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John MacArthur and Evangelical Agnosticism About or Over the Biblical Doctrine of Separation, pt. 3
Answering the Question of Separation
In a Q and A at Master’s Seminary, John MacArthur answered a student’s question in chapel about the practice of separation. I included the transcript of the question and answer in part one and made some overall analysis. In part two I compared MacArthur’s answer to one about separation shortly thereafter by Rick Warren. The Master’s Seminary student asked about “partnership in ministry,” having it with those who agree on the essentials without agreement on non-essentials.
MacArthur started his answer by saying that he should try to work with whoever the Lord allowed in the Kingdom. His argument is that people working together in the kingdom under Christ should figure out how to work together now. Scripture says nothing like that about working together in the kingdom. Several passages speak to this issue.
Separation from Believers in the Bible
The doctrine of separation requires separation from professing believers. Several places in the New Testament teach this and especially in what John MacArthur addresses to the question. In 1 Timothy 6:3-5 the Apostle Paul writes under inspiration of God:
If any man teach otherwise, and consent not to wholesome words, even the words of our Lord Jesus Christ, and to the doctrine which is according to godliness. . . . from such withdraw thyself.
This is a command for regenerated, immersed church members to withdraw themselves from those who teach different than what your church believes and practices, assuming this is orthodox doctrine.
Speaking of separating from brothers in Christ, the Apostle Paul writes in 2 Thessalonians 3:6, 14-15:
Now we command you, brethren, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye withdraw yourselves from every brother that walketh disorderly, and not after the tradition which he received of us. . . . And if any man obey not our word by this epistle, note that man, and have no company with him,, that he may be ashamed. Yet count him not as an enemy, but admonish him as a brother.
Paul says that if a brother walks disorderly and not after the tradition received from the apostle, withdraw yourself from him. If he is not obeying whatever is in 2 Thessalonians, which includes eschatology and other doctrines, note that man and have no company with him.
Wrong Answers
Alienation from People in the Kingdom?
The above are verses that deal directly with the question asked of MacArthur. The young man even asks for scripture to answer the question. MacArthur does not do that. Instead, he goes anecdotal and alludes to a passage out of context. Why doesn’t MacArthur give him a scriptural answer? I think there could be many different reasons, but in the end, it’s just that he gave an unscriptural answer. “Do not separate” is in essence his answer.
The Apostle Paul doesn’t say, “I don’t want to alienate people who are in the kingdom.” Separation is a means of restoration. Shame is a tool toward repentance. Separation also practices holiness, such as “be holy as I am holy” (1 Pet 1:15-16). Does the truth alienate people in the kingdom? Separation is a biblical means for preserving the truth, guarding or keeping the truth. It’s not the first option, but when someone doesn’t teach the words of Jesus Christ, consent to His words, scripture says, withdraw thyself.
Not separating will only bring more false doctrine and practice. Scripture doesn’t say, “If you want to get rid of false doctrine and practice, write another book about it.” Writing a book might help, but scripture doesn’t teach that as a method. Separation is not easy to do. I never found child discipline easy. It’s easier to let people get away with what they say and do.
You Wouldn’t Send Someone to Another Church?
MacArthur makes the following argument:
I as a pastor; I would never say to a lay person, “Well your theology is bad; you need to go to another church.” So why would I say that to a Bible teacher or a pastor?
It is true that someone can have a bad theology and stay in the church. Even Jezebel was given “space to repent” in Revelation 2:21 at the church at Thyatira. Paul gives instruction in Romans 16:17:
Now I beseech you, brethren,, mark them which cause divisions and offences contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned; and avoid them.
Churches shouldn’t just allow false doctrine. At some point separation also must occur. Paul explains. In 1 Corinthians 1:10, Paul wrote:
Now I beseech you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you; but that ye be perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment.
Church members are required to speak the same thing, be perfectly joined together in the same mind and the same judgment. That isn’t happening when church members believe a different doctrine. When “a Bible teacher or a pastor” teaches bad theology, should John MacArthur consider that the same as a particular church member believing something different?
Separation Must Occur to Obey God’s Word
If a church member starts spreading false doctrine, the Romans 16:17 applies to that. According to 1 Corinthians 1:10, everyone in a church must have the same mind and judgment. Unity is not based on toleration of bad doctrine and bad behavior. This, however, is the way evangelicalism rolls. Is there any wonder so much false doctrine and practice exists?
I’m not going to go further with the MacArthur answer. His answer is bad. It should not be followed by anyone.
I could say there are a number of reasons why MacArthur takes the wrong position about separation. Maybe he thinks it’s right. That’s hard to believe. In the end, he missed. The young man wanted to hear what scripture taught. He didn’t hear it.
Essentials and Non Essentials?
The young man brought up essentials and non-essentials. His idea was, separate over essentials. Don’t separate over non-essentials. He was looking for the way to judge between these two categories. He wasn’t given it. Scripture doesn’t teach this arbitrary, subjective criteria for judging.
Sure, certain doctrines and practices are more consequential than others. Certain doctrines relate more closely to the gospel than others. I almost always think of two examples. Nadab and Abihu offered strange fire, which was a wrong recipe at the altar of incense. Ananias and Sapphira kept back part of an offering, and said they gave it all. Are those essentials or non-essentials? God wants respected everything that He said.
Separation isn’t easy. It still must be done. It will be done, because God will do it. He will separate. It’s an attribute of His nature.
John MacArthur and Evangelical Agnosticism About or Over the Biblical Doctrine of Separation
I write on ecclesiastical separation here because the Bible teaches separation in every book and in some, much more than others. Since separation is inherent in God’s attribute of holiness, I see it as a major doctrine. I also believe it is one of the marks of a true church. For this reason, several years ago now Pillarandground Publishing produced A Pure Church: A Biblical Theology of Perfect Preservation, which exegetes key passages on the doctrine. I have found that evangelicals ignore the doctrine of separation despite its prevalence in God’s Word.
Agnosticism about separation is more than not knowing about it. It is staying ignorant on the scriptural teaching of separation. Evangelicals in general do not talk about separation at all. They act like it doesn’t exist as a doctrine of scripture.
