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Luke 23:43: Where Does the Comma Go? Was the Thief in Paradise That Day? “Verily, I say unto thee, To day shalt thou be with me in paradise,” as in the KJV, or “Verily I say unto thee to day, Thou shalt be with me in paradise,” as the Watchtower Society, Seventh Day Adventism, and other annihilationists teach?
How Long Were the Original Manuscripts Around? Considerations on the NT Autographa and Early NT Apographa from Scripture and Patristic Writers, part 4
Heresies between A. D. 180-185,[i]
while discussing the reading “666” concerning the mark of the beast and the
presence of a variant reading of “616,”[ii]
stated:
being the state of the case, and this number being found in all the most
approved and ancient copies [of the Apocalypse], and those men who saw John
face to face bearing their testimony [to it]; while reason also
leads us to conclude that the number of the name of the beast, [if reckoned]
according to the Greek mode of calculation by the [value of] the letters
contained in it, will amount to six hundred and sixty and six; that is, the
number of tens shall be equal to that of the hundreds, and the number of
hundreds equal to that of the units (for that number which [expresses] the
digit six being adhered to throughout, indicates the recapitulations of that
apostasy, taken in its full extent, which occurred at the beginning, during the
intermediate periods, and which shall take place at the end), — I do not know
how it is that some have erred following the ordinary mode of speech, and have
vitiated the middle number in the name, deducting the amount of fifty from it,
so that instead of six decads they will have it that there is but one. [I am
inclined to think that this occurred through the fault of the copyists, as is
wont to happen, since numbers also are expressed by letters; so that the Greek
letter which expresses the number sixty was easily expanded into the letter
Iota of the Greeks.][iii] Others
then received this reading without examination; some in their simplicity, and
upon their own responsibility, making use of this number expressing one decad;
while some, in their inexperience, have ventured to seek out a name which
should contain the erroneous and spurious number. Now, as regards those who
have done this in simplicity, and without evil intent, we are at liberty to
assume that pardon will be granted them by God. But as for those who, for the
sake of vainglory, lay it down for certain that names containing the spurious
number are to be accepted, and affirm that this name, hit upon by themselves,
is that of him who is to come; such persons shall not come forth without loss,
because they have led into error both themselves and those who confided in
them. Now, in the first place, it is loss to wander from the truth, and to
imagine that as being the case which is not; then again, as there shall be no
light punishment [inflicted] upon him who either adds or subtracts anything
from the Scripture, under that such a person must necessarily fall. Moreover,
another danger, by no means trifling, shall overtake those who falsely presume
that they know the name of Antichrist. For if these men assume one [number],
when this [Antichrist] shall come having another, they will be easily led away
by him, as supposing him not to be the expected one, who must be guarded
against.
therefore, ought to learn [what really is the state of the case], and go back
to the true number of the name, that they be not reckoned among false prophets.
But, knowing the sure number declared by Scripture, that is, six hundred sixty
and six, let them await[.][iv]
the Ante-Nicene Fathers text to the
“in all the most approved and ancient copies” clause in this quotation reads, en pasi toiß spoudaioiß kai arcaioiß
antigrafoiß. This passage is interesting, as
showing how very soon the autographs of the New Testament must have perished,
and various readings crept into the mss. of the canonical books.”[v] Does this clause indicate indeed that the
autographs were already gone? A number
of factors suggest otherwise. First, the
conclusion is entirely an argument from silence. That the autographa are not specifically mentioned does not necessitate
their nonexistence. Second, Irenaeus
wonders that anyone receives the corrupt reading 616—after all, the correct
number is in “all the most approved and ancient copies.” As the autograph of the Revelation, by definition,
was only in one place, but a great number of copies had been made from it (a
definite implication from Irenaeus’ declaration, and one in favor of a correct
textual transmission), his statement apparently relates to the ease of access
to one of these “approved” and “ancient” copies, which would have corrected
misunderstanding concerning the apocalyptic number for those who were
proclaiming 616. An indirect indication of the loss of the less easily
accessible original was not in view.
Third, what surely made these copies “approved” was the certainty of
their identity with the autograph, which would certainly have been much easier
to establish if it was still extant, rather than lost. The word antigrafoß was used for a “certified copy of an official document”[vi];
these copies could have been made directly from the original penned by John the
apostle, or at least had a verifiable and short genealogy to the
autograph. It is noteworthy that “all”
of these approved copies, not “most” or “almost all,” read 666; this also suggests their common recent derivation from the
original. Fourth, Irenaeus had absolute
certainty concerning the correct text;
666 was “the true number . . . the sure number,” and partisans for the
alternative were worthy of “no light punishment” who will “necessarily fall” as
“false prophets” for adding or taking away from Scripture (Revelation
22:18-19). Even those who unknowingly
advocate the wrong number require “pardon.”[vii] His certainty concerning the correct text is
consistent with yet extant autographs.
Fifth, “those men who saw John face to face” were still a
controlling factor limiting textual alteration;
they apparently were able to verify the correct text and were interested
in doing so. Irenaeus’ statement
concerning the existence and distribution of authoritative “approved and ancient copies,” which he knew with
certainty reflected the Johannine autograph, does not demonstrate the early
loss of the original and the rapidity of universal textual deterioration—it
rather testifies to the opposite.
Rome at the beginning of the third century,[viii]
in a work against the heresy of Artemon, stated:
Scriptures [the followers of Artemon] have boldly falsified, and the canons of
the ancient faith they have rejected, and Christ they have ignored, not
inquiring what the sacred Scriptures say, but laboriously seeking to discover
what form of syllogism might be contrived to establish their impiety. And
should any one lay before them a word of divine Scripture, they examine whether
it will make a connected or disjoined form of syllogism; and leaving the Holy
Scriptures of God, they study geometry, as men who are of the earth, and speak
of the earth, and are ignorant of Him who cometh from above. Euclid, indeed, is
laboriously measured by some of them. And Aristotle and Theophrastus are
admired; and Galen, forsooth, is perhaps even worshipped by some of them. But
as to those men who abuse the arts of the unbelievers to establish their own
heretical doctrine, and by the craft of the impious adulterate the simple faith
of the divine Scriptures, what need is there to say that these are not near the
faith? For this reason is it they have boldly laid their hands upon the divine
Scriptures, alleging that they have corrected them. And that I do not state
this against them falsely, any one who pleases may ascertain. For if any one
should choose to collect and compare all their copies together, he would find
many discrepancies among them. The copies of Asclepiades, at any rate, will be
found at variance with those of Theodotus. And many such copies are to be had,
because their disciples were very zealous in inserting the corrections, as they
call them, i.e., the corruptions made by each of them. And again, the copies of
Hermophilus do not agree with these; and as for those of Apollonius, they are
not consistent even with themselves. For one may compare those which were
formerly prepared by them with those which have been afterwards corrupted with
a special object, and many discrepancies will be found. And as to the great
audacity implied in this offence, it is not likely that even they themselves
can be ignorant of that. For either they do not believe that the divine
Scriptures were dictated by the Holy Spirit, and are thus infidels; or they
think themselves wiser than the Holy Spirit, and what are they then but
demoniacs? Nor can they deny that the crime is theirs, when the copies have
been written with their own hand; nor did they receive such copies of the Scriptures
from those by whom they were first instructed in the faith, and they cannot
produce copies from which these were transcribed. And some of them did not even
think it worthwhile to corrupt them; but simply denying the law and the
prophets for the sake of their lawless and impious doctrine . . . they sunk
down to the lowest abyss of perdition.[ix]
his opponents for their corruption of Scripture, evidencing that such
alteration of the words “dictated by the Holy Spirit” was considered a damnable
crime. One of the ways he proves that
his opponents, rather than his own party, were the corruptors of the text, is
his statement that the heretics were not able to indicate the source of their
own copies.[x] The allegation that the Artimonians “cannot
produce copies from which [their own] were transcribed” would be empty if the
orthodox were not themselves able to demonstrate that their copies matched the
autographs. This suggests that the
originals were still extant in Caius’ day.
advocates aver; it is “strongly
supported by P47 a A P 046 051 all extant minuscules itgig
vg syrph, h copsa, bo arm al”
(A Textual
Commentary on the Greek New Testament,
Bruce M. Metzger (New York, NY: American Bible Society, 1994; 2nd
ed.), note on Revelation 13:18).
Nevertheless, the Revised Standard
Version notes on Revelation 13:18 that “other ancient authorities read six hundred and sixteen,” while the New Revised Standard Version, New Living
Translation, English Standard Version, and New American Standard Version, among others, reference this
undoubted corruption as well. The
Antichrist will doubtless appreciate these modern Bible versions for confusing
the issue of the number of his name.
which reads, “That is, X into EI, according to Harvey, who
considers the whole of this clause as an evident interpolation. It does not
occur in the Greek here preserved by Eusebius (Hist. Eccl., 5:8).” While it
is true that this sentence is not in the section quoted by Eusebius, in his Ecclesiastical History 5:8 he quotes
Irenaeus as follows: “Now since this is
the number in all the good and ancient copies, and since those who have seen
John face to face testify, and reason teaches us that the number of the name of
the beast appears according to the numeration of the Greeks by the letters in
it . . .” And going on later he says
concerning the same point, “We therefore will not take the risk of making any
positive statement concerning the name of the Antichrist [and he continues the
quote]” (Eusebius, Ecclesiastical
History, trans. Kirsopp Lake).
Eusebius leaves out much more than this one clause—he skips from the
first part of book 5 chapter XXX:1 to near the end of XXX:3 (AN:XXX:7331-7333),
with the evident intention of not quoting the entire passage. That a particular clause within the section
skipped does not occur, because the entire section is missing, is a weak
argument for an interpolation.
& R. Scott, (9th ed. w/rev. supplement. New York, NY: Oxford University Press,
1996). The word is also used in a more
general sense. Among the apostolic “fathers,”
the word appears in MPoly 22:2; 23:5; Pap 29:1. (cited from the Accordance module Apostolic Fathers: Greek Texts and English Translations, ed.
Michael W. Holmes (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 1999); Module version
1.1.) Note also 1 Esdr 2:19; 6:7; 8:8;
Esth 13:1; 3:14; 4:8; 16:1, 19; 8:13; 1 Mac 8:22; 11:31, 37; 12:5, 7, 19, 23;
14:20, 23, 27, 49; 15:24; and Bar 6:0 in the LXX. The word does not appear in the NT.
the textual controversy a separating issue?
“Caius,” pg. 141-2, A Dictionary of Christian Biography.
in Eusebius’ Ecclesiastical History
5:28. The text that follows comes from Fragments of Caius: Against the Heresy of
Artemon, AN:III:48591.
a test of accuracy employed by others as well.
For example, Jerome, while arguing with Rufinus over falsifications in
the latter’s translation of Origen’s Peri ÔArcwn, stated, “At all events, to cut short a long discussion, I can point
out whence I received the Peri ÔArcwn, namely, from those who copied it from your manuscript. We want in
like manner to know whence your copy of it came; for if you are unable to name
any one else as the source from which it was derived, you will yourself be
convicted of falsifying it” (Jerome’s
Apology for Himself Against the Books of Rufinus, book 2, NPN-2:23:20687).
