Category: Confessionalism

More Lumping and Splitting

Published on by D. G. Hart25 Comments

Word on the web is that Rome is opening up ecumenical conversations with confessional Lutherans. At the First Things blog, Matthew Block describes some of the activity and rationale for these discussions.

While dialogue between Roman Catholics and mainline Lutherans continues, a desire has arisen among Roman Catholics to begin looking to confessional Lutherans for more fruitful dialogue. The Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, while still under the presidency of Cardinal Walter Kasper, contacted the Independent Evangelical Lutheran Church in Germany (SELK), Dr. Klän reported, to “fathom the chances of having something like a dialogue established between the two church bodies, the Roman Catholic Church in Germany and [SELK].” Dr. Klän and SELK’s Bishop Hans-Jörg Voigt were subsequently invited to visit the Unity Secretariat in Rome to meet with Cardinal Kasper and Msgr. Dr. Matthias Türk (responsible for the PCPCU’s Lutheran relations). This consultation led to the six-part discussions in Germany.

“One cannot deny that the church is influenced and affected by worldly societal trends,” said Dr. Klän in his report to the ILC. “The challenges that Christianity is facing today are not restricted to one church body. And that is why it makes sense to look for alliances with Christians and churches we might find agreement with on certain issues.”

He continued: “In many a way it may be hoped that confessional Lutheran-Roman Catholic dialogue on the world level could contribute to pursuing the goal of communicating foundational principles of Christian faith and defending them against being watered down, being contradicted, being challenged, and neglected not only from outside Christianity, but also within the realm of established church bodies. That is why it makes sense to me for the ILC and its member churches to enter into a theological dialogue with the Roman Catholic Church.”

The Roman Catholic Church seems to agree. When the German discussions ended, the participants issued a report encouraging both churches to enter into formal dialogue. Responding to that report, the new president of the PCPCU, Cardinal Kurt Koch, wrote in 2011 to Bishop Voigt of the SELK, informing him that the Roman Catholic Church is highly interested in starting an official dialogue with the ILC.

(Here is a link to the International Lutheran Council.)

Block suggests that recent opposition to Obamacare is a factor in making these ecumenical discussions plausible:

In the United States of America, for example, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops and The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod have recently become allies over the subject of religious liberty in the face of the Health and Human Services contraceptive mandate. And in Canada, very tentative discussions between the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops and Lutheran Church–Canada have also begun. These churches are members of the International Lutheran Council, an international association of Lutheran churches known for their more traditional interpretation of the authority of Scripture and the Lutheran Confessions—hence the term “confessional” Lutherans.

I don’t mean to remind Lutherans impolitely of Martin Luther’s chutzpah at the Marburg Colloquy, but these sort of dialogues do present a problem both for the integrity of the Roman Catholic Church and Lutheran communions and for the powers of human reason. Here I am reminded of Alan Wolfe’s interpretation of the recent thaw between Roman Catholics and Protestants in the United States (this from a sociologist of Jewish-American extraction who has no dog in the interpretive fight):

Now it is undoubtedly truth that many of these once furious debates between Catholics and Protestants have subsided in contemporary America. For the first time in our history, a generic thing called Christianity is emerging, as large numbers of switchers move from one faith to another and as young spiritual seekers respond, not to doctrinal differences between faiths, but to the vibrancy of specific sermons or the charisma of particular clergy. But if there exists a convergence among Christians today, it is difficult to imagine that the Christianity which historically divided them is precisely what is now unifying them. On the contrary, it makes more sense to argue that there is something in contemporary American culture that causes all American religions to become similar to each other (just as there is likely something in Nigerian culture that make all of Nigeria’s faiths — Anglican, Catholic, and Muslim — conservative in a worldwide context). Once something resembling a generic Christianity emerges, in other words, it confirms a relationship between democracy and Christianity, but it is not the one discovered by Tocqueville and extended by Heclo: today democracy shapes Christianity more than the other way around. (in Christianity and American Democracy, by Hugh Heclo et al, 191-192)

This is one reason why lumping causes indigestion for splitters. I don’t presume to speak for the lumpers who seem to be able to swallow anything.

The Bible's Forked Tongue?

Published on by D. G. Hart415 Comments

Put simply, the Bible speaks narrowly to the church but broadly to believers. This, at least, is the unexamined logic of neo-Calvinism.

Two-kingdom proponents and neo-Calvinists both distinguish between the institutional church and its members. This distinction allows us to recognize that Christians properly do things that the church can’t do. Christians work as artists, parents, plumbers, bankers, and bakers. The church does not produce or rear children, lacks its own currency, uses bread from common sources for the Lord’s Supper. So far so good.

