Very interesting video

Check out this conversation between Ligon Duncan, Al Mohler and Kevin DeYoung.

DeYoung, Duncan, Mohler: What's New About the New Calvinism from The Gospel Coalition on Vimeo.

Very interesting stuff. Here you have a very traditional older Presbyertian leader, a young Reformed guy and a Baptist leader. I found the way they were dressed amusing as well. DeYoung, the Young, Reformed, Restless guy is wearing an open collared dress shirt. Duncan is also but he has a sports coat on. Mohler as always is wearing a suit and tie. I am not sure I have ever seen Dr. Mohler NOT wearing a tie. I liked what Ligon had to say in the middle, we are in an increasingly secular culture and as Christians look around we are perhaps more concerned about fellowship with other believers than we are with feuding over secondary doctrines.

If I may be so bold, I see a "new, New Calvinism" taking root among those who hold to the Five Points of Calvinism to varying degrees, the authority of the Scriptures, a high view of God's holiness and sovereignty as well as His mercy and grace and the Five Solas of the Reformation (faith alone, grace alone, Scripture alone, Christ alone, to God alone be the glory!) but don't hold to the church culture and traditions normally associated with being "Reformed". It is that jettisoning of these church traditions that makes arbiters of "Truly Reformed" so incensed because in spite of the calls for semper reformanda, that only applies as far as constantly returning to the confessional standards in the eyes of the "Truly Reformed".

It is encouraging to see that so many people are embracing the Doctrines of Grace but see no need to cling to the traditions that surround it. These three brothers hold to those traditions but they have been profitable to learn from for many who don't. Our focus should be on the sovereignty of God in salvation, not on whether piano playing is allowed or the mode and recipients of baptism.

A terrible irony

I refreshed the article I referenced in the previous post and was heartbroken to see this ad on the page. In the midst of an article about how to dispose of murdered children is an advertisement for Sparrow Hospital with the words "Inspired by Life" and a picture of a newborn child. What a contrast that this child is held and loved while another is thrown in a dumpster.

How precious is a newborn baby! What a miracle, what a wonder! How many millions never made it to this point since Roe v. Wade and are never held by a mother or a nurse or a proud grandparent? What a terrible legacy this country has embraced, a legacy of millions upon millions of the most innocent among us who never had a chance to be held and loved. It is a stain on the legacy of this nation and the shame of the church that we spend more on our own comforts than we do on fighting for the lives of these children.

Trying to regulate Moloch worship in Michigan

There is legislation that has been introduced in Michigan to regulate the disposal of aborted babies, requiring either medical cremation or burial at the request of the mother. This was sparked by the recent discovery of large numbers of aborted babies in garbage bags in the dumpster behind an abortion mill, individually placed in plastic baggies, many with the mothers name attached to the baggie. Apparently the humane thing to do is require that these tiny victims are “properly” disposed of.

Following an investigation of the matter by the Michigan attorney general, which was recently completed, state Rep. Rick Jones, R-Grand Ledge, announced Wednesday he has co-sponsored legislation to require doctors and clinics to medically cremate an aborted fetus, or bury it if the parents request it. Failure to comply could be punished by three years in prison and/or a $5,000 fine.

"When I was notified of this, I was horrified," Jones said. "I couldn't believe it."

I understand what Representative Jones is trying to do and I appreciate his efforts. Having said that, it is naïve for people to think that abortion mills are treating aborted children as anything other than something to be disposed of as cheaply as possible. What is truly horrifying is not that aborted babies are tossed in a dumpster. The truly horrifying part is that women pay a “doctor” to kill the defenseless baby inside of them, babies that are entirely dependent on their mothers and yet those mothers choose to fix their “mistakes” by killing that child. In a world where worship of self-gratification is the highest religion, there are far too many “doctors” who are willing to sacrifice children on the altars of Choice and Lust and Profit.

These “doctors” are not doctors at all. They are not healers in any sense of the word. They are assassins with diplomas from a medical school. People hire assassins to kill someone else when they don’t have the nerve or the ability to do it themselves and that is all abortionists are, assassins pure and simple. We shouldn’t be nearly as worried about how aborted children are disposed of as we are about what would lead a woman to pay an assassin to murder her own child.