The Encyclopaedia Britannica on Christmas
(i. e. the Mass of Christ), in the
Christian Church, the festival of the nativity of the Jesus Christ. The history
of this feast coheres so closely with that of Epiphany (q. v.), that what follows must be read in connexion with the
article under that heading.
less than by the primitive non—Marcan document embodied in the first and third
gospels, begins, not with the birth and childhood of Jesus, but with his
baptism; and this order of accretion of gospel matter is faithfully reflected
in the time order of the invention of feasts. The great church adopted
Christmas much later than Epiphany; and before the fifth century it was no
general consensus of opinion as to when it should come on the calendar, whether
on the 6th of January, or the 25th of March, or the 25th
of December.
of December with the birthday of Christ is in a passage, otherwise unknown and
probably spurious, of Theophilus of Antioch (A. D. 171-183), preserved in the
Latin by the Magdeburg centuriators (i. 3, 118), to the effect that the Gauls
contended that as they celebrated the birth of the Lord on the 25th
of December, whatever day of the week it might be, so they ought to celebrate
the Pascha on the 25th of March when the resurrection befell.
of December is in Hippolytus’ (c. 202) commentary on Daniel iv. 23. Jesus, he says,
was born at Bethlehem on the 25th of December, a Wednesday, in the
42nd year of Augustus. This passage also is almost certainly interpolated. In
any case he mentions no feast, nor was such a feast congruous with the orthodox
ideas of that age. As late as 245 Origen, in his eighth homily on Leviticus,
repudiates as sinful the very idea of keeping the birthday of Christ “as if he
were a king Pharaoh.”| The first certain of mention of Dec. 25 is in a Latin
chronographer of A. D. 354, first published entire by Mommsen.[1]
It runs thus in English: “Year 1 after Christ, in the consulate of Caesar and
Paulus, the Lord Jesus Christ was born on the 25th of December, a
Friday and 15th day of the new moon.” Here again no festal celebration
of the day is attested.
speculations in the 2nd century about the date of Christ’s birth.
Clement of Alexandria, towards its close, mentions several such, and condemns
them as superstitions. Some chronologists, he says, alleged the birth to have
occurred in the twenty-eighth year of Augustus, on the 25th of Pachon, the Egyptian
month, i. e. the 20th of
May. These were probably the Basilidian gnostics. Others said it on the 24th
or 25th of Pharmuthi, i. e.
the 19th or 20th of April. Clement himself sets it on the 17th of
November, 3 B. C. The author of a Latin tract, called the De Pascha computus, written in Africa in 243, sets it by
private revelation, ab ipso deo inspirati, on the 28th of March. He
argues that the world was created perfect, flowers in bloom, and trees in leaf,
therefore in spring; also at the equinox, and when the moon just created was
full. Now the moon and sun were created on a Wednesday. The 28th of
March suits all these considerations. Christ, therefore, being the Sun of
Righteousness, was born on 28th of March. The same symbolical
reasoning led Polycarp[2]
(before 160) to set his birth on Sunday, when the world’s creation began, but
his baptism on Wednesday, for it was the analogue of the sun’s creation. On
such grounds certain Latins as early as 354 may have transferred the human
birthday from the 6th of January to the 25th of December,
which was then a Mithraic feast and is by the chronographer above referred to,
but in another part of his compilation, termed Natalis invicti solis, or
birthday of the unconquered Sun. Cyprian (de orat. Dom. 35) calls Christ
Sol verus, Ambrose Sol novus noster (Sermo vii. 13), and such
rhetoric was widespread. The Syrians and Armenians, who clung to the 6th
of January, accused the Romans of sun-worship and idolatry, contending with
great probability that the feast of the 25th of December had been
invented by the disciples of Cerinthus and its lections by Artemon to
commemorate the natural birth of Jesus. Chrysostom also testifies the 25th
of December to have been from the beginning known in the West, from Thrace even
as far as Gades. Ambrose, On Virgins iii. Ch. I, writing to his sister,
implies that as late as the papacy of Liberius 352-356, the Birth from the
Virgin was feasted together with the Marriage of Cana and the Banquet of the
4000 (Luke ix. 13), which were never feasted on any other day but Jan. 6.
in a sermon preached at Antioch on Dec. 20, 386 or 388, says that some held the
feast of Dec. 25 to have been held in the West, from Thrace as far as Cadiz,
from the beginning. It certainly originated in the West, but spread quickly
eastwards. In 353 – 361 it was observed that the court of Constantius. Basil of
Caesarea (died 379) adopted it. Honorius, emperor (395 – 423) in the West,
informed his mother and brother Arcadius (395 – 408) in Byzantium of how the
new feast was kept in Rome, separate from the 6th of January, with
its own troparia and sticharia. They adopted it, and recommended
it to Chrysostom, who had long been in favor of it. Epiphanius of Crete was won
over to it, as were also the other three patriarchs, Theophilus of Alexandria,
John of Jerusalem, Flavian of Antioch. This was under Pope Anastasius, 398 –
400. John or Wahan of Nice, in a letter printed by Combefis in his Historia
monothelitarum, affords the above details. The new feast was communicated
by Proculus, patriarch of Constantinople (434 – 446), to Sahak, Cataholicos of
Armenia, about 440. The letter was betrayed to the Persian king, who accused
Sahak of Greek intrigues, and deposed him. However, the Armenians, at least
those within the Byzantine pale, adopted it for about 30 years, but finally
abandoned this together with the decrees of Chalcedon early in the 8th
century. Many writers of the period 375 – 450, e. g. Epiphanius,
Cassian, Asterius, Basil, Chrysostom and Jerome, contrast the new feast with
that of the Baptism as that of the birth after the flesh, from which we
infer that the latter was generally regarded as a birth according to the
Spirit. Instructive as showing that the new feast traveled from West eastwards
is the fact (noted by Usener) that in 387 the new feast was reckoned according
to the Julian calendar by writers of the province of Asia, who in referring to
other feasts use the reckoning of their local calendars. As early as 400 in
Rome an imperial rescript includes Christmas among the three feasts (the others
are Easter and Epiphany) on which theaters must be closed. Epiphany and
Christmas were not made judicial non dies until 534.
some years in the West (as late as 353 in Rome) the birth feast was appended to
the baptismal feast on the 6th of January, and in Jerusalem it
altogether supplanted it from about 360 to 440, when Bishop Juvenal introduced
the feast of the 25th of December. The new feast was about the same
time (440) finally established in Alexandria. The quadragesima of
Epiphany (i. e. the feast of the presentation in the Temple, or hupaponte)
continues to be celebrated in Jerusalem on the 14th of February,
forty days after the 6th of January, until the reign of Justinian.
In most other places it had long before been put back to the 2nd of
February to suit the new Christmas. Armenian historians describe the riots, and
display of armed force, without which Justinian was not able in Jerusalem to
transfer this feast from the 14th to the 2nd of February.
grounds on which the Church introduced so late as 350 – 448 a Christmas feast
till then unknown, or, if known, precariously linked with the baptism, seem in
the main to have been the following. (I) The transition from adult to infant
baptism was proceeding rapidly in the East, and in the West was well-nigh
completed. Its natural complement was a festal recognition of the fact that the
divine element was present in Christ from the first, and was no new stage of
spiritual promotion coeval only with the descent of the Spirit upon him at
baptism. The general adoption of child baptism helps to extinguish the old view
that the divine life in Jesus dated from his baptism, a view which led the
Epiphany feast to be regarded as that of Jesus’ spiritual rebirth. This aspect
of the feast was therefore forgotten, and its importance in every way
diminished by the new and rival feast of Christmas. (2) The 4th
century witnessed a rapid diffusion of Marcionite, or, as it was now called,
Manichaean propaganda, the chief tenet of which was that Jesus either was was
not born at all, was a mere phantasm, or anyhow did not take the flesh of the
Virgin Mary. Against this view the new Christmas was a protest, since it was
peculiarly the feast of his birth in the flesh, or as a man, and is constantly
spoken of as such by the fathers who witnessed its institution.
Britain the 25th of December was a festival long before the
conversion to Christianity, for Bede (De temp. rat. ch. 13) relates that
“the ancient peoples of the Angli began the year on the 25th of
December when we now celebrate the birthday of the Lord; and the very night
which is now so holy to us, they called in their tongue modranecht (modra
niht), that is, the mothers’ night, by reason we suspect of the ceremonies
which in that night-long vigil they performed.” With his usual reticence about
matters pagan or not orthodox, Bede abstains from recording who the mothers
were and what the ceremonies. In 1644 the English puritans forbad any merriment
or religious services by act of Parliament, on the ground that it was a heathen
festival, and ordered it to be kept as a fast. Charles II. revived the feast,
but the Scots adhered to the Puritan view.
Teutonic countries Christmas presents are unknown. Their places taken in Latin
countries by the strenae, French etrennes, given on the 1st
of January; this was in antiquity a great holiday, wherefore until late in the
4th century the Christians kept it as a day of fasting and gloom.
The setting up in the Latin churches of a Christmas crèche is said to
have been originated by St Francis.
A. H. Kellner, Heortologie (Freiburg im Br., 1906), with Bibliography;
Hospinanius, De festis Christianorum (Genevac, 1574); Edw. Martene, De
Antiquis Ecclesia Ritibus, iii. 31 (Bassani, 1788); J. C. W. Augusti, Chrisl.
Archaologie, vols. i. and v. (Leipzig, 1817-1831); A. J. Binterim, Denkwurdigkeiten,
v. pt. i. p. 528 (Mainz, 1825 &c.); Ernst Friedrick Wernsdorf, De
originibus Solemnium Natalis Christi (Wittenberg, 1757, and in J. E.
Volbeding, Thesaurus Commentationum, Lipsiae, 1847); Anton. Bynaeus, De
Natali Jesu Christi (Amsterdam, 1689); Hermann Usener, Religionsgeschichtliche
Untersuchungen (Bonn, 1889); Nik. Nilles, S. J., Kalendarium Manuale (Innsbruck,
1896); L. Duchesne, Origines de culte chretien (3e ed.,
Paris, 1889). (F. C. C.) (pgs. 293-294, The
Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th ed., vol. VI. New York: Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc., 1911).
TDR
der sächsischen Akademie der Wissenschaften (1850). Note that in A. D. 1,
Dec. 25 was a Sunday and not a Friday.
In a fragment preserved by an Armenian writer,
Ananias of Shirak.
The Kaufman, Kafkaesque Performance “Art”/Hoax That Is Most of Professing Christianity Today, pt. 2
Part one of this got little attention, let alone little love, when I think it is stating things as they are. I’m not going to go back to the Kaufman and Kafka analogy — you’ll have to read part one to get that — but I’m going to be a glutton for punishment, because I had decided to write at least two parts. So here goes.
I’m saying that most of professing Christianity is a performance art, which is different than a performing art. Sometimes it is called conceptual art. This perhaps majority of professing Christianity has the world as an audience and is playing a game with it. The lines have blurred between reality and fiction. And this kind of game playing works best and perhaps only in religion.