But the hiccup for neo-Calvinists comes when they insist that Christians must have biblical warrant or use the lens of Scripture for all that they do. In Kingdoms Apart, Timothy R. Scheurers, puts it this way:

Where . . . proponents of the Two Kingdoms perspective go wrong, however, is in their failure to distinguish adequately between the work of the church (as an institution) and the cultural activity of Christians who are simultaneously citizens of heaven and earth (church as an organism). The Two Kingdoms doctrine neglects the biblical command that in every area of public living, believers should apply the principles and values that shape their distinctiveness as Christians. If fails to provide a biblical and helpful paradigm for cultural living by limiting the unique identity and spirituality of believers in this world. . . .

Scripture nowhere hints that we are to live a compartmentalized life in which we relegate our Christian convictions to Sunday observance only. Romans 12:1 declares that for those who have been renewed by the Spirit of God, it is entirely reasonable and fitting for them to offer up to God their whole person, both body and soul, in an act of worship. . . . If we accept the Two Kingdoms assertion that the Christian’s secular activities are “thoroughly common,” and that it is improper to “apply” the gospel to our work in the common realm, it would seem a type of Sunday Christianity remains for us. However, if we are transformed by the gospel, then it is profoundly relevant for how we conduct ourselves as Christians in the civil realm, for “the very essence of Christian faith includes a grace-produced identity that comes to manifestation in the way we live our lives every day of the week.” (144-45)

And thus we see another example of neo-Calvinism’s bloated rhetoric for admirably pious reasons.

Here is the rub: if the essence of the Christian faith is a grace-produced identity for every area of human existence, then the church (institute or institutional) lacks this Christian essential. After all, the corporate church does not take stands on matters in which Christians engage throughout the week — plumbing, baking, banking, gardening, ditch-digging. No Reformed church has produced a chapter or chapters in its creeds about algebra, Greek, or photosynthesis. That does not seem to bother neo-Calvinists since the work of the church is different from that of the believer.

But if neo-Calvinists are content with churches that lack the essence of Christianity, why do they demand more of believers than of the church? Churches don’t confess articles of faith about hydrogen or dangling prepositions because the Bible does not speak to such matters. The Reformed creeds summarize biblical teaching and if Scripture taught trigonometry or Asian history, churches would be expected to teach what God’s word reveals.

And yet, under the logic of the comprehensive sweep of Christianity and biblical testimony, neo-Calvinists claim powers for believers what the church lacks, namely, the ability to apply biblical norms to all walks of life. We do not let ministers preach sermons on tax rates, rotation of crops, exercise, or television game shows. But now along come neo-Calvinists to tell us that any Tom, Dick or Mary, who has no training in biblical exegesis or may not even be catechized, is going to tell us how the gospel transforms cat litter, Alfred Hitchcock movies, and meteorology?

And people wonder why the institutional church ends up suffering in neo-Calvinist contexts, or why the convoluted notion of kingdom-work has given every member a ministry.

As I say, neo-Calvinists intentions may be admirable. But Calvinists, who put the T in TULIP, were not supposed to be suckers for good intentions.

Of Paper Popes and Parasitic Presbyterians

Published on by D. G. Hart105 Comments

Perhaps the ruckus over Jason Stellman’s decision has passed but one response by Peter Leithart needs some attention, if only because it highlights a general problem in Reformed and Presbyterian circles. It is the way that Reformed Protestantism sits lightly with folks who are officers in Reformed and Presbyterian communions. Not to pick on anyone in particular, but also not to hide behind vagaries, this problem is not Leithart’s by himself. It is also part of the gift mix that John Frame and Tim Keller have bequeathed to many of their readers and fans.

The problem specifically is one identifying more with the Bible than tradition, relying more on exegesis than the common confession of a Reformed communion, exploring more existing church and intellectual concerns than mining paths trod by saints in the past.

Here is Leithart’s version of this impulse (in the context of Stellman’s decision):

Confessionalists, after all, place a great deal of emphasis on the tradition of Reformed theology, embodied especially in Reformed confessions. Throughout the debates of the past few years, I have presented mainly biblical arguments for my positions, and kept historical concerns subordinate. My opponents have typically been much more interested in testing my views by the Westminster Confession. The touchstone of their theology is a piece of the Reformed tradition as much as, and in some cases more than, Scripture. Confessionalists claim that the Confession provides standard exegesis of Scripture, to which Reformed theologians have to submit. Confessional Reformed theology thus has a natural affinity for Rome that biblicists like me don’t share. Confessionalists want the Confession to be a paper Pope. It’s not surprising that some find the paper Pope inadequate, and go searching for a live one. (If, as some will charge, Scripture is a paper Pope, it’s one whose ring I gladly kiss.)

