A RESPONSE TO LIGON DUNCAN

Ligon Duncan, a leading voice in the American PCA, has made six criticisms of the FV to a UK publication.  I think that he has provided us with a handy summary of the main issues. He said:

The embrace of FV could be promotive of:

(a) an unhealthy and unbiblical sacramentalism;
(b) a confusion over the nature of justification and of saving faith;
(c) an externalism and formalism;
(d) a loss of assurance;
(e) an undermining of the doctrine of the new birth;
(f) a reconstructionist approach to Christian cultural engagement and more.

Here is my response.

a)  SACRAMENTS

The difference is not between a healthy and an unhealthy sacramentology, but between a sacramentology and an empty sign non-sacrament.  How does one say this gently?  The problem with Ligon Duncan and others like him is that they do not have a recognizable sacramentology at all, never mind a healthy one.

Anyone who is an evangelical, or an ex-evangelical, knows that they do not have sacraments.  They have empty signs that do not do what they signify.  That is a touchstone of evangelical orthodoxy, and it has infiltrated the Reformation churches from the Baptists.

This is an area where the Reverend Duncan and his friends need to admit that they are out of accord with the Reformation and their own confessions.  Step two is to repent, and embrace a proper biblical sacramentology.

b)  JUSTIFICATION BY FAITH ALONE

It is true that many FV men are confused about justification and saving faith.  I believe that the teaching of Norman Shepherd is partly responsible.  He is held in high regard for his obvious exegetical gifts, but I believe that he has erred in the matter of the justification of the wicked.  I believe that he has confused what James says about the justification of the righteous that is by works, with Paul’s doctrine of the justification of the wicked that is apart from works.

At the same time, there are many FV men who are not in the least bit confused.  They believe, hold, expound, and teach that a sinner is justified by faith alone, apart from the works of the law, and they uphold the absolute distinction between law and faith in this most important matter.

Where they have erred is on not defending themselves vigorously enough.

At the same time I do not believe that the NAPARC, or their UK counterparts, have the correct doctrine of sola fide.  What they have is a baptistic perversion of it that the Reformers anathematized.  Do they know this?  Some of them do, but it is my view that most evangelical Pastors are unaware of the actual Reformation doctrine.

Here it is.  A man is justified by faith alone, apart from the law, whether the law of God or man.  On that all agree.  The NAPARC error lies in the method of its application to the repentant sinner, or, the proper means of grace.

An accurate representation of the semi-Protestant doctrine of sola fide states that, the vilest offender who truly believes, that moment form Jesus a pardon receives.

Paul the Apostle did not receive his forgiveness the moment that he believed on the Damascus Road!  He had to wait three days, until Ananias commanded him to wash away his sins in baptism!

The Protestant, biblical doctrine is that justification is ordinarily received in baptism, which is the usual means of grace, since, as the Creed states, I acknowledge one baptism for the remission of sins. The scriptures provide us with only one example of a man who was justified apart from a sacrament, and that was Abraham.  Therefore we do not handcuff God to the sacrament.  However, ever since the great Abraham, his successors have received their forgiveness through the sacrament of circumcision, which was replaced by Christ and John the Baptist with baptism.

Therefore, Ligon Duncan and his friends have a baptistic doctrine of justification that the Reformers to a man rejected.  It is unbiblical and unconfessional.

There is another very important point to be made on this subject.  How many NAPARC or FIEC Pastors preach and teach sola fide?   Do not the majority preach decisional salvation?  Isn’t that salvation by works?  It is indeed!  Perhaps NAPARC needs to get its house in order on sola fide before attacking others.

c) FORMALISM

Does the FV promote externalism and formalism?  If formalism means forms of worship without regard to inner significance, then simply reading the FV literature will put the troubled mind to rest.  The FV men are deeply concerned about the inner significance of Baptism and the Supper.  They are not ritualists. They are protesting against baptisms and communion services that deny the inner significance of the sacraments!

Indeed, formalism is a criticism that the FV levels against the modern Reformed churches.  When a baptism is performed, and the minister denies that anything spiritual is happening, indeed, that the remission of sins is not being ministered, it is formalism.  The inner meaning of the sacrament is denied.  When a communion is administered, and the Pastor denies that Christ’s body and benefits are being conveyed to the believing man, it is formalism, because the inner meaning and reality is being denied.