I have a better idea. Since they are labeling the baggies with these children in them anyway, instead of requiring the clinic to incinerate the remains, give them to the woman that the child came out of. That way she can exercise her “choice” in how to dispose of this child that she paid to have torn from her body. These clinics make it all so neat and tidy. Come in the front door pregnant, go out the front door not pregnant. Meanwhile, the child you came in with is unceremoniously discarded in a plastic bag in a dumpster in the alley. Start making women carry the fruits of their “choice” out in a clear plastic bag and let them see that the cost of that visit to an abortion mill is far greater than a few hundred dollars.

One of the most horrifying forms of idolatry in the Bible was when the Israelites adopted the pagan practice of offering children up as a fiery sacrifice to false gods like Moloch. America is not Israel under the Old Covenant and the gods being sacrificed to are not Moloch but the high priests of the cult of “choice” are every bit as bloodthirsty in slaying children to appease their gods. Perhaps they are worse because they are not motivated as much by a false religion as they are by simple greed. There is nothing that can make the disposal of these children “proper”, not burial and not cremation. They had their humanity stripped from them when their mothers offered them up to these assassins for a small fee. Regulating the disposal of their bodies only makes this horrible crime a little more respectable.

Been out of touch

I haven't been blogging the last couple of days because of extensive travel for work and a lot of other stuff going on (including my wife's nephew suffering a severe accident at their family farm). I also am speaking this weekend at our assembling of the church so I have been prepping for that. There are some important things going on with us that perhaps we can share soon and I have been pretty preoccupied with thinking about political stuff, but I hope to get back on track here soon.

The next book to read

Just got a review copy of Why Four Gospels? written by the esteemed David Black courtesy of the good folks at Energion Publications. From the book description....

In Why Four Gospels? noted Greek and New Testament scholar David Alan Black, concisely and clearly presents the case for the early development of the gospels, beginning with Matthew, rather than Mark. But this is much more than a discussion of the order in which the gospels were written. Using both internal data from the gospels themselves and an exhaustive and careful examination of the statements of the early church fathers, Dr. Black places each gospel in the context of the early development of Christianity.

Though Markan priority is the dominant position still in Biblical scholarship, Dr. Black argues that this position is not based on the best evidence available, that the internal evidence is often given more weight than it deserves and alternative explanations are dismissed or ignored. If you would like an outline of the basis for accepting both early authorship of the gospels and the priority of Matthew, this book is for you.

It is not a huge book so it should be accessible for someone like me with limited academic background in this field. I was a bit startled that the bibliography was twenty pages long! Looking forward to reading the latest from Dr. Black!

(I probably should start doing more reading of books instead of blogging about books I am gonna read)

New book I am reading

I just got a new book from the library that has been very interesting so far in light of my upcoming trip. Written by Phillipe Girard, Haiti: The Tumultuous History - From Pearl of the Caribbean to Broken Nation, just came out last month so it is an overview of the history and culture of Haiti including the recent earthquake. I read through the introduction last night and was encouraged. It seems that Girard, while pulling no punches, is also not going to lay all of the blame for Haiti’s woes on Western colonialism. As he points out in the intro, there are lots of countries that have similar backgrounds and have experienced similar struggles but are in far better shape. It is interesting and instructive to see how far Haiti has fallen. Girard points out that at one time the United States saw Haiti as an economic and military threat!

Haiti was clearly a tragic situation long before the earthquake. I am hoping that Haiti: The Tumultuous History - From Pearl of the Caribbean to Broken Nation will help me to understand the underlying situation in Haiti. It is important to simply be willing to go to Haiti and other places where the physical and spiritual needs are so immense but the long term goal should be to see Haiti more self-sufficient. To understand how that can happen, you need to understand how they have arrived at this point. I will have a review once I complete the book which shouldn’t take long.

More thoughts on the Sabbath

When I was reading up on Christians and the Sabbath for my post last week on that topic, I came across some posts that led to others that led to others and one led me to Do Reformed Christians Confess the Sabbath? by R. Scott Clark (he of "churches that don't baptize infants aren't 'real' churches" fame). It was a pretty typical snarky diatribe against non-Reformed people, against credobaptists and the obligatory shot at people who use the term Reformed to describe themselves but don't meet Dr. Clark's approval. Nestled in the midst of an otherwise very predictable post was this interesting statement (emphasis added):

It is interesting that the same lot of people who are going to the mat for 6-24 creation (I’m thinking of Al Mohler here) seem to miss the primary message of Gen 1: God sanctified (i.e., made holy) one day out of seven as a matter of creational order. The creation narrative culminates in the Sabbath, which was a testimony to Adam of his eschatological heritage should he fulfill the probation. The Mosaic law itself, in Exod 20:8, testifies to the creational origin of the Sabbath principle. God worked six days and “rested” the Sabbath. On the basis and example we too are to work and rest.