Behind this Confessionalist elevation of tradition (in practice, over Scripture) is a broader tendency related to what I have critiqued elsewhere as “tragic metaphysics,” the notion that the original and old is necessarily preferable to the derived and the new. In its Trinitarian dogma, Christianity says the opposite: The Son, though He comes from the Father, is equal to the Father in every respect; in fact, there is no pure, unsupplemented origin, because there can be no Father without a Son. It says the opposite too in its eschatology: The golden age is not lost in the unrecoverable past but ahead of us in an eschatological future. Its Trinitarian theology and eschatology give Christian faith an open-endedness that can be unsettling. It’s unnerving to have to seek foundations in a city that is yet to come. (According to Fergus Kerr, this is exactly what Thomas says –Thomas is an “eschatological foundationalist.”)

When I read an argument like this I wonder whether someone like Leithart could just as easily minister in a Free Methodist Church as among Presbyterians. After all, lots of Protestants claim to be biblical and don’t let the past affect what is best for the church today. Or what about the Southern Baptist Convention? Is that set of congregations just as good as the United Reformed Churches? Or could it be that when push comes to shove, a fellow like Leithart really does identify with the Reformed tradition? That something really does differentiate Reformed from other Protestant communions?

I have no idea what Leithart’s response might be to a question about whether to minister as a Presbyterian or Lutheran. But I suspect, even hope, that he would say that Reformed Protestantism is superior in its teaching and practices to other Protestant churches.

If so, it would be a welcome development if he would pay back a little into the Presbyterian heritage fund. I mean, it is one thing to teach and defend the Reformed confessions and another to sit back and let your professional colleagues do it, all the while benefitting from at least some of their labors. It is also one thing to seek unity and discipline in a Reformed communion (through the heavy lifting of service at church assemblies) and allow the efforts of others to provide a cushion for you to do your own work. Furthermore, it is one thing to build on insights of generations of theologians and pastors (after all, Leithart isn’t starting from scratch, not even with his exegesis) and not show some gratitude for what has gone before.

Not everyone has to do the same amount of work or heritage maintenance. But is it too much to ask for everyone to be pulling in the same direction?

It is a free country, of course, and we have Reformed communions that are more or less confessional. So Leithart doesn’t have to do anything to keep up with his teaching, preaching, blogging, and writing. But for the sake of truth in advertising, identifying with his Presbyterian credentials, communicants, and past would certainly be desirable. It would even be responsible.

Postscript: I hesitated to employ “parasitic” in the post’s title but wanted to maintain the alliteration. “Free-riding” is obviously less inflammatory but at least I (always gracious) didn’t use “bloodsucking.”

24/7/52/12 Christians

Published on by D. G. Hart202 Comments

Our relentless and erstwhile defender of all things Jonathan Edwards made a remarkable assertion in his interactions with other Old Lifers. He wrote:

If confessionalists are just going to church on Sunday, affirming the confession, taking the sacrament and just waiting for Christ to come again, then they are being lazy. If confessionalists are not seeking His glory in all things, then they are being lazy.

This is a useful observation that points to a basic and abiding difference between pietism and confessionalism. Pietists keep alive that old fundamentalist ideal of full-time Christian service. Unless a believer’s life shows religious affects all the time, then the pietist observer wonders about the authenticity of faith.

Say, for instance, a father of four, keeps the Lord’s Day holy by going to two worship services, relaxing with his family, and leading his children in some catechism memorization. Then during the week he holds down a respectable job that takes at least fifty hours of his time (especially given the commute; on some of his drive he does not listen to Christian radio but tunes in to NPR). He also eats with his wife and children at breakfast and dinner, and leads family worship after both meals (though the morning devotions are abbreviated). Meanwhile, on Wednesday night he enjoys friendship and camaraderie with the members of his bowling team. Thursday nights he pays the bills (thanking the Lord for on-line banking). Saturdays he catches up with home projects and plays a little basketball in the drive way with his three sons. And through it all he tries to talk to his wife about life, the kids, the Republican primaries, and the current season of “Curb Your Enthusiasm.”

I ask you: is this man lazy? Is he cold and indifferent to the “things of the Lord”? And what if he follows Calvin on vocation in such a way that he is reluctant to point to all the ways that he is glorifying God (because he worries about pride and knows that sometimes he actually thinks more about what it takes to make a shot or hold a meeting than he does about whether basketball or business glorify God)?

