regeneration by ritual’ (baptismal regeneration), or when it is being used to deflect from justification by faith alone. Otherwise, my side really likes union and our guys even include whole chapters in their systematic theologies to mystical union (they even use the cool word ‘mystical’ without getting slammed by other Reformed theologians).
Saying you are being crucified because you point out that the Westminster Standards reference union is empty and silly. The false teachers are using ‘union’ against justification by faith alone the same way they use ‘grace’ to excise the Covenant of Works from the Garden.
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I used excise wrong, and I frankly can’t think of the word I meant to use. I’ll just say ‘cut out.’
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Ok, but Christian, no one on this list with whom you are talking is using union in the way you seem to be attacking. So, either you are completely unable to carry on a nuanced theological conversation or you are simply lumping together anyone who talks about union with the “false teachers” out of an overreaction. You say that talking about union – even having whole chapters on it – is acceptable. So, why can’t we talk about it without you going into rants about false teachers, regeneration by ritual, etc. I mean, if your complaint is that the “false teachers” use the language of union to spread their false teachings they probably use paedobaptism, catechism and preaching, too. Should we get rid of those also?
You still have not sufficiently answered my questions so I will simply assume you concede the point. Union comes before justification and the other benefits flow from that union. That is the Confessions stance via the catechisms.
I don’t understand why it is that you keep mentioning Muller without actually quoting him. I hope you get a commission whenever you do. I will be sure to tell him you said ‘hi’ the next time I see him. Maybe I can get you an autographed book…any preferences on which one?
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Christian, my comments weren’t directed to you, so I’d appreciate you let someone who has something worth saying (that would be Darryl), say it. Any conversation with you is fruitless.
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It’s not all about you, Matthew. (Or maybe it is. I don’t know. Maybe it is all about you, and I just didn’t get the memo.)
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cnh, I’m going to be serious with you. In my initial comments I got to the heart of these matters. Look at the John Owen quote in the early part of this thread. Regeneration is the main thing. This makes people angry. False teachers despise any notion of regeneration by the Word and the Spirit. The Roman Catholic Church in it most corrupt era kept the Word of God away from people on pain of torture and death *so that* regeneration could not happen. Notice though they called people to be *baptized* all day long. The devil knows what regenerates, and it’s not ritual.
As for the sophistry with union, you just have to entertain the possibility there is more going on there than you currently can discern. The false teachers – I repeat – use union to lessen justification by faith alone the exact same way they use grace to erase the Covenant of Works from the Garden.
The entire enterprise of the false teachers is to keep people in the system of the Beast, working for their own salvation, exalting man and ritual above the Word and the Spirit.
You want union with God before you are made right with God by God Himself. This is not entering in by the front door. You’ll get kicked out of the Wedding. (Practically speaking you’ve yet to be broken in your vanity, worldly pride, and rebellious self-will, and you are making demands on God and His plan. A Christian needs an internal reorientation from being man-centered to being God-centered.) I and everybody else who annoys you like I’ve been doing am doing you a favor.
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cnh, I’m not persuaded about definitive sanctification. It is the peculiar view of Murray.
Matt, you make a point with which I must agree. But who talks about regeneration or sanctification as the doctrine upon which the church stands or falls? It seems to me that some are saying that of union. In either case, justification is the crown jewel of benefits because it has to do with the righteousness that makes us right with God, which is what salvation is about — as in saved from sin and death.
Jeff, if faith produces union, then union is a benefit applied in the application of redemption. But in previous discussions you have talked about union as a mechanism, akin to an instrument, which is akin to faith. And this is where I see a lot of confusion — is union a benefit that comes with the application of redemption or is it an instrument. in the application of redemption?
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cnh, union only hurts (me, at least) when it denies the priority (and importance) of justification to sanctification. Frankly, I don’t care if union is before or after justification. I am awfully concerned though about making justification and sanctification so simultaneous that you can then say good works or personal righteousness are necessary for salvation (as opposed to good works being the necessary consequence-outcome of saving faith). So far, a lot of union talk has been designed to avoid antinomianism and to fashion an incentive for personal holiness. It may be a genetic fallacy or impolite, but that was what was motiving Shepherd too. Which is why union has been used as a covered for Shepherd like views (as in Kinnaird).