John MacArthur Talks About Separation
Seminary Student Asks about Unity and Separation
In a recent Q and A in a Master’s Seminary chapel, John MacArthur answered a question about separation. Here is the question (at 32:18 in the video, goes to 39:07):
My question specifically is on church unity. I’m interested in partnership in ministry. I was wondering from your example specifically with pastors who would agree on the essentials but not necessarily on important doctrines that aren’t essential. What are some biblical passages or references or biblical principles that have helped you navigate that issue in your ministry well?
Alienating People in the Kingdom?
MacArthur answered:
Well, I think the simple one — that’s a good question — the simple one, is, is the person a true believer? And if the person is a true believer, then the Lord allowed him into the kingdom. And if you’re in the Kingdom, I have to figure out a way to work with you. I mean that’s, that is the simple answer.
I don’t want to alienate people who are in the Kingdom, so if they’re, if you’re a heretic, you deny the Trinity or the deity of Christ or you have some heresy of some kind, or your life is, ya know, got some stains of sin and all that, I don’t want to cooperate with somebody like that.
But I basically am bound. I am already one in Christ with everybody else who’s in the Kingdom. He that is joined to the Lord as one Spirit. We’re all one, so we have to figure out how can I minister with, how can I minister to the people of God. It’s, um, I as a pastor; I would never say to a lay person, “Well your theology is bad; you need to go to another church.” So why would I say that to a Bible teacher or a pastor?
Yoking Together
MacArthur continued:
Years ago I decided I wasn’t going to preach only to the people who already believe everything I believe. What’s the point? So, um, I was criticized, because you know I would be at a conference with someone who believed differently about certain things. I mean, they gave me trouble when I started going to Ligonier conferences over baby baptism and covenant theology and all that. Um, but but again, if they’re going to give me a platform, I’ll take it.
And you know RC actually allowed me to have a debate with him on infant baptism, and it’s available. You can listen to it, and I told him: “You shouldn’t do that RC. You have no chance. There’s not, you can’t find a verse in the Bible about infant baptism. So he said, ‘No I think it’ll be great.’ I said, ‘okay I’m gonna go first because I don’t, I don’t want to have to use the Bible to answer a non-biblical argument.”
So I think what is most important is that you establish your own fidelity to the degree that people don’t question your associations. I mean if I if I’m at Ligonier nobody thinks I abandoned what I believe. If I went over to Jack Hayford’s church and did a pastor’s Conference of Foursquare and Charismatics, nobody felt that I had abandoned my non-charismatic view I’ve got too much in print on that. Um, so if there’s not, and he wanted me to speak on the authority of scripture because he thought that was the weakest part of the ministry of these hundreds of pastors.
Lines He Can’t Cross
Furthermore, MacArthur said,
So again I just think you have to make judgments, but you always want to be gracious and loving and unifying and helpful to others who are in the Kingdom. Now there’s a line at which you can’t cross because someone is blatantly disobedient to scripture that would be, you won’t see me on a panoply of speakers that includes women because that is a total violation of scripture when you have men and women preachers. I can’t do that because I, uh, you know your reputation at that point becomes very muddy. So, um, you know that would be, there would be, other aspects of that too.
Um, somebody who’s so tapped into the culture, that, um, they’re viewed as, um, a problem outside tolerable convictions, I wouldn’t be a part of that. I wouldn’t speak on the same place as Bill Hybels or Joel Osteen. I don’t know about him. I don’t know if he’s a Christian or not, but even if I did, nobody would think I had compromised, because they would know by reputation that I’m going to be faithful to the truth, and they would say, “Why did he have MacArthur?”
An Example
MacArthur finished:
So if you establish your fidelity to scripture it puts you in a position where you can be in a lot of places. If you compromise along the way then, and people are questioning you. I had that conversation with James McDonald one day. It was not a happy one, but I said you just betrayed all the people who have been listening to you for years, but what you did you basically, said to them, “I’m not who you think I am.”
You don’t live long enough to fix that. You don’t get to go back to square one. You don’t hit a reset button. You didn’t like that but it was true so you you get one life at and one shot at this and you don’t want to try to hit a reset button down the road, so it, you have to be very diligent in maintaining your integrity.
Analysis of the Answer
Incoherence
That was pretty much verbatim what MacArthur answered to that question. It was a question about unity and really about separation. Every question about separation or unity is also about the other, unity or separation. The young male seminary student wanted MacArthur to give scriptural support. He did allude to scripture, but he in no way gave a scriptural answer. The answer really sounded like MacArthur had no clue on what the Bible taught about separation.
The only guidance from scripture I heard was the allusion to, a loose paraphrase of, the short sentence in 1 Corinthians 6:17, which says, “But he that is joined unto the Lord is one spirit.” I don’t think that’s a good verse to use. It’s in the context of sexual sin, and Paul is saying that fornicators are bringing God into the activity. Since they are one with God, joined unto Him, their sin associates Him with whatever the sin is or worse. Should John MacArthur bring God to the Charismatic strange fire location? This is a separation passage that shows that we should keep God out of situations. We bring Him when we go.
When MacArthur was done answering, I can’t think that the young man knew what he said. It was incoherent and contradictory as an answer. If I was to interpret it, it was something like, play it by ear with little to no objective standard. Evangelicals cannot, will not, and do not answer questions on separation. The instinct is, don’t separate. Stay together. Look to keep working together, even with doctrinal differences. If MacArthur’s answer was an answer, I don’t think it could stand as legitimate because it was so meandering.
Excuses
I know what MacArthur believes. He’s public on it. That doesn’t give him a pass to associate with and work with whoever He wants. By doing so, He is accommodating someone else’s false teaching. Even if it doesn’t have anything to do with MacArthur, it does have something to do with the one with whom he fellowships. That’s the message of 2 Thessalonians 3:14, “And if any man obey not our word by this epistle, note that man, and have no company with him, that he may be ashamed.” That is a command to separate from a professing believer. MacArthur doesn’t mention it.