Huh. The primary message of Genesis 1 is the institution of the Sabbath. Really? Even though we don't see anything about the Sabbath until the Exodus from Egypt. I think Dr. Clark is missing the difference here between culminates and concludes. The Genesis 1 account concludes with God resting on the seventh day but it culminates with the creation of man. See when I read Genesis 1, the primary message I see is not the seventh day. It is God creating the heavens and the earth, God creating ex nihilo all that we see around us and on the sixth day God's crowning achievement, creating man in His own image. The day of rest is what He did after He carried out His primary purpose of creation and creation was not merely a vehicle to get Him to that seventh day. Genesis 1 is not a story primarily about the Sabbath. It is a story of creation by the Creator, a grand framework to understand who God is and who man is in relation to Him. It serves to introduce us to God and His majesty and to explain the great question that has troubled men for thousands of years: where do we come from?

In this view of Genesis 1, it is almost as if all of the work of creation, including creating man in God's image, only serves the purpose of giving God something to do for six days until He institutes the Sabbath which becomes Sunday morning church services. I don't think you will find a similar viewpoint regarding the Sabbath as the primary message of Genesis 1 among very many contemporary Reformed brothers.

The more I read and ponder what the most militant "Reformed" brothers teach, the less I see of the New Testament in it. I think Dr. Clark is right about this when he says:

It’s interesting to see where the Young, Restless, and Reformed fellows depart from the Reformed confession. What exactly in the Reformed confession animates them? So far as I can tell the only aspect of the Reformed confession that they really like is the doctrine of divine sovereignty (predestination and providence). Everything else seems to be negotiable.

I would agree with that. The younger generation is not content to merely ask "What is Reformed" as if that is the end all and be all of Christian maturity but instead seeks to ask "What is Biblical". Even the question that forms the title of his post: Do Reformed Christians Confess the Sabbath? is asking the wrong question and makes it seem as if "Reformed Christians" are a separate and intellectually superior class of Christians, not like those ignert evangelicals. For me, I embrace the Reformed confessions where they reflect the Bible, i.e. in soteriology, the grand and glorious doctrines of God's sovereign grace in salvation. As for the rest of it, I have no qualms about chucking it to the side, not because I am rebellious or think I am smarter than those Reformed brothers who have come before me. It is because in far too many places I know what is considered "Reformed", meaning the culture and traditions that surround confessionally Reformed Christian groups, and I don't find it to be faithful to Scripture. What exactly am I referring to?

A priesthood of specially set apart holy men. Holy buildings where God's people worship. Special days that are set apart for worship. A tithe system to support the priests and the holy buildings.

That is not "Reformed".

That is simply Old Testament worship dressed up in New Testament language.

I want no part of it. The church, established by Jesus Christ and described in the New Testament, was not a Sabbath keeping/observing church. If the very beginning of the Bible culminates in and is primarily about the Sabbath and if "Sabbath confessing" is so vital, why are men like Dr. Clark left arguing for it from the Old Testament, from highly shaky inferences and from silence? Why doesn't the Bible speak of Sunday as the Christian Sabbath and why is Sabbath confessing not mentioned as part of the functioning of the church?

I will leave the memorizing of "Reformed" confessions to the scholars and traditionalists. There is plenty of Kingdom work to be done that we are called to and none of it requires us to memorize the Three Forms of Unity or to argue about who is or is not "Truly Reformed. Arguing about interpreting traditions is precisely the sort of foolish, vain and prideful wasting of time that the Pharisees engaged in and we saw how that was received by Jesus.

So do Christians, Reformed and not, "confess the Sabbath"? Of course!

So then, there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God, for whoever has entered God's rest has also rested from his works as God did from his. (Heb 4:9-10)

He is the Lord of the Sabbath. Jesus is our Sabbath rest, not just on Sunday but every day. Praise God for that!

The love of money is Crystal clear

I think I have shown remarkable restraint this week by not commenting on the recent news that the Crystal Cathedral has filed for bankruptcy protection from its creditors. A lot of attention is being paid to this around the secular media as well as among Christians and there is just the faintest whiff of condescension among the more orthodox brethren that this has befallen what can only be described as a theologically squirrelly group. My concern today is not with the Crystal Cathedral but what this whole episode says about the church as a whole.