In most Reformed Churches today formalism is orthodox doctrine – if not formally, then actually.

d) A LOSS OF ASSURANCE

I suspect that the Reverend Duncan is speaking of the FV observation that the scriptures speak of the reality that some of those who come to a justifying faith can and do fall away.  He is probably an advocate of the once-saved-always-saved school of thought.

Federal Vision men point out that the entire letter to the Hebrews is an extended warning against apostasy, that is, falling away from Christ.  They see that Hebrews’ threats of vengeance against disloyalty to Christ are not empty, as the OSAS people teach, who vehemently insist that they are means of grace to the elect, who through them persevere infallibly, because they cannot fall away.

Instead, the inspired writer gives historical examples such as the wilderness generation.  The enslaved Israelites believed when Moses commanded them to eat the Passover Lamb, they believed in God when he destroyed the pursuing Egyptian army, but they fell when they refused to enter Canaan for fear of the enemy.  They had once believed, but fell through later unbelief.

We are exhorted not to follow their poor example, and be damned as they were.

In all fairness, there are many godly exegetes who have taken the view that it is impossible to fall away from a true justifying faith.  More than that, they have probably been in the majority over the centuries. However, there are others who have believed just as strongly in absolute predestination who have taken the view that some of those with true faith can and do fall.  Great names such as Augustine and Prosper come t mind.  The English Delegation to the Synod of Dort made this same point, and urged the divines to leave room within the Reformed tradition for both readings.

In any case, the fifth point of TULIP is that those who persevere to the end will be saved, not that all who have believed will necessarily persevere to the end.  The test and sign of true faith is perseverance, not faith itself.

e)  UNDERMINING THE NEW BIRTH

This accusation is about the FV observation that regeneration in the Bible is connected to baptism as the means of the new birth.  Baptism is the laver of regeneration, the rite in which Christ circumsizes our hearts and makes us new.  Evangelicals deny this with a passion, but it is Reformation doctrine, enshrined in all of its confessions, based upon sure and certain warrants of scripture.

Is it possible to undermine the new birth by explaining it the way the Bible does?  If so, the scriptures themselves undermine the new birth, which is patently absurd.  No, the Bible links the new birth to our baptism into Christ, and the Federal Vision is drawing attention to this fact.

f) RECONSTRUCTIONISM

The men within the Federal Vision conversation have not adequately made it clear that they believe that the Law of Moses has been abolished.  This is a weakness.  Perhaps they regard it as too obvious to mention.  Be that as it may, there is a clear necessity to reaffirm this point of New Testament doctrine in no uncertain terms.  What they do attempt is to try to apply the general equity of the Mosaic laws to modern society, not the specifically Jewish laws.  Is that an error?  If Christ is Lord of all the nations of the earth, and his holy laws are a light to those in darkness, then they must be applied and obeyed by the rulers of the earth.  That too is Reformation orthodoxy.

Take this test

http://www.selectsmart.com/plus/select.php?url=denomtradition

These were my results.

(100%) 1: Presbyterian/Reformed

(82%) 2: Anglican/Episcopal/Church of England

(76%) 3: Baptist (Reformed/Particular/Calvinistic)

(74%) 4: Congregational/United Church of Christ

(71%) 5: Eastern Orthodox

(69%) 6: Lutheran

(61%) 7: Roman Catholic

(58%) 8: Church of Christ/Campbellite

(41%) 9: Methodist/Wesleyan/Nazarene

(38%) 10: Pentecostal/Charismatic/Assemblies of God

(33%) 11: Anabaptist (Mennonite/Quaker etc.)

(30%) 12: Seventh-Day Adventist

(28%) 13: Baptist (non-Calvinistic)/Plymouth Brethren/Fundamentalist

Where is the true church?

I have seen a huge upsurge in activity by Roman Catholics and the Eastern Orthodox in trying to bring Protestants into their churches.  I know of one congregation where three families have left for Orthodoxy over a short period, without warning, literally from one week to the next.

The main argument used by the internet evangelists boils down to a claim that theirs is the true church, and that we Reformed folk are called to be reconciled to our mother, Rome, or, our mother, Orthodoxy.  Jesus came to found a church, they say, and here it is!

When asked to support their claim to be the one true church, the only understandable argument seems to be, “Because we say so.  We are the true church to which Christ has given authority, so you had better listen up!”

So then, how do we identify the true church? What do we say to those who are strongly attracted by claims of ancient tradition, and an uninterrupted continuity of two thousand years?

The gospel itself has got to be the key to identifying a true church of Christ.  So then, what is the gospel?