The first example I gave was the Charismatic movement, and I included continuationists and revivalists. Charismatics are playing and many, if not most, have themselves convinced that the Holy Spirit is doing something there. They will not be challenged or questioned, which is part of the game, as it defies love in their arrangement. It’s the equivalent of not laughing at a Kaufman act, because it isn’t funny. Many have gone along with this act, and now mistake this for a real movement of God. They are as good as fishing in their empty bathtub, the absurdity of it. I add continuationists as their enablers, the ones not quite willing to join, but unwilling to warn that the emperor is wearing no clothes.
Revivalists have their own version of it, but not different than some of the abuses of the false religion at Corinth. People are convinced of some kind of real spirituality with antics that produce results that are attributed to the Holy Spirit. Part of the performance is preaching, which is called Holy Spirit preaching because of a particular style that is often so contrived and so over-the-top that people are willing to attribute it to the supernatural. If it isn’t what the Bible says, that can be fine, because the Holy Spirit is “working.” How do you know? Because you can feel it. Music, the building, and other techniques and strategies create an atmosphere that promotes enthusiasm and euphoria, then labeled as “alive” and related to the “Spirit’s working.” Results are produced that back the claim. The audience wants something to happen and is willing to lay aside a right instinct to question in order to accept that it has, as a part of the self-delusion. If you break away, you are admitting that you were involved in something that was too strange for someone in his right mind. You embrace the performance. You go along with it. You feel good. You must be OK. You’re not.
Now to another example of this, and it might be all I talk about on this one, and I might not even finish it.
The Church Growth Performance “Art”/Hoax
There is so much of this, the church growth performance “art”/hoax, that it is very difficult to sort through it all. It has sadly turned God’s institution, the church, into so much of a game. It’s hart to know where to start. I want to illustrate the absurdity of it.
My church has 42,000 every time we meet. How about that? Doesn’t that sound great? God is working. “Tell me about it.” OK. I have a season ticket to the San Francisco Giants, and they sell out every game, 42,000 people. What I do is stand up in my section, and I read a verse, pray, and then sit back down. We have 42,000 show up for that. You say, “But they aren’t there for what you’re doing. They’re not there for the verse and the prayer.” And I say, “What difference does it make why they’re there, as long as they come? Why do you have to be so critical?”
The church growth movement (CGM) is essentially about getting people to church at almost any cost, short of a criminal operation. In certain cases, laws are probably broken. Such a high percentage of professing Christianity is using some form of the CGM strategy, that one could say that everyone is doing it. It’s not everyone, but almost as good as everyone. There are people not doing it, I know, but it’s very difficult to find someone that is not strategizing in a CGM kind of way to see people visit a church meeting.
My second paragraph of this section was extreme to illustrate, but what I’m going to explain next is an actual conservative example of what I’m talking about, where we’re at in this. It’s not close to the worst. A certain neighborhood is designated as a location where a bus route can start. The people looking at the neighborhood see it as a place where plenty of households of whatever nature will let their children ride on the bus to a meeting that is called “church.” Alright. Now is the time to recruit the riders. You pray. Then you go out and start knocking on the doors of this neighborhood inviting its children to come, telling them that it will be safe and there’ll be some helpful things about God, but also on this trip on the bus, you will get candy and soda and an opportunity to win some prizes. And that’s just a normal Sunday, regardless of the big push when something more will be offered during one or two times of the year.
From one morning of work, there are twenty riders the first Sunday. Amazing! “God worked.” “God blessed.” “God is using me.” “God answered my prayer.” “I always pray; that’s important.” When you get to church, leadership is impressed. They give positive reinforcement. “God really has used you” is verified by others. You were a top spiritual leader on that given Sunday. That’s how God works.
On the bus, a lot of positive attention is given. There’s a lot of hype. There’s a lot of excitement. There’s socializing. The kids get to take a trip away from home and make some new friends. When they get there, they have an exciting class, an exciting junior church. There are a lot of other kids there. It’s fun. It is face-paced, dynamic, and did I say exciting? The songs are fast and exciting. The people have a lot of enthusiasm and give a lot of attention to the children. The candy comes. The soda comes. The prizes come. The next Saturday you visit the previous riders, to come again. Others are also recruited with the same previous offer. A few won’t come back, but those are replaced with others.
There are so many different ways to get people to church, who wouldn’t otherwise come, if the sole reason was God and the Bible, if the motive was love for God and obedience as a Christian. There are a lot of different ways to justify this strategy. There is no example of it in the Bible. It is in fact the opposite of how Jesus worked even when He preached the gospel. He didn’t try to make it easier on people. They needed to believe it was the truth, and that was a good enough reason. God’s Word was depended upon, because that was the means of salvation. That’s how the Holy Spirit works, is through scripture. And in the end, the response will glorify the Lord.
What I’m saying is that the above is very conservative. It’s nothing like the hip thrusting “worship leaders” of a Rick Warren meeting. They’re nothing like the kegger party gathering of a Mark Driscoll. Those using this more conservative means in part justifies themselves by the idea that they aren’t like these other people, aren’t employing some of the same techniques. They don’t have the rock concert or the jumpers every Sunday in the children’s area. And it is one strategy. This is not supposed to be done.
By the way, I’m not saying that it isn’t hard work to put all these types of programs together. It isn’t easy to go back to the neighborhood every week. It’s hard to plan the choreography for this week’s special. Paying for the lighting and the speakers and the microphones and the instruments, learning how to play them — it all takes time and money. Paying for gas money for a big gas-guzzling bus is expensive. It’s a sacrifice to pay for that. Candy and soda for a lot of people adds up. Organizing a program every week for all those people with short attention spans is hard. It’s hard work, time-consuming, all of it. But it works. And when it works, it feels good. You’re helping people. You care for people. The kids enjoy it. They learn the Bible too. You could make a long list of a lot of good things that happen every week. One more thing here, I think that it is a similar feeling that President Obama gets when he thinks he’s giving healthcare to 30 million who don’t have it at the expense of all the others (if they weren’t already, they’re now guaranteed Democrat voters too, who don’t want to give up this freebee).
Those involved agree with each other that this is the work of God. The people who criticize don’t love the Lord. They probably only say things because they are ashamed of their own work for God and the lack of results. They justify their own deadness by their criticism. They probably wish they had as many people in their service as we do in our bathrooms in any one meeting. If God is working, you get a lot of people. And they’re getting a lot of people. With all those people things are hopping, and that’s the atmosphere that clues you in that God is working. That’s what it is to be alive, is to have a lot of children coming because they’re going to get candy and a soda, and then more.
There are so many prongs to this, so many tentacles. It’s not the simplicity of the New Testament, what Paul calls the simplicity of Christ. Jesus and the Apostles just told people what it was, explained it, and people either wanted it or not. Their goal was to make it plain to everyone who would want to listen. They didn’t sugar coat it, try to make it look like something that it wasn’t. They talked about the hardest stuff, the cross, up front. It wasn’t a performance. It was real. And that’s what true spirituality looks like. It’s not a performance with props and actors. It’s real. And that was before anyone got into the church. The church was for believers. They were the worshipers of God, and only believers can worship God.
All of the strategies of the CGM of whatever branch or style or technique or packaging do not take faith. They do not please God. Faith comes by the hearing of the Word of God. You don’t find this in the Bible. It is sight. It is flesh. It isn’t the Holy Spirit, but it is sadly designated as of God, which is part of the hoax. And meanwhile, people are not hearing the true Gospel. They are not even being offered the opportunity to hear it in most instances. And we don’t find out if people would really be willing to do actual biblical ministry, fulfill the Great Commission. They think it’s offering small toys and candy, it’s inviting people to a concert, it’s bringing people to the social club. The leaders probably know that people don’t want to know their Bible that well. Many of them don’t know it well. I’m not saying that some of them don’t read it. They do, and then they use it. I say, “Use it.” They many times don’t rightly divide it. They don’t look to it as their basis for what to do, for what God wants. It’s very often just another prop in the performance. Not every Christian should be expected to learn the Bible well enough to talk to anyone, to preach to anyone. And they usually won’t, so men have developed and are inventing new ways to do work without really even having to be saved.
Just like the Charismatic movement is thriving in foreign places, especially third world countries, leaving them worse off then what they were before, the CGM strategies are also going here. It’s a good use of the dollar. You can bribe more people with less money in those places. Sometimes there is just the curiosity of what the American might do or what he might give you in the future. The American “churches” have perpetuated it with expectations of some big stories in the prayer letter that reports or now on the website. And so the leaders on the field are being urged to do these things. They feel good having a big group that is so impressive. They call it the work of the Lord. The American churches agree.
Perhaps to be continued.
Ekklesia Means “Assembly” pt. 3
Part One, Part Two, (A Related Blogpost)
Find It from the Many Links
at the Right Column Under “Posts On the Church”)
A few weeks ago now, I was asked, “Why is the idea of local church only so important? Or, to put it another way, why is the idea of the universal church dangerous?” This post will answer that question.
ONE, the universal church as a teaching or belief eisegetes scripture or distorts the plain meaning of the text. The more I hear universal church people talk and write, the more I think this. I am sorry, but I read and listen to inane statements attempting to defend universal church from the Bible. No verse teaches it. Men will say that some verse “obviously” teaches it, and then they give no grammatical or syntactical evidence. When I expect it, they turn pretty quickly to, first, quote of a well-known theologian (speaking as one having no authority), and, second, to mockery.
There is plenty of grammatical proof for a local church. There is none for the universal. If this was such an important concept, then why is there no unequivocal, just plain, mention of it in the Bible? Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think there is even anything fuzzy, but if the “true church” really is all believers, where is the statement of that? So if someone can just make the Bible mean whatever he wants it to mean, that’s going to mess everything else up too. We see this happening all the time.
So I don’t see universal church in the Bible. I actually see “universal” and “church” as mutually exclusive, absolutely contradictory to each other. I do believe scripture teaches some paradoxes, but universal and church are not a paradox. They’re a contradiction.
The generic, singular usages of “church” seem to give people the most trouble. None of those prove a universal church. Since they don’t prove anything, they should be interpreted in the light of what is proven, what is plain. But no, universal church people take the non-existent, at best fuzzy, and conform the plain to that. It’s horrible.
So when people read this in, I ask, why? It’s not in there, so where did it come from? I look back at history and I see Roman Catholicism. I see Platonic philosophy. It’s easy to see how it got read in. It got read in by amillennialism, by allegorizing, by spiritualizing, by philosophizing, and by covenant theology. It explains and backs up and buttresses a state church. When you want a state church and it isn’t in the Bible, you’ve got to find it somehow. This is how it gets “found.” It does distort the simplicity that I see in scripture. The gospel, the worship, and the church are all simple.
Universal church people are, for the first time I’ve read, asking how that we read a local only position into scripture. We don’t, but they act like we have to do that, when it’s already clear that the local church is in the Bible. I’m reading two things, it seems, now. One is that it came from a reaction to Campbellism. I just wag my head on that one. It doesn’t make sense. Nothing can even prove it. It’s shoddy work. It starts by assuming that local only ecclesiology started with Graves and that Graves lived when Campbellism started. There’s your deep work. Sheer speculation. Two is that it came to defend a particular view of history, separate from Roman Catholicism. I can’t even find that spider web. Both of these are just desperate.