MacArthur excuses not separating by saying there is no point to preaching to people who believe just like you do. Where he preaches the most, his church, believes just like he does. Everyone should preach to people who don’t believe like them. They should do it in evangelism and in doing spiritual warfare with professing Christians. Discipleship requires this. This is entirely different than fellowship with a disobedient brother or yoking together with unbelievers for a common work, like Billy Graham did in his crusades.
Strange Fire
Not long ago, MacArthur said that Charismatics offered strange fire to the Lord. That means they are false worshipers, who imagine a false god. In this answer, MacArthur says, you can go and work with Jack Hayford, the Charismatic, as long as people know who you are. You can speak on a specific topic that Hayford wants and give Hayford authentication while you’re at it. God seeks for true worshipers. That offense to God isn’t enough for MacArthur.
Why is infant sprinkling a lesser deal than women preachers? How much less obvious is infant sprinkling than women preachers? MacArthur says, women preachers, that’s “blatantly disobedient.” He can’t cross that line. Yet, he can cross the line of infant sprinkling. Is it because that’s not blatantly disobedient? Where did infant sprinkling come from? I’m using that as an example. I would be scratching my head if I were a woman preacher.
Not About You
From his answer, John MacArthur sounds like separating is about you, about how well you’ll do in life. In his case, it’s about him. If he associates with someone, will it taint him in some way, so that he will lose effectiveness or opportunity as a servant of God? Separation is not mainly about you. It is first and foremost about God.
Does what God says about separation apply to John MacArthur? God teaches on it. In part two, I’m going to come back and take scripture and apply it to John MacArthur’s terrible answer about unity and separation.
More to Come
Four Views On the Spectrum of Evangelicalism: A Book Review
I recently listened on Audible through the book Four Views on the Spectrum of Evangelicalism, contributors Kevin Bauder, R. Albert Mohler Jr., John G. Stackhouse Jr., and Roger E. Olson, series editor Stanley N. Gundry, gen eds. Andrew David Naselli & Collin Hansen (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2011). The four views presented are:
Fundamentalism: Kevin Bauder
Confessional Evangelicalism, R. Albert Mohler, Jr.
Generic Evangelicalism, John G. Stackhouse, Jr.
Postconservative Evangelicalism, Roger E. Olson
When I listen through a book on Audible I usually listen through twice, since it is easier to miss things when listening to a book than it is when reading one.
For most of the book, I was cheering for Kevin Bauder, for reasons which will be clear below.
Let the Wolves In!
Roger Olson’s View
Beginning with the bad people who are fine letting the wolves in: Roger Olson argues that “inerrancy cannot be regarded as necessary to being authentically evangelical. It is what theologians call adiaphora–a nonessential belief” (pg. 165). What is more, “open theists [are] not heretical” (pg. 185). Evangelicals do not need to believe in penal substitution: “there is no single evangelical theory of the atonement. While the penal substitution theory (that Christ bore the punishment for sins in the place of sinners) may be normal, it could hardly be said to be normative” (pg. 183). However, fundamentalism is “orthodoxy gone cultic” (pg. 67). Deny Christ died in your place, think God doesn’t know the future perfectly, and think the Bible is full of errors? No problem. Let a Oneness Pentecostal, anti-Trinitarian “church” in to the National Association of Evangelicals (pg. 178)? Great! Be a fundamentalist? Your are cultic.
Summary: While Christ says His sheep hear His voice, and Scripture unambiguously teaches its infallible and inerrant inspiration (2 Timothy 3:16; 2 Peter 1:16-21) as the Word of the God who cannot lie, and penal substitution is at the heart of the gospel, Dr. Olson thinks one can deny these things and not only be a Christian but be an evangelical. Let in the heretics and the wolves!
Let Some of the Wolves In!
John Stackhouse’s View
John G. Stackhouse, Jr. is only slightly more conservative than Dr. Olson. For Dr. Stackhouse, “open theists are, to my knowledge, genuine evangelicals” (pg. 132). No! But at least anti-Trinitarian Oneness Pentecostals who have a false god, a false gospel, and are going to hell are not evangelicals (pg. 204). Does something so obvious even deserve a “Yay”?
What about penal substitution? “substitutionary atonement is a nonnegotiable part of the Christian understanding of salvation, and evangelicals do well to keep teaching it clearly and enthusiastically” (pg. 136). One cheer for Dr. Stackhouse. But then he goes on:
But suppose somebody doesn’t teach it? Does that make him or her not an evangelical? According to the definition I have been using, such a person might well still be an evangelical. Indeed, the discussion in this section takes for granted that some (genuine) evangelicals are uneasy about substitutionary atonement, and a few even hostile to that idea. But they remain evangelicals nonetheless: still putting Christ and the cross in the center, still drawing from Scripture and testing everything by it, still concerned for sound and thorough conversion, still active in working with God in his mission, and still cooperating with evangelicals of other stripes. Evangelicals who diminish or dismiss substitutionary atonement seem to me to be in the same camp as my evangelical brothers and sisters who espouse open theism: truly evangelicals, and truly wrong about something important. (pgs. 136-137)
So the one cheer quickly is replaced by gasps for air and a shocked silence, as the heretics and the wolves come right back in again. Dr. Bauder does a good job responding to and demolishing these justifications of apostasy and false religion.
Write Thoughtful Essays Showing that the Wolves Need Critique, but
Let the World and the Flesh In and Don’t Be A Fundamentalist Separatist:
Al Mohler’s View
R. Albert Mohler, Jr. calls his view “Confessional Evangelicalism,” although he never cites any Baptist or any other confession of faith in his essay. He thinks you do actually need to believe Christ died in your place, open theism is unacceptable, and an inerrant Bible is something worth standing for (1.5 cheers for Dr. Mohler, led by very immodestly dressed Southern Baptist cheerleaders who know that God made them male and female, not trans). However, Dr. Mohler does not believe in anything close to a Biblical doctrine of ecclesiastical separation. His Southern Baptist denomination is full of leaven that is corrupting the whole lump. His ecclesiastical polity is like the Biden administration on the USA’s southern border–claiming that there are a few barriers that keep out people who are trying to creep in unawares while millions of illegals come pouring in with a nod and a wink.