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There’s an assertion out of thin air! What do you mean? How does this follow?
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Jeff, you appear to be saying that we are united to Christ by faith. I (along with lots of others) am saying that we are justified by faith. Union and justification, then, appear to be in a similar relationship to faith. Since justification is a benefit of the redemption purchased by Christ, is union such a benefit? Other times you have seemed to speak of union more on the order of faith, as an instrument that produces justification.
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Daryl you wrote,
“Frankly, I don’t care if union is before or after justification. I am awfully concerned though about making justification and sanctification so simultaneous that you can then say good works or personal righteousness are necessary for salvation (as opposed to good works being the necessary consequence-outcome of saving faith). ”
So I should gather that you would have problems with this sort of language, “Are good works necessary to justification? We deny. Are good works necessary to salvation? We affirm.”
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Jesse, I need more context to answer your question. What surrounds these quotes?
I am comfortable and affirm WCF16 2: good works “are the fruits and evidences of a true and lively faith, etc.”
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The context is Turretin on Sanctification and Good Works.
In this same chapter he opens by making plain that sanctification stands for the “real change of man” which for him takes place in three ways, efficacious calling, regeneration and infusion and practice of righteousness (which I learned from Christian just yesterday!). All three of these come under the broad category of sanctification, a term that can by used to stand for the whole Christian life.
Now he agrees that there is a stricter usage of the term (one that you seem to want to make the exclusive use and seem to posit that only Murray spoke otherwise) which does “follow” justification though begun in the act of regeneration.
In this section he goes on to talk about justification and sanctification being distinct but never “torn asunder”. Several pages later he enters into his discussion on the necessity of good works. And the quote you see is his topic heading.
Of course he will make all the proper distinctions, at least from where I am sitting, but it does not seem, by what you say above and elsewhere, that you find this way of speaking proper. Can we affirm with him that as a ground of our salvation and standing works have no place, “Rather the question concerns the necessity of means, of presence and of connection or order – Are they required as the means and way for possessing salvation? This we hold.”
He does go on to say such a formula was rejected by certain “Lutheran theologians as less suitable and dangerous; nay, even by some of our theologians; still we think with others that it can be retained without danger if properly explained.”
Maybe you are one of the “some” of which he speaks. I would not begrudge you this right, but when we begin (like Christian) to talk beyond what the tradition binds others to as if it were “just this way”, I begin to lose a bit of my catholic spirit.
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Jesse, here’s one part of a response, without having read more of Turretin or the context for his formulations. No one who asserts the priority of justification denies sanctification, though the charge of antinomianism has been used against priority. BTW, I’ve heard that Turretin affirmed the priority or the forensic. So as long as the priority is affirmed, I’m comfortable generally with some of the language about necessity of good works.
Also, the opponents of priority have often wanted to insist that Reformed and Lutherans have different understandings of justification. So the concern for catholicity is as much a concern for me as it might be for you against Christian.
Finally, why is union essential to what Turretin says? Is his a point about union or about sanctification? In other words, aren’t some insisting on a certain language about union in order to affirm T’s views on sanctification? I’m not sure how that follows, as in my first point, the priority of justification is not antinomian (at least as Paul understood the charge of antinomianism and also was able to say that the works of the law kill and condemn.)
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Darryl, may I call you Darryl?
I understand your desire for priority. That said, do the “unionists” not also affirm the priority of justification? But then of course once we say priority we have to get into all those pesky issues of what sort of “priority” we are talking about. And before we can do that we have to define what “manner” of speech we are using with reference to sanctification (broader or narrower as Turretin says).
Why is union essential to what Turretin is saying? I guess I would refer back to the LC 66 issues and the placement of union which would then give context for the whole conversation itself. And again, I am not insisting you speak this way, but I am not willing to give in and say therefore no one should speak this way because it’s “not reformed” and compromises “justification by faith”.