So TWO, a universal church brings in Platonic philosophy and allegorical interpretation into the Bible. When allegorization becomes the norm, then infant sprinkling becomes a way to join the church, which is the equivalent of salvation. That has perverted the gospel. Now you can read in apostolic succession, a human priesthood, and transubstantiation.
THREE, the universal church belief will cause men to see all sorts of other interpretations and doctrines and practices a different way, the wrong way. It will necessarily twist other doctrines. Instead of the gifts being used in a church, now they are used outside of a church, and someone feels justified having done so, because their gift is being used in the “true church.” The justification of a “church council” comes from seeing something other than and more than two churches settling their differences in Acts 15. There are many, many more here.
FOUR, the universal church belief destroys all other true beliefs. The fastest way for the truth to be destroyed is to get it outside of what God built to protect it. A universal church cannot protect the truth. It doesn’t have a pastor, doesn’t practice the ordinances, and doesn’t practice church discipline, all ways that the truth is protected and preserved. The universal church as a container for truth has holes all over it and it results in exponentially fast distortion of the truth. The truth can only be protected at a local level. Other of the reasons related directly to this one.
I believe the biggest reason for postmodern Christianity, emergents or emerging, and loosey-goosey dealing with the truth comes directly out of the wrong view of the church. When a universal church guy wants to protect the truth, generally he writes a book on it or has a conference or a council or a coalition. None of those are biblical ways, because the only biblical ways are done by an actual church and none of what the Bible says about a church protecting or preserving the truth is those things.
FIVE, the universal church disables biblical unity and biblical separation. This, of course, is related to the truth, as I said that other reasons directly relate the destruction of all other beliefs, including the gospel. The unity of the Bible and the separation of the Bible will never be practiced consistently by a universal church person. The reason there are about 20-30 interpretations of John 17 is because of the universal church. There is little agreement on what the unity is that Jesus is praying for. There is non-stop discussion on what are the correct doctrines to separate over. The fundamental or essential doctrines gets increasingly dumbed down to make it still not possible, but to give it a better try with no hope of succeeding. Ultimately the truth is what is discarded.
So, SIX, the universal church belief causes scripture to contradict itself. Scripture won’t contradict itself, even as God won’t deny Himself, but unity and separation contradict with a universal church belief. It becomes impossible not to contradict. That doctrine cannot be true.
And, therefore, SEVEN, the universal church destroys church purity. Here’s how it happens. I want to use music and worship as an example. A church doesn’t break fellowship with a church that plays rock music, because “all believers are the true church.” The rock music church claims to believe in salvation by grace through faith. The people in the church that doesn’t use rock music are influenced by the rock music church. More in the non-rock music church begin accepting it. The non-rock music church starts using rock music. I’ve seen this again and again in my lifetime.
EIGHT, the universal church belief results in people wasting their lives with wood, hay, and stubble. Gold, silver, and precious stone are about the temple of God, which is local only. Paul said, “Ye are the temple of God.” There are thousands that work in “ministries” that are not in fact worship of God, but another ox-cart of their own invention. They are wasting their time and their life.
NINE, the universal church belief brings the following mess-ups that could each be their own separate explanation of the dangers of the universal church: parachurch organizations, church hoppers, inclusion of all sorts of heinous groups into the broad umbrella of “the church,” apostate denominations like Roman Catholicism, Lutheranism, and Methodism, justification of a state church, ecumenism, disrespect of the church (which is local only), unfaithfulness to church (they’re attending the big one), validates hierarchical leadership that is everywhere today — various sacral societies applying unscriptural authority all over, giving to whatever charity and counting this as the Lord’s giving, discipleship is destroyed because men think they are making disciples outside of the actual Great Commission (when they’re not), Christian publishers affected by whatever it is that will be popular enough to help them meet payroll for their staff and employees, missionaries giving an account to boards ahead of churches, and more. If I spent more time thinking, I’m sure I could list a few dozen more. These were easy and they all come out of a universal church belief.
TEN, the universal church belief will be the final belief of the anti-christ, who will lead a universal church. That church will feel justified, I believe, by the same arguments as the universal church. Jesus will destroy the universal church. A universal church contradicts replenish the earth. It is a modern tower of Babel. Babylon is the final religion, the universal church, that will be destroyed.
People ask me why church doctrine is so serious. Why would we separate over it? If you give in on the church, you now give in on every single doctrine. If you say there is a universal church, now someone can and will practice universal church, and then all other doctrines will be perverted. Could there be a true doctrine that is true that would cause all of that? No way.
Just as a little aside, to be read later, the universal church teaching and belief creates guys like we have had a few of in our comment section, who free float, and can go off in any “ministry” they want, essentially creating havoc, without accountability. They don’t like strong pastoral authority, really almost any pastoral authority, if any authority at all. They like to be their own man out there free-floating. They can just say, “God led me,” and take off. God speaks to them individually without the work of a church. Their word is as good as anyone else’s. They can be a big shot in their own little pond. They are their own expert. A lot of pastors are the same way. They just go when they want, start their own ministry when they want, with little regard to the inter-relations of a church. “The body is all believers,” and as far as they’re concerned they’re then fitting into the body. Someone might disagree, but they could never have the authority of the big one, so no one has to listen. This is all the product of a belief in a universal church and it has created more wackos and cuckoos than anything. The universal church belief is perfect for the men who see computer chips in their corn flakes.
Reformed Continuationists: Strange Fire or Not?
We have our Word of Truth Conference this week. You’ll at least have audio from the conference, some before it’s over and all shortly thereafter, Lord-willing. You’ll probably have video. I’m looking into live-streaming. We’ve never done it.
I’m also planning on finishing the series on Ekklesia, or the last part of that series, which would lay out what we think is so damaging to universal church doctrine. Besides that, there is at least one other post I’d like to write on the issue that relates to history.
For those who read Thomas Ross’s John Wesley post, I’m still interested in how he is wrong. I got the name-calling, the ad-hominem, the judging of motives, the slandering and smearing, got all that, and also got how that other men have said good things about John Wesley, but I’m waiting for the actual proof that it was wrong. Maybe that’s not how fundamentalists and evangelicals roll. Oh well, too bad. Perhaps just typical. Now to this post.
I have been watching what could be described as an intramural fight between reformed cessationists and reformed continuationists. I’m talking about that where John MacArthur is on one side with all those preachers who identify and associate with his Strange Fire Conference (I’m not sure they’re in the majority) and then John Piper, Mark Driscoll, Wayne Grudem, and Sam Storms. This is tough for some watching, because there is so much admiration among young, even fundamentalists, for John Piper and Mark Driscoll today. Let me give my take, or my play-by-play of what is taking place. I’m doing this because I believe there is very important issue here, one that has led me to take a break from one or two other issues to talk about this. I do want all of you to pay attention. Stick with me. I’m not doing this out of sheer human interest. I haven’t read anyone write this, but I think it will nail this, and the reason I can do it is because of a unique perspective and independence, I believe, that I have.
John MacArthur is actually not a fundamentalist. He’s very, very close, but not quite. He doesn’t even call himself one, and I’m sure he knows why. By the way, what I believe holds evangelicals back from being fundamentalists is their consistency in their ecclesiology, and that’s a whole other series of blogposts again. Because of this Strange Fire Conference he held at his church, and other things like that, some would rightfully, I believe, evaluate that he is moving closer to fundamentalism. But this is where the rub comes.
When you listen to the reformed Charismatics or continuationists (same thing), you hear them opine about how that MacArthur is broad-brushing, throwing the baby out with the bathwater, etc. that he is judging the Charismatics as not saved. Why would that be the criticism? Why? Because the gospel is the center of evangelicalism of which these reformed continuationists consider themselves. I have never seen MacArthur make a big whoop about any issue except gospel-related issues in the true heritage of evangelicalism. That’s also what many fundamentalists would say, except they would add that you are to sort of separate over the gospel. MacArthur doesn’t delineate the separation so much.
What it sounds like, however, is that MacArthur and Johnson, et. al., just go about exposing and perhaps mocking the freaky practices of Charismaticism, related to continuationism, like barking like a dog, strange trances, night club looking worship, rolling on the floor laughing, fake healings, etc. These are wrong and embarrassing in that order, but are they gospel? This is where Charismatics and continuationists, especially the reformed ones, who are paying attention and less loony tunes, would cry foul. “You can’t not call us Christians!” “Not barking like a dog isn’t a way that a person is converted or gets saved!” They’ve got a point here. How do these particular practices, scripturally, mean that someone is not saved? Especially these reformed Charismatics would say the same thing about salvation by grace that MacArthur would and also would defend their “holy rolling brothers.” Shouldn’t MacArthur just ease up, since this isn’t a gospel issue?
But MacArthur is saying it is a gospel issue. That point came out again and again in the conference. He’s saying these people are not saved. Why? They are offering strange fire to the Lord. Their worship practices indicate that they are not saved. They might say they are saved, might claim to be saved by grace through faith, but MacArthur can’t get through those practices and say they’re not saved. The problem here, and I get it, is where someone is supposed to draw the line in evangelicalism. When has someone gone over the line, to where you would say he isn’t saved unrelated to the gospel? This isn’t unrepentant adultery or shacking up or support of homosexuality or the like. These people would not support that.
MacArthur hasn’t taken a stand on the regulative principle. I never heard it uttered from his mouth until, I think, once in the conference, but he wasn’t even endorsing it. I can’t imagine he supports it, based on many of his own practices. He’s been a guy that has protected his own style by saying that he only draws lines where the Bible says, never going beyond what is written. So there. But the Bible doesn’t prohibit, for instance, barking like a dog. And the “charisma” is just a doctrinal difference with these guys — they still all believe it’s salvation by grace through faith. MacArthur is being put in a spot where he looks very, very inconsistent, very, very selective in his targeting here. It looks like he might be up in arms about a preference, and he’s “dividing the body of Christ” (his and their view) by doing so. Again, they’ve got a point, I think.
Even MacArthur himself in the past without retraction, said that the Lonnie Frisbee, Calvary Chapel, Jesus movement will be viewed as a true revival. He’s said that at least twice in the past as an important early aspect to Grace Community Church. Now in this conference he says that his stream doesn’t flow from there (like he’s been reading me — it really does read like it), but from the reformation. That first stream actually did do a lot of feeding of GCC in the first several years, and MacArthur took advantage of those folks then.
So MacArthur is either saying that there is a serious gospel problem. Most Charismatics are not saved and you can see it in their worship. How people worship, their style, is in fact an indicator, even though there is no scriptural evidence of that, or at least none has been given in the past. The reformed continuationists are encouraging this lack of salvation, aiding and abetting. Or he is saying that false worship is a problem. We’ve got to be against false worship.