The last thing to be observed is, that the Lord enjoins every one of us, in all the actions of life, to have respect to our own calling. He knows the boiling restlessness of the human mind, the fickleness with which it is borne hither and thither, its eagerness to hold opposites at one time in its grasp, its ambition. Therefore, lest all things should be thrown into confusion by our folly and rashness, he has assigned distinct duties to each in the different modes of life. And that no one may presume to overstep his proper limits, he has distinguished the different modes of life by the name of callings. Every man’s mode of life, therefore, is a kind of station assigned him by the Lord, that he may not be always driven about at random. So necessary is this distinction, that all our actions are thereby estimated in his sight, and often in a very different way from that in which human reason or philosophy would estimate them. There is no more illustrious deed even among philosophers than to free one’s country from tyranny, and yet the private individual who stabs the tyrant is openly condemned by the voice of the heavenly Judge. But I am unwilling to dwell on particular examples; it is enough to know that in every thing the call of the Lord is the foundation and beginning of right action. He who does not act with reference to it will never, in the discharge of duty, keep the right path. He will sometimes be able, perhaps, to give the semblance of something laudable, but whatever it may be in the sight of man, it will be rejected before the throne of God; and besides, there will be no harmony in the different parts of his life. Hence, he only who directs his life to this end will have it properly framed; because free from the impulse of rashness, he will not attempt more than his calling justifies, knowing that it is unlawful to overleap the prescribed bounds. He who is obscure will not decline to cultivate a private life, that he may not desert the post at which God has placed him. Again, in all our cares, toils, annoyances, and other burdens, it will be no small alleviation to know that all these are under the superintendence of God. The magistrate will more willingly perform his office, and the father of a family confine himself to his proper sphere. Every one in his particular mode of life will, without repining, suffer its inconveniences, cares, uneasiness, and anxiety, persuaded that God has laid on the burden. This, too, will afford admirable consolation, that in following your proper calling, no work will be so mean and sordid as not to have a splendour and value in the eye of God. (Institutes III.10.6)

So how do we account for such different assessments of this ordinary believer? More important, why can’t defenders of revivals be more charitable?

Two-Kingdom Theology and Professional Sports Fans

Published on by D. G. Hart42 Comments

Protestant athletes are in the news — Tim Tebow, of Bible-verse eyeblack fame, and David Freese of World Series heroism (thanks to our D.C. correspondent). The reasons for the attention to these athletes say a lot about the differences between evangelicalism and confessional Protestantism. Practically anyone who watches sports knows that Tebow is a Christian and for good reason since he exhibits the typical born-again wear-it-on-your-sleeve (or in this case cheek) piety. Practically no one knew that Freese is a Missouri Synod Lutheran, and again this is fitting since confessionalists prefer not to draw attention to themselves.

Brian Phillips at Grantland (thanks to one of Reformed Forum’s listeners) has a very funny and poignant essay about Tebow. He is particularly interested in the way that the Denver quarterback is carrying the weight — likely intentionally — of the culture wars on his strong back. People either love or hate Tebow and it seems to depend on whether one is a Christian or one is anti-Christian. But Phillips points out astutely how stupid rooting against Tebow is:

For the sake of argument, let’s say that the universe is radically meaningless. If that’s the case, then when Tebow wins, it’s a fluke that doesn’t prove anything. When he loses, it’s also a fluke that doesn’t prove anything. For his losing to mean anything, it has to tie into some larger cosmic order, and if it does, then it can’t prove that there isn’t one. Since no one really knows whether the universe is meaningless or not, things rapidly grow confusing. Tebow scoring a two-point conversion on an off-tackle power play could prove that Jesus rose from the dead on the third day, or it could, well, not. Tebow’s getting picked off after telegraphing a pass could doom us to a state of terrifying metaphysical uncertainty, especially if we are the Broncos’ quarterbacks coach. But if you’re against Tebow, you can’t read too much into Tebow’s failures, or else Tebow has already won.

I myself have no dog in this fight, partly because the National Football League holds less and less interest, and also because the Tebow story hasn’t grabbed any part of me.

At the same time, I have plenty of reason to root against Freese (though it is too late for that) since he is part of a team that took down my beloved Phillies (and he had some hand in doing that). If I were an evangelical and my faith went “all the way down,” then I’d have to root for another confessional Protestant (better if he were Reformed — and didn’t play on the Lord’s Day). But two-kingdom theology is remarkably handy in allowing me to separate my ecclesial convictions from rooting interests. So while I appreciate Freese’s church affiliation as a confessional Protestant, as a native of Philadelphia I hope the Cardinals recognize his value and trade him to Major League Baseball’s equivalent of hell — the Houston Astros.

Machen Day 2011

Published on by D. G. Hart9 Comments

I am not sure if our favorite PCA blogger had J. Gresham Machen’s birthday in mind when he posted a piece on the fortunes of Machen’s kind of confessionalism within the PCA, but it was good preparation for today’s festivities. The same goes for Westminster Seminary California which has released Scott Clark’s interview with me about Machen’s legacy and the chapter I wrote for W. Robert Godfrey’s festschrift, a recording that may put party-goers quickly to sleep.