The gospel is the account of the birth, life, death, burial, resurrection, session, and Parousia of the Lord Jesus, the Christ – with its authorized apostolic interpretation.

Here is the interpretation: The Lord Jesus was incarnate for us men and for our salvation.

That same salvation is by pure grace, a free gift, by undeserved mercy, purchased by the cross. This gift of salvation is without reference to human works of any kind, as the apostle Paul teaches us in many unambiguous passages.

It by grace that you are saved, and this not of yourselves, it is the gift of
God, not by works, lest any man should boast. (Paul the Apostle).

Any gospel that adds works of any kind to grace is an anti-gospel, and any church that does so is an anti-church.

Application: works in our day pass by the name of free will, which is simply a way of describing what a man is able to do or work by his own power and ability.  To most churches salvation is by free will, helped by grace, which is a contradiction in terms.

Therefore the RCC and EO churches have erred in setting aside the grace of God by adding works to the cross for forgiveness. Ditto all the once Protestant churches who have abandoned the gospel of free grace, such as those who follow the Billy Graham model of evangelism.

The true churches of Christ are those Reformed and Lutheran churches who steadfastly cling to the gospel of grace. Outside of this church there is no salvation, since it is there that the gospel is heard and believed, and the sacraments rightly administered – which signs and seals are ordinarily necessary for salvation as means of grace.

The is the church that is the mother of the faithful, the heavenly Jerusalem.

The Tornado, the Lutherans, and homosexuality.

From John Piper’s Desiring God website.

I saw the fast-moving, misshapen, unusually-wide funnel over downtown Minneapolis from Seven Corners. I said to Kevin Dau, “That looks serious.”

It was. Serious in more ways than one. A friend who drove down to see the damage wrote,

On a day when no severe weather was predicted or expected…a tornado forms, baffling the weather experts—most saying they’ve never seen anything like it. It happens right in the city. The city: Minneapolis.

The tornado happens on a Wednesday…during the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America’s national convention in the Minneapolis Convention Center. The convention is using Central Lutheran across the street as its church. The church has set up tents around it’s building for this purpose.

According to the ELCA’s printed convention schedule, at 2 PM on Wednesday, August 19, the 5th session of the convention was to begin. The main item of the session: “Consideration: Proposed Social Statement on Human Sexuality.” The issue is whether practicing homosexuality is a behavior that should disqualify a person from the pastoral ministry.

The eyewitness of the damage continues:

This curious tornado touches down just south of downtown and follows 35W straight towards the city center. It crosses I94. It is now downtown.

The time: 2PM.

The first buildings on the downtown side of I94 are the Minneapolis Convention Center and Central Lutheran. The tornado severely damages the convention center roof, shreds the tents, breaks off the steeple of Central Lutheran, splits what’s left of the steeple in two…and then lifts.

Let me venture an interpretation of this Providence with some biblical warrant.

1. The unrepentant practice of homosexual behavior (like other sins) will exclude a person from the kingdom of God.

The unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.” (1 Corinthians 6:9-10)

2. The church has always embraced those who forsake sexual sin but who still struggle with homosexual desires, rejoicing with them that all our fallen, sinful, disordered lives (all of us, no exceptions) are forgiven if we turn to Christ in faith.

Such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God. (1 Corinthians 6:11)

3. Therefore, official church pronouncements that condone the very sins that keep people out of the kingdom of God, are evil. They dishonor God, contradict Scripture, and implicitly promote damnation where salvation is freely offered.

4. Jesus Christ controls the wind, including all tornados.

Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him? (Mark 4:41)

5. When asked about a seemingly random calamity near Jerusalem where 18 people were killed, Jesus answered in general terms—an answer that would cover calamities in Minneapolis, Taiwan, or Baghdad. God’s message is repent, because none of us will otherwise escape God’s judgment.

Jesus: “Those eighteen on whom the tower in Siloam fell and killed them: do you think that they were worse offenders than all the others who lived in Jerusalem? No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish.” (Luke 13:4-5)

6. Conclusion: The tornado in Minneapolis was a gentle but firm warning to the ELCA and all of us: Turn from the approval of sin. Turn from the promotion of behaviors that lead to destruction. Reaffirm the great Lutheran heritage of allegiance to the truth and authority of Scripture. Turn back from distorting the grace of God into sensuality. Rejoice in the pardon of the cross of Christ and its power to transform left and right wing sinners.