I say that the gospel and worship dovetail. How you worship says what or who you worship. You can decide who someone is worshiping by how they worship what or whom. If it is irreverent, then it isn’t God they’re worshiping, even if they say they are. MacArthur says this isn’t Jesus and it isn’t the Holy Spirit in the Charismatics, and he’s judging by their worship. They can’t know God, because God wouldn’t want what they’re offering Him. And you can’t be saved with the wrong God, the wrong Jesus, the wrong Holy Spirit. People think they’re saved, but they’re not because they are placing their faith in the “grace” of an impostor.
I believe, and have already been writing and saying for years, that the false worship of evangelicalism, not just Charismaticism, is tell-tale to their false Jesus, their other Jesus. They have a Jesus crafted in their own lust, that accepts their lust as worship, like those in Ephesus and in Corinth. The ecstatic utterances were just one manifestation in Corinth of ecstasy and euphoria. People are fooled too who have never spoken in gibberish or barked like a dog. MacArthur has used the same strategies at his church that offer people the same feelings that are deceiving of the true Holy Spirit. They give a feeling that deceives. The people are less deceived than at these Charismatic locations, but they are moving their direction, because that is where the beguiling and the seduction is, by painting a different image of God with the aesthetics and the feelings. This is the vehicle that the demons use to carry people away to their dumb idols, their own lustful fancies, their lying vanities.
It really is not the pot calling the kettle black. It is perhaps an old frying pan calling the kettle black. It’s not quite a pot, but it’s halfway there. It’s angry at the kettle. It think the kettle is ruining everything.
Let me give an easy example. The Charismatics have extreme activities, freakish ones, for which they credit the Holy Spirit. We say that’s not the Holy Spirit. You’ve got these cessationist evangelicals who play their rock music, promote their rock music, love their rock music, and even worse, and then all their worldly entertainment, and we’re supposed to think that’s God, that’s Jesus, that’s permissible, that exposing that is going beyond what is written. Why? It’s the same thing. It comes from the same poison fountain.
Not aside from the main point is when someone makes judgments of beauty relativistic. There is one God and, therefore, truth, goodness, and beauty are also transcendent. When you fiddle with beauty, make it relativistic, there goes truth and goodness. And you’ll get barking like a dog, calling it worship, without people knowing the difference. When Paul said think on what’s lovely, there must be an objective lovely to think about. MacArthur has fudged on that, but he wants the Charismatics to change their tune (pun intended), or they’re not saved. It’s hard to stomach for some. Is “think” on lovely just when you’ve got the lights on the platform and the service has started, or do these rock music loving friends of MacArthur get to pick and choose when to think on lovely and what is lovely. If that’s going to be relative then it’s all relative as far as they’re concerned.
These conservative cessationist evangelicals do see this as a gospel issue. So many people are being deceived, they have to say something. It’s no wonder that those being targeted don’t see it as fair.
The Charismatic movement is obvious to John MacArthur and people like him. He’s obvious to me. I hope he listens.
John Wesley — heretic or hero?
Baptists and fundamentalists who obtain their history mainly from sanitized and
hagiographical Protestant sources often have a very inaccurate view of the
theology of John Wesley. The following post should serve as a corrective, and
will bring up some of the facts often left out of the sanitized and
hagiographical accounts.
saints could lose their salvation.
example, he said: “”I believe a
saint may fall away; that one who is holy or righteous in the judgment of God
himself may nevertheless so fall from God as to perish everlastingly.” (pg. 81,Works, vol. 6).
heresy of his is so well known that I will not provide further documentation of
it.
the sign gifts, preparing the way for Pentecostalism.
Wesley brothers abandoned the dominant Protestant cessationism to adopt a
continuationist doctrine, a view in which they were followed by the Methodist
movement, and which explains much of the fanaticism that came to characterize much of Methodism. Wesley said: “[I]f
the Quakers [who were strong continuationists] hold the same perceptible
inspiration with me, I am glad” (“Letter to ‘John Smith,’ March 25,
1747; elec. acc. Wesley Center Online: Wesley’s Letters,
1747,
http://wesley.nnu.edu/john-wesley/the-letters-of-john-wesley/wesleys-letters-1747/.
Compare pg. 43, Theological Roots of Pentecostalism, Dayton). Thus, nineteenth-century Methodists, writing
to defend continuationism, noted: “[W]e dare to maintain that many
of the phenomena of the Pentecostal times have been continued, are common, and
ought to be expected in every age. . . . [Cessationist] censors are exceedingly
severe, [unjustly so, upon] the habitual reference made by the . . . teachers
to the direct influence of the Holy Spirit . . . [as] a revealer as well as an
interpreter of truth . . . speak[ing] to us not only by the written Word, but
also by visions, or feelings, or aspirations, or impressions, independent of
the Word; and extending even to what is sometimes claimed as a
physical consciousness . . . [as by continuationist antecedent] Dr. Upham” (pg.
106, “The Brighton Convention Its Opponents.” London Quarterly Review,
October 1875). Indeed, “much in Pentecostal teaching is a legacy
from Anglicanism . . . through the mediation of Wesley” (pg. 185, The
Pentecostals, Hollenweger).
mysticism, and developed his doctrine of perfectionism in connection with it.
Catholic mysticism was key to the development of the perfectionism and
continuationism of John Wesley. “John Wesley . . . says that he
began his teaching on Perfection in 1725 . . . [although he] was not converted
[on his own testimony] until 1738 . . . [h]ow did he come to teach
it? His father and mother . . . had both been interested in . . .
Roman Catholic mystical teaching . . . and had read a great deal of it. . . .
John Wesley had read [in addition to other Romanist mystics such as] . . .
Tauler . . . Thomas à Kempis . . .[and the] ‘Protestant mystic . . . [who]
wrote a book on Perfection . . . William Law,’ but he was influenced “in
particular [by]. . . Madame Guyon . . . [and] the Roman Catholic Archbishop
Fénelon,” although the Romanist mystic “Marquis or Baron de Renty” was probably
Wesley’s single “favorite author,” eclipsing even Guyon and Fénelon (pgs.
307-308, The Puritans: Their Origins and Successors,
Lloyd-Jones). Thus, Wesley could speak of “that excellent man, the
Marquis de Renty” although he knew the Catholic was infected with “many touches
of superstition, and some of idolatry, in worshipping saints, the Virgin Mary
in particular” (cf. Sermon 72, series 2, Sermon 133, series 4, Sermons,
on Several Occasions, and to which reference is made in the trust-deeds
of the Methodist Chapels, as constituting, with Mr. Wesley’s notes on the New
Testament, the standard doctrines of the Methodist connexion, John
Wesley. Orig. pub. 4 vol, 1771. Elec. acc. Logos Bible
Software). Wesley was also profoundly influenced by the ascetic,
Romanist, and Eastern Orthodox “monastic piety of the fourth-century ‘desert
fathers’” during his time in the “Holy Club” at Oxford
University. “[T]he consideration of Macarius the Egyptian and
Ephraem Syrus and their descriptions of “ perfection” (teleiosis) as the
goal (skopos) of the Christian in this life” were influential in
“shaping . . . Wesley’s . . . doctrine of Christian perfection . . . John
Wesley . . . was . . . in touch with Gregory of Nyssa, the greatest of all the
Eastern [Catholic] teachers of the quest for perfection. Thus, in his early
days, [Wesley] drank deep of this Byzantine tradition of spirituality at its
source and assimilated its concept of devotion as the way and perfection as the
goal of the Christian life. . . . The devotional works . . . of two Latin
[Roman Catholic] traditions of mystical spirituality . . . [and] the traditions
of Eastern Orthodoxy-Clement of Alexandria, Gregory of Nyssa, Macarius of
Egypt, and others . . . introduced [important] factors of . . . [Wesley’s]
understanding of perfection. . . . Wesley . . . was inclined to go beyond
logical subsequence [in justification and sanctification] to experiential
subsequence because of the deep influence of the Eastern Fathers on him in
terms of the relation of perfection to process and goal.” (pgs.
93-97, “‘Dialogue’ Within a Tradition: John Welsey and Gregory of
Nyssa Discuss Christian Perfection,” John G. Merritt. Wesleyan
Theological Journal 22:2 (Fall, 1987) 92-117). Thus, Wesley
received his idea of Christians entering into perfection or a second-blessing
from Catholic mysticism, and transferred his two-stage notions into
the Higher Life movement and into Pentecostalism. “John Wesley . . .
under the influence of Catholic works of edification, distinguished between the
ordinary believer and those who were ‘sanctified’ or ‘baptized with the
Spirit.’ . . . This view was adopted . . . by the evangelists and theologians
of the American Holiness movement . . . such as Asa Mahan and C. G. Finney . .
. [and] the early Pentecostal movement” (pgs. 21, 322, The Pentecostals,
Hollenweger). Along with perfectionism, Wesley (as already mentioned
above) also adopted the ancient and medieval Catholic continuationism (cf. pgs.
44-45, Theological Roots of Pentecostalism, Dayton) that provided
such key support in the apologetic for image worship in the iconoclastic
controversy and at other times, as well as Catholic worship of the saints
themselves, transubstantiation, and other idolatries, since the marvels which
were so often performed by the graven images of and relics culled from the
saints, transubstantiated bread, and so on, validated such Catholic beliefs in
a way that Scripture certainly could not (cf. pgs. 135ff., Counterfeit
Miracles, Warfield).
perfectionism, “never claimed the experience for himself. He was a
very honest man. He taught this perfectionism but he would never say
that it was true of himself.” Indeed, for “many years he had great
difficulty of producing any examples of it,” although at one point “he felt he
could produce 30 such people; but only one of the 30 seemed to
persist—the others fell away” (pg. 311, The Puritans: Their
Origins and Successors, D. M. Lloyd-Jones).
assurance of salvation.
error of an improper “immediate enjoyment of personal assurance” (pg.
180, The Doctrine of Justification, James
Buchanan). Early in his ministry, “John Wesley summed up his
thoughts on this subject in a letter written in January, 1740: ‘I
never yet knew one soul thus saved without what you call the faith of
assurance; I mean a sure confidence that by the merits of Christ he was
reconciled to the favour of God’ [pg. 200, Wesley’s Standard Sermons]. Thus
the cognition that saving grace had worked in a life was seen
as the final means to ascertain if saving grace had indeed been present. The
implications of this teaching, taken by itself, seem to lead to a condition in
which superficial self-analysis (‘yes, I’ve got the witness’) results in
spirituality while the kind of doubt which assailed such people as Luther and
even at times John Wesley himself results in a loss of the hope of salvation”
(pg. 171, “John Wesley and the Doctrine of Assurance,” Mark A.
