Seething Kids in Mother's Milk

In a recent Bible study, I made application of the scriptural prohibition of "seething a kid in its mother's milk." Interestingly, this obscure statute is found in three places- Exodus 23:19; 34:26; and Deuteronomy 14:21- God giving three witnesses to a principle. 

The Rabbis make a rule of this forbidding the consumption of dairy and meat together, even prohibiting using the same dishes or storage places for both. However, this stretches a specific prohibition of a kid in its own mother’s milk to include all animals of any age and all milk being located in the same proximity. Is this a logical interpretation, or does this make void the word of God by their tradition?

Paul the apostle took an obscure regulation occurring in Moses only once- Deuteronomy 25:4, “Thou shalt not muzzle the ox when he treadeth out the corn.”- and made broader application twice- 1 Corinthians 9:9; 1 Timothy 5:18- saying, God is concerned here with more than the ox; and the laborer is worthy of his pay. Can we not make a similar application of God’s three witness concern a kid and its mother’s milk?

Principle: An immature offspring should not suffer or die by means of what is meant to nourish from its own mother. 

Our mother is the church. We are the children of God, of his flock, brought into the covenant by and through the church’s labor. Our milk, until we are strong enough for meat, is the simple substance of God’s word. Yet, it is possible, and too often happens, that young Christians are beaten up with what is meant to nourish, bring life and encourage growth. Such can happen when the word of God is misinterpreted, misapplied, used out of context, in a manner contrary to its intent, out of season, with a haughty spirit, in an accusatory manner rather than one that edifies. And, such may be done by believers with much zeal for the things of God but lacking wisdom in speaking the truth in love. 

 Does the KJV Qualify as Vulgar?

I wrote the following in July of 2009, while living and ministering in Boise, to answer to the Question: “Does the KJV qualify as ‘vulgar language’ as required by WCF I:8?”  A few thoughts: 

1) The AV was not standard English when it was fresh.  It gave us a sort of Hebraicized English with its formal equivalent style of translation. This style did not make the text beyond understanding; and left ambiguities of the original as ambiguities rather than force a particular interpretation into the translation. 

2) That said, the wide circulation and use of the AV and Shakespeare perhaps did much to standardize the English language, much as the Quran did for Arabic and Cervantes did for Spanish.  I dispute the contention English has changed more in the last four hundred years than any equivalent time before.  There is far greater difference between the Chaucer’s English and the AV than between the AV and today. Canterbury Tales to the AV was approximately 220 years. 

3) “Vulgar” may mean “common” much the same as “koine.”  Koine was the common international language of the Greco-Hellenistic world.  Paul wrote the Romans in Koine, not Latin.  The AV is common to English speaking peoples.  One will find churches in the UK, Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, India, and North America using the AV and understanding it.  The AV is a truly “common” translation of the scriptures.  For the same reason, the 1650 Scottish Psalter is the “common” Psalter of the English language. 

4) While I’m not opposed to the use of different translations of the Bible or Psalter, and would favor a modern, international, ecclesiastical, Reformed translation of the Bible based upon the TR, we don’t have such. 

5) Having read and considered the previous thread, I will continue to read the AV in public worship, when necessary providing a brief preface of obscure words, phrases or grammar, the same way I might explain some strange Hebrew cultural or historical reference in the text.  I do the same when we regularly sing from the 1650 Psalter. I do so without any concern I may be violating the intent of WCF I:8. It is important we read, hear, sing, pray and preach with understanding.  If the AV is not understandable, neither are the Westminster Standards. 

BTW, here in the Treasure Valley of Idaho, where one often encounters KJV-Only cultists and Mormons, the AV is more readily accepted by them as authoritative.   

I can’t tolerate “churchy” language, practice or piety; but, dignity and reverence in public worship is not the same.  When unbelievers dare enter the precincts of Mount Sion, the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, the general assembly and church of the firstborn, they might expect it to look and sound different than the world. So, they have to strain a little to hear the accents of Sion; I have to do that when I’m in New Jersey, New York, Boston, Glasgow or London. Doesn’t mean I don’t appreciate those fine places or would not visit them again, even though many of the natives don't speak a vulgar English.

PREACHERS AND POLITICS

PREACHERS AND POLITICS
By Robert L. Dabney


From “Political Preachers,” The Texas Presbyterian (May 4, 1894): 1 and “The Gospel Idea of Preaching,” Presbyterial Critic 1:7 (July 1855): 315-319.

The appropriate mission of the minister is to preach the gospel for the salvation of souls. The servant who, by diverging into some other project not especially enjoined on him, nor essential for him to perform, precludes himself from his allotted task, is clearly guilty of disobedience to his master, if not of treason to his charge.

Now, questions of politics must ever divide the minds of men; for they are not decided by any recognized standards of truth, but by the competitions of interest and passion. Hence, it is inevitable that he who embarks publicly in the discussion of these questions must become the object of party animosities and obnoxious to those whom he opposes. How then can he successfully approach them as the messenger of redemption? By thus transcending his proper functions, he criminally prejudices his appointed work with half the community, for the whole of which he should affectionately labour.

God has reserved for our spiritual concerns one day out of seven, and has appointed one place into which nothing shall enter, except the things of eternity, and has ordained an order of officers, whose sole charge is to remind their fellow-men of their duty to God. Surely, it is a tribute small enough to pay the transcendent weight of eternal things, to reserve the season and the place sacredly to them, which God has set apart for hem. This surely is not too much for resisting the tendencies of man toward the sensuous and toward forgetfulness of the spiritual life. But when the world sees a portion or the whole of this sacred season abstracted from spiritual concerns, and given to secular agitations, and that by the appointed guardians of sacred things, it is the most emphatic possible disclosure of unbelief. It says to men, “Eternity is not of more moment than time; heaven is not better than earth; a man is profited if he gains the world and loses his soul, for do you not see that we postpone eternity to time, and heaven to earth, and redemption to political triumph—we who are the professed guardians of the former?” One great source, therefore, of political preaching may always be found in the practical unbelief of [the preacher] himself; as one of its sure fruits is infidelity among the people. He is not feeling the worth of souls, nor the “powers of the world to come,” nor “the constraining love of Christ” as he should; if he were, no sense of the temporal importance of his favorite political measures, however urgent, would cause the wish to abstract an hour from the few allowed him for saving souls. We solemnly protest to every minister who feels the impulse to introduce the secular into his pulpit, that he thereby betrays a decadent faith and spiritual life in his own breast. Let him take care! He is taking the first steps toward backsliding, apostasy, damnation.

Weak defenses of this abuse have been attempted. It is asked, “Is not the minister also a citizen?” The answer is, “He is a citizen only at the hustings*, and on a secular day. In the pulpit he is only the ambassador of Christ.” It is urged again, that Peter, Paul, and the Lord Jesus Christ, taught political duties. We reply: Would that these pests of modern Christianity had truly imitated them; had taken not only their texts, but their discourses from them, instead of deriving the latter from the newspapers. Let them do as the sacred writers do: teach the duties of allegiance from the Christian side and motive only, “that the word of God and his Gospel be not blasphemed.” Another plea is, that Christianity is designed to produce important collateral results on the social order of nations; as that the social order reacts on Christianity. The answer is twofold: that these secular results are the minor, the eternal redemption of souls is the chief end of God in his Gospel. He is a criminal servant who wilfully sacrifices the less to the greater. Second, the only innocent way (as the most efficient) in which the minister of religion can further these secular results, is so to preach each man’s own sins and redemption to him as to make him personally a holy man. When society is thus purified, by cleansing the integral individuals who compose it, then, and then only, will the social corruptions of commonwealths be effectually purged away.