Tom is Wright and Wrong

Tom Wright is correct in identifying the context for Paul’s teaching on justification as the status of the Jew and the Gentile regarding God and each other.  He is right to see that Paul is dealing with the issues facing the original Christians, Jews to a man, who were being required to treat the believing Gentiles as full equals in the church, and before God.  The teaching on justification by faith alone apart from works has as its purpose the demonstration that being Jewish and a descendant of Abraham means nothing in the matter of forgiveness.  Both Jew and Gentile are under sin, both are condemned by it, and it follows that neither Jew nor Gentile can be justified before God by works.

Bishop Tom is wrong in his actual doctrine of justification.  He drags works into it, and, in so doing, he completely overthrows the gospel of free grace.  He roots the declaration of forgiveness in part upon the whole life lived.  Justification by faith alone means justification apart from works, so Bishop Tom is teaching justification by faith and works.  That is heresy.

An Examination of Trent

Reading Chemnitz’s Examination of Trent.  He devastates it.

Did Rome give Protestants the Bible?

They say that they did, but it is an outrageous fib.  The canon was not formulated or compiled by the Pope, but by the universal agreement of the undivided church.  At that time Rome was by no means the leader of all Christians, just of the Italians.  In Britain the church was decidedly not Roman, but Celtic, with its own laws and traditions.  The churches of Alexandria, Antioch, and Constantinople, if anything, had the pre-eminence at that time!

The universal church of that time did not recognize the Pope as the Vicar of Christ, and refused to allow him this title and authority.

During the Middle Ages Rome refused to allow translations of the Bible into the language of the people, insisting upon the Latin translation known as the Vulgate.  In England ordinary people were executed for saying the Lord’s Prayer and Apostle’s Creed in English.  When Tyndale translated the Bible into English he was murdered by Rome and its allies, and every copy that the Bishop of London could get his hands on, he burned in huge piles.  Papists were Bible-burners, not the benevolent Bible-givers that they now present themselves as.

The truth is that we gave the Bible to the church, who had hidden it away as a book too dangerous to be read.  Protestants read it out loud to the people in their own languages in church, over the murderous protests of Rome.  Now the Romans are doing it too, and they are following a Protestant tradition in doing so.

We also gave communion to the people, and that weekly.  In medieval Romanism the people got it once a year, at Easter, and then only half.  To this day they may be denied the wine. Now RCs can have it daily, but only because Protestants blazed the trail.

We also gave congregational worship to the people.  In medieval churches the people were silent spectators, watching the priest and his assistants do everything.  Protestants included the people’s responses into their liturgies, and gave them Psalms and Canticles to sing.  Later what we know as  hymns were written, and in time they became a universal practice.

So when you see Roman Catholics responding during the liturgy, taking Communion regularly, and singing in church, know that they are  being Protestant!

At least they had the good sense eventually to fall into line, even if it was through gritted teeth, and at the cost of much blood and suffering.

The truth is that Rome refused to read the Bible, it prevented people from doing so, and it murdered those who did.  

Our Protestants fathers got hold of copies of the Greek NT from Greek scholars fleeing the fall of Constantinople, translated them into the languages of the people, and put it into their hands, ears, hearts, and minds.  Rome did everything in its power to withhold the Bible, but the Reformers would not allow it.

Anglicans who hate Anglican Doctrine

“And while the Orthodox Church is filled with errant sinners at all levels, and took its time developing sound doctrine over the centuries, it has never canonized error. The CoE, on the other hand, seems only capable of defending and requiring their priests and seminarians to believe the most un-Apostolic and abominable things, such as the Calvinism of the 39 Articles”.  (Quoted from Father Paul Taylor’s website).

Isn’t it astonishing that so many who cling to the name  of Anglican hate and detest the doctrine of the very religion that they claim to love?  It is a source of never diminishing astonishment to me.

The Two Opponents of the Reformation

… were Rome, of course, and the Anabaptists.  Evangelicalism is the modern heir of Anabaptism, not excluding those paedobaptists who make the sacraments into empty signs, and go on about free will in the matters of justification and election.

Evangelicalism is Part of the Problem

The heading says it.  A movement that worships church growth, meaning bottoms on seats, and serves it by reducing the Bible to an absolute minimum, that refuses to teach both the easy and the difficult doctrines – because they do not help to increase numbers – is part of the problem.

A church that reduces salvation to “having a personal relationship with Jesus”, a term that is so amorphous that it is impossible to say what it means, is part of the problem.

The answer is a return to the Catholic and Reformed Faith.  Evangelicalism is a catastrophic departure from the faith handed down to us.