Noll. Bibliotheca Sacra 132:526 (April
1975). However, by 1755 Wesley had moderated his position slightly,
so that one could be shaken in his assurance without losing his salvation,
although a total lack of assurance was still only compatible with a lost
estate: “I know that I am accepted: And yet that knowledge is
sometimes shaken, though not destroyed, by doubt or fear. If that knowledge
were destroyed, or wholly withdrawn, I could not then say I had Christian
faith. To me it appears the same thing, to say, ‘I know God has accepted me’;
or, ‘I have a sure trust that God has accepted me.’ . . . [Nonetheless,]
justifying faith cannot be a conviction that I am justified. . . . But still I
believe the proper Christian faith, which purifies the heart, implies such a
conviction” (pgs. 452-453, Letter DXXXII, July 25, 1755, in The Works
of the Rev. John Wesley, vol 12, 3rd. ed, with the
last corrections of the author. London: John Mason,
1830). Furthermore, Wesley affirmed that objective marks cannot be
elaborated to distinguish between the witness of the Spirit to one’s
regenerated state and self-delusion; “this kind of defense based on
intuition . . . raised the specter of enthusiasm for some of Wesley’s critics”
(pg. 174, ibid.). In this doctrine of assurance Wesley’s
view was similar to that of Jacob Arminius: “Arminius thought that
no one would be a true Christian who did not have a present assurance of
present salvation. He wrote: ‘Since God promises eternal life to all
who believe in Christ, it is impossible for him who believes, and who knows
that he believes, to doubt of his own salvation, unless he doubts of this
willingness of God.’” (pgs. 164-165, “John Wesley and the Doctrine of Assurance,”
Noll, citing pg. 348, Arminius: A Study in the Dutch Reformation,
Carl Bangs. Nashville: Abingdon Press,
1971. Compare The Doctrine of Assurance, with Special
Reference to John Wesley, Arthur S.
Yates. London: Epworth, 1952).
confusion about conversion and assurance appeared in various preachers
influenced by his theology; thus, for example, Welsh holiness
evangelist Seth Joshua wrote: “[People] are entering into full assurance
of faith coupled with a baptism of the Holy Ghost. . . . I also think that
those seeking assurance may be fairly counted as converts” (pg. 122, The
Welsh Religious Revival, Morgan, citing Mr. Joshua’s diary. Of
course, some people who think that they are in need of assurance truly are
unconverted, but such clarity appears to be lacking in Mr. Joshua’s
comments. Spirit baptism has nothing to do with obtaining assurance
in the Bible.). Methodist confusion on assurance passed over into
the Pentecostal movement, which taught that assurance was of the essence of
saving faith: “If God for Christ’s sake has forgiven you your sins,
you know it. And if you do not know it better than you know anything
in this world, you are still in your sins. When you go down in the
atonement, in the sacrifice of our Lord Jesus Christ, you are
accepted. And if you are accepted, and He has given you a clean
heart and sanctified your soul, you know it. And if you do not know
it, the work is not done” (pg. 2, The Apostolic Faith I:2 (Los
Angeles, October 1906), reprinted on pg. 6, Like As of
Fire: Newspapers from the Azusa Street World Wide
Revival: A Reprint of “The Apostolic Faith” (1906-1908), coll.
Fred T. Corum & Rachel A. Sizelove).
teaches that all believers can have assurance of salvation, but that assurance
that one has personally passed from death to life is not of the essence of
saving faith (cf. 1 John & London Baptist Confession of Faith of
1689, 18:1-4).
Christ’s righteousness in justification.
Wesley also rejected the doctrine of the imputation of Christ’s righteousness
in justification, writing: “Does ‘the righteousness of God’ ever
mean . . . ‘the merits of Christ?’ . . . I believe not once in all the
Scripture. . . . It often means, and particularly in the Epistle to
the Romans, ‘God’s method of justifying sinners.’ . . . ‘The righteousness of
God’ signifies, the righteousness which the God-man wrought
out[?] No. . . . It signifies ‘God’s method of justifying
sinners.’” (pg. 217, Aspasio Vindicated, and the Scripture Doctrine of
Imputed Righteousness Defended, in Eleven Letters from Mr. Hervey to Mr.
Wesley, in Answer to that Gentleman’s Remarks on Theron and Aspasio, W.
Hervey. Glasgo: J. & M. Robertson,
1762; & pg. 137, Eleven Letters from the Late Rev. Mr.
Hervey , to the Rev. Mr. John Wesley, Containing an Answer to that Gentleman’s
Remarks on Thereon and Aspasio, W. Hervey. 2nd ed. London: J.
& F. & C. Rivinot, 1789. cf. pg. 497, The Doctrine of
Justification, James Buchanan. Carlisle, PA: Banner
of Truth, 1997 (orig. pub. 1867)). “Many Wesleyan Methodists,
following the example of their founder, have . . . keenly opposed . . . the
doctrine . . . of [Christ’s] imputed righteousness” (pg. 500, The
Doctrine of Justification, Buchanan). Thus, “Wesley could not
resist assimilating justification into sanctification—the latter being his
preeminent and enduring interest. The . . . notion that the believer is simul
justus et peccator (at once both righteous and a sinner) Wesley firmly
rejected. Many Arminians [including Wesley] further assert that faith is not
merely the instrument of justification but the ground on
which justification rests. Thus Wesley wrote that ‘any righteousness created by
the act of justification is real because of the ethical or moral dimension of
faith’” (pg. 353, The Cross and Salvation: The Doctrine of Salvation,
Bruce Demarest). Thus, Wesley wrote: “Least of all does
justification imply that God is deceived in those whom he justifies; that he
thinks them to be what, in fact, they are not; that he accounts them to be
otherwise than they are. It does by no means imply that God . . . esteems us
better than we really are, or believes us righteous when we are unrighteous.
Surely no. . . . Neither can it ever consist with his unerring wisdom to think
that I am innocent, to judge that I am righteous or holy, because another is
so. He can no more, in this manner, confound me with Christ, than with David or
Abraham. . . . [S]uch a notion of justification is neither reconcilable to
reason nor Scripture” (pg. 47, The Works of the Reverend John Wesley,
vol. 1. New York: Emory & Waugh, 1831—note that
“reason” is mentioned before “Scripture” as a reason to oppose the Biblical
doctrine of justification.)
of baptismal regeneration.
Wesley brothers and the Methodist denomination retained the Anglican belief in
baptismal regeneration when they left the English state-church to start their
own religion. Commenting on John 3:5,
Wesley affirmed, “Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit—Except he
experience that great inward change by the Spirit, and be baptized (wherever
baptism can be had) as the outward sign and means of it [he cannot enter into
the kingdom of God].” Commenting on Acts 22:16, he wrote: “Baptism administered to real penitents, is
both a means and seal of pardon. Nor did God ordinarily in the
primitive Church bestow this on any, unless through this means.” On
both texts John Wesley clearly affirmed that baptism is the means of the new
birth. He also declared, “It is certain our Church supposes that all
who are baptized in their infancy are at the same time born
again; and it is allowed that the whole office for the baptism of
infants proceeds upon this supposition” (Wesley, sermon, The New Birth). In
his Doctrinal Tracts (pg. 246, 251) he wrote, “What are the
benefits . . . we receive by baptism, is the next point to be considered. And
the first of these is the washing away of original sin, by the application of Christ’s
death. . . . the merits of Christ’s life and death, are applied to us in
baptism. . . . infants are . . . proper subjects of baptism, seeing, in the
ordinary way, they cannot be saved unless [sin] be washed away in baptism.
Infants need to be washed from original sin. Therefore they are proper subjects
for baptism.” (cited in chapter 9, The Evils of Infant Baptism, Robert
Boyt C. Howell, accessed in the Fundamental Baptist CD-Rom Library, Oak
Harbor, WA: Way of Life Literature, 2003). John’s brother, the
Methodist hymn-writer Charles Wesley, wrote against the Baptists, “Partisans of
a narrow sect/ Your cruelty confess/ Nor still inhumanly reject/ Whom Jesus
would embrace./ Your little ones preclude them not/ From the baptismal flood
brought/ But let them now to Christ be saved/ And join the Church of God.” (Charles
Wesley’s Journal, 18 October 1756, 2:128). The Wesleys only
called adults already baptized as infants to conversion because of their
heretical Arminian theology. Since they rejected the Biblical truth
that once one is saved, he is always saved (Romans 8:28-39), they held that one
who was regenerated in infant baptism could fall away and become a child of the
devil again, at which time he would need a second new birth.
“John Wesley’s View of Baptism,” John Chongnahm Cho, Wesleyan Theological Journal 7 (Spring 1972) 60-73) for more on Wesley’s
doctrine of baptismal regeneration.
making Wesley into a hero of the faith, historic Baptists and fundamentalists
should make sure that their churches know that Wesley believed in Arminianism,
in the continuation of the sign gifts (helping to prepare the way for
Pentecostalism), in Catholic mysticism, in perfectionism, in a false view of the assurance of salvation, in a false doctrine
of justification by becoming inwardly holy, and in baptismal regeneration.
This article has also been posted here.
Applications of the Truth that the Just Shall Live by Faith, part 5–“The just shall live by faith”— A Study of the Relationship of Faith to Salvation in its Justifying, Sanctifying, and Glorifying Fulness, part 28
Christ.
as the eternal Son of God. He has
existed from eternity with His Father, rejoicing always before Him,
participating in the ineffable communion of love and delight of the three
Persons in the undivided Trinity. Before
the beginning, now, and to all eternity, He possesses in full the undivided
Divine essence. He is God from God,
Light from Light, true God from true God, eternally begotten of the
Father. His throne, as God, is for ever
and ever, and the scepter of His kingdom is a righteous sceptre. He is the I AM, who was, and is, and is to
come, the Almighty. He is self-existent,
immeasurable, and eternal. He is the Creator and Sovereign of the Universe—all
things were made by Him, all things consist by Him, and all things are of Him,
through Him, and unto Him. He fully
possesses the infinite Divine glory, and will receive, with His Father and the
Holy Spirit, the worship and adoration of the entire redeemed creation, for
ever and ever.
in His Mediatorial office. Behold, in
the eternal counsel of peace, the Father giving the elect to the Son, the Son
agreeing to redeem them, and the Spirit determining to regenerate them. Behold, and wonder at the mystery of
godliness: God manifest in the flesh.
See the condescension of the Father’s express Image tabernacling among
men, He who was always consubstantial with the Father as to His Godhead becoming
consubstantial with humanity as to His manhood, uniting in His one Person the
Divine nature and a true human nature.
Behold the eternal Word conceived in the womb of Mary, being born in a
manger. See the fulness of the Godhead
embodied in a true Child who grew in wisdom and stature, and favor with God and
man. Behold Him in His human
identification with the sinful and extremely needy race He came to
redeem. See Him growing weary with a
journey, and sitting on Jacob’s well to rest.
See Him weeping at the grave of Lazarus—and raising his beloved friend
from the dead. See His tender friendship
with the Apostle John, the disciple whom Jesus loved. See Him sorrowful and very heavy in light of
His coming cross, agonizing in prayer to the Father, betrayed by a familiar
friend and deserted and denied by the rest.
See Him unjustly condemned, mocked, spat upon, whipped, and
crucified. See Him saving the soul and
bringing to Paradise the repentant thief crucified next to Him. See Him bearing the sins of the world in His
body, perfectly satisfying the demands of Divine justice through His one
offering. See Him rising from the dead
and so destroying the power of death, and ascending to the right hand of His
Father, being crowned with glory and honor, and having all power in heaven and
earth given into His hand. See Him
interceding for His people as their Priest and Advocate, and by His omnipotent
power preserving every one of them to everlasting glory. See Him, with the Father, sending the Holy
Spirit, reflecting the Spirit’s eternal procession from the Father and the Son
in His temporal mission to indwell the church.