If the example of Christ and his apostles were correctly weighed, it would be a sufficient guide to all other ministers. They lived in a time of intense party agitation. The Jewish commonwealth was then divided by a question, the most momentous that could fire the heart of a nation—whether their divinely-ordained constitution was compatible with their subjugation by a Pagan empire? This question was everywhere hotly debated; it was rapidly growing into that war which a generation later brought the end of the Hebrew commonwealth. We know that neither Jesus nor Paul was insensible to patriotism. The former wept over the approaching ruin of his country; the latter declared himself ready to die for his compatriots; yet, such is their reserve on the question in their religious teachings, that the unlearned reader of the New Testament is left in actual ignorance of its existence, except that at once it is forced upon our Saviour’s attention by a direct inquiry. And then so small does this great secular interest appear beside the eternal errand which he came to subserve, he devotes only a part of one sentence to the former, reverting even before he ends it to the more absorbing concerns of the soul. Let his ministers imitate him.

“The preacher’s business is just to show the people what is in the Bible,” as God has there set it forth. This principle cuts up by the roots the whole fashion of “preaching up the times,” as it was quaintly called by our Scotch forefathers. If the preacher’s business is the redemption of the soul, and his instrument is the Bible truth, it is plain that he has no business in the pulpit with …politics … and all the farrago of subjects with which infidel ministers of Christianity essay to eke out, as they suppose, the deficient interest and power of the message of salvation. The preacher’s business in the pulpit is to make Christians, and not to make … statesmen, historians, or social philosophers. His message from the pulpit is that which God has put into his mouth, and nothing else. The question may be asked: “Are Bible principles never to be applied, then, to the correction of the social evils of the day by those who are the appointed expounders of the Bible?” So far as God so applies them in the Bible, yes; but no farther. Let the preacher take the application of the principles, as well as the principles applied, from the word of God; let him take, not only his starting position but his whole topics, from God’s word, and he will be in no danger of incurring that sarcasm, as biting as it is just, directed against those who “take their texts from the Bible, and their sermons from the newspapers.” Many preachers seem to think that if it is a scriptural principle which they use, it matters not how unscriptural or extrascriptural is the use which they make of it. They forget that it does not follow, because a man has drawn his weapon from the king’s armory, that therefore he is fighting the king’s battle; soldiers have sometimes used the sovereign’s arms to fight duels with each other. It may be asked again: “Is the preacher to forego and disuse all that influence for social good which his Christian intelligence gives him? Has he ceased to be a citizen and patriot because he has become a minister? No. But when he appears in the pulpit he appears not as a citizen but as God’s herald. Here is a very simple and obvious distinction much neglected. The other channels of patriotic influence are open to him which other citizens use, so far as he may use them without prejudice to his main calling. To cleave to this alone is made his obvious duty by three reasons. The importance of the soul’s redemption is transcendent. All social evils, all public and national ends, sink into trifles beside it. Hence God’s ministers owe this practical tribute and testimony at least to this great truth; to devote all the machinery and power of religious ordinances—that single domain into which the all-engrossing world does not intrude—to this one grand object. That minister is false to truth and to his Master who says by his conduct that there is anything on earth important enough to subtract one atom of sacred time or sacred ordinances from their one great object. Again, by securing the redemption of the soul, the preacher will secure all else that is valuable in his hearers. Let him make good Christians, and all the rest will come right without farther care. If we have a nation of Bible Christians, we shall have without trouble all the social order, liberty, and intelligence we need. And last, he who undertakes the work of the social philosopher, the legislator, the politician, will diminish his energies, zeal, time, and influence for promoting his higher object. He will waste on the less those energies of head and heart which were all needed for the greater. He will shut up his access for good to all the minds which are opposed to him on these secular questions, and thus incur a hindrance which will incapacitate him for his own Master’s work, by undertaking work which belonged to other people. What is this but treason?

* hustings: the proceedings or locale of an election campaign

Conniving at Violations of the Majesty of God

"Let us also learn that nothing is less consistent than to punish heavily the crimes whereby mortals are injured, whilst we connive at the impious errors or sacrilegious modes of worship whereby the majesty of God is violated."

John Calvin
Comment on Exodus 32:29

True Spiritual Worship

Puritan, William Gurnall:

Your morals may be impeccable, but if you do not worship God, then you are an atheist.

If you worship Him and that devoutly, but not according to Scripture, you are an idolator.

If according to the rule, but not according to the spirit of the gospel, then you are a hypocrite.

Mencken On Machen

[H. L. Mencken’s obituary for J. Gresham Machen, Baltimore Evening Sun (January 18, 1937), 2nd Section, p. 15.]

“Dr. Fundamentalis”

The Rev. J. Gresham Machen, D. D., who died out in North Dakota on New Year’s Day, got, on the whole, a bad press while he lived, and even his obituaries did much less than justice to him. To newspaper reporters, as to other antinomians, a combat between Christians over a matter of dogma is essentially a comic affair, and in consequence Dr. Machen’s heroic struggles to save Calvinism in the Republic were usually depicted in ribald, or, at all events, in somewhat skeptical terms. The generality of readers, I suppose, gathered thereby the notion that he was simply another Fundamentalist on the order of William Jennings Bryan and the simian faithful of Appalachia. But he was actually a man of great learning, and, what is more, of sharp intelligence.

What caused him to quit the Princeton Theological Seminary and found a seminary of his own was his complete inability, as a theologian, to square the disingenuous evasions of Modernism with the fundamentals of Christian doctrine. He saw clearly that the only effects that could follow diluting and polluting Christianity in the Modernist manner would be its complete abandonment and ruin. Either it was true or it was not true. If, as he believed, it was true, then there could be no compromise with persons who sought to whittle away its essential postulates, however respectable their motives.

Thus he fell out with the reformers who have been trying, in late years, to convert the Presbyterian Church into a kind of literary and social club, devoted vaguely to good works. Most of the other Protestant churches have gone the same way, but Dr. Machen’s attention, as a Presbyterian, was naturally concentrated upon his own connection. His one and only purpose was to hold it [the Church] resolutely to what he conceived to be the true faith. When that enterprise met with opposition he fought vigorously, and though he lost in the end and was forced out of Princeton it must be manifest that he marched off to Philadelphia with all the honors of war.

II

My interest in Dr. Machen while he lived, though it was large, was not personal, for I never had the honor of meeting him. Moreover, the doctrine that he preached seemed to me, and still seems to me, to be excessively dubious. I stand much more chance of being converted to spiritualism, to Christian Science or even to the New Deal than to Calvinism, which occupies a place, in my cabinet of private horrors, but little removed from that of cannibalism. But Dr. Machen had the same clear right to believe in it that I have to disbelieve in it, and though I could not yield to his reasoning I could at least admire, and did greatly admire, his remarkable clarity and cogency as an apologist, allowing him his primary assumptions.

These assumptions were also made, at least in theory, by his opponents, and thereby he had them by the ear. Claiming to be Christians as he was, and of the Calvinish persuasion, they endeavored fatuously to get rid of all the inescapable implications of their position. On the one hand they sought to retain membership in the fellowship of the faithful, but on the other hand they presumed to repeal and reenact with amendments the body of doctrine on which that fellowship rested. In particular, they essayed to overhaul the scriptural authority which lay at the bottom of the whole matter, retaining what coincided with their private notions and rejecting whatever upset them.