But whether these resources were designed to highlight today’s anniversary, the following may provide reasons for donning party hats and blowing horns:

There are entirely too many denominations in this country, says the modern ecclesiastical efficiency expert. Obviously, many of them must be merged. But the trouble is, they have different creeds. Here is one church, for example, that has a clearly Calvinistic creed; here is another whose creed is just as clearly Arminian, let us say, and anti-Calvinistic. How in the world are we going to get the two together? Why, obviously, says the ecclesiastical efficiency expert, the thing to do is to tone down that Calvinistic creed; just smooth off its sharp angles, until Arminians will be able to accept it. Or else we can do something better still. We can write an entirely new creed that will contain only what Arminianism and Calvinism have in common, so that it can serve as the basis for some propose new “United Church.” . . . .

When we pass from these modern statements to the great creeds, what a difference we discover! Instead of wordiness we find conciseness; instead of an unwillingness to offend, clear delimitation of truth from error; instead of obscurity, clearness; instead of vagueness, the utmost definiteness and precision.

All these differences are rooted in a fundamental difference of purpose. These modern statements are intnded to show how little of truth we can get along with and still be Christians, whereas the great creeds of the church are intended to show how much of truth God has revealed to us in His Word. (“Creeds and Doctrinal Advance”)

The Danger of Revivals and of Their Critics

Published on by D. G. Hart35 Comments

Our favorite PCA blogger has once again kicked up a little e-dust with a review of Kenneth Stewart’s new book, Ten Myths about Calvinism: Recovering the Breadth of the Reformed Tradition. The review itself is worth reading, as is a subsequent post that explains the author’s perspective (the author being pastor William H. Smith aka The Christian Curmudgeon). But what is particularly striking about the review and its responses (some from Ken Stewart himself) is how sensitive the topic of revivalism is.

Not to make this all about me (about which it generally is), but Stewart even calls my interpretation of revivalism “dangerous.” In fact, one of the underlying factors in Stewart’s purpose and in the book’s reception will be the way Reformed Protestants consider the relationship between being Reformed and being evangelical. Some like Stewart – John Frame may be the most notable exponent of this – tend to view evangelicalism and Reformed Protestantism as co-extensive, with Reformed being in some constructions a subset of evangelicalism. Others like the informal members of the Old Life Theological Society regard this relationship as more troubled than peaceful because of important differences between evangelicals and Reformed Protestants.

One of those differences is revivalism. Stewart believes that Reformed Protestants have generally been supportive of revivals. He even wonders who would not be in favor of unbelievers being converted and believers becoming more devout. Stewart believes that the critics of revivals have been a minority view, and that such folks are – well – dangerous. Is this the evangelical academic version of Gilbert Tennent’s “The Danger of An Unconverted Ministry”?

But the critics of revival, like myself anyway, are not opposed to conversion nor to increased godliness among the saints (why we need to call that revival is another matter). At the same time, critics of revival see that revivals generally undermine those aspects of church life that make Reformed churches Reformed. If you look at the Old Side Presbyterians critique of the supposedly good First Pretty Good Awakening, their concerns about subscription and church polity were not without merit. Similar criticisms informed the Old School Presbyterian critiques of the pro-revival New School Presbyterians. New Side and New School Presbyterians were of course pro-revival and so less attached to Presbyterian convictions and practice that was becoming officers who had taken vows about being Presbyterian. (Do evangelicals have vows?)

Here is how Charles Hodge put the division among colonial Presbyterians during the allegedly Calvinistic revivals of the First Pretty Good Awakening (danger alert!!):

It appears from this history that the great schism was not the result of conflicting views, either as to doctrine or church government. It was the result of alienation of feeling produced by the controversies relating to the revival. In these controversies the New Brunswick brethren were certainly the aggressors. In their unrestrained zeal, they denounced brethren, whose Christian character they had no right to question. They disregarded the usual rules of ministerial intercourse, and avowed the principle that in extraordinary times and circumstances such rules ought to be suspended. Acting upon this principle, they divided the great majority of the congregations within the sphere of their operations, and by appealing to the people, succeeded in overwhelming their brethren with popular obloquy. Excited by a sense of injury, and alarmed by the disorders consequent on these new methods, the opposite party had recourse to violent measures for redress, which removed none of the evils under which they suffered, and involved them in a controversy with a large class of their brethren, with whom they had hitherto acted in concert. These facts our fathers have left on record for the instruction of their children; to teach them that in times of excitement the rules of order, instead of being suspended, are of more importance than ever to the well-being of the church; that no pretence of zeal can authorize the violation of the rules of charity and justice; and on the other hand, that it is better to suffer wrong than to have recourse to illegal methods of redress; that violence is no proper remedy for disorder, and that adherence to the constitution, is not only the most Christian, but also the most effectual means of resistance against the disturbers of the peace and order of the church. (Constitutional History, Part II, pp. 249-50)

So the criticisms of revivalism and evangelicalism more generally is not necessarily the product of idiosyncratic or Dutch Reformed (as Stewart alleges) outlooks. It may simply follow from reading the splits in American Presbyterianism caused by revivals.