Dr. Bauder makes some legitimate criticisms of Dr. Mohler, while also being much more cozy with him than John the Baptist or the Apostles would have been. Dr. Bauder says that Mohler is “doing a good work, and that work would be hindered if I were to lend credibility to the accusation that he is a fundamentalist” (pg. 97). That is Bauder’s view of the false worship, the huge number of unregenerate church members, the spiritual deadness, the doctrinal confusion, and the gross disobedience in the Southern Baptist Convention. Hurray? Dr. Bauder’s discussion is not how the first century churches would have worked with disboedient brethren (2 Thessalonians 3:6, 14).
Separate From the Wolves, but Not From Disobedient Sheep:
Kevin Bauder’s “Mainstream Fundamentalist” View
Kevin Bauder is a self-identified “historic fundamentalist.” (But what if there never was a unified “historic fundamentalism”?) He is the only one of the four contributors who actually thinks that ecclesiastical separation needs to take place. So two cheers for Dr. Bauder! Bauder argues: “the gospel is the essential ground of all genuinely Christian unity. Where the gospel is denied, no such unity exists” (pg. 23). Therefore, “Profession of the gospel is the minimum requirement for visible Christian fellowship. The gospel is the boundary of Christian fellowship” (pg. 25). Bauder does a good job showing that people must separate from those who deny the gospel, or those who fellowship with those who deny the gospel. Two more cheers for Bauder.
However, Bauder warns about what he calls “hyper-fundamentalism,” which is actually Biblically consistent separatism (and which gets no voice to defend itself in this book). He has strong words for the “hyper-fundamentalists”–stronger than the way he voices his disagreements with Mohler:
One version of fundamentalism goes well beyond the idea that I summarized earlier in this essay. It could be called hyper-fundamentalism. Hyper-fundamentalism exists in a variety of forms. … [H]yper-fundamentalists sometimes adopt a militant stance regarding some extrabiblical or even antibiblical teaching. For example, many professing fundamentalists are committed to a theory of textual preservation and biblical translation that leaves the King James Version as the only acceptable English Bible. When individuals become militant over such nonbiblical teachings, they cross the line into hyper-fundamentalism. … [H]yper-fundamentalists understand separation in terms of guilt by association. To associate with someone who holds any error constitutes an endorsement of that error. Persons who hold error are objects of separation, and so are persons who associate with them. … [H]yper-fundamentalists sometimes turn nonessentials into tests of fundamentalism. For example, some hyper-fundamentalists assume that only Baptists should be recognized as fundamentalists. Others make the same assumption about dispensationalists, defining covenant theologians out of fundamentalism. Others elevate extrabiblical personal practices. One’s fundamentalist standing may be judged by such criteria as hair length, musical preferences, and whether one allows women to wear trousers. … Hyper-fundamentalism takes many forms, including some that I have not listed. Nevertheless, these are the forms that are most frequently encountered. When a version of fundamentalism bears one or more of these marks, it should be viewed as hyper-fundamentalist. It is worth noting that several of these marks can also be found in other versions of evangelicalism.
Hyper-fundamentalism is not fundamentalism. It is as a parasite on the fundamentalist movement. … Mainstream fundamentalists find themselves in a changing situation. One factor is that what was once the mainstream may no longer be the majority within self-identified fundamentalism. A growing proportion is composed of hyper-fundamentalists, who add something to the gospel as the boundary of minimal Christian fellowship. If the idea of fundamentalism is correct, then this error is as bad as dethroning the gospel from its position as the boundary.
Another factor is that some evangelicals have implemented aspects of the idea of fundamentalism, perhaps without realizing it. For example, both Wayne Grudem and Albert Mohler (among others) have authored essays that reverberate with fundamentalist ideas. More than that, they and other conservative evangelicals have put their ideas into action, seeking doctrinal boundaries in the Evangelical Theological Society and purging Southern Baptist institutions.
Mainstream fundamentalists are coming to the conclusion that they must distance themselves from hyper-fundamentalists, and they are displaying a new openness to conversation and even some cooperation with conservative evangelicals. Younger fundamentalists in particular are sensitive to the inconsistency of limiting fellowship to their left but not to their right. (pgs. 43-45)
By Bauder’s definition, the first century churches would have been “hyper-fundamentalist” parasites. (Note that Bauder also makes claims such as: “Some hyper-fundamentalists view education as detrimental to spiritual well-being” [pg. 44]. There is probably a guy named John somewhere in a “hyper-fundamentalist” church that thinks education is a sin, and there is also probably a lady named Mary in a neo-evangelical church who thinks the same thing, and a big burly fellow named Mat in a post-conservative church who agrees with them, but nothing further about these sorts of claims by Bauder needs further comment. So we return to something more serious.) Do you separate over more than just the gospel? Do you, for example, separate over men who refuse to work and care for their families (2 Thess 3:6-14)? You are a parasite, just as bad, if not worse, than people who do not separate at all. Do you separate over false worship (“musical styles” to Bauder), since God burned people up for offering Him strange fire (Lev 10:1ff)? You are bad–very, very bad. Let the strange fire right in to the New Testament holy of holies (1 Corinthians 3:16-17)!–even though God says He will “destroy” those who do such a wicked thing. Do you take a stand for the perfect preservation of Scripture–as did men like George S. Bishop, one of the contributors to The Fundamentals (see, e. g., George S. Bishop, The Fundamentals: “The Testimony of the Scriptures to Themselves,” vol. 2:4 [Bellingham, WA: Logos Bible Software, 2005], 80ff.)? You King James Only parasite! Do you seek to follow the Apostle Paul and the godly preacher Timothy, and allow “no other doctrine” in the church–not just “no other gospel,” but “no other doctrine” (1 Timothy 1:3)? Do you repudiate Dr. Bauder’s schema of levels of fellowship to seek what Scripture defines as unity: “that ye all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you; but that ye be perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment” (1 Corinthians 1:10)? You are bad–very, very bad. You should be rejected, and we should join hands, instead, with evangelicals like Mohler who write essays that we “reverberate” with while they work in a Southern Baptist Convention teeming with unregenerate preachers and church members which almost never obeys Matthew 18:15-20 and practices church discipline. If you think Scripture is not kidding when it says men with long hair or women with short hair is a “shame” (1 Corinthians 11:1-16), or you do not want the women in your church to be an “abomination” (Deuteronomy 22:5) by wearing men’s clothing like pants, then you are certainly, certainly beyond the pale. Corruptions in our culture do not matter-let them into what should be Christ’s pure bride! Everyone knows that the loving thing to do is to allow half the congregation to be an abomination so that they can fit in with our worldly, hell-bound culture.