Upon this contumacy Dr. Machen fell with loud shouts of alarm. He denied absolutely that anyone had a right to revise and sophisticate Holy Writ. Either it was the Word of God or it was not the Word of God, and if it was, then it was equally authoritative in all its details, and had to be accepted or rejected as a whole. Anyone was free to reject it, but no one was free to mutilate it or to read things into it that were not there. Thus the issue with the Modernists was clearly joined, and Dr. Machen argued them quite out of court, and sent them scurrying back to their literary and sociological Kaffeeklatsche. His operations, to be sure, did not prove that Holy Writ was infallible either as history or as theology, but they at least disposed of those who proposed to read it as they might read a newspaper, believing what they chose and rejecting what they chose.

III

In his own position there was never the least shadow of inconsistency. When the Prohibition imbecility fell upon the country, and a multitude of theological quacks, including not a few eminent Presbyterians, sought to read support for it into the New Testament, he attacked them with great vigor, and routed them easily. He not only proved that there was nothing in the teachings of Jesus to support so monstrous a folly; he proved abundantly that the known teachings of Jesus were unalterably against it. And having set forth that proof, he refused, as a convinced and honest Christian, to have anything to do with the dry jehad.

This rebellion against a craze that now seems so incredible and so far away was not the chief cause of his break with his ecclesiastical superiors, but it was probably responsible for a large part of their extraordinary dudgeon against him. The Presbyterian Church, like the other evangelical churches, was taken for a dizzy ride by Prohibition. Led into the heresy by fanatics of low mental visibility, it presently found itself cheek by jowl with all sorts of criminals, and fast losing the respect of sensible people. Its bigwigs thus became extremely jumpy on the subject, and resented bitterly every exposure of their lamentable folly.

The fantastic William Jennings Bryan, in his day the country’s most distinguished Presbyterian layman, was against Dr. Machen on the issue of Prohibition but with him on the issue of Modernism. But Bryan’s support, of course, was of little value or consolation to so intelligent a man. Bryan was a Fundamentalist of the Tennessee or barnyard school. His theological ideas were those of a somewhat backward child of 8, and his defense of Holy Writ at Dayton during the Scopes trial was so ignorant and stupid that it must have given Dr. Machen a great deal of pain. Dr. Machen himself was to Bryan as the Matterhorn is to a wart. His Biblical studies had been wide and deep, and he was familiar with the almost interminable literature of the subject. Moreover, he was an adept theologian, and had a wealth of professional knowledge to support his ideas. Bryan could only bawl.

IV

It is my belief, as a friendly neutral in all such high and ghostly matters, that the body of doctrine known as Modernism is completely incompatible, not only with anything rationally describable as Christianity, but also with anything deserving to pass as religion in general. Religion, if it is to retain any genuine significance, can never be reduced to a series of sweet attitudes, possible to anyone not actually in jail for felony. It is, on the contrary, a corpus of powerful and profound convictions, many of them not open to logical analysis. Its inherent improbabilities are not sources of weakness to it, but of strength. It is potent in a man in proportion as he is willing to reject all overt evidences, and accept its fundamental postulates, however unprovable they may be by secular means, as massive and incontrovertible facts.

These postulates, at least in the Western world, have been challenged in recent years on many grounds, and in consequence there has been a considerable decline in religious belief. There was a time, two or three centuries ago, when the overwhelming majority of educated men were believers, but that is apparently true no longer. Indeed, it is my impression that at least two-thirds of them are now frank skeptics. But it is one thing to reject religion altogether, and quite another thing to try to save it by pumping out of it all its essential substance, leaving it in the equivocal position of a sort of pseudo-science, comparable to graphology, “education,” or osteopathy.

That, it seems to me, is what the Modernists have done, no doubt with the best intentions in the world. They have tried to get rid of all the logical difficulties of religion, and yet preserve a generally pious cast of mind. It is a vain enterprise. What they have left, once they have achieved their imprudent scavenging, is hardly more than a row of hollow platitudes, as empty as [of] psychological force and effect as so many nursery rhymes. They may be good people and they may even be contented and happy, but they are no more religious than Dr. Einstein. Religion is something else again–in Henrik Ibsen’s phrase, something far more deep-down-diving and mudupbringing, Dr. Machen tried to impress that obvious fact upon his fellow adherents of the Geneva Mohammed. He failed–but he was undoubtedly right.

Thornwell's Memorial

Southern Presbyterian theologian James Henley Thornwell made an effort to persuade his CSA countrymen to constitutionally acknowledge God. Had they done so, things might have been different.

What follows is the text of that memorial. This was taken from James Henley Thornwell’s Collected Writings, Volume IV, Pages 549-556:

The petition of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in the Confederate States of America now met and sitting in the city of Augusta , in the State of Georgia , to the Congress of the Confederate States of America , now met and sitting in the city of Richmond , in the State of Virginia , respectfully showeth:

That this Assembly is the supreme judicatory of those Presbyterian churches in the Confederate States which were formerly under the jurisdiction of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in the United States; that it comprises ______Presbyteries, ______Synods, and ______members; that it represents a people devotedly attached to the Confederate cause, and eminently loyal to the Confederate Government. The changes which your honorable body has made in the Constitution of the United States, and which have been ratified and confirmed by the various States of the Confederacy, have received the universal approval of the Presbyterian population of these States; and none have been more grateful to God than themselves for the prudence, caution, moderation, and wisdom which have characterized all your counsels in the arduous task of constructing the new Government. We congratulate you on your success. But, gentlemen, we are constrained, in candour, to say that, in our humble judgement, the Constitution, admirable as it is in other respects, still labours under one capital defect. It is not distinctively Christian. It is not bigotry, but love to our country, and an earnest, ardent desire to promote its permanent well-being, which prompts us to call the attention of your honourable body to this subject, and, in the way of respectful petition, to pray that the Constitution may be amended so as to express the precise relations which the Government of these States ought to sustain to the religion of Jesus Christ.

The Constitution of the United States was an attempt to realize the notion of popular freedom, without the checks of aristocracy and a throne, and without the alliance of a national church. The conception was a noble one, but the execution was not commensurate with the design. The fundamental error of our fathers was, that they accepted a partial for a complete statement of the truth. They saw clearly the human side -- that popular governments are the offspring of popular will; and that rulers, as the servants and not the masters of their subjects, are properly responsible to them. They failed to apprehend the Divine side -- that all just government is the ordinance of God, and that magistrates are His ministers who must answer to Him for the execution of their trust. The consequence of this failure, and of exclusive attention to a single aspect of the case, was to invest the people with a species of supremacy as insulting to God as it was injurious to them. They became a law unto themselves; there was nothing beyond them to check or control their caprices or their pleasure. All were accountable to them; they were accountable to none. This was certainly to make the people a God; and if it was not explicitly expressed that they could do no wrong, it was certainly implied that there was no tribunal to take cognizance of their acts. A foundation was thus laid for the worst of all possible forms of government -- a democratic absolutism, which, in the execution of its purposes, does not scruple to annul the most solemn compacts and to cancel the most sacred obligations. The will of majorities must become the supreme law, if the voice of the people is to be regarded as the voice of God; if they are, in fact, the only God whom rulers are bound to obey. It is enough, therefore, to look upon government as simply the institute of man. Important as this aspect of the subject unquestionably is, yet if we stop there, we shall sow the seeds of disaster and failure. We must contemplate people and rulers as alike subject to the authority of God. His will is the true supreme; and it is under Him, and as the means of expressing His sovereign pleasure, that conventions are called, constitutions are framed and governments erected. To the extent that the State is a moral person, it must needs be under moral obligation, and moral obligation without reference to a superior will is a flat contradiction in terms. If, then, the State is an ordinance of God, it should acknowledge the fact. If it exists under the conditions of a law superior to all human decrees, and to which all human decrees behoove to be conformed, that law should be distinctly recognized. Let us guard, in this new Confederacy, against the fatal delusion that our government is a mere expression of human will. It is, indeed, an expression of will, but of will regulated and measured by those eternal principles of right which stamp it at the same time as the creature and institute of God . And of all governments in the world, a confederate government, resting as it does upon plighted faith, can least afford to dispense with the Supreme Guardian of treaties.