The Crystal Cathedral is just a very public manifestation of a broader problem in the church culture in America. It is not limited to “prosperity gospel” folks but is something that is widespread. The numbers may be smaller but the issue with debt and money is the same. That problem is that the church seems to have no conception of how to be good stewards of money:

The local church in America is in love with money and what money can do for the local church.

It is well documented how much Christian churches spend on themselves in the form of buildings, mortgages, staff, programs, upkeep, etc. and that spending, as long as it is on “my church” seems to be OK. When “my church” spends a huge percentage of its giving on itself, that is necessary for Gospel work. When someone else spends that money, especially when it is a huge sum and I disagree with them theologically, it is a sign of poor stewardship. One man’s poor stewardship is another man’s necessity. I read a Facebook post yesterday by a ministry that was shaking its head ruefully at the foolishness of the Crystal Cathedral while at the same time this organization and the associated church are spending millions upon millions for buildings. I guess it is OK to spend lavishly on facilities when you have the right theology.

As I write this on a Friday, I wonder how much money is tied up in church buildings that are mostly empty today and have been most of the last week. Tens of millions? Hundreds of millions? The number is enormous and is unsupportable. Before the orthodox start wagging their fingers at the Crystal Cathedral for their fiscal irresponsibility, they need to look at their own church budgets.

Cholera Outbreak In Haiti

Amidst the recovery from the devastating earthquake comes news of over 130 deaths from a fast moving cholera outbreak:

A fast-moving cholera outbreak north of the Haitian capital has killed at least 138 people, a U.N. official said Friday.

Another 1,526 cases are also part of the outbreak, said Imogen Wall, the U.N. humanitarian spokeswoman in Haiti. All the cases have been reported in the Lower Artibonite region, north of Port-au-Prince, she said.

"This is a situation that's developed very quickly. It's only been 48 hours and we've already got 138 deaths confirmed," Wall told CNN.

She called the situation "a serious development, partially because cholera is a very dangerous disease, and it spreads very fast, but also because it's unusual to Haiti," she said. "There hasn't been an outbreak here in decades."

Please be in prayer for the people of Haiti and for those who are ministering to them. Given the lack of infrastructure in Haiti, this situation can get even more grim very quickly. We take for granted that we have abundant sources of clean water in America but this most basic of human needs is by no means a given for millions of people around the world.

Three Cheers For Discernment!

The Fo-Mo Chronicles: Of course we are Christians, we have a picture on our wall!

Russ Moore weighs in

Russell Moore weighs in on the Gospel Coalition question: How do Christians work for justice in the world and not undermine the centrality of evangelism?

I think his answer strikes the proper tone. Here is a snippet:

We do not, though, counteract legalism in the realm of personal morality with an antinomianism. And we do not react to the persistent “social gospels” (of both Left and Right) by pretending that Jesus does not call his churches to act on behalf of the poor, the sojourner, the fatherless, the vulnerable, the hungry, the sex-trafficked, the unborn. We act in the framework of the gospel, never apart from it, either in verbal proclamation or in active demonstration.

The short answer to how churches should “balance” such things is simple: follow Jesus. We are Christians. This means that as we grown in Christlikeness, we are concerned about the things that concern him. Jesus is the king of his kingdom, and he loves whole persons, bodies as well as souls.

Christ Jesus never sends away the hungry with, “Be warmed and filled” (Jas. 2:16). What he says, instead, as he points to the love of both God and neighbor, to the care of both body and soul, is: “You go, and do likewise” (Lk. 10:37).

This is a vital question and one that can get off kilter easily. Dr. Moore's answer really hits the nail on the head: follow Jesus. If we know who He is and what He has done and what He taught and just simply follow Him, we will always be on the right path.

It cannot be one or the other, it must be both

The Lausanne Congress on World Evangelism is going on this week in South Africa and some people are (rightly) concerned that in the desire to address issues of social and moral concern, Gospel proclamation is being left behind. The Gospel Coalition is asking four Christian leaders to address the question: How do Christians work for justice in the world and not undermine the centrality of evangelism?

This is an important question. I would affirm that there is a concern here. Doing acts of mercy is not the Gospel. Giving someone food or medicine without telling them the Good News of Jesus Christ, who He is, what He did and how that saves His sheep, is not the Gospel.