Dr. Bauder at least says one should separate over the gospel, and he does a good job proving that Scripture requires churches to do that. He has numbers of effective critiques of positions to his left. He clearly has studied history and is a thinker. But he does not present a Biblical case for consistent separatism-very possibly because consistent ecclesiastical separation is only possible when one rejects universal “church” ecclesiology for local-only or Landmark Baptist ecclesiology, and views the local assembly as the locus for organizational unity, while Bauder believes in a universal “church” and must somehow accomodate Scripture’s commands for unity in the body of Christ to that non-extant entity. As the book A Pure Church: A Biblical Theology of Ecclesiastical Separation demonstrates, churches must separate from all unrepentant and continuing disobedience, not just separate over the gospel. Dr. Bauder’s view is insufficient. Furthermore, his critique of what he labels “hyper-fundamentalism” is inconsistent. If the “hyper-fundamentalists” do things like separate too much and take stands for pure worship, are they thereby denying the gospel? If not, why does Bauder think they should be repudiated and separated from?
One other important point: some of those who would repudiate Dr. Bauder’s view as too weak are themselves to his left, not his right. For example, the King James Bible Research Council and the Dean Burgon Society, prominent King James Only advocacy organizations that would claim to be militant fundamentalists, are willing to fellowship with anti-repentance, anti-Lordship, anti-Christ (for does not “Christ” mean “the Messiah, the King, the Lord”?) advocates of heresy on the gospel as advocated by Jack Hyles, Curtis Hudson and the Sword of the Lord, and the so-called “free grace” movement of Zane Hodges. Fundamentalist schools that stand for gender-distinction and conservative worship, such as Baptist College of Ministry in Menomonee Falls, WI, are willing to fellowship with people who believe the truth on repentance and the gospel as well as with anti-repentance heretics at Hyles Anderson College and First Baptist (?) Church (?) of Hammond, Indiana like John Wilkerson. If you think Kevin Bauder’s Central Baptist Seminary is too weak, but you yourself do not separate even over the gospel, but tolerate false views of repentance or other heresies on the gospel that Paul would not have tolerated for one hour (Galatians 1:6-9, 2:5), you need to reconsider your position.
Take a stand–follow God. Allow “no other doctrine” (1 Timothy 1:3). Separate not just on the gospel, but from all unfruitful works of darkness (Ephesians 5:11). You may be excluded from the book Four Views on the Spectrum of Evangelicalism, with its more liberal contributors viewing you as “cultic” and the most conservative contributor viewing you as a “parasite” and a “hyper-fundamentalist,” but that is fine-God your adopted Father, Christ your gracious Redeemer, and the blessed Holy Spirit, who has made your body and your congregation into His holy temple, will be pleased. The needy sheep in your flock who had a faithful pastor will embrace you and thank you as they shine like the sun in the coming glorious kingdom, as you led them to faithfulness to Christ and a full reward, instead of compromise. If Christ does not return first, your church may, by God’s grace, continue to pass on the truth and to multiply other true churches for centuries, instead of falling into apostasy because of a sinful failure to consistently practice Biblical separation.
Get off the spectrum of evangelicalism entirely and follow Scripture alone for the glory of God alone in a separatist, Bible-believing and practicing Baptist church. You will be opposed now, but God will be glorified, and it will be worth it all, when we see Jesus.
–TDR
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Changes in Personal Belief and the Effects on Relationships (part one)
Growth and Change
No one comes into this world knowing every doctrine of scripture. For someone to grow in grace and knowledge, he will change in his personal belief. He could go either way, better or worse. A person won’t remain static. Growth requires making good changes and avoiding bad ones.
Like anyone else, I have a story of change in personal belief. I have often told people that I changed on eight to ten biblical doctrines or issues of various significance through the years. No one should change from something right to something wrong. I always believed I was moving from wrong to right, but not everyone agreed with that.
Adding and Subtracting
God says, don’t take away from or add to scripture. Both directions are bad, subtracting and adding. Furthermore, someone doesn’t do better if he takes every doctrine or issue to the most strict or extreme place that he could.
In the Garden of Eden, Eve said the following in Genesis 3:2-3 to the serpent:
We may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden: But of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God hath said, Ye shall not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die.
God had said the following in Genesis 2:17:
But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.
When you read the two statements, you can see that Eve added to what God said. God said nothing about touching the fruit of the tree. Yet, Eve did. She took an even more extreme position than God, which was wrong.
Almost every change I ever made in belief or practice, I moved in a stronger, more strict or conservative direction. Certain other Christians opposed some of those changes. In a most recent change, that developed over a number of years, I loosened in my belief or practice. I see liberty on something where I once saw regulation. Those accustomed to my rightward movement saw this as inconsistent.
Precipitating Change
In every instance I changed, some event precipitated the change. Very often I changed while preaching or teaching a series through a particular book. Sometimes I was faced with a situation that I had never encountered. I had to make a decision.
In all my years of pastoring, that I know, I have never believed and practiced in an identical way with any other church. I know of no Baptist church that is identical to another in its belief and practice. Beliefs and practices might be close to the same, but with slight variation.
Here at this blog, Thomas Ross and I don’t believe or practice exactly the same. We have differences. We’re very close, but not the same. Some of you readers have read our debates here and elsewhere. Nonetheless, we still partner on this blog.
Through the years, our church still fellowshipped with other churches even with the differences we had. It’s usually not easy to clash with another church on doctrinal and practical differences. Even interpretational differences might bring conflict between believers or churches. Almost everyone thinks they’re right.