Your honourable body has already, to some extent, rectified the error of the old Constitution, but not so distinctly and clearly as the Christian people of these States desire to see done. We venture respectfully to suggest, that it is not enough for a state which enjoys the light of Divine revelation to acknowledge in general terms the supremacy of God; it must also acknowledge the supremacy of His Son, whom He hat appointed heir of all things, by whom also He made the worlds. To Jesus Christ all power in heaven and earth is committed. To Him every knee shall bow, and every tongue confess. He is the Ruler of the nations, the King of kings, and Lord of lords.

Should it be said that the subjection of governments to Jesus Christ is not a relation manifested by reason, and therefore not obligatory on the State, the answer is obvious -- that duties spring not from the manner in which the relation is made known, but from the truth of the relation itself. If the fact is so, that Jesus Christ is our Lord, and we know the fact, no matter how we come to know it, we are bound to acknowledge it, and act upon it. A father is entitled to the reverence of his son, a master to the obedience of his servant, and a king to the allegiance of his subjects, no matter how the relation between them is ascertained. Now, that Jesus Christ is the supreme Ruler of the nations, we know with infallible certainty, if we accept the Scriptures as the Word of God.

But it may be asked -- and this is the core of all the perplexity which attends the subject -- Has the State any right to accept the Scriptures as the Word of God? The answer requires a distinction, and that distinction seems to us to obviate all difficulty. If by “accepting the Scriptures” it is meant that the State has a right to prescribe them as a rule of faith and practice to its subjects, the answer must be in the negative. The State is lord of no man’s conscience. As long as he preserves the peace, and is not injurious to the public welfare, no human power has a right to control his opinion or to restrain his acts. In these matters he is responsible to none but God. He may be Atheist, Deist, infidel, Turk or Pagan: it is no concern of the State, so long as he walks orderly. Its protecting shield must be over him, as over every other citizen. We utterly abhor the doctrine that the civil magistrate has any jurisdiction in the domain of religion, in its relations to the conscience or conduct of others, and we cordially approve the clause in our Confederate Constitution which guarantees the amplest liberty on this subject.

But if by “accepting the Scriptures” it is meant that the State may itself believe them to be true, and regulate its own conduct and legislation in conformity with their teachings, the answer must be in the affirmative. As a moral person, it has a conscience as really and truly as every individual citizen. To say that its conscience is only the aggregate of individual consciences, is to say that it is made up of conflicting and even contradictory elements. The State condemns many things which many of its subjects approve, and enjoins many things which many of its subjects condemn. There are those who are opposed to the rights of property and the institution of marriage, yet the public conscience sanctions and protects them both. What, then, is this public conscience? It is clearly the sum of those convictions of right, that sense of the honourable, just and true, which legislators feel themselves bound to obey in the structure of governments and the enactment of laws. It is a reflection of the law of God; and when that law is enunciated with authoritative clearness, as it is in the Scriptures, it becomes only the more solemnly imperative. And as the eternal rule of justice, the State should acknowledge it. Considered in its organic capacity as a person, it no more violates the rights of others in submitting itself to the revealed will of God, than a Christian, when he worships the supreme Jehovah, violates the rights of an Atheist or idolater. What the State does itself, and what it enjoins upon others to do, are very different things. It has an organic life apart from the aggregate life of the individuals who compose it; and in that organic life, it is under the authority of Jesus Christ and the restraints of His holy Word.

That, in recognizing this doctrine, the State runs no risk of trespassing upon the rights of conscience is obvious from another point of view. The will of God, as revealed in the Scriptures, is not a positive Constitution for the State; in that relation it stands only to the Church. It is rather a negative check upon its power. It does not prescribe the things to be done, but only forbids the things to be avoided. It only conditions and restrains the discretion of rulers within the bounds of the Divine law. It is, in other words, a limitation, and not a definition, of power. The formula according to which the Scriptures are accepted by the State is: Nothing shall be done which they forbid. The formula according to which they are accepted by the Church is: Nothing shall be done but what they enjoin. They are here the positive measure of power. Surely the government of no Christian people can scruple to accept the negative limitations of the Divine Word. Surely, our rulers do not desire that they shall have the liberty of being wiser than God.

The amendment which we desire, we crave your honourable body to take note, does not confine the administration of the State exclusively to the hands of Christian men. A Jew might be our Chief Magistrate, provided he would come under the obligation to do nothing in the office inconsistent with the Christian religion. He would not be required to say that he himself believes it, nor would he assume the slightest obligation to propagate or enforce it. All that he would do would be to acknowledge it as the religion of the State, and to bind himself that he will sanction no legislation that sets aside its authority. The religion of the State is one thing; the religion of the individuals who may happen to be at the head of affairs is quite another. The religion of the State is embodied in its Constitution, as the concrete form of its organic life.

Your honourable body will perceive that the contemplated measure has no reference to a union or alliance betwixt the Church and State. To any such scheme the Presbyterians, and, we think we can safely venture to say, the entire Christian people of these States, are utterly opposed. The State, as such cannot be a member, much less, therefore, can it exercise the function of settling the creed and the government, of a Church. The provinces of the two are entirely distinct: they differ in their origin, their nature, their ends, their prerogatives, their powers and their sanctions. They cannot be mixed or confounded without injury to both. But the separation of Church and State is a very different thing from the separation of religion and the State. Here is where our fathers erred. In their anxiety to guard against the evils of a religious establishment, and to preserve the provinces of Church and State separate and distinct, they virtually expelled Jehovah from the government of the country, and left the State an irresponsible corporation, or responsible only to the immediate corporators. They made it a moral person, and yet not accountable to the Source of all law. It is this anomaly which we desire to see removed; and the removal of it by no means implies a single element of what is involved in a national Church.

The amendment which this General Assembly ventures respectfully to crave we have reason to believe is earnestly desired, and would be hailed as an auspicious omen by the overwhelming majority of the Christian people of these Confederate States. Is it not due to them that their consciences, in the future legislation of the country, should be protected from all that has a tendency to wound or grieve them? They ask no encroachments upon the rights of others. They simply crave that a country which they love should be made much dearer to them, and that the Government which they have helped to frame they may confidently commend to their Saviour and their God, under the cheering promise that those who honour Him He will honour. Promotion cometh not from the East, nor from the West, nor from the South. God is the ruler among the nations; and the people who refuse Him their allegiance shall be broken with a rod of iron, or dashed in pieces like a potter’s vessel. Our republic will perish like the Pagan republics of Greece and Rome , unless we baptize it into the name of Christ. “Be wise now therefore, O ye kings: be instructed, ye judges of the earth...Kiss the Son, lest he be angry, and ye perish from the way, when his wrath is kindled but a little.” We long to see, what the world has never yet beheld, a truly Christian Republic, and we humbly hope that God has reserved it for the people of these Confederate States to realize the grand and glorious idea. God has wooed us by extraordinary goodness; he is now tempering us by gentle chastisements. Let the issue be the penitent submission of this great people at the footstool of His Son.