But to make sure my own views of revivalism are not obscure, and to let folks see if they are dangerous, I conclude by listing my major objections:

1) Revivalism (and evangelicalism generally) is anti-formal because of an emphasis on the work of the Spirit (especially in conversion but also in preaching). This stress makes presbyters or church members less worried about the wording of creeds or the requirements of polity than they should be. “It’s the Spirit that matters, not whether presbytery follows church order.”

1a) Revivalists (and evangelicals generally), because of their anti-formalism, disregard the importance of the sacraments. Perhaps the greatest example of this is the way that pro-evangelical Reformed folk regard Baptists as Reformed.

2)Revivalism (and evangelicalism generally) cultivates an appetite for the extraordinary in matters of devotion. This leads to a piety that is often discontent with the outward and ordinary means of grace that God has instituted in the church, such as the word preached by ordinary ministers, and the ordinary elements of bread, wine, and water, or even the really dull aspects of session and presbytery meetings.

3) Revivalism (and evangelicalism generally) does not know what to do with children of the covenant except to demand conversion. How you take a child who has grown up participating in family and corporate worship, has tried to lead a pious life, has prayed regularly, and tell him to convert from his wicked ways is beyond me. It is also a recipe for spiritual schizophrenia or a baptized child going to a non-Reformed church as an adult.

These views may be dangerous. But how could anyone who has studied the history of the church look at revivalism or evangelicalism as Christian expressions without problems? Reformed churches, of course, have problems too. But you can’t be Reformed if you think that basic aspects of your creed and ministry are your problems. And that is what evangelicals want from Reformed Protestants – give up those distinct aspects that make you Reformed (in doctrine, worship, and polity) and we’ll give you a seat under the big evangelical umbrella. (I might be tempted if they were serving drinks with umbrellas, but that would be really, really dangerous.)

Confession of Faith or Health Care Legislation?

Published on by D. G. Hart23 Comments

My confession of faith is not the Westminster Confession. It is the confession of my communion, the Orthodox Presbyterian Church. Of course, our confession bears many resemblances to the Westminster Confession. But if folks look at the publication of our confession, neatly produced by the Committee on Christian Education, it reads, the “Confession of Faith and Catechisms of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church with Proof Texts” (the proof texts are especially all the OPC’s). Again, the OPC did rely upon standards handed down from the Westminster Divines, adopted by the Scottish Kirk, and then in 1729 by the Synod of Philadelphia for the communion that was taking shape in the British colonies in North America. Still, when OPC officers subscribe our confession and catechisms, they are embracing documents that are different from those produced during the 1640s, and also with different understandings (because of the development of history) of several of the doctrines taught.

Many of the controversies in our current setting stem from originalists who insist that the contemporary church has abandoned the original sense of the Standards, and those who seek a different elaboration of Reformed theology. I myself find that I am on different sides of this debate, on the one hand wanting to find room for genuine theological developments within our communions, and on the other, realizing the folly and danger that usually attends adapting to the times.

Jason Stellman wants to break through the impasse and proposes the writing of a new confession. At his blog he writes:

Here’s where a new confession comes in. What is needed is the ability to avoid the task of divining the ever-elusive “system of doctrine,” the confession-within-the-confession, the bits and pieces of our doctrinal standards that really matter. But as long as we theoretically subscribe to the Westminster Confession and Catechisms but allow countless exceptions to be taken to them, we leave ourselves no choice but to scratch our heads over whether things like refraining from recreation on the Sabbath and 6/24 creation are intrinsic to the system. My proposal is simply that if we all agree that something is not intrinsic to the system, then why not omit it altogether? Then, once we have identified what our system of doctrine actually is, we can confess it strictly and with confidence. It is just this kind of approach—one that calls for strict subscription to the system of doctrine but allows laxity on incidental matters—that could potentially be the impetus for an ecumenical Reformed church consisting of believers from British Presbyterian and Continental Reformed backgrounds.

Maybe it comes from having studied with Scott Clark, but Stellman has a point. And though I can’t find it at Scott’s blog, he has for many years been maintaining that we need a new confession of faith, one that reflects both the tradition and the developments in theology since 1647. And while I can’t identify precisely the points of the argument, I think it runs something like this: if we continue to hold creeds and catechisms written in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, they run the risk of functioning like dictionaries – reference works we simply pull off the shelf when an ordination exam comes along or when going to a trial, but seldom used in the day-to-day life of a congregation and its broader communion. Richard Muller has proposed a helpful remedy to this situation, one that makes our adopted creeds and confessions part of the warp and woof of church life (in corporate and family worship, and in member’s piety).