Reasons for Change and Differences
When I change, why believe or practice different than before? Why do Bible believing and practicing churches still have some differences with each other in doctrine and practice?
Direct Statements, Plain Inferences
Differences in belief and practice start with variated understanding of either direct statements of scripture or of the plain inferences from direct statements in the Bible. Not every teaching of the Bible comes from a direct statement. Some comes from a combination of direct statements and plain inferences. In general I haven’t changed in my adult life on anything in a category of direct statements or plain inferences from scripture.
When I say direct statements and plain inferences, I also say that these proceed from only a grammatical, historical interpretation of scripture. Direct statements and plain inferences come from the actual meaning of the words of scripture in their context. I also consider the laws for the usage of those words, their syntax, and their meaning in their textual and historical context.
I take a stronger position on repentance and Lordship than I did forty years ago. In the past, I never denied that teaching. However, like every other doctrine and practice proceeding from direct statement and plain inference from direct statements, I grew in my grasp and conviction.
A Series of Overlapping Statements and Inferences
Some doctrines and practices proceed from a series of overlapping statements and inferences in the Bible. When you read all of the passages combined, you will come to certain conclusions that are also your beliefs and practices. The nation Israel, one third of its total number of people according to Zechariah, will receive Christ as the Messiah during the seven year tribulation period. Nations will surround her and at this juncture, Israel will repent with a confession such as Isaiah 53. God will save Israel.
I get my belief about the event of the salvation of Israel from conclusions arising from a series of overlapping statements and inferences in scripture. Furthermore, almost every belief and practice, comes from both the interpretation and the application of scripture. Application almost always depends on the reality of certain self-evident truths, assumed by God. God expects us to apply what He said. Man lives by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.
Separating Differences
Many professing believers take what I call, unscriptural positions. Differences occur between believers and churches when one or more veer away from the teaching of the Bible. They might do that for many reasons. Some of them are just personal. An individual believer or a church leader may have a personal issue with someone. People might not like the way someone treated them or others with whom they fellowship.
Differences between churches may not be doctrinal or practical, but personal or political. They fellowship with others with different doctrine or practice, even with the same differences as someone with whom they won’t. Their decisions about relationship relate to hurt feelings or bruised egos. They won’t reconcile, forgive, or seek mediation because of pride. They wait for the other party to initiate reconciliation, and even if it does, they reject reconciliation or mediation. True churches separate, but scripture teaches constructive reasons, not personal or political ones.
More to Come
The Trinitarian Bible Society and Its Position on Scripture
Four days ago the Trinitarian Bible Society launched this video, called, “Upholding the Word of God.”
I appreciate their stand on scripture. What they present is what, I believe, many Christians across the world say they believe. What the above video explains is also why they believe it.
Scriptural Presuppositions
The Trinitarian Bible Society starts with scriptural presuppositions. Their practice of Bible publication arises from their biblical beliefs about the Bible. This is how it should be. It’s also what we do not see with those on the critical text side. They do not emphasize or most often even teach at all what is the scriptural basis of their position. Their position does not have a biblical mooring.
Someone who appears and speaks often in the above video is Jonathan Arnold, who is also pastor of the Westminster Baptist Church in London. My wife and I visited that church twice on trips to England. I appreciate this younger man’s stand on the Word of God in a time of much attack on the doctrine of scripture. He is now the General Director of the Trinitarian Bible Society.
Many pastors across the world use the Greek New Testament, textus receptus, printed by the Trinitarian Bible Society. They also print an entire original language Bible in the received text of the Old (Hebrew) and New (Greek) Testaments.
Separatist Heritage
The Trinitarian Bible Society is by history and, therefore, by definition a separatist organization. It started from a split from the British and Foreign Bible Society over spreading Unitarianism, hence, Trinitarian, and over scripture, therefore, Bible. As an indication of how significant people thought that was, two thousand gathered for the first meeting at Exeter Hall in London in 1831. Could they get that many to gather for that separatist purpose today?
The British and Foreign Bible Society allowed a Unitarian as an officer. Unitarian at the time became the doctrinal position du jour. It’s a familiar theological term now, unitarian, but it really does encapsulate almost every major theology error in the history of heresy. It was essentially Socinianism, which taught works salvation and anti-Trinitarianism. Unitarians denied not only the deity of Christ but also the miracles of the Bible. They did away of the authority of scripture.
For a long period of time, we would call Socinianism or Unitarianism theological liberalism. Most liberal churches in whatever denomination are Socinians or Unitarians. In many ways, we would say they don’t believe anything. They are drawn together by their denial of scriptural and historical doctrine, which is to say, they deny the truth.
Overall
I have attended many churches affiliated with the Trinitarian Bible Society (TBS) in England. Some strong churches exist who would not fellowship with the Trinitarian Bible Society, but very few. A majority of the strongest churches in England, where the best representation of New Testament Christianity exists, associate themselves with the TBS. This says much about the outcome or consequences of the received text of the original languages of scripture and the King James Version, which these churches support and propagate.
I differ from most of these Trinitarian Bible Society affiliated institutions in ecclesiology, eschatology, and dispensationalism versus covenant theology. That saddens me, but it does not take away the joy I have for what they do believe. I rejoice in that. I have more in common with these churches than I do most other Baptist churches today.
The churches affiliated with the Trinitarian Bible Society believe an orthodox, true position on the Trinity and about the Lord Jesus Christ. They preach a true gospel, including repentance and Lordship. TBS type churches utilize reverent worship. They are active in their evangelism of the lost. Their churches are not worldly churches. Their preaching of scripture is dense and thorough. They rely on scripture for their success. I am not saying these doctrines and practices are all that matter, but they do distinguish the Trinitarian Bible Society affiliated churches.
Debunking of Nine Marks Dual Church View: Both Universal and Local Churches, Part Three
Nowhere does scripture make a connection between an earthly church and then a final heavenly church. Neoplatonic Christianity or professing Christianity invented this idea, one borrowed by Jonathan Leeman in his article, The Church: Universal and Local, for the 9 Marks parachurch organization. A believer in a salvific way has a citizenship in heaven and has a seat in heaven in the sense that God reserved it for him, which is like someone seated in Congress without physically being there. Because He saved me and keeps saving me, Jesus anchors me in the heavenly holy of holies. The seating of me and the anchoring of me there does not mean I am there in the present. It is a blessed guarantee of my salvation.