The whole substance of what we desire may be expressed in the following or equivalent terms, to be added to the section providing for liberty of conscience:

Nevertheless we, the people of these Confederate States, distinctly acknowledge our responsibility to God, and the supremacy of His Son, Jesus Christ, as King of kings and Lord of lords; and hereby ordain that no law shall be passed by the Congress of the Confederate States inconsistent with the will of God, as revealed in the Holy Scriptures.

On the Sufficiency of Scripture

The doctrine of the sufficiency of Scripture means the Bible contains all the words of God he intended his people to have at each stage of redemptive history, and now contains all the words of God we need for salvation, trusting and obeying him perfectly. [Note: Edited version of definition found in Wayne Grudem’s Systematic Theology.] This is the doctrine of Sola Scriptura, Scripture alone.

Deuteronomy 29:29 tells us, "The secret things belong unto the LORD our God: but those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children for ever, that we may do all the words of this law."

Everything which could be known about God has not been revealed. Certain things are manifest in the general revelation of creation and man’s nature such that we are without excuse in our ignorance of the Creator. However, because of our blindness due to sin we will never find God through general revelation. God’s special revelation is essential to direct us to him. There remain unrevealed secrets regarding God beyond our comprehension. However, what he has revealed is sufficient; it belongs to us to teach our children and obey.

Of course there are unrecorded things spoken by God’s servants. Elijah, Elisha and other non writing prophets spoke God’s message to their generation. The Apostle Paul wrote at least three, and possibly four, letters to the church at Corinth. As we have two, the other was either incorporated into the extant two or lost. Every word spoken by these inspired prophets or apostles were not necessarily inspired. God did not chose to preserve every word spoken or written. If an authenticated third letter of Paul to Corinth was recovered today, it would be interesting historically but not canonical.

As Roman Catholics point out, Jesus spoke many things to his disciples. Mark 6:34, "And Jesus, when he came out, saw much people, and was moved with compassion toward them, because they were as sheep not having a shepherd: and he began to teach them many things." To our knowledge none of these words were recorded during his earthly ministry. He promised the apostles in John 14:26, "But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you." And thus he did.

Was every word Jesus spoke subsequently recorded by the Apostles in canonical scripture? Of course not. John’s gospel ends (21:25), "And there are also many other things which Jesus did, the which, if they should be written every one, I suppose that even the world itself could not contain the books that should be written. Amen." However, every word which Jesus spoke, which was essential for our salvation, nurture and edification, was recorded. And, on matters where Jesus had left no instruction, inspired Apostles left God’s direction (1 Cor. 7:12). What was recorded by the first generation Apostles and Evangelists was sufficient for future ages, as I will show Scripture teaches.

But, the church of the first generation did not have the Bible! Does this not disprove the doctrine of the sufficiency of Scripture?

God’s special revelation was sufficient for each generation. God’s revelation through Moses was sufficient for the Israelites coming out of Egypt. It contained all they needed for salvation, nurture and edification. Men might not add to or take from it. Only a sovereign God could add to it in his own time as he did through David, Solomon, Ezra, and the written prophets. There were generations and centuries in which there was no new revelation. What they had was sufficient. Such was the time from Joel and Malachi to the time of the Messiah’s coming.

Wait a minute. Roman Catholics and the Eastern Orthodox believe certain books from this period were inspired.

But, what say these books themselves. First Maccabees records the cleansing of the temple after their liberation of Jerusalem. They took down the altar polluted by pagan worship and wondered what to do with the desecrated stones. Chapter 4, verse 46 records, "And they laid up the stones in the mountain of the temple in a convenient place, till there should come a prophet, and give answer concerning them." Note, this was an age without a prophet and no authoritative direction for a new dilemma.

The books Protestants refer to as "Apocrypha" remain helpful as historical documents (like Josephus and Eusebeus) but not as authoritative revelation. The Jews excluded them from their canon and the Protestants followed suit. Jerome, who translated the Old and New Testaments into Latin agreed the Apocryphal books could not be used to establish doctrine and practice. From such come such erroneous doctrines as praying for the dead.

Was the early church left without an authoritative witness? Of course not. The early church continued to have the Old Testament. They also had the continuing testimony of Jesus in the Spirit assisted memory of the Apostles. They also had the additional inspired witness of the Apostles to deal with new circumstances Jesus had not addressed.

Very quickly, they had the writings of Paul and James followed by the gospels. I’d agree with J. A. T. Robinson’s argument, all the books of the New Testament were complete before 70 AD, before the last Apostle and the generation which knew Jesus passed away. Thus, during this first generation, there was a sufficient witness in the Old Testament, the testimony of the living Apostles and the New Testament books as they were written. Already, the letters of Paul were recognized as "Scripture" (2 Peter 3:16).

The canonical documents of the Apostles were circulated even before their death; how much more after the passing of the generation who had known Jesus. Other literature claiming apostolic authorship necessitated lists of books considered inspired. These lists display remarkable agreement long before the persecuted church could manage to hold a council to make such a decision.

During this time, every church may not have possessed every book of the New Testament. However, with the Old Testament and a single gospel or letter of Paul they had sufficient Scripture for their salvation and edification.

The Roman Catholic claim is that other unrecorded teachings of Jesus were passed from the Apostles to their successors and may still be made known to the church today, not as new or prophetic revelation but as a disclosure of previously known revealed truth from the apostolic age.

Gnostic heretics in the early centuries of the church claimed possession of secret doctrines of Jesus. The orthodox church rightly answered, if Jesus had left undisclosed teaching, it would have been to the Apostles, who would have passed these on to their successors. Therefore, truth was to be found in these apostolic churches. This refutation of the Gnostics did not necessitate the actual existence of any unknown deposit of truth, nor was it a warrant to add to or contradict the canonical Scriptures.

Consider 2 Timothy 3:16-17:

All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: That the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works.

and, Psalm 119:1:

Blessed are the undefiled in the way, who walk in the law of the LORD.

Though Paul nor the Psalmist were speaking of the entire canon we currently possess, they indicate the available inspired word of God was sufficient for every good work and by it a man may be perfect and undefiled in the way of God. Likewise, this applies to all the revelation God has given us. Nothing new is necessary for our salvation, perfection or obedience. Scripture alone is sufficient.

What makes a church or minister of Christ apostolic is not some mythical pseudo-historical succession from the apostles but faithful adherence to the once and for all sufficient witness of the prophets and apostles given in the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments.

Roman Catholics would have us believe a church which historically has taught doctrines and practices contrary to the word of God has authority to add to God’s faithful witness extra canonical doctrines. Thus, the Infallibility of the Pope, the Immaculate Conception and Assumption of Mary must be accepted as divine truth. Such are not mere applications of Scripture but previously unknown doctrines elevated to the level of Scripture. No standard exists by which such may be evaluated if Scripture is not the final measure of divine truth. Thus, the Roman bishop becomes the final arbitrator of truth, making himself a rival of God and Christ, an anti-Christ.