I would also absolutely agree that there is no greater act of mercy than preaching the Gospel to the lost. Feeding a lost person without telling them about Jesus just makes this life a more comfortable place to go to hell from. Conversely a person who is born-again and starves to death is infinitely and eternally better off than the richest unbeliever in America. The Gospel proclamation is not one of the calls of Christians, it is the call and everything else is secondary.

Having said all of that, there is clearly a disconnect in much of the church between proclaiming the Gospel and living out the life of those transformed by the Gospel which is why we have conferences like Lausanne in the first place. I would ask not just How do Christians work for justice in the world and not undermine the centrality of evangelism? but also How do Christians evangelize the lost while not neglecting the works of justice and mercy that we are called for?

The first leader to respond, D.A. Carson, responded that one way the problem is solved by getting the Gospel right and that in doing so justice will naturally follow:

The gospel is the good news of what God has done, especially in Christ Jesus, especially in his cross and resurrection; it is not what we do. Because it is news, it is to be proclaimed. But because it is powerful, it not only reconciles us to God, but transforms us, and that necessarily shapes our behavior, priorities, values, relationships with people, and much more. These are not optional extras for the extremely sanctified, but entailments of the gospel.

That is very true and believe me I can (and have) spent all day showing where people get the Gospel and its implications wrong. It is fine and dandy to say, as Carson does, that proclaiming the Gospel will lead to the alleviation of temporal suffering but at the risk of wrathful comments I will suggest that the real life outcome is not the neat “one to one” correlation that Carson seems to suggest and while his answer is eminently theologically sound, in practice that is not where we see Christians focusing.

I would go further and suggest that the church spends an awful lot of time and effort and money on activities that are neither Gospel proclaiming or works of mercy. Proclaiming the Good News to the lost is the very heart of the life of a Christian. Caring for the poor and for widows and the orphans gets a lot of mention in the Bible and is clearly important to the early church and the focus of their giving (see my post of why we give here). On the other hand, monologue sermons, building campaigns, choir practice, Vacation Bible School, pastoral sabbaticals, Sunday school, harvest festivals, theology conferences, “worship” concerts, weddings and funerals are absent from the Bible but that is where we spend most of our time and effort and money.

So what is the core problem?

First, I don’t think that the problem is so much an issue of emphasis, it is that there are too few Christians who are doing the work of ministry. You can coach the fundamentals in basketball all day long but if you put one guy on the court against five, he is going to lose. When the work of evangelism is subcontracted to just a few people or the work of mercy is relegated to just a few people, the harsh reality is that one or the other (or both!) is going to suffer. Amidst all the preaching and sermonizing people get the message that proclaiming the Gospel and ministering to the hurting is something for some of us to do, those who are “gifted” or “called”. The truth of the matter is that it is the responsibility of all Christians and that the men we recognize as elders are called to equip everyone else for the work of ministry, not merely by teaching us from the pulpit but by demonstrating by their lives how we should live so that we can imitate their lives.

Second, people just simply don’t hear it said that being a disciple of Christ involves far more than membership in a local church. Calls for real sacrificial living are few and far between. When have you heard it said from a pulpit that you may need to set aside saving for retirement to help orphans and widows? Or that you should sell some of your stuff and give the money to help a brother or sister in need? Or that the pastor of your church is not only not able but not called to carry the entire burden of ministry and Gospel proclamation for a local church? The reason for the disconnect between the Gospel and action is that the moral imperatives that come along with a redeemed life have been reduced to church attendance and “tithing”.

Third, the Gospel witness and works of mercy are not competing priorities, they should complement one another. Conversely overemphasizing one while neglecting the other weakens both. I like what the second leader interviewed had to say (Ray Ortlund):

It’s a good question. But I would also ask, “How can Christians neglect the work of justice in the world without undermining evangelism?”

The problem is not an overemphasis on one or the other, it is that often the emphasis is on neither and it must be on both. The way we ensure that we don’t forget evangelism or mercy is to first, as Carson says, make sure we get the Gospel right. Second, equip all believers and give them the ability and encourage the inclination to do ministry in the world, to think outside of the church building for ministry opportunities. Third, be bold and clear that the life of a disciple of Christ is not one of insulated middle-class values and comforts but instead a self-denying, cross bearing life that will rub the world the wrong way.

What are your thoughts? How do we balance the imperative of Gospel proclamation with the entailments of works of mercy?