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Rev. Pirschel, you may call me Darryl. I’ve been called worse.
Why all the qualifications about priority? Our communion has affirmed it, at least the GA study committee. What are the errors that attend a “wrong” statement of priority? And doesn’t the idea of the material principle of the Reformation suggest a certain kind of priority of justification for all Protestants?
If you want to defend Turretin by referring to LC 66, I guess that’s okay but I’m still not sure that is his point or theirs, or that union is as central to the Standards as some read them. I mean, in that section of the LC, communion, not union, is the heading for talking about the benefits like justification, etc. So it is this effort to see union everywhere that I find puzzling. LC 66 does talk about union and then goes to effectual calling. LC 69 discusses communion and then goes to justification, adoption, and sanctification. (Communion is missing explicitly from the SC.) This means that I could read the standards as saying communion is more basic than union. So why in that part of the LC focus on union and not communion?
No offense, but it seems arbitrary and I fear something else is going on with this stress on union. Seeing the way union has been used by FVers and Kinnaird, I’d think the unionists would be quick to clarify they are not saying that. And yet more opposition to Lutheran or Lutheran-like statements of forensic priority than these other problem spots have come from unionists.
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Why all the qualifications? No personal reason, just laying out what Turretin was careful to make distinctions about. I guess I could retort, “Why the fear of qualifications?” But I know what you are trying to protect, I get it and I know the dangers of not doing so, pastorally/theologically etc. Moralism is a drag, dont want no part of it.
As an aside, I find it amusing how our “communion” spoke in a received report but apparently did not speak in its official exercise of the keys with regard to Kinnaird. We all have our ways of reading animus now don’t we?
This is where the real issue is for me; the our team versus your team mentality. I thought we were on the same team. I mean I cant go to 99% of churches out there because of what I believe, do we really need a new reformation over whether sanctification and justification are temporally simultaneous? Isnt it more important to make certain that we believe justification has its ground in Christ’s work alone received by me by faith alone? A faith that, while in no way meritorious, will pursue pleasing God? And when it fails, and it will daily, hourly and moment by moment, finds it’s rest in Christ’s work for me?
It would seem from our discussion that the confession isn’t as clear as we would like on the precise matter at hand, so do we need to be wholly agreed here to walk together? Some act, on both sides of the debate, as if we cannot. I disagree (even Turretin knew their would be guys like you who were closet liberal, limp wristed, quasi Lutherans in the Reformed church). And for those who take themselves a bit too seriously that was a joke.
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Hi Dr. Hart,
The issue is one of comparing unlike things…
DGH: Jeff, you appear to be saying that we are united to Christ by faith.
Yes. (WSC 30).
DGH: I (along with lots of others) am saying that we are justified by faith.
Yes. (Citations not necessary!)
DGH: Union and justification, then, appear to be in a similar relationship to faith.
No.
DGH: Since justification is a benefit of the redemption purchased by Christ, is union such a benefit?
No.
DGH: Other times you have seemed to speak of union more on the order of faith, as an instrument that produces justification.
No.
Let me carefully explain the No’s.
By faith, God unites us, brings us into union with Christ. This means that what is mine (sin) is his; and what is his (righteousness) is mine.
There are two aspects of this union. Legally, He is my federal head. So in Him, I am declared righteous (Phil 3). Experientially, Christ dwells in our hearts through faith. So Christ in us (via the Holy Spirit) produces the fruit of righteousness.
Hence: justification is a benefit, a manifestation of my union with Christ (WLC 69).
By contrast, union is the mechanism, the process by which that justification takes place. In re justification, union is a synonym for imputation: Christ’s righteousness is legally reckoned to me.
By further contrast, faith is the instrument, the “thing” that receives God’s grace.
So comparing justification to union to faith is like comparing apples to food transportation to trucks. There just isn’t any way to compare them.
This is why “union” doesn’t appear in an ordo salutis. Union is not a part of salvation that happens; it comprehends the whole of salvation. Our justification, adoption, and sanctification (and other benefits) manifest our union (WLC 69).