Effective Preaching

By far the most effective ingredient of good preaching is the personal piety of the preacher himself. How little must the presence of God be felt in that place, where the high functions of the pulpit are degraded into a stipulated exchange of entertainment, on the one side, and of admiration, on the other! and surely it were a sight to make angels weep when a weak and vapouring mortal, surrounded by his fellow-sinners, and hastening to the grave and the judgement along with them, finds it a dearer object to his bosom to regale his hearers by the exhibition of himself, that to do, in plain earnest, the work of his Master.

- Thomas Chalmers (March 17, 1780 - May 31, 1847), Scottish mathematician, minister of the gospel, leader and first moderator of the Free Church of Scotland in the Disruption of 1843; born at Anstruther in Fife.

On the Administration of the Lord's Table, Kirk of Scotland (1560)

In 1560, the kirk sent forth its creedal testimony in the Scottish Confession, which was written by six ministers: John Knox, John Douglas, John Row, John Spottiswoode, John Willock, and John Winram. These ministers were also commissioned to draft "in a volume the policy and discipline of the kirk." The latter became the First Book of Discipline of the Scottish Church.

From the First Book of Discipline (1560) of the Kirk of Scotland, giving directions for the administration fo the Lord’s Supper (The Ninth Head); note their advice regarding frequency:

Four times in the year we think sufficient to the administration of the Lord's Table, which we desire to be distinct, that the superstition of times may be avoided so far as may be. Your honours are not ignorant how superstitiously the people run to that action at Pasche, even as [if] the time gave virtue to the sacrament; and how the rest of the whole year they are careless and negligent, as that it appertains not unto them but at that time only. We think therefore most expedient, that the first Sunday of March be appointed for one [time]; the first Sunday of June for another; the first Sunday of September for the third; and the first Sunday of December for the fourth. We do not deny but that any several church, for reasonable causes, may change the time, and may minister ofter; but we study to suppress superstition. All ministers must be admonished to be more careful to instruct the ignorant than ready to satisfy their appetites; and more sharp in examination than indulgent, in admitting to that great mystery such as are ignorant of the use and virtue of the same. And therefore we think that the administration of the Table ought never to be without that examination pass before, especially of those whose knowledge is suspect. We think that none are apt to be admitted to that mystery who cannot formally say the Lord's Prayer, the articles of the belief, and declare the sum of the law.

Idolatry and the Constitution

In my preaching through First Kings, I came across the following from Peter Leithart’s Brazos Theological Commentary on 1 &2 Kings (Brazos Press, Grand Rapids, 2006), where he begins his comment on 1 Kings 21, pp. 152-3:

Americans, if they believe in idolatry at all, believe it is a victimless sin. Though it is debatable that the framers of the American Constitution envisioned a secular state, the First Amendment has come to be understood as a protection of all religious belief, though not a protection of religious behavior (e.g. polygamy is not a protected religious behavior). According to contemporary interpretations of the First Amendment, it makes no social and political difference what people believe. They can worship a thousand gods or none; they can worship Allah or Jesus; and it has absolutely no public consequences. All can live in harmony and peace despite our religious differences, because the sacred canopy overarching all our particular religious commitments is a commitment to the American system. Particular religions are subordinated to the American civil religion, a religion to which all Americans adhere. Whatever we are ethically or religiously, we are all hyphenated Americans: Christian-Americans or Buddhist-Americans or Muslim-Americans or atheist-Americans, but always Americans. This is what O’Donovan had in mind when he suggests, shockingly to many American Christians, that the First Amendment “can usefully be taken as the symbolic end of Christendom,” since, whatever the intentions of the framers, it “ended up promoting a concept of the state’s role from which Christology was excluded, that of a state freed from all responsibility to recognize God’s self-disclosure in history” (1996, 244-45).

Indifference to idolatry has its roots in the early modern period. According to a common telling of the story, Europeans discovered that theology was bloodily divisive and concluded that the only way to restore comparative harmony was to expunge theology from the public square, forcing theological decision and debate into the recesses of the conscience or, at best safely behind the walls of the church (Pannenberg 1989, 12-15). William Cavanagh vigorously and persuasively challenges this account of secularization arguing that the wars of religion did not move religion into private space but instead invented the modern concept of religion (2000, 15-42). Besides, all efforts to establish social harmony on the foundation of theologically neutral concepts of nature and human nature are doomed to failure. To found a constitution on the premise that human beings are something other than the image of God is not to found a constitution on neutrality. It is, so Christians must testify, to found a constitution on falsehood.

Scripture does not treat idolatry as morally or politically indifferent. What and how we worship shapes the kind fo persons we become. After describing false gods as speechless, blind, deaf, immobile, and powerless, Psalm 115, says that “those who make them will become like them, / everyone who trusts in them” (115:8). Idolaters are as dumb, blind, deaf, and impotent as the gods they worship. On the other hand, as the Gospels demonstrate, those who turn to Jesus in faith are healed of all such diseases. Worshipers of the living God live.

Calvin on the Duties of the Civil Magistrate

The duty of magistrates, its nature, as described by the word of God, and the things in which it consists, I will here indicate in passing. That it extends to both tables of the law, did Scripture not teach, we might learn from profane writers, for no man has discoursed of the duty of magistrates, the enacting of laws, and the common weal, without beginning with religion and divine worship. Thus all have confessed that no polity can be successfully established unless piety be its first care, and that those laws are absurd which disregard the rights of God, and consult only for men.

[continued]

John Calvin, Institutes, IV:20:9

Lucy created this of me

Some of My Appalachian Kin

The man in the right front was my great grandfather.

Plain Reasons for Using the KJV Today

This was a speech given to the Trinitarian Bible Society in London by the Reverend David Silversides. He is Pastor of the Loughbrickland Reformed Presbyterian Church of Ireland in Loughbrickland, Ulster, United Kingdom.

http://www.sermonaudio.com/sermoninfo.asp?currSection=sermonsspeaker&sermonID=12140662448

Neither Mr. Silversides nor I advocate the KJV as superior to the received texts in Hebrew and Greek. However, he makes a good case for preferring the KJV.

Work of the Holy Spirit

There are no miraculous or extraordinary spiritual gifts validating God’s Revelation today, nor is any new Revelation given. The Canon is closed, God’s Special Revelation complete. Thus defined, God’s extraordinary activity has ceased.

Our persuasion and assurance of the infallibility of the truth of Scripture and its divine authority is from an inward work of the Holy Spirit, bearing witness by and with the Word in our hearts (WCF I:5). Although the Scriptures only mean what God originally intended to say, the inward illumination of the Spirit is necessary for a saving understanding of the Word (WCF I:6).

The Spirit of God calls individuals to saving faith, confirms our assurance, dwells in us to destroy the dominion of sin and strengthen us in all saving graces to the practice of holiness (WCF XIII:1), gives or takes away our liberty to pray for particular intentions, calls and confirms men to ordained ministry, guides ministers and church judicatories in their ministry and decisions, congregations in their calling of ministers, ministers in accepting calls, and individuals in life decisions. This leading of God should always be subjected to the measure of God’s Word and the confirmation of the Church.

The Church’s neglect of the whole counsel of Scripture leads to renewal movements often tainted with abuses, exaggerations of God's Word, unbiblical presumptions of authority, and heresy. Faithful preaching of God's Word, guidance of our Reformed Confessions and Biblical church government and discipline would make such movements unnecessary.