But another way to give us more ownership of our confessional standards is to write a new one.

The more I study the history of the Reformed churches, the more sense this proposal makes. The Westminster Assembly was an incredibly complicated affair, and the issues before that body are virtually unknown to contemporary readers (unless you’re Chad Van Dixhoorn). For instance, here is what Philip Benedict writes about the Divines:

The majority of the delegates who favored a presbyterial-synodal form of church government worked to bring the others around to their position by demonstrating the form’s biblical basis point by point.; but the exegesis proved a time-consuming, contentious business. As the divines puzzled over Scripture, the clash of arms realigned the political situation. The New Model Army proved more successful that the Scottish forces in the warfare against the king and did a better job of claiming credit for joint victories. As the army’s power increased, the Independents and Erastians within the assembly grew more assertive and forces the initiation of regular consultations with Parliament, which was less sympathetic to clerical independence. As in the cities of Germany and Switzerland in the first century of the Reformation, the issue of who controlled excommunication became a bone of contention. . . . The new form of church government for England finally decided upon in conjunction with Parliament and spelled out in measure of August 1645 and March 1646 approximated the presbyterial-synodal churches of Scotland, France, and the Netherlands . . . . But it contained major compromises with Erastian and congregationalist concerns . . . . These accommodations displeased the Scottish envoys, who castigated the new system as a “lame Erastian presbytery.”(Benedict, pp. 400-401)

Aside from questions of church polity and ecclesiastical authority, England was also facing antinomianism and neo-nomianism churning out of sixteenth-century debates over predestination. Puritan practical divinity was also in the air, as were debates over prayer books and liturgical forms. The point is that the confession can be read as a historical document to see what was animating Reformed English and Scottish churchmen in the seventeenth century. In fact, it needs to be read this way if it is going to function as a reliable standard (has anyone heard of grammatical-historical exegesis?). And as a state-appointed committee, its documents can also be read like Obama’s recent health care provision – a statement that bears all the compromises that come with politics, which is the art of compromise.

But such historical investigation and political intrigue is a long way from embracing the Westminster Confession as our own confession of faith. For that reason, I do believe that Stellman and Clark are on to something. Maybe if the NAPARC churches ever adopted Bob Godfrey’s proposal for a federated denomination of Reformed churches, their first item of business would be to call an assembly to write a Reformed confession for the twenty-first century.

If George Washington Gets A Pass, Why Not William Ernest Hocking?

Published on by D. G. Hart7 Comments

Well, one reason is that Washington was the nation’s first president and the U.S. Capitol has a whole lot of hullabaloo about him as a divine-like being (see the image of Washington’s apotheosis). Hocking, by contrast, was merely a professor of philosophy at Harvard University. As positions go, teaching at Harvard is not too shabby, but it runs well behind the founding president of the greatest nation on God’s green earth.

But when you read the religious statements of each man, you do begin to scratch your head about the relative orthodoxy of George Washington, regarded by most professional historians to be a deistical member of the Masons, compared to the theological liberalism of Hocking, who wrote the controversial report on American Protestant foreign missions, Re-Thinking Missions (you know, the report that led Machen to found the Independent Board for Presbyterian Foreign Missions and to Machen’s conviction and suspension from ministry in the PCUSA).

Here is Washington’s statement regarding a national day of thanksgiving

Whereas it is the duty of all Nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey his will, to be grateful for his benefits, and humbly to implore his protection and favor–and whereas both Houses of Congress have by their joint Committee requested me “to recommend to the People of the United States a day of public thanksgiving and prayer to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many signal favors of Almighty God especially by affording them an opportunity peaceably to establish a form of government for their safety and happiness.”

Now therefore I do recommend and assign Thursday the 26th day of November next to be devoted by the People of these States to the service of that great and glorious Being, who is the beneficent Author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be–That we may then all unite in rendering unto him our sincere and humble thanks–for his kind care and protection of the People of this Country previous to their becoming a Nation–for the signal and manifold mercies, and the favorable interpositions of his Providence which we experienced in the course and conclusion of the late war–for the great degree of tranquillity, union, and plenty, which we have since enjoyed–for the peaceable and rational manner, in which we have been enabled to establish constitutions of government for our safety and happiness, and particularly the national One now lately instituted–for the civil and religious liberty with which we are blessed; and the means we have of acquiring and diffusing useful knowledge; and in general for all the great and various favors which he hath been pleased to confer upon us.

and also that we may then unite in most humbly offering our prayers and supplications to the great Lord and Ruler of Nations and beseech him to pardon our national and other transgressions–to enable us all, whether in public or private stations, to perform our several and relative duties properly and punctually–to render our national government a blessing to all the people, by constantly being a Government of wise, just, and constitutional laws, discreetly and faithfully executed and obeyed–to protect and guide all Sovereigns and Nations (especially such as have shewn kindness onto us) and to bless them with good government, peace, and concord–To promote the knowledge and practice of true religion and virtue, and the increase of science among them and us–and generally to grant unto all Mankind such a degree of temporal prosperity as he alone knows to be best.