Universal church ecclesiology uses neoplatonic language. It says the true church is all believers, the apparent “universal church,” which manifests itself in a visible church, the local one. It finds reality in the ideal or the mystical. Leeman says the universal church becomes local by gathering. A church is a gathering. A gathering doesn’t become a gathering by gathering. The not-gathered thing is not a gathering. This is also how all of the New Testament reads. It’s not called a gathering or an assembly when it doesn’t assemble. It isn’t an assembly then. The only reason why Leeman talks about the church as universal comes from neoplatonism.
Jonathan Leeman writes a unique ecclesiology. The dual church view isn’t unique, but his attempt to keep an attachment to the literal meaning of ekklesia, “assembly.” 9 Marks and he see the damage of the typical universal church teaching, that becomes easily untethered from the biblical practice of the church, which is only local. The typical universal church teaching creates free agents without accountability, living how they want yet continuing to call themselves Christians.
The attempt to keep congruity between assembly and universal church keeps Leeman in the mainstream of evangelicalism, which loves its universal church. It keeps alive a multitude of boards, conventions, associations, colleges, universities, and other parachurch organizations. Someone can live and work in that parachurch world as if it is Christian ministry without anything like it in the Bible. It is unhelpful, but mainly untrue. Whatever kingdom-like quality Leeman wants to attribute to the church, the mixture of the universal undermines the authority that the kingdom of Jesus Christ possesses.
As one might expect, Leeman’s system of interpretation effects his outcome. He fails to mention, however, his system — amillennialism. That system must see a universal church, which is a synonym with the kingdom. It erases a line between soteriology and ecclesiology. It results in reading his conclusions into scripture.
A Kingdom Argument
Leeman uses a doctrine of the kingdom to argue for a universal church. Some truth exists within the framework of his argument. As a representative of His church, Jesus gives Peter the keys to the kingdom in Matthew 16:18-19. That does not mean the church is the kingdom, which emerges from amillennialism, an eschatology of Roman Catholicism and Capital Hill Baptist Church, Mark Dever, and 9 Marks. The church and the kingdom interrelate like the church and the family of God do.
Leeman says the church provides the way to say who citizens of the kingdom are. He compares church membership to the means of possessing the passport into the kingdom. To know who they are, Leeman postulates baptism and the Lord’s Supper as the means. He says these are covenant signs of the new covenant, so they express the entrance requirements into the kingdom. Nothing in the Bible says this. It is nifty inventiveness to attempt to prove a point, while having nothing to do so. It’s another way of my saying that it’s a stretch by Leeman.
The article further argues the kingdom/church concept with the language of “binding” and “loosing” in Matthew 16:19 and 18:18. Churches are doing kingdom work. They are not the kingdom. They represent the kingdom on earth. God gives the church — churches — heavenly authority to judge who is in and who is out. I’m sure that Leeman knows that doesn’t mean that the church kicks people out of heaven or out of the kingdom.
Jesus characterizes the extent of the judgment of the church in Matthew 18:17, “Let him be unto thee as an heathen man and a publican.” The church regards a person as heathen. He may not be heathen. The man under church discipline in 1 Corinthians 5 proved himself to be a kingdom citizen, even though the church loosed him. The Lord Jesus Christ gives to the church, which is visible and local, the earthly judgment of heavenly or kingdom citizenship.
It’s true that someone, who isn’t baptized, doesn’t take of the Lord’s Table, won’t join a church, doesn’t submit to church leadership, and won’t gather with a church, the church should judge as not saved. Christ gave that judgment to the church. This doesn’t mean the church is the kingdom. It’s been given the authority of the kingdom. The King of the kingdom is Christ and the Head of the church is Christ.
The Bible offers a distinct soteriology and a distinct ecclesiology. They are distinct doctrines. However, they also relate to one another. Church membership requires salvation. However, it also requires baptism. Baptism isn’t salvation. It isn’t a “putting away of the filth of the flesh” (1 Pet 3:21). According to the New Testament, a church can have unbelievers in it, a mixed multitude, and will very often have unsaved church members, who should examine themselves whether they be in the faith (2 Cor 13:5). Most reading here know that church membership is not the same as salvation.
Terminology like church, temple, and body relate to the church. Words like kingdom, family, and saint relate to salvation. You can be in the kingdom, family, and a saint without baptism. To be in the church, temple, and body, you must be baptized. Scripture shows some relationship between terms of the church and of salvation. However, Leeman takes this further than what scripture teaches in order to vindicate his false universal church teaching.
Historical Argument
Leeman attempts to justify the universal church with a historical argument, using the patristics and the Protestant Reformers. He portrays a pendulum swing between an emphasis on the local church then the universal church and then back to the local church, meanwhile both churches existing with his dual church view. He writes the following:
Yet among Baptist groups the risk now would be to shift the weight of the body entirely onto the other foot, where Christians would give all their attention to the local church and little to the universal. Certain strains of Baptist churches, such as the Landmarkists of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, would in fact argue that only the local church exists. They would also refuse to share the Lord’s Supper with anyone who was not a member of their own church. Gratefully, such strains were rare.
He charges Baptists with overemphasis on the local church, especially those he calls and others label, “Landmarkists.” He attacks closed communion, unwillingness to share the Lord’s Supper with someone not a member of his church. I would contend that the Landmarkists brought ecclesiology back to scripture and communion back to its “communion of the Lord’s body,” which is local only. Christ gave communion to His church, which is local only.
The Landmarkers rose out of the Southern Baptist Convention, when Protestants shared their pulpits and partook in their communion. Baptists distinguish themselves as separatists. They separate from false doctrine such as infant sprinkling. Further, Southern Baptists allowed modernism or liberalism into the churches and rejected church perpetuity in their seminaries, leading to ecumenism. Landmarkers brought the Convention back to scripture and historic Baptist doctrines.