God in His mercy sends revival and hunger into the hearts of His people, causing many to desire Him and not be satisfied with a nominal faith. Sometimes such Christians have unexpected encounters with God’s grace. For some, this is the experience of regeneration; for others, the assurance of grace and salvation. All regenerated believers have the Holy Spirit and are baptized by one Spirit into one body in Christ. As the Confession states, one may be genuinely regenerated without experiencing assurance (WCF XVIII:3). It is God's desire that we know we have eternal life (1 Jn. 5:13), and experience joy inexpressible and full of glory (1 Pt. 1:8). Any of these experiences, may be what some identify as "baptism with the Holy Spirit." The Confessions give better and Biblical language to describe these spiritual events.

One should not base his relationship with God on the anticipation of extraordinary experiences of His grace. The Spirit of God enables us to have an assurance of grace and salvation without extraordinary, extra-biblical revelation or means, by the use of ordinary means (WCF XVIII:3): reading and meditating on scripture, prayer, hearing the Word preached, receiving the Sacraments and subjection to biblical authority.

"God in his ordinary providence makes use of means, yet is free to work without, above and against them, at His pleasure." (WCF V:3) Although there are no extraordinary works of God to confirm additions to His Word, a Sovereign God may use special providential means to guide, deliver or protect His people, especially in times of persecution, hardship, or advancement of the Kingdom, never as a contradiction, an addition to, or with the infallible certainty of canonical Revelation, but "as gracious intimations of the will of God, granted to them in answer to prayer, for their own encouragement or direction" (McCrie, Story of the Scottish Church). Scripture does not forbid one to pray for God’s special providential intervention to deliver beyond His ordinary workings through man and nature. The Spirit may give or withhold liberty and faith for such prayers or restrain such.

Trinkets of the Whore

George Gillespie
(1613-1648)
The Popish Ceremonies (including Holy Days) are proved to be Idolatrous Because they are badges of Present Idolatry.

The following quote is take fromGillespie's A Dispute Against the English Popish Ceremonies Obtruded on the Church of Scotland, published in 1637 when he was 24. Gillespie later served as a Scottish commissioner to the Westminster Assembly.

EPC 3.3, 181-197. That The Ceremonies Are Unlawful, Because They Sort Us With Idolaters, Being The Badges Of Present Idolatry Among The Papists.

Sect. 1
It follows according to the order which I have proposed, to show next that the ceremonies are idolatrous, participative. By communicating with idolaters in their rites and ceremonies, we ourselves become guilty of idolatry; even as Ahaz (2 Kings 16:10), was an idolater, eo ipso [for that very reason], that he took the pattern of an altar from idolators. Forasmuch, then, as kneeling before the consecrated bread, the sign of the cross, surplice, festival days, bishopping, bowing down to the altar, administration of the sacraments in private places, etc., are the wares of Rome, the baggage of Babylon, the trinkets of the whore, the badges of Popery, the ensigns of Christ's enemies, and the very trophies of Antichrist: we cannot conform, communicate and symbolize with the idolatrous Papists in the use of the same, without making ourselves idolaters by participation.

Shall the chaste spouse of Christ take upon her the ornaments of the whore? Shall the Israel of God symbolize with her who is spiritually called Sodom and Egypt? Shall the Lord's redeemed people wear the ensigns of their captivity? Shall the saints be seen with the mark of the beast? Shall the Christian church be like the Antichristian, the holy like the profane, religion like superstition, the temple of God like the synagogue of Satan? Our opposites are so far from being moved with these things, that both in pulpits and private places they used to plead for the ceremonies by this very argument, that we should not run so far away from Papists, but come as near them as we can. But for proof of that which we say, namely, that it is not lawful to symbolize with idolaters (and by consequence with Papists), or to be like them in their rites or ceremonies, we have more to allege than they can answer.
http://www.naphtali.com/GGhodays6.htm
http://www.naphtali.com/epcextrc.htm
http://www.apuritansmind.com/GeorgeGillespie/GeorgeGillespieMainPage.htm

Who Should Be Baptized?

In whom also ye are circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, in putting off the body of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ:
Buried with him in baptism, wherein also ye are risen with him through the faith of the operation of God, who hath raised him from the dead. [Col. 2:11-12 KJV]

Clear connection here (Col. 2:11-12) between circumcision in the Old Testament and baptism in the New Testament. Paul is saying baptism is "circumcision in Christ."

Consider Romans 4:11 concerning Abraham:
And he received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the righteousness of the faith which he had yet being uncircumcised: that he might be the father of all them that believe, though they be not circumcised; that righteousness might be imputed unto them also: [KJV]

Paul specifically says circumcision is a sign and seal of righteousness or justification by faith.

God commanded that circumcision, a sign and seal of justification by faith, be given to infant children of Abraham who were incapable of believing.

Abraham was a believer when he was circumcised, and therefore circumcision is a sign and seal of his justification by faith. The pattern in the book of Genesis is: First, the adult believer Abraham received circumcision, the sign and seal of justification by faith. Then the sign and seal was administered to his household.

The same pattern is seen in the book of Acts. First, there are adult believers; they receive the sign and seal of justification by faith, baptism; then this sign and seal is given to their households.

Baptists argue for an explicit New Testament command to baptize children of believers. God gave an explicit command in the Old Testament for the sign and seal of justification by faith to be administered to believers and their children. Without an explicit, specific New Testament reference to change that principle, how can we withhold the sign and seal of justification by faith from infant children of believers?

Christian parents, believing parents, have no more right or option to say, "Shall we have our children baptized?" than believing parents under the old covenant had a right to ask if their child should be circumcised. The New Testament does not speak explicitly, but points to the Old Testament where the Spirit has spoken sufficiently for our instruction.

The lack of an explicit question or instruction regarding the baptism of infant children in the New Testament indicates common agreement, background and understanding on this issue. What the Spirit had already said was sufficient.

Presbyterians do not speak of "New Testament Christianity" but "Whole Bible Christianity. We read the New Testament in the context of the Old.

[For the above argument, I am indebted to the late Donald A. Dunkerley– one time Baptist, mentor, fellow minister and friend– and a tract he wrote on Baptism, originally published by the Presbyterian Evangelistic Fellowship]

Where Does Revival Start?

Charles G. Finney (1792-1875), father of Revivalism, said on the opening page of his Lectures on Revivals in Religion: "Religion is the work of man."

J. H. Merle d’Aubigne (1794-1872) in the Reformation in England said:

"...to believe in the power of man in the work of regeneration is the great heresy of Rome, and from that error has come the ruin of the Church. Conversion proceeds from the grace of God alone, and the system which ascribes it partly to man and partly to God is worse than Pelagianism."

American Presbyterian, Princeton theologian, Charles Hodge (1797-1878) points out the same danger:

"No more soul-destroying doctrine could well be devised than the doctrine that sinners can regenerate themselves, and repent and believe just when they please. . . As it is a truth both of Scripture and of experience that the unrenewed man can do nothing of himself to secure his salvation, it is essential that he should be brought to a practical conviction of that truth. When thus convicted, and not before, he seeks help from the only source whence it can be obtained."

These three men were contemporaries. D’Aubigne and Hodge agree, but disagree with Finney. Everyone who speaks of the 'new birth' does not mean the same thing.

Finney is considered the hero of Evangelical Religion in America.

Whose religion is it?

Do we bring ourselves to God?

Are we regenerated (born again) because we believe?
OR
Do we believe because God regenerates us?