See the union His elect have with Him in His death, burial,
resurrection, and ascension. See Him
completing the work of His humiliation, and uniting to His immutable Divine perfections
the human perfections that make Him the perfect and all-sufficient Savior of
all who will come to Him. See Him ruling
over the church in the world, preparing mansions for His beloved people, and
coming again to bring them to Himself.
See Him sitting on the throne of David and manifesting the righteous
rule of God over the earth in the Millenial kingdom. See Him as the Light of the New Jerusalem,
and His people singing the praises of redeeming love and serving Him before the
throne of God and the Lamb for ever and ever.
See Christ’s glory in John’s Gospel as the bread of life, the light of
the world, the door to eternal life, the good shepherd who gives His life for
the sheep, the resurrection and the life, the way, the truth, and the life, and
the true vine, the source of all grace, the font of spiritual and eternal life
for all those brought into union with Him.
See the glory of the Lord Jesus in all Scripture, in type and in
antitype, in promise and in fulfillment, and embrace Him, cleave to Him ever
the more in all that He is and in all that He does. The glory of God in Christ is an
inexhaustible theme, the delight and glory of the saints to all eternity. A few lines of application certainly cannot
even begin to compass it in its beauty and glory.[1] Oh Christian, set in motion the work of
eternity now—through the Scripture, behold the glory of God in Christ! In so doing, He will reveal Himself to you,
you will partake in ever greater levels of spiritual life, and you will be
transformed into the moral likeness of your incarnate Head.
also that the more true intellectual and
experiential knowledge of God in Christ the Christian has, the more he longs
for more such knowledge, and the more he hates his fleshly feebleness in seeking
after it. Does your heart and flesh,
all the faculties of your who renewed person, cry out for God, the living God,
as your own God? What an awful evil is
this faintness, this feebleness, is seeking after God your Father, His Son, and
His Spirit? How does believing
meditation on Gethsemane, and on the cross, affect the heart! For seeing the Lord Jesus in His glory
enflames the believer’s soul with love for Him, with true sanctification as a
result. And yet the disciples failed to
watch and pray, but slept while the Lord wept His infinitely precious tears of
blood, and forsook the Lord when He went to the cross. How often do I follow their faithless and
criminal example, and fail to draw nigh to the Lord when He has come nigh to
me? My God, oh for grace to love and
know Thee more!
particular ministers have, in proclaiming the mystery of God in Christ. Oh Christian, you have the privilege and the
duty to give the gospel to the unconverted, and to set forth the Lord Jesus
before believers in all His glory and grace to stir up their holy affections
for Him. How much time do you spend
proclaiming the gospel? How many doors have
you knocked on this week? Is not Jesus
Christ worthy of being known by all men?
Furthermore, Hebrews 10:24-25 commands you to provoke others in the
church to love and to good works. How
better to do this than to set God in Christ before them? Do you talk of your Father, and of His Son
your Redeemer, on the Lord’s Day? “Then
they that feared the LORD spake often one to another: and the LORD hearkened,
and heard it, and a book of
remembrance was written before him for them that feared the LORD, and that
thought upon his name. And they shall be mine, saith the LORD of hosts, in that
day when I make up my jewels; and I will spare them, as a man spareth his own
son that serveth him. Then shall ye return, and discern between the righteous
and the wicked, between him that serveth God and him that serveth him not” (Malachi 3:16-18).
pastor, evangelist, and Christian preacher, you have the privilege and duty of
setting forth the most stupendous of all truths in the proclamation of the
Triune God and the incarnate, crucified, and risen Christ. Am I
to proclaim the “mystery of godliness, God manifest in the flesh”? Who is sufficient for these things? Employ the great privileges that God has
given you and set forth the truth, and all the truth, with nothing added or
taken away, with holy boldness and passion, and with holy fear and trembling
over the fact that the Lord has chosen and commanded you so to do. Earnestly contend for the faith, that nothing
whatever of the glory of God revealed in Christ through the Scriptures, and
committed to you for bold and public proclamation everywhere to all men, be
lost.
of God in Christ, as set forth from Genesis to Revelation, to any other and
lesser message. Do not turn from
Christ to a merely “practical” message or mere moralism. Doubtless the people of God must, and will,
adorn their knowledge of God with good works.
Indeed, the greater their true spiritual fellowship with Christ, the
greater will be their outward manifestations of practical holiness. However, to take knowledge of the Lord Jesus
away to focus exclusively upon what is “practical” is to rip out the soul from
true religion and leave a lifeless corpse.
Any “piety” that does not lead men to behold, believe on, receive, and
know Jesus Christ is false, fleshly, and devilish.
specific sins, do not let the Lord Jesus be removed from your view. It is certainly proper to set yourself
mightily against particular lusts and products of the old man and to strive to
utterly put to death specific manifestations of indwelling sin (Romans 8:13;
Colossians 3:5). But do not remove the
glory of God in Christ from its central place in your heart and mind. Sweet fellowship with Him causes the vain
allurements of sin to quickly fade. Yes,
your specific sins are awful, and a terrible problem—fight them with all your
might. But make sure that in your
warfare you have the Captain of the hosts of the Lord with you—without Him you
can do nothing. Closer communion with
Christ will end many a seemingly intractable battle with besetting sins.
blessing to the conversion of sinners and the spiritual strengthening of saints
when Christ is preached and plainly set forth.
Proper preaching of the Lord Jesus will have supernatural efficacy to
produce spiritual results, while the employment of humanly devised marketing or
salesmanship techniques will only detract from a real focus on the revealed
glory of God in the incarnate Redeemer.
What is the chaff to the wheat?
of the church the worship of the Triune God through Christ must not be removed
from its proper central place. Since
God’s own instituted worship is the best means of His own revelation, the
Regulative Principle of worship must be consistently practiced. What is more, in whatever music is employed,
not only must all fleshly sounds be rejected, but even proper melody and
harmony must not be allowed to overshadow the spiritual worship of God. He
must always remain the focus—let not the elements of worship, and especially
the circumstances, attract attention to themselves and become ends to
themselves.
–TDR
by faith.” The entire study is available
and can be downloaded as a single file here.
theme, see CRISTOLOGIA: or, a Declaration
of the Glorious Mystery of the Person of Christ, and Meditations
and Discourses on the Glory of Christ, in His Person, Office, and Grace: With the Differences Between Faith and
Sight: Applied unto the Use of Them that
Believe & Applied unto Unconverted Sinners and Saints Under Spiritual
Decays, by John Owen.
Three Take-Aways from John MacArthur’s Strange Fire Conference
Usually I write two columns a week. The third one is on Friday and by Thomas Ross. I wrote three last week, however, because what I saw in the live stream of the Strange Fire Conference in Southern California. I was very interested in the conference and wish I could have watched more, but I saw most of the q and a on Thursday and Friday, and little of both of Phil Johnson’s sessions in the afternoon. Morning and evening didn’t work for me, so that’s all I saw. I needed to let you know how much I saw, relating to what I write next.
When I read John MacArthur’s Charismatic Chaos two decades ago, it was a very helpful book on the Charismatic movement. There was nothing better on the subject. I look forward to reading Strange Fire. So my first take-away is the overall positive of teaching and preaching against the Charismatic movement, against continuationism, and for cessationism. It would aid many in its uncovering of the Charismatic movement. I don’t think MacArthur was too tough on Charismatics. It’s as bad as he says. It’s worse, but at least as bad as he says, and he says it is very, very bad. That’s a positive take-away.
My next two take-aways are negative. It’s not personal against anyone. As I’ve said many times before, I like John MacArthur and Phil Johnson. I’m not making that up. I don’t say these things because I’ve even got it out against them. I write this because I do love them and want them to change. MacArthur said toward the end of his Q and A that he knows that he’s wrong on something, and he wants to change. I hope that’s true. I hope it wasn’t said as his excuse for John Piper.
Even though a short term effect of Charismatic Chaos and Strange Fire is against Charismaticism, the long term effect of John MacArthur is to send people that direction. I believe that I can defend that accusation or assertion by things that MacArthur himself said in the conference. Jesus warned about causing the little ones to stumble, about putting a heavy weight, a millstone, around your neck and throwing yourself into deep water rather than causing one of them to stumble. MacArthur is causing people to stumble by these two negative take-aways.
I’m going to take these in what I consider reverse order of priority, the least first. The first is the harm MacArthur causes with his treatment toward John Piper. There are three parts to this harm. First, he harms love, second, he harms the nature of truth, and, third, he harms the casualties of his not separating.
About love, MacArthur’s dealing with these men is nothing more than sentimentalism. He is in fact not loving John Piper with his treatment of him. MacArthur says:
This is where love comes in to embrace faithful men. I know I’m wrong somewhere, and if you can show me where please show me, because I would change. I know somewhere I’m wrong, because none of us has a complete control of all truth. And I hope to have the same charity from them, that I would eagerly extend to them.
Piper advocates for Charismatics with his teaching, against what MacArthur says. Piper would speak in tongues if God would allow him and he believes and teaches that God does give men this gift today, and he, Piper, pastors them. Piper spoke with the Jesus Culture group, one of the main streams of Pentecostalism today at Passion 2013. One one hand, MacArthur talks about immense destructive damage that Charismaticism does (and that MacArthur crushes here), but it’s charity to embrace Piper anyway, says MacArthur. He hopes for the same charity in the areas where surely he is wrong. In other words, if you separate from them, that wouldn’t be loving. Is church discipline loving? Is that separation not charitable? This just turns love to mushy sentimentalism.
What MacArthur does with Piper, Mahaney, and Grudem, and especially Piper here, says “we’re all going to be wrong about things” so you get a pass on some things, as long as you’re faithful on enough. Why should any Charismatics be expected to change if Piper doesn’t have to change? Shouldn’t they just be embraced out of charity too? You can either know the truth, or you can’t, and if we’re going to do a whole conference, then it is clear. If it is clear, then we don’t embrace Piper, because he’s not in fact being faithful.
If MacArthur lets Piper go, then Piper can let so-and-so go, and those to the left of MacArthur can let someone to the left of Piper go, and then next generation just takes it a little bit further. That’s how we got to where we’re at with the Charismatic movement in the first place. Non-charismatic churches began accepting Charismatics as legitimate. MacArthur still does too. If it is as destructive as MacArthur says, and it is, even more so, then we’ve got to put out those enabling the destruction. If not, then you are causing many, many to stumble. That isn’t charitable. It isn’t a biblical way to treat the truth, as if it’s so many loose tomatoes on the back of a produce truck.
The second negative take-away is the music issue. I agree with most of what they said. MacArthur said this:
The contemporary evangelical church has very little interest in theology and doctrine, so you’re going to have a tough sell. It’s about style. And style is the Trojan Horse that lets Charismatics in the church. Because once you let the music in, the movement follows. It all of a sudden becomes common. We sound like the Charismatics, sing like they do, have the same emotional feelings that they have. It’s a small step from doing the same music to buying into the movement. So the tough thing is you’re going back to a church that is thinking like that. It’s hard to make sound doctrine the issue when style is much more the interest of the leaders of the church.
