{"id":1570,"date":"2009-12-28T08:50:52","date_gmt":"2009-12-28T16:50:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/oxgoad.ca\/2009\/12\/28\/well-meaning-error\/"},"modified":"2009-12-28T08:50:52","modified_gmt":"2009-12-28T16:50:52","slug":"well-meaning-error","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/oxgoad.ca\/2009\/12\/28\/well-meaning-error\/","title":{"rendered":"well meaning error"},"content":{"rendered":"

A recent series of articles deals with the problem of error creeping into the church. First<\/a>, an overview of ancient heresies is offered. Second<\/a>, a modern error by an other-wise well-respected Bible teacher, Henry Morris, is highlighted. And third<\/a>, an error by M. R. DeHaan with respect to the nature of Christ’s blood is exposed, with this comment:<\/p>\n

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Sadly, DeHaan\u2019s views have had wide circulation among fundamentalists for the past five decades. Whatever one may believe about the present location of the blood of Christ, there can be no biblical retreat from the fact that Jesus\u2019 blood was human blood.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

One might suspect that the series of articles was written so that this statement could be uttered, but that might be seen as too cynical.<\/p>\n

In any case, it is true that it seems very easy to slip into error when it comes to the person of Christ. These errors seem to come when, in our zeal to defend one area of biblical truth, we overstate the case and make an error in another area of biblical truth. And sometimes such errors come when, in our zeal for rhetorical flourish, we indulge too much in the speculative nature of things about which the Bible is silent. It seems that we would be safest by simply affirming ONLY what the Bible affirms and leaving speculation entirely aside.<\/p>\n

For example, consider the following statement from the articles pointing out errors. Do you see anything wrong with it? Do any aspects of it make you a little uncomfortable?<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

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One of the great, fundamental truths of the virgin birth is that it guarantees the sinlessness of Jesus Christ. It was necessary for the Son of God to become human through a miraculous conception and birth. The normal process always produces a new person, so for God\u2019s Son to come into the world due to natural procreation would have produced a being with two persons. Since He was a pre-existent person, the Son of God needed only to take to Himself an impersonal human nature, and because it was impersonal, it was also sinless (since persons sin, not bodies). Mankind desperately needed a sinless substitute and the God-man, Jesus Christ, perfectly met both requirements\u2014He was fully man and completely sinless.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Does the idea of an ‘impersonal human nature’ strike you as somewhat odd? Does it mean that Jesus wasn’t a human person, only a divine person in a human body? If that were true, would it be possible to say that the Son fully identified himself with humanity? Does not having a human person mean no human personality? Is that exactly an orthodox description?<\/p>\n

Please note that I don’t subscribe to Two Persons in the Incarnate Son of God. I believe that it is One Person, Two Natures. But to say that the incarnation is simply acquiring an ‘impersonal human nature’ seems to be a little odd. At the very least, it does seem that it could lead to an error concerning the nature of Christ’s identification with mankind.<\/p>\n

Further, what about this idea that the human nature of Christ was sinless "because it was impersonal". The reason given is that "persons sin, not bodies". Is sin to be thought of only in terms of what persons do outside the will of God? Is that what makes sinners sinful? What about the imputed sin of Adam? What about the inherited sin nature passed on from generation to generation?<\/p>\n

If not having a human person guarantees the sinlessness of Christ because persons sin, not bodies, does that mean humans only become sinful when they sin? Isn’t that awfully close to the dreaded "P"-word? ((Pelagianism))<\/p>\n

The reason I am asking these questions is to illustrate how easy it is to make statements that seem to slip into error or have the potential of slipping into error if, once uttered, they become too vigorously defended. I don’t think the person who made the statement is in any danger of making these errors, but his statement isn’t airtight as it stands.<\/p>\n

Furthermore, when people like Morris and DeHaan and "fundamentalists" make these kinds of errors – and even stoutly defend them – what should be done about them?<\/p>\n

Should they be purged out of the church, like Arius of old was?<\/p>\n

Do the errors of Henry Morris or M. R. DeHaan rise to that level? Would we propose that Christians should declare them heretics and condemn their ministries as unacceptable? Would we consider them so deviant that we would advocate complete separation, like we would with modernists?<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t think we would make those kinds of conclusions, though when you consider the teachings mentioned, we are exceedingly uncomfortable.<\/p>\n

What distinguishes these men from Arius? Or, for that matter, what distinguishes these men and their teachings from modern Arians, the Jehovah\u2019s Witnesses? <\/p>\n

Isn\u2019t the distinction something like this: these errors are \u2018side-teachings\u2019, not the primary or defining thrust of the ministries of Morris or DeHaan. Their errors aren\u2019t the foundational basis of their theology, rather they are tangential to an essentially orthodox view. The JWs or Arius, on the other hand, base everything on their heretical view of Christ. <\/p>\n

Some might use the term ‘misguided’ with respect to these errors. Certainly they are misguided. They should be exposed and repudiated. But then, should we then mount a constant campaign to set them aside as useless and declare their fellowship completely unacceptable? Should we refrain from using their ministry in other ways where no such errors exist? I don’t think we would go that far. Not with Morris and DeHaan. Should we impugn fundamentalism because some fundamentalists have echoed similar errors? I don\u2019t think so.<\/p>\n

And may God keep us all from foolish errors in what we say. We are all certainly all too capable of such!<\/p>\n

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A recent series of articles deals with the problem of error creeping into the church. First, an overview of ancient heresies is offered. Second, a modern error by an other-wise well-respected Bible teacher, Henry Morris, is highlighted. And third, an error by M. R. DeHaan with respect to the nature of Christ’s blood is exposed, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[37,69],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2fYWj-pk","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/oxgoad.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1570"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/oxgoad.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/oxgoad.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oxgoad.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oxgoad.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1570"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/oxgoad.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1570\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/oxgoad.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1570"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oxgoad.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1570"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oxgoad.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1570"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}