JRC
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DGH: So why in that part of the LC focus on union and not communion?
Why talk about redemption and not salvation? Surely synonyms can be used!
DGH: No offense, but it seems arbitrary and I fear something else is going on with this stress on union. Seeing the way union has been used by FVers and Kinnaird…
Frankly, the FV is late in the game. They were able to make headway because the notion of union, and the notion of the visible church, and the notion of the efficacy of sacraments, were already established categories that were then advanced beyond their proper station. Had they come out with this radical new idea (“Hey everyone, ‘union’ is a great description of our salvation!”) then your fear would make more sense.
Go back to earlier sources on union to understand it properly. Or even modern sources, like A. Hoekema, who treat it in a classic manner.
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Jeff, you’ve lost me but a blog is no place to do ST. You say union and communion are synonyms. They may be for you but I suspect they weren’t for the Divines. This is why I really would ask for more attention to the word “communion” in WLC 69. They could have uses union if they are synonyms. They could have simply put the answer to 69 in 66. But they made a distinction and you just seem to brush it away.
The same goes for your traffic between instrument and mechanism. When you write your ST you’ll have more space to spell this out. But for now I am not convinced that it is a synonym. And for that reason, I’m still trying to wrap my head around union, which like Waldo keeps popping up everywhere.
Jesse, some of the team spirit has persisted because of the Shepherd controversy which was never seriously addressed in the OPC. Both sides in that struggle have been wary since. And I’d say that one side has been pushier of late in the charges of Lutheran and in saying that the doctrine of justification needs to be improved by adding more on union, definitive sanctification, the list could go on. Wouldn’t it make sense that in the context of an unresolved controversy over justification you perhaps state clearly what you are and are not saying about improving justification. At least Shepherd spelled it out in 34 theses and several papers.
BTW, our communion’s ruling on Kinnaird included provisions that he shouldn’t be teaching his views, and the lack of clarity in that verdict prompted the report on justification. Do you really think you are barred from 99 % of the churches because of your views? Are your views that widely known? (I don’t really know them.) I do know that some people advise against calling certain graduates of a certain seminary because of the forensic priority.
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DGH: And for that reason, I’m still trying to wrap my head around union
Well, like I said, go back to the earlier sources on union rather than more modern ones, especially ones that reflect something of the OPC struggle, which I really don’t understand.
I think AA Hodge’s treatment is pretty clear.
As for brushing aside differences, I beg of you to overlook my presumption in thinking that “communion” would mean “union with.” 😉
The communion in grace which the members of the invisible church have with Christ, is their partaking of the virtue of his mediation, in their justification, adoption, sanctification, and: Whatever else, in this life, manifests their union with him. — WLC 69.
JRC
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But Jeff, you’re living now and you’re writing in this context. Perhaps you can connect the dots and show how in the current context Hodge or WLC 69 needs to be understood. I have never said this idea is foreign to the tradition. I have said that the idea is not resting quietly on today’s troubled waters.
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Darryl,
The 99% comment was not of the OPC but of the church universal. We are reformed and bound by the same confession, that means much of the american church wants nothing to do with us. It was simply my way of saying if the two sides have this much in common, are we going to let the East/West union issue be the way to get the percentage to 99.5%.
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As far as which side is pushier, I didnt know the issues were so stark until certain blogs informed me how unreformed definitive sanctification was and how everyone knows the whole reformed tradition really held to republication in the way certain men define it. Its a two-way street, let’s be honest.
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Jesse, I’d say that if some people had been pushier with Shepherd than with those who were pushy with Shepherd the church would be spared much of this suspicion. Again, the context is what partly accounts for this tension. One coast has been candid about the justification controversy. The other has not. And the stuff about definitive sanctification and republication make a lot more sense when seen in the context of that controversy over justification that started in the 1970s and keeps rumbling along.
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DGH: Perhaps you can connect the dots and show how in the current context Hodge or WLC 69 needs to be understood.
I thought I had been connecting dots for some time now?
The understanding in the current context should be, IMO, the same understanding as in Hodge’s day, or as in Westminster’s.