MacArthur said the following in the first Q and A:
I don’t think it has to do with what the teachers are saying. I think it’s the music. It’s like getting drunk so you don’t have to think about the issues of life. If you shut down the music, turn on the lights, and have someone get up there and try to sell that with just words, it’s not going to work. You’ve got to have some way to manipulate their minds.
Justin Peters later says, same session:
The music is just an avenue to get them into their teaching. The music is popular and they’re wanting to draw people in.
John MacArthur follows:
I would go so far as to say that evangelical noncharismatic churches are using music that is unacceptable to draw people in. They’re using the music of the world to suck people in as if somehow people would get saved through the music. The two have no connection. This is so close to what’s in a normal evangelical environment that it’s a very small step to getting sucked in, because the style is the same.
Mike Riccardi, staff there, put together a quick transcript of the sessions, which was good, and he quoted from one of MacArthur’s last sermons of the conference on Sunday:
I’m convinced that the contemporary style of charismatic music is the entry point for Charismatic theology into churches. If you buy the music, the theology follows. Because all of a sudden you’re listening to the same songs/artists, experiencing the same emotions. The church may be non-Charismatic, but all the style is exactly the same. That’s the entry point. Show me a church that has a strong doctrinal statement, and I’ll show you a church reluctant to embrace even the music. Show me a church that loves great hymns and theology put to music, I’ll show you a church reluctant to embrace the charismatic movement. And because the music doesn’t come in, the theology doesn’t either. That’s the seductive entry point.
I’m not talking about specific things, because there is contemporary music that’s beautiful and we can and should sing that. But when it its uncritical and not about the mind, but about the flesh, when it’s not about truth understood but emotion felt, it induces the same kind of feelings that are consistent with the Charismatic movement and opens the door. If we’re all singing the same music, how can we divide each other? I think the Charismatic movement has significantly diminished worship. It’s taken out of the arena of truth, out of the mind, and reduced it to feelings of the flesh.
All of these say that the entry point to the Charismatic movement is the music. They say it is the style of music. The style of music of the Charismatic is popular in evangelicalism. It is popular and rampant with those of John MacArthur. We’ve talked about this already. MacArthur’s church promotes the entry point to the Charismatic movement.
Why is it the entry point is a good question. They nibble around the edges of this, but MacArthur especially gets into it, when he talks about the ecstasy, things we’ve talked about a lot here (it makes me wonder if MacArthur is reading What Is Truth). It wouldn’t surprise me, and if you are, keep reading John MacArthur, and welcome. What especially had me wondering if John was reading something I’ve written (read it here) was this paragraph:
But you have to understand, this other stream of evangelicalism goes back to about 1966, when the hippies came out of San Francisco, joined Calvary Chapel, and we had the launch of an informal, barefoot, beach, drug-induced kind of young people that told the church how we should act. Hymns went out. Suits went out. For the first time in the history of the church, the conduct of the church was conformed in a subculture that was formed on LSD in San Francisco and migrated to Southern California.
That launches the self-focused church that winds up in the seeker-friendly church, that splinters in the Vineyard movement, which develops into the charismatic stream. I don’t go back to Lonnie Frisbee, who led the Jesus movement and died of AIDS as a homosexual. That’s not my stream. But that’s the stream that has produced the culturally-bound, seeker-driven church movement. And while there are good and bad and better and worse elements of it, that’s where it comes from. We are very different.
That’s not his stream, he says now. John MacArthur says it’s his stream (quotes found at this link, which I had included above) and that it was a genuine revival. Now he says it isn’t. Which is true? Is he correcting the former few times he said this. To critique MacArthur, however, the stream of which he writes is one that can be traced back further than the Jesus Movement, but back to Charles Finney and revivalism. Iain Murray’s book, Revival and Revivalism, is helpful here. Out of the river of revivalism came various streams, a major one in the Charismatic movement, but also many other potently devastating, pragmatic ones.
Strange fire is false worship. The music is the worship. Half or more of MacArthur’s music comes out of the stream he decries. It justifies all of the music that is the professed entry point and Trojan horse for the poison and destruction all over the world. Why should they change if MacArthur and the graduates of Master’s College and Seminary are going to use the same stuff? And believe me, it’s all over and bad and worse. All of this comes out of the earlier revivalistic stream and the Lonnie Frisbee and Calvary Chapel stream. The strange fire is right there!!
For the Apostle Paul to change, he had to count his past as dung. As it relates to these two take-aways, I pray that MacArthur and those he influences, will count his own strange fire as dung.
Applications of the Truth that the Just Shall Live by Faith, part 4–“The just shall live by faith”— A Study of the Relationship of Faith to Salvation in its Justifying, Sanctifying, and Glorifying Fulness, part 27
strengthened and deepened through the exercise of believing receipt of greater
revelations through the Word of the Triune God in His ontology and economy and
through your response, enabled by grace, of fuller surrender to and entrusting
of yourself to Him. Therefore, while unbelievers refuse, to their eternal ruin, to see the
Lord Jesus in the Word and entrust themselves to Him at all, you must seek to
see more and more of Christ and the entire Triune Godhead in the Word, and
entrust yourself to Him in an ever greater way as the revelation of Him in the
Scripture is illuminated to your soul, through the supernatural grace decreed
by the Father for your good by Christ the Mediator through the applicatory work
of God the Holy Spirit. See ever the
more of the glory of the Lord Jesus’ Divine Person. Wonder ever the more at the condescending
love manifested in His incarnation.
Meditate upon all the aspects of His glorious saving work. Think in amazement about His exercise of all
the Divine attributes towards you for your good. Rejoice with exceeding joy at His exercise of
all the attributes of His glorified Human nature towards you for your
good. Fill yourself up with these
things. You will be worshipping and
praising your Triune God through your precious Lord Jesus for them for all
eternity.
desire that God the Spirit will illumine to you the revelation of the Triune
Jehovah, and of Christ the Blessed Mediator, in the Word. How necessary it is that God reveals Himself
to you! Left to yourself, you are
utterly unable to discover Him. You will
not know whether to turn to the right hand or the left. Furthermore, your heart contains such
corruption and wickedness within it that God would be perfectly just to
immediately thrust you into the depths of hell, separated from His blessed face
for all eternity. Is the infinite King
of glory obliged to show Himself to such a worm? God forbid! Recognize that both the initial
bestowal of faith upon you, and the increase of faith in its exercise in you,
are supernatural gifts from God, not autonomous products of your fallen will,
and look to the Lord to perform in you what you cannot perform yourself. Without
the free, gracious, and sovereign work of the Spirit in revealing Christ to
you, you will never find Him. How
necessary it is, then, that God takes the initative and reveal Himself to your
soul!
expectation of a gracious revelation, and you will not be looking to the Lord
and seeking for God to reveal Himself to you in Christ, if you are not upright
in heart—if you are wilfully choosing sin over Christ, you evidence that you do
not desire a part in any of this glory, as you prefer your sinful abominations
to that knowledge of and communion with God that is the greatest treasure of
eternity.
yourself to the reading, study, memorization of, and meditation on the Word,
praying for the illumination of the Spirit, depending on His sovereign grace
alone, hungering and thirsting after knowledge of God in Christ. The Bible is the very Word of God, the
infallible, inerrant, revelatory speech of the Most High to man. It is a more sure Word than even the audible
testimony of the Father to Christ as heard on the Mount of Transfiguration (2
Peter 1:16-21). It is the perfect,
unbreakably authoritative revelation of the Father to you through Christ by the
Spirit. Oh, the sureness, the power, the
infinite value of the Scriptures! Here
is a sure anchor for your faith. Here is
pure knowledge of God. Here is a genuine
revelation, each jot and tittle of which is more sure and more lasting than the
heavens and the earth. Here is the
spring from whence the waters of life flow.
Here is the love-letter of the Most High to His blood-bought
people. The Bible is the instrument that
the Spirit uses to show God in Christ to those who cry out for knowledge of Him. Do you treat the Bible as the invaluable
treasure that it is? Does your use of
time reflect such a view of God’s Word?
What is your attitude when you read and study it? “[T]o this man will I look . . . saith the LORD . . . even to him that is poor
and of a contrite spirit, and trembleth at my word” (Isaiah 66:2). Furthermore, read, study, memorize, and
meditate upon the Word with the expectation that God will work. He has promised that if you draw nigh to Him,
He will draw nigh to you. He both supernaturally
produces initial saving faith and supernaturally strengthens faith through the
instrumentality of the Word (Romans 10:17).
If you hunger and thirst after Him, He will certainly satisfy your
longings for Him and will sup with you, and you with Him—for He Himself, in His
gracious love, has placed those desires within you. He will shine in your heart the light of the
glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
Seek, then, oh Christian—seek your God in His Word!
believer should seek for the highest intellectual knowledge of Christ’s Person,
of his Triune God, and of the specific character of all their works. Careful, detailed, and taxing theological
work and careful study contributes, rather than detracts, from affective
appreciation of God in Christ.
Carelessness or disinterest in careful thought about God is not piety,
but ungodliness. Do you love the truth
represented by the Nicene homoousios?
Do you love the truth represented by the Chalcedonian definition of Christ’s
Person and natures? Throughout John’s
Gospel, learning and understanding more about Christ led to greater faith in
Him. Do you long to learn and understand
more about the Lord Jesus Christ? While
the intellectual apprehension of facts is not enough—commital to Him, based on
those facts, must follow (John 2:23-3:3)—unknowing determinations of the will
without knowledge are also insufficient (John 9:1-34 vs. 35-41).[i] The embrace of faith requires a properly known
and apprehended object. Do you seek God
with your mind, as well as your will and affections?
since the Biblical Christ is a real Person—the Creator and Redeemer of the
world, and the only begotten Son of God—believing fellowship with Jesus Christ
is both a product of and a means to a greater knowledge of Him, and leads to a
holy abhorrance of every counterfeit “Jesus” (2 Corinthians 11:4) set forth by
the world, the flesh, and the devil.
Love for the living Christ and views of His glory will lead to a love of
holy and spiritual worship and a rejection of the fleshly worship of fleshly
“Jesus”; a love for the Redeemer who
boldly and plainly rebuked the false doctrines of the Pharisees and Saduccees
will lead the Christian to reject the ecumenical “Jesus” that unites false
doctrine with the true; knowledge of the
true Christ will lead one to reject the fanaticism of the charismatic “Jesus,”
the annihilationist “Jesus” of sundry cults, the Arian or Sabellian “Jesus” of
others, the wafer “Jesus” of Romanism, and all other false Christs.
miracles and had intellectual apprehension of various facts about Him, but did
not commit themselves to Him, and were thus still unconverted (3:1-3). The blind man Christ healed in John 9 was
willing to get cast out of the synagogue for His sake, yet he did not know that
the Lord Jesus was the Son of God (9:36), or that He was not a sinner (9:25),
and was only converted at the end of the chapter when he found out the proper
knowledge of the Person of Christ (9:35-41).
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