Leeman uses a kind of smear tactic, because his knowing what readers may have heard about Landmarkism. It’s like calling someone “flat earth” or “election denier.” It’s a rhetorical tactic. It doesn’t make a true historical or biblical point. He assumes people will think Landmarkism is bad, so they’ll associate local only ecclesiology then as bad too.
I agree that men through history believed in a local church, a universal church, in only a local church, and in both a local and a universal church. You can find all of those ecclesiological positions through history. However, we know a church is local. Where is the universal church in scripture and did it develop through history? Did it arise from neoplatonism?
Forced Universal with It “Showing Up”
Leeman says the universal church shows up in churches, which are local. He says that happens when churches cooperate with another in common service or labor for the Lord. Yes, churches all have the same Head if they are true churches. That doesn’t make a universal church. It is a generic church. It is an institutional understanding of church. Each true church has Christ as its head. This is not the discovery of or a doctrine of a universal church.
Churches either fellowship based upon the same doctrine and practice or they separate from one another. When they fellowship, that isn’t a universal church concept. That is just fellowship between two churches, like existed between the Jerusalem church and the Antioch church.
The universal concept of church seems to require churches cooperating. It leads to diminishment and corruption of true doctrine. If there is to be “no schism in the body” (1 Cor 12:25), and the body is universal, then no church should separate from one another. However, “the body” in 1 Corinthians 12 is defined as local in v. 27, when Paul says, “Ye are the body of Christ,” speaking of the church at Corinth. If it was universal, Paul would have written, “We are the body of Christ.” He doesn’t. Schisms exist between bodies. They are not to exist in the body.
The unity that Jesus prayed for in John 17 (v. 22) is found in separate churches that fellowship one with another based upon the truth (John 17:17). Unity is required in individual churches (Eph 4), not between separate churches. Separate churches attempt to have unity like Jerusalem and Antioch tried in Acts 15. True unity requires separation.
Evangelicals like Leeman do not teach biblical separation. They don’t write on it. They talk about church discipline, but they don’t teach on separation from other churches. Their false universal church teaching fuels this, which will mean apostasy for their churches and their movement. Every New Testament epistle teaches the doctrine of separation, which depends on a right view of the nature of the church.
Baptists and Presbyterians, False Worship, and Separation
Some of what I write here relates to something I got on my phone from a notification. It was Derek Thomas, the Presbyterian, representing the Master’s Seminary on a podcast. He did about fifteen minutes on preaching and the problem of evil, focusing on sermons through Job. I don’t know that an evangelical Presbyterian might differ with a Baptist interpretation of Job. Thomas said he disagreed with Calvin, whom he said took the Elihu position, essentially seeing Elihu arriving at the end of Job and mopping up the whole discussion.
The appearance of Thomas for Master’s Seminary drew my attention to the doctrine of Presbyterians and fellowship with them. Presbyterians sprinkle infants, which they consider baptizing babies. Should this bring separation from Presbyterians?
Presbyterians in the ordinance of baptism sprinkle infants. A Book of Public Prayer for the Presbyterian Church of America, 1857, reads (p. 147):
Baptism is an holy Sacrament instituted by Christ: in which a person professing the Christian Faith, or the infant of such, is baptized with water into the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: in signification and solemnization of the holy covenant in which as a believer, or the seed of believers, he giveth up himself, or is by the parent given up, to God the Father Son and Holy Ghost: to believe in, love, and fear this blessed Trinity, against the flesh, the devil, and the world. Thus he is solemnly entered a visible member of Christ and His Church, a child of God, and an heir of heaven.
This is considered and called “a prescribed form of worship” (p. xv), so under the category of worship. Is baptism worship of God? The thought here is that the ordinances of baptism and the Lord’s Supper, these two rites, are acts of worship in the New Testament temple of God. To worship God, God must accept the baptism.
Through the Bible, a primary criterion for worship is that God accepts it. For God to accept it, it must accord with scripture. God accepts worship in truth. In the Old Testament, God punishes false worship by death, such as the case of Nadab and Abihu for offering strange fire to the Lord. Infant sprinkling is not truth.
C. H. Spurgeon preached and the transcript reads:
When we reflect that it is rendered into some thing worse than superstition by being accompanied with falsehood, when children are taught that in their baptism they are made the children of God, and inheritors of the kingdom of heaven, which is as base a lie as ever was forged in hell, or uttered beneath the copes of heaven, our spirit sinks at the fearful errors which have crept into the Church, through the one little door of infant sprinkling.
Preaching at the Metropolitan Tabernacle in 1861, Hugh Brown said:
We cannot but regard infant baptism as the main root of the superstitious and destructive dogma of baptismal regeneration, to which as Protestants we are opposed; we cannot but regard infant baptism as the chief corner-stone of State Churchism, to which as Dissenters we are opposed; we cannot but regard infant baptism as unscriptural, and to everything that is unscriptural we, as disciples of Jesus Christ, must be opposed; and we do trust that all who differ from us, and however widely they may differ, will still admit that we are only doing what is right in maintaining what we believe to be the truth of God with reference to this matter.
I’ve read many who say that infant sprinkling has sent more people to hell than any other false doctrine. I can’t disagree. Recently someone compared this to 1-2-3-pray-with-me or easy prayerism. They both send many people to Hell, the latter catching up today with infant sprinkling in its damnatory qualities.
I’m happy when I hear any Presbyterian believes right, preaches scripturally, about anything. Love rejoices in the truth. Infant sprinkling is false worship and as a doctrine sends people to Hell. God killed Nadab and Abihu for changing the recipe at the altar of incense. How much more serious is the false worship and perverting message of infant sprinkling? Baptists should separate from Presbyterians, not remain in unity with them. They should not yoke together in common ministry. They should do what God does with false worship.
John MacArthur: A Conservative Evangelical Preaches on Separation
A sermon popped up in the notifications on my phone late last week and it said, “Come Out from Their Midst and Be Ye Separate (2 Corinthians 6:14-18)” by John MacArthur. Apparently it was something preached earlier in March at his Shepherd’s Conference, but only posted three days before. I was very surprised to see the text and especially the title with the word “separate” in it.
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