fundamentalism by blunt instrument
I am working away on Sunday’s sermon. I come across a line in Keil & Delitzsch… a parte ante. Alas, my classical education is severely lacking. What to do?
I search on the internet for a Latin-English dictionary. I find a nifty little program that (I think) gives me the correct translation.
Is there a more defining evangelical organization than the Evangelical Theological Society (ETS)? Some might say that the quintessential Evangelical organization would be the National Association of Evangelicals, but would that really be true? One key area of comparison is the doctrinal standards of each organization. The NAE requires members to affirm their statement of faith. The ETS requires members to hold to their doctrinal basis. (Of course, the ETS requires a level of scholarly attainment for membership as well, due to its differing nature. We are not comparing that aspect of these organizations.)
Now, which organization requires the more exclusive standard of doctrinal agreement as its foundational basis?
While I am laid up, I’m going to try to catch up on a few things I have noticed but not given any commentary on over the last few months. These comments are going to come in the order that they appear in my Bloglines reader.
First item: a little something from 9marks back in October, Three Books Church Planters Should Read, and A Lesson in Not Following Instructions. The point of interest to me in this post is Dever’s recommendation of J. I. Packer’s Fundamentalism and The Word of God. Packer’s thesis concerning fundamentalism in this book essentially goes this way: “Fundamentalists were useful idiots in their day, but thank God, this isn’t their day.” So much for the hopes of influencing conservative evangelicals towards fundamentalism.
I am typing one-handed, my right arm in a sling. They told me I can’t use my puter for two days! That’s almost as bad as no Timmies!
The concern was possibility of blocked heart arteries, today’s procedure was an angiogram. They discovered some minor buildup in an area that doesn’t concern them, so treatment is medication, diet, and exercise. Thanks for your prayers.
Maranatha!
don j
jer 33.3
I am scheduling this to post at the same time I will be checking in to our local hospital for a medical procedure. I anticipate that I will be back at it later in the day. The procedure has some risk attached to it, but the risk is quite small. I am confident in the Lord, wherever this journey takes me… but I am probably going to have to give up doughnuts. Alas!
If you have a moment, your prayers would be appreciated.
Our concluding message for the second chapter of Romans concludes Paul’s main argument against the Religious man. The Religious man thinks he is exempt from God’s judgement because he has divinely revealed Rites and special judgement escaping Power because of his superior morality and way of life. These notions misunderstand the nature of true acceptance by God, a regeneration of the inner man by the power of the Spirit instead of the works of the flesh.
We conclude the first half of The Pilgrim’s Progress as we see Christian and Hopeful finally reach the destination of all believers, the Celestial City. We see them linger first in Beulah land, the land where the seasoned saint is partly in this world and partly in the next, then they cross the river of death, entering into the joy of their Lord. Bunyan says (as in his vision the gates to the City close) “After that they shut up the gates; which, when I had seen, I wished myself among them.”
In our own ministry, we have seen many saints go on ahead of us. I can sincerely say that I wish myself among them. Our folks gave what I thought were moving testimonies at the end of this session on that subject. I amplified their words so that you can hear them also, hopefully the distortions at that amplification will not be too distracting.
We begin our Christmas season with an introductory message. The Moravians have a Christmas ornament that is a multi-pointed star. It began as an educational project but quickly became a beloved symbol of Christmas. Four passages are associated with its meaning, these will form our theme for the month of December, all related to the ’star’ and its association with our Lord Jesus Christ.
Our first message introduced this theme by taking a look first at the rich young ruler and the spiritual investment to which the Lord called him – give up everything. Then the Lord taught his disciples the principle of multiplied returns – give up everything and get one hundred fold in this life and in the life to come, everlasting life! Exactly what the rich young ruler asked for.
We compared these themes to the spiritual investment Count Zinzendorf made in the 1700s. He was the spiritual leader of the Moravian movement, called by some ‘the rich young ruler who said Yes!’ When Zinzendorf died, his Moravians and their mission sent out over 228 missionaries, seeing many thousands come to Christ, simply because they made the right spiritual investment.
Unfortunately, the modern Moravian church does not match the orthodoxy of former days, but the missionary efforts of the 18th century Moravians are an inspiration to us today.
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My apologies for the delay in posting this! (I know the world was waiting with bated breath.) We had a blessed day yesterday and a busy day today.
Back in May, Scott Aniol posted Leading Music at the Conference on the Church for God’s Glory on his site, Religious Affections.
