{"id":1881,"date":"2011-05-09T20:03:06","date_gmt":"2011-05-10T04:03:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/oxgoad.ca\/2011\/05\/09\/why-not-join-the-ces\/"},"modified":"2011-05-09T20:03:06","modified_gmt":"2011-05-10T04:03:06","slug":"why-not-join-the-ces","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/oxgoad.ca\/2011\/05\/09\/why-not-join-the-ces\/","title":{"rendered":"why not join the CEs?"},"content":{"rendered":"

On SI, regular commenter Ron Bean asked the question<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\n

For the sake of summary, simplicity and specificity could someone (perhaps RPittman, who last used this phrase) list some of these many problems of CE’s?<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

I responded with a list of four items<\/a> that came to mind immediately, but I\u2019d like to expand on that list a bit here.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Let me note a couple of things before getting to the list. I am not trying to say that CEs are evil, apostate, the spawn of Satan, or anything anywhere close to those epithets. I began my response to Ron Bean with this paragraph:<\/p>\n

\n

Ron, let me first acknowledge that there are many valuable contributions to Christian thought and life by Conservative Evangelicals. I think most of us who have problems with them do appreciate their ministries (to varying degrees).<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

What I am trying to outline is some items that remain significant barriers to ministry partnership. These are real differences between us. We aren\u2019t just playing party politics as some allege. It\u2019s not just that CEs haven\u2019t gone to \u2018our schools\u2019 or aren\u2019t in \u2018our tribe\u2019 or aren\u2019t located in \u2018our spot\u2019 on the map. These differences involve objectionable beliefs or practices that all conservative evangelicals share in some combination or other. ((That is to say, all CEs are marked by several of these characteristics, though not necessarily all of them.)) They reflect an essential difference in philosophy of the ministry that manifests itself in the various problems I am noting.<\/p>\n

Here are some of the problems from my perspective:<\/p>\n

    \n
      \n

      1. The growing influence of charismatism<\/b><\/p>\n

      The charismatics have major problems when it comes to inspiration, inerrancy and the canon. They either believe in ongoing revelation (denying a closed canon) or they believe the Bible is in error when it expressly says that Agabus spoke his prophecy by the "Spirit". The influence of charismatism has widely altered the shape of evangelicalism at large.<\/p>\n

      The infatuation with charismatism led John Piper and C J Mahaney to a friendly relationship with the Toronto Vineyard "Laughing Revival" phenomenon. Mahaney reportedly led his church in the ‘Toronto Blessing’ in the 90s. Have either Mahaney or Piper publicly repudiated these connections with serious error? I don’t know of any such repudiation.<\/p>\n

      As I am writing about this, an announcement arrives from 9Marks about some speakers at Together for the Gospel<\/a> next year. One speaker will be one of the Sovereign Grace men, Jeff Purswell<\/a>, who will be teaching from 1 Cor 12-14. What do you suppose will be the topic of discussion?<\/p>\n

      I ran across an article from the UK, sounding the alarm about the rise of charismatism in conservative circles because of the ‘Reformed’ connection in the case of Sovereign Grace. The article is a sermon preached at a conference in Northwest England called ‘God’s Glory Our Joy’. The message came from the 2009 conference, links found here<\/a>. The message in question is called " The Charismatic Legacy: The impact of the renewal movement 40 years on". It is available as a Word file on the page linked.<\/p>\n

      The charismatic influence on ‘conservative’ evangelicals is a serious concern. It is not something to be dismissed. One could say that a large part of the collapse of evangelicalism at large is the growth of charismatic influence in its midst.<\/p>\n

      Because of this influence, fundamentalists need to give the conservative evangelicals a wide birth.<\/p>\n<\/ol>\n

        \n

        2. The continuing relationship between CEs and the Billy Graham organization itself.<\/b><\/p>\n

        The most conservative CE of them all, John MacArthur, has spoken in recent years at Graham’s training center, the Cove, and has published articles in Graham’s Decision magazine. The connections between Southern Seminary and the Graham organization are well known. Mark Dever is chairman of the board at Southern. Dever, Mohler, and others continue to affirm the necessary corrective of New Evangelicalism \u2013 needed to correct the ‘excesses’ of fundamentalism \u2013 and yet claim that we don’t need a new New Evangelicalism. Still, we see continuing errors like the signing of the Manhattan Declaration by many well-known conservative evangelicals.<\/p>\n

        3. The inconsistent complementarianism<\/b><\/p>\n

        Complementarianism is the doctrine of male headship \/ leadership in home and church. The doctrine has been ably defended and promoted by conservative evangelicals, yet its tenets are inconsistently applied. I noted this in an earlier post, but John Piper, the ‘grand-daddy’ of complementarians (editor of Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood<\/i>) participated as one of six expositors preaching through Ephesians at the recent Lausanne conference. Two of the other expositors were women. The 9Marks organization recently announced a foray into the Phoenix area<\/a> in a church<\/a> that has a woman deacon and a woman on the ‘ministry staff’. (This latter may be an un-ordained person who is named distinctly from the elders of the church.) Still, one wonders how committed these men are to biblical complementarian ideals.<\/p>\n

        Ironically, complementarianism has given rise to a number of women speakers and writers. They have been promoted for their support of complementarian ideals. And of course they speak at \u2018women\u2019s conferences\u2019 or at \u2018women\u2019s sessions\u2019 in otherwise \u2018male\u2019 conferences. But we find their books and even their messages recommended to men. One recent conference elicited a male<\/strong> recommendation of a female<\/strong> message as \u201cone of the very best I have ever heard.\u201d So much for complementarianism. <\/p>\n

        4. The tolerance of worldliness on many levels<\/b><\/p>\n

        The tolerance of worldliness would include the widespread tolerance of men like Mark Driscoll, and such discussions as you see on SI where gambling and drinking are openly approved. (In moderation \u2026 of course.)<\/p>\n

        In this same category would be the widespread use of worldly music that undermines the gospel message being preached. Almost all the CE ministries usually touted as exemplary are affected by this. <\/p>\n<\/ol>\n<\/ol>\n

        These examples serve as a quick catalog of my concerns with conservative evangelicalism. It is not meant to be an exhaustive list, but simply to show objectively some definite differences between fundamentalists and conservative evangelicals.<\/p>\n

        From a fundamentalist perspective, I think these differences preclude any kind of ministry cooperation. The fundamentalist approach to ministry is just too different from the evangelical approach. I think the evangelical approach leads in a direction I don\u2019t want to go, nor do I want the people I serve to head in that direction because of my failure to maintain a clearly distinct ministry.<\/p>\n

        \"don_sig2\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

        On SI, regular commenter Ron Bean asked the question: For the sake of summary, simplicity and specificity could someone (perhaps RPittman, who last used this phrase) list some of these many problems of CE’s? I responded with a list of four items that came to mind immediately, but I\u2019d like to expand on that list […]<\/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,"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[105,37,71,44],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2fYWj-ul","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/oxgoad.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1881"}],"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=1881"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/oxgoad.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1881\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/oxgoad.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1881"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oxgoad.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1881"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oxgoad.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1881"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}