And here is a statement from Hocking about the aim of missions:

The goal to which this way leads may be variously described, most perfectly perhaps in the single phrase, Thy Kingdom come. This is, and has always been, the true aim of Christian missions.

Its detail varies as we learn more of what is involved in it. It means to us now, as always, saving life. It means representing to the Orient the spiritual sources of western civilization, while its other aspects, technical and material, are being represented so vigorously in other ways. It means paving the way for international friendship through a deeper understanding. It means trying more definitely to strengthen our own hold on the meaning of religion in human life. Should we try to express this conception in a more literal statement it might be this: To seek with people of other lands a true knowledge and love of God, expressing in life and word what we have learned through Jesus Christ, and endeavoring to give effect to his spirit in the life of the world.

Whatever the merits of either statement, it is curious to note that Hocking at least mentions Jesus Christ while Washington rarely referred to the second person of the Trinity, except when using the conventional language of the Book of Common Prayer. (It is odd, by the way, for evangelicals to cling to the language of formal prayers when defending Washington’s piety when that same liturgical language was and is off limits in born-again worship where sincerity demands extemporaneous prayers and repudiates merely going through the motions of “prayer-book” religion.)

Which leads to the question: if we can make allowances for George Washington’s religious statements, don’t we have to extend the same generosity to Harry Emerson Fosdick, Hocking, and Pearl Buck? In other words, if you show charity to the American founders, don’t you have to extend the same to Protestant liberals? In which case, if we believed in the orthodoxy of the Founders, would we actually have communions like the OPC and the PCA?

Forensic Friday: You Say Klinean, I Say Repristination

Published on by D. G. Hart19 Comments

In the current issue of the Westminster Theological Journal, William Evans from Esrkine College, has an article offering a taxonomy of the current debates over the doctrine of union. In the repristinationist wing he puts Westminster California. He even specifies that the revisionism of Shepherd and Federal Vision provoked the repristinationist effort. The other group in Evans’ taxonomy is the Biblical Theology wing of Vos, Murray, and Gaffin. Some of these distinctions among Shepherd/FV, WTS, and WSC seem a bit arbitrary since all sides claim to stand within the tradition of biblical theology (was anyone more biblical theological than Kline?). What does separate these groups is the way each wing positions itself in relationship to the past, with Shepherd/FV (Mark Horne’s ransacking of the 17th century notwithstanding) being the most novel, the Biblical Theological group extending back mainly to Vos (with a lot of use made of a particular section of Calvin) and the repristinators endeavoring to recover the sixteenth- and seventeenth-century categories for a stable theological program and church life.

Which leads to the way in which Evans characterizes Westminster California:

The overriding motive here is clear and laudable – safeguarding the Reformation doctrine of justification by grace through faith.

Here, first of all, we find a vigorous defense of the Law/Gospel hermeneutic. If salvation is to be truly gracious, then law and gospel must be distinguished. In contrast to the Revisionists, who view the Law/Gospel distinction as genetically Lutheran rather than Reformed, these figures stress the essential continuity of Lutherans and Reformed on this matter, although the attitude toward law is more positive than one finds among some Lutherans. For example, there is consistent affirmation of the “third use” of the law (i.e., the law of God as a guide for the life of the Christian).

Second, in keeping with this, there is vigorous defense of the conceptual apparatus of later federal orthodoxy, especially the bi-covenantal framework involving a Covenant of Works and a Covenant of Grace. The covenant of works as an instantiation of the law principles is viewed as an essential guarantor of the Law/Gospel distinction. Then, in order to underscore the gracious uniqueness of the New Covenant, the Mosaic Covenant is seen in part as a “republication” of the Covenant of Works. There is also defense of a pre-temporal intratrinitarian Covenant of Redemption or pactum salutis between the Father and the Son, which is viewed as providing a foundation for the Covenant of Grace in theology proper.

What is worth noting, aside from highlighting Evans’ piece, is the omission of the worn out canard that Westminster California is simply channeling Meredith Kline. In point of fact, WSC is trying, as Evans concedes, to hold on to the insights of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. As Mike Horton mentioned recently, that sure puts those complaints about Westminster California’s radicalism in a different light.