In the article, he commented on the music at the Together for the Gospel conference he had attended earlier in the year. Among other things he said this:
Although every hymn choice for that conference was in and of itself conservative, and although the accompaniment was simple in theory, a completely different underlying philosophy bled through. The leader of the singing, who led from the piano, was a master at emotional manipulation stimulation. How he accompanied the hymns moved and swayed the audience in certain emotional directions. He constantly shouted out unintelligible exclamations that further roused the audience. And the audience did respond. Hands waving in the air, enthusiastic shouting, vigorous singing, and even some jumping around.
I would recommend you read Scott’s entire article. There is some discussion following, but the article is the main thing. Now, I don’t have the time, the $$$, nor the interest to attend such conferences. I didn’t really have a full picture of what Scott was describing, but I had an idea what it was like. Now you can get a sense of exactly what Scott is describing…
I recently posted a review of a book by my good friend, Randy Jaeggli, on the subject of the Christian and alcohol consumption. As Calvin Coolidge is said to have said about a preacher’s attitude toward sin: “He was agin it.”
I came across an article in the Criswell Theological Review today. The article is by Richard Land and Barrett Duke. In The Christian and Alcohol, they appear to be ‘agin’ it also. The whole issue of the CTR is devoted to the subject of Christians and alcohol use. I commend Land and Duke’s article to you, I think they present a well-reasoned position for adopting a policy of total abstinence. [Read more…]
In this message we look at what good our religion is if we have the right rites but the wrong lives. Paul proposes a situation where the uncircumcised (the Un-Rite)nevertheless keeps the righteousness of the Law. He asks, will not his law keeping equal the value of your circumcision? Moreover, will not his law keeping judge your law breaking? Jesus gave examples, the men of Nineveh and the ‘queen of the south’ (Mt 12.41-42). The same problems attend our religion today. We have the Bible,we have baptism, we have the customs and practices of Christianity, but when we sin (as professing Christians) we stand judged by the lives of non-Christians who don’t sin in the same ways we do.
All of this builds the case that neither morality (Rm 2.1-16) nor religion (Rm 2.17-29) can exempt us from the judgement of God and the sentence of wrath that has fallen on mankind. (Rm 1.18-32). We need something superior to morality and religion.
In this session we see the renewed attempt by Christian and Hopeful to evangelize Ignorance. Ignorance is completely confident in his own obedience, he has no sense that he needs more than his own self-justification. He does not know he needs the merits of Christ. Leaving him to his own deserts, Christian and Hopeful talk of another man, Mr. Temporary, who made a show of going on a pilgrimage, but turned back when his mind was not changed, he feared other men, could not bear the shame of religion and was grieved to feel guilt for his sin.
Our message this afternoon returns to a theme we considered eight years ago, the fruit of the Spirit as taught in Galatians. Today’s message looked at the whole idea of spiritual fruit, the desirability of spiritual fruit, and the method of cultivating spiritual fruit. For cultivation, we must crucify the flesh — weed the garden, and so enhance the working of the Spirit in our own lives.
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We had a visiting couple today… lots of visitors lately, but not many returnees. That’s what we would really like, but so far our many visitors lately have been just visitors.
Our study of Romans moves from showing the insufficiency of even revealed religion to eradicate sin (Rm 2.17-24). Now Paul attacks confidence in the rites of revealed religion. Men made idols out of the rites of Judaism, thinking that their possession and performance of the rites meant they escaped God’s wrath towards sin, failing to realize that their sin invalidated their rituals. The same condition afflicts us today, even us as independent Baptists. We easily make our religious exercises into ‘magic’ rituals that act as ‘charms’ to keep us safe from condemnation. We think that if we regularly attend church, if we’ve been baptized, if we’ve prayed a prayer or walked an aisle, we’ve escaped! But we fail to understand that sins invalidate rituals. What we need is genuine Biblical repentance and faith in the finished work of Christ for our sins. From that faith decision flows the newness of life.
In this session we see Christian and Hopeful keeping themselves wakeful in the Enchanted Grounds by engaging in ‘well managed fellowship’. The specific topic that engages their minds is a discussion of Hopeful’s salvation testimony. In this section Bunyan gives us a clear picture of a soul under conviction and turning to Christ. We made our reading shorter this week to spend more time covering this section in detail.
This afternoon we considered another distinctive of our Church life, reverent worship. Much has been said all over the world about worship in recent years, but we stand as a body of believers committed to conservative, reverent, traditional worship. By worship we mean more than music, but everything from music to offering to announcements to preaching and all the bits in between. Our reason for insisting on this kind of worship is found in Hb 12.18-29, as the Christian experience is compared to Mt Sinai and found to be far more solemn and far more holy than that awe inspiring experience. We intend to be reverent in worship because God is who He is.
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A smallish crowd today, but blessed services nonetheless.
The latest audio from the GBCvic
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