We are justified by faith by the imputation of Christ’s righteousness. One way of expressing that is that we are united with Him and His righteousness thereby becomes ours.
I encourage you to go back and re-read, say, Inst. 3 with an eye toward the prominence of union in Calvin’s thought.
Here is how he begins Chapter 3, titled, “The way in which we receive the grace of Christ”:
We must now see in what way we become possessed of the blessings which God has bestowed on his only-begotten Son, not for private use, but to enrich the poor and needy. And the first thing to be attended to is, that so long as we are without Christ and separated from him, nothing which he suffered and did for the salvation of the human race is of the least benefit to us. To communicate to us the blessings which he received from the Father, he must become ours and dwell in us. Accordingly, he is called our Head, and the first-born among many brethren, while, on the other hand, we are said to be ingrafted into him and clothed with him, all which he possesses being, as I have said, nothing to us until we become one with him.
And the answer to the question, “in what way?” is, Faith.
Or look at what Calvin thinks of baptism:
The last advantage [of three — JRC] which our faith receives from baptism is its assuring us not only that we are ingrafted into the death and life of Christ, but so united to Christ himself as to be partakers of all his blessings. For he consecrated and sanctified baptism in his own body (Matt. 3:13), that he might have it in common with us as the firmest bond of union and fellowship which he deigned to form with us; and hence Paul proves us to be the sons of God, from the fact that we put on Christ in baptism, (Gal. 3: 26-27.) Thus we see the fulfilment of our baptism in Christ, whom for this reason we call the proper object of baptism. — Inst 4.15.
While I agree with you that union should not displace JBFA in our thinking; nor is it to be a despised doctrine and given a place secondary to ordo salutis.
And in historical fact, the doctrine of union precedes the doctrine of ordo by a good 50 years or so (taking Perkins’ Golden Chain to be the first articulation of the ordo)
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>As far as which side is pushier, I didnt know the issues were so stark until certain blogs informed me how unreformed definitive sanctification was
Definitive sanctification is not unReformed. Tweaking it into service with union to trump justification is unReformed. Clearly a more direct way of stating it would have been: “I didnt know the issues were so stark until certain blogs informed me how unreformed Murray’s idea of definitive sanctification was…”
>and how everyone knows the whole reformed tradition really held to republication in the way certain men define it. Its a two-way street, let’s be honest.
It’s called Federal Theology, the spine of which is the two Adams. The confusion is between republication vs. ‘reestablishment’ which if not explained understandably gets the sola fide warriors (of which I’m one) who don’t yet know the issues up in arms and allows the false teachers an open field of confusion to ply their trade.
Jesus was born *under the law* and fulfilled what the first Adam failed to fulfill. That law was republished on Sinai to demonstrate this. National Israel was a proto-type of the Messiah. National Israel’s very history mirrors the history of the man Jesus Christ. The law was republished in elaborated form to give evidence that Jesus fulfilled what Adam failed to fulfill. Only Jesus could, after the fall.
There is only way to be saved: works. Either our own (good luck with that), or Jesus Christ’s, appropriated by faith.
A point that gets missed on this subject is this: though national Israel was saved by faith in the coming Messiah just as we are saved by faith in the already come Messiah, national Israel still was as unique a player in God’s plan of redemption as the first Adam was unique and as Jesus Christ Himself is unique. The history of national Israel was the actual *substance* of biblical history, for one thing (the failure to save themselves or keep their land by their works following the law is the example for us all driving us all to Christ, for instance). National Israel, also, was a type of Christ. Fallen man is none of those things. The apostle Paul, in Romans, struggles to explain how national Israel is different from fallen man in general yet at the same time the same as fallen man. National Israel’s status as a *unique player* in God’s plan of redemption is the subject of that struggle to explain. Though he makes it clear once one knows the ‘whole’ and can see the parts in relation to the whole.
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There is only [one] way to be saved: works. Either our own (good luck with that), or Jesus Christ’s, appropriated by faith.