Ephesians 2:1-10 (KJV)
1And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins; 2Wherein in time past ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience: 3Among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind; and were by nature the children of wrath, even as others. 4But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us, 5Even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ, (by grace ye are saved;) 6And hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus: 7That in the ages to come he might shew the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness toward us through Christ Jesus. 8For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: 9Not of works, lest any man should boast. 10For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.

Fetching Tow

Fetching Tow: Lucy says I should explain what the term means. To fetch is to convey from one place to another, to go get and bring back. One who fetches is a ‘go-fer.’ Tow may be the material (flax or hemp) for spinning. One can spin ideas as well as fiber. Tow is also tinder for starting a fire. Isaiah 1:31 (KJV) speaks of God’s judgment, "And the strong shall be as tow, and the maker of it as a spark, and they shall both burn together, and none shall quench them." One may ‘fetch tow’ to start a fire of conviction, judgment, repentance, revival, reformation, conversation or debate. Luther was ‘fetching tow,’ providing tinder for theological discussion, when he nailed his 95 theses (16th century equivalent of a blog) to the Wittenberg castle church door. One may also ‘fetch tow,’as to convey something in a tow bag, a gunnysack. Gunnysacks are not worth much, but their contents may be of value. The Apostle Paul said, "But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us." [2 Cor. 4:7] In earthen vessels or ‘tow bags,’ not everything I’ll share here will be my own. Sometimes, I’ll ‘fetch tow’ and share from greater minds than my own, with the hope of spinning a new fabric or starting a fire in our hearts or conversation.

Is Rome the Original Church?

It is a misunderstanding to say the Roman Catholic Church uniquely descends from the apostolic church and is the original church from which all others come. Protestants and Roman Catholics often misunderstand and misrepresent the nature and history of the Church.

There is one "catholic" (universal) Church on earth, sometimes more, sometimes less visible, always subject to mixture and error, manifesting itself in divers nations and eras. It is possible for particular churches to degenerate and to become no churches of Christ (‘synagogues of Satan’), although they may contain genuine believers. God promises there will always be a valid church, a remnant, on earth to worship Him and do His will against which the gates of hell will not prevail.

The church of the first generation was not perfect, but had its conflicts and problems, even in the New Testament era; just read the New Testament, especially the Acts of the Apostles.

In the early post-apostolic and patristic church (from the completion of the New Testament to the mid 700's AD) persecution kept it pure. The pastors, or bishops, of important cities, especially where the church was founded by an apostle, took on a leadership role against heresy.

The bishop of Rome had a prominence, but not the supremacy he claimed in the middle ages. The bishop of Rome took on increased authority in the power vacuum left by the fall of the western Roman Empire. However, much autonomy existed for national churches. The ancient Celtic church of the missionary bishop Patrick was not under Roman church authority. Not until the late 7th century, with the power of the Anglo-Saxon kings, was the Celtic church brought under the authority of Rome by the massacre of Celtic Christian leaders. Patrick was no Roman Catholic!

A major challenge to Roman supremacy came in 1054, when the bishops of the Eastern churches rejected the claims of the bishop of Rome. The Eastern and Western churches were divided, with the Roman bishop still claiming supreme authority in the West. The Eastern churches go back to the fist century and have an equal claim to antiquity. These are the predecessors Eastern Orthodox churches of today.

Many present doctrines and practices associated with the Roman church were articulated in the medieval period. The veneration of Mary and the saints, adoration of images, prayer for the dead, belief in baptismal regeneration and that sacraments had power in and of themselves, belief in purgatory and limbo, man made feasts and holy days, the mass and exaggerated power for the ecclesiastical hierarchy were all present. These and other man made abuses of doctrine, worship and practice polluted the church. These doctrines and practices often associated with Rome were not officially recognized, just condoned. The Roman Catholic Church did not exist as it does today.

The Protestant churches did not branch off from Rome. First the Eastern and Western churches divided. Then Rome and the various national Protestant churches divided from the Western church in the 1500's.

Luther, Calvin, Knox and other Reformers made no claim of starting a new church. They saw a continuity with the apostolic church; but said continuity must be faithful to the doctrine of the apostles as found in the Bible, not determined by claims to unscriptural authority. The Protestant churches of Germany, Switzerland, France, Holland, Hungary, Scotland and England were a continuation of the national churches in those lands purified in doctrine, worship and government. One could claim the Church of Scotland was a revival of the ancient Celtic church, now freed of Roman domination.

The Roman Catholic Church in its present form began at the Council of Trent in the 1560's. At that council, the unofficial pre-reformation doctrines became official church teaching. The constitution of the Roman church was reorganized, and the authority of the bishop of Rome made clear. The doctrines of transubstantiation and veneration of the saints became and prayer for the dead became official.

Protestant, Orthodox and Roman churches may claim continuity with the apostolic church. Protestant denominations today are no less part of the one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church of Jesus Christ than the Eastern Orthodox or Roman churches. The closer a church is to the teachings of Jesus Christ, as found in the Bible, the more legitimate its claim to be the historic and genuine church. The church has authority as far as they root that authority in the Scriptures. Those faithful to the apostolic teachings of the Bible are ‘apostolic’ churches.

Protestants do not claim to be the only expression of the church. Most recognize there are true believers, even in apostate groups. Most recognize there is one catholic (universal) Church of Jesus Christ on earth, existing in various imperfect manifestations. The existence of so many Protestant denominations in America is a scandal. However, unity must be in the truth of the Bible, not in some lowest common denominator compromise.

In looking for a church, we should find the congregation and denomination which most nearly teaches and does all that Jesus commanded, that is most committed to the truth of the Bible, that finds its authority for all it teaches and practices- doctrine, government, discipline or worship- in Scriptures alone, and is willing to be guided and corrected (reformed) by Scripture as the voice of her Lord.

This defines a faithful, catholic and apostolic church of Jesus Christ. Faithful Reformed Churches may make this claim as well as any, better than most, certainly more than apostate Rome.

© 2006

Essentials of the Gospel

Thomas McCrie gives us this account in his Story of the Scottish Church pp. 247-248:

An English merchant, who had occasion to visit Scotland in the way of business about the year 1650, happened to hear three of the most eminent of the Scottish ministers of that age– Robert Blair, Samuel Rutherford, and David Dickson. Being asked, on his return, what news he had brought from Scotland, the gentleman, who had never shown any sense of religion before, replied, "Great and good news! I went to St. Andrews, where I heard a sweet and majestic-looking man (Blair); and he showed me the majesty of God. After him, I heard a little fair man (Rutherford); and he showed me the loveliness of Christ. I then went to Irvine, where I heard a well-favored proper old man, with a long beard (Dickson); and that man showed me all my heart."

That is a great tribute to three of the great ministers of the 17th Century Second Scottish Reformation. It is also a good summary of the essentials of the gospel:

We must know our sinfulness, God’s majesty, and His provision for us in Christ Jesus alone.

Cal Knox on the firing line

Calvin on the Godly Magistrate

John Calvin, in the preface to his Institutes of the Christian Religion, addressed to King Francis I of France:

The characteristic of a true sovereign is, to acknowledge that, in the administration of his kingdom, he is a minister of God. He who does not make his reign subservient to the divine glory, acts the part not of a king, but a robber. He, moreover, deceives himself who anticipates long prosperity to any kingdom which is not ruled by the sceptre of God, that is, by his divine word. For the heavenly oracle is infallible which has declared, that “where there is no vision the people perish” (Prov. 29:18).