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I said definitive sanctification is not unReformed. Here is a passage from John Owen posted in a thread over at the Heidelblog that states the Reformed understanding:
“One thing we must premise to clear our ensuing discourse from
ambiguity ; and this is, that there is mention in the Scripture of a
twofold sanctification, and consequently of a twofold holiness. The first is common unto persons and things, consisting in the peculiar
dedication, consecration, or separation of them unto the service of
God by his own appointment, whereby they become holy. Thus the
priests and Levites of old, the ark, the altar, the tabernacle, and the
temple, were sanctified and made holy; and indeed in all holiness
whatever, there is a peculiar dedication and separation unto God.
But in the sense mentioned, this was solitary and alone. No more
belonged unto it but this sacred separation, nor was there any other
effect of this sanctification. But, secondly, there is another kind
of sanctification and holiness, wherein this separation to God is not
the first thing done or intended, but a consequent and effect thereof.
This is real and internal, by the communicating of a principle of
holiness unto our natures, attended with its exercise in acts and
duties of holy obedience unto God.â€
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Jeff, the quotes from Calvin sound like union is election — becoming ingrafted into Christ, our federal head. That’s a different point of ST than the application of redemption or the work of Christ. They are related. But again, the union-talk needs to be systematized — that is, we need to see how it fits into ST if it is a breakthrough. (But again, then the point seems to shift when you say it’s as old as the hills.)
But you don’t say anything here about the context. Why the stress on union? Why now?
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DGH: Jeff, the quotes from Calvin sound like union is election — becoming ingrafted into Christ, our federal head. That’s a different point of ST than the application of redemption or the work of Christ.
Interesting interpretation. If so, then why is he speaking of “becoming possessed of the blessings we have in Christ…”? Sure sounds like the application of redemption to me.
DGH: …we need to see how it fits into ST if it is a breakthrough.
It isn’t a breakthrough; else it wouldn’t be in the Confession and the Institutes. It may be that the notion that “union is central to Calvin’s thought” is a more recent idea — and one that I would disagree with.
DGH: But you don’t say anything here about the context. Why the stress on union? Why now?
Don’t know. My spring break plan, Lord willing, is to read up and find out what I can.
—
Let me ask you a couple of questions, if I may.
* When you say that justification has logical priority before sanctification, what do you mean precisely?
* In your view, why does the Confession not directly teach an ordo? Does this imply that ordo is a doctrine in which there is liberty of belief?
* Calvin’s approach to salvation is that faith takes hold of two separate benefits, justification and repentance (which he also calls “regeneration”). He does not make one logically dependent on the other, but both as mutually present in the redeemed man (Inst 3.3.1) — one cannot partake of repentance without imputation; one cannot partake of imputation without repentance. Is this a deficiency?
JRC
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Jeff, on you first question, I’ll quote from the OPC’s report on justification: “In addition to the doctrine of union with Christ, the idea of the ordo salutis makes clear that justification is prior to sanctification. This is not priority in the sense that one is somehow more important than the other. Neither is it a temporal priority, strictly speaking, for there is no such thing as a justified person who is not also being sanctified. But while justification is the necessary prerequisite of the process of sanctification, that process is not the necessary prerequisite of justification. It is true to say that one must be justified in order to be sanctified; but it is untrue to say that one must be sanctified in order to be justified. Justification and sanctification bear
a relationship to each other that cannot be reversed.”
I am puzzled by your third question. In context, it seems to use regenration, repentance, and sanctification interchangeably. Remember, where you see synonyms (union and communion), I do not.
Regarding an ordo in the Confession, I guess you can find one there, but it is not entirely clear. I mean, why teach on faith (ch. 14) after justification (chap. 11)?
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On the third question, I was issuing the standard disclaimer one encounters reading Calvin: his use of the term “regeneration” is different from the later usage.
He explicitly equates it with “repentance”: In one word, then, by repentance I understand regeneration, the only aim of which is to form in us anew the image of God, which was sullied, and all but effaced by the transgression of Adam. — Inst. 3.3.9.
The only reason I pointed it out was to make sure that you didn’t think I was saying that effectual calling is the result of faith!
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