Church Revival Movement » faithful

Returning to the Blessed Bible

Fri, 25 Jun 2010 11:40:07 +0000

Some 350 years ago, our faithful Reformed forefathers in Scotland took hold of the covenant of grace in their National Covenant, by this means fulfilling their duty and privilege as Christ’s witnessing church in the British Isles. Thus was born the Second, or Covenanted Reformation of religion in those Isles, sustained and greatly furthered by the swearing of the Solemn League and Covenant five years later. The latter “covenanted uniformity of religion” undergirded the work of the famous Westminster Assembly, and bound the covenanting churches and nations to the adoption and implementation of that Assembly’s work (the Confession of Faith, Larger and Shorter Catechisms, Directory for Public Worship, and Form of Church-Government). Sadly, of these churches and nations Scotland was most faithful to pay her vows, and only for a brief time. In 1650, a deadly, Church-dividing blow was dealt by the majority of backsliding civil and ecclesiastical leaders in their support of the “Public Resolutions.” England and Ireland had already broken their sacred bond. The next four decades were times of bitter and often unrelenting trial for the faithful, protesting remnant (which included such men as Samuel Rutherford, Archibald Johnston of Warriston, James Guthrie, Patrick Gillespie, John Brown of Wamphray, Robert M,Ward, William Guthrie, Donald Cargill, Richard Cameron, and James Renwick), who themselves by God’s grace were unrelenting in their testimony against the covenant-breaking Resolutioners and the defections in Church and State. Though the merciless persecution by the civil and ecclesiastical tyrants ended with the Reformation-denying Revolution settlement of 1688, the blessed but short-lived Covenanted Reformation has been, and continues to be, opposed by many, ignored by or unknown to others, and embraced and loved by only a faithful few, who, like their fathers (and unlike the RPCNA today) truly wear the name, “Covenanter.”
There have been many in the last three centuries who have gloriously praised the work of the Westminster Assembly, yet there has been at best only an incomplete adherence to the Assembly’s doctrine and practice. Many factors have contributed to this, of which the foremost must certainly be our wretched failure to receive the love of the truth. Consequently, our righteous God has given the people and nations professing His name over to a profound blindness, in keeping with His fearful threatenings in the Scriptures (2 Thess. 2:10-12; Rom. 1:28; etc.). This “judicial blindness” has led to an increased preaching, publishing, and practicing of numerous errors condemned by our forefathers as Popish on the one hand, and schismatic and Independent on the other, in so-called “Protestant,” “Reformed,” and “Presbyterian” churches. Richard Bacon exemplifies this dreadful dynamic in our day.
As we see, then, our quarrel goes back over three hundred years – and really, back to the dawn of the human race. Our contending is for nothing less than the Crown Rights – the comprehensive Crown Rights – of the blessed promised Seed, the Lord Jesus Christ, which are denied, trampled, and usurped on all sides. The Serpent and his seed throughout the millennia have unceasingly sought and fought to strip the Lamb of God of his due honor and glory in Church and State. The Lamb and his followers have continually met them in battle, being made strong through his Spirit and Word, and through his might “casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ” (2 Cor. 10:5). By such faithful contendings, God has graciously granted two major Reformations in days past: we stand desperately in need of a third. There is great cause for rejoicing in Zion, however, for an increasing number of God’s people are beginning to be awakened, and to return to the blessed biblical attainments of the Covenanted Reformation. We are hopeful that the prayers of the faithful Covenanters of old are being answered: that the rediscovery of their precious principles and practices are nothing less than a prologue to the third reformation and the worldwide overthrow of Antichrist.

“Emerging Church Movement”

Fri, 25 Jun 2010 11:20:43 +0000

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (BP)–A recently developed way of envisioning church known as the “Emerging Church Movement” deals carelessly with Scripture and compromises the Gospel, according to a prominent evangelical scholar and a Southern Baptist seminary president.

But Brian McLaren, one of the movement’s leaders, told Baptist Press that such criticisms are unfounded and that the Emerging Church Movement is “seeking to be more faithful to Christ” in the current postmodern cultural context.

In a book entitled “Becoming Conversant with the Emerging Church,” which is scheduled to be published in June by Zondervan, theologian D.A. Carson defines the Emerging Church Movement as a group of people who believe the church must use new modes of expressing the Gospel as western culture adopts a postmodern mindset.

“At the heart of the ‘movement’ … lies the conviction that changes in the culture signal that a new church is ‘emerging,’” writes Carson, who serves as research professor of New Testament at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in Deerfield, Ill. “Christian leaders must therefore adapt to this emerging church. Those who fail to do so are blind to the cultural accretions that hide the gospel behind forms of thought and modes of expression that no longer communicate with the new generation.”

According to Carson, the movement arose as a protest against the institutional church, modernism and seeker-sensitive churches.

At times it is difficult to identify with precision the participants and parameters of the movement, he writes.

Carson acknowledges that the Emerging Church Movement has encouraged evangelicals to take note of cultural trends and has emphasized authenticity among believers.

He criticizes the movement, however, for a reductionistic understanding of modernism and an inappropriate dismissal of confessional Christianity.

Carson asserts that some Emerging Church leaders are “painfully reductionistic about modernism and the confessional Christianity that forged its way through the modernist period” and that they “give the impression of dismissing” Christianity.

Carson argues that many thinkers in the movement shy away from asserting that Christianity is true and authoritative.

He also argues that the Emerging Church Movement frequently fails to use Scripture as the normative standard of truth and instead appeals to tradition.

In response to Carson, McLaren told Baptist Press that “Dr. Carson doesn’t understand us.”

McLaren, who is the founding pastor of Cedar Ridge Community Church near Baltimore, Md., and was listed as one of 25 influential evangelicals by TIME magazine, said that he rejects the label “movement” to describe the Emerging Church.

“I generally don’t even use the term movement at this point,” he said. “I think it’s more of a conversation. It’s a group of people who are talking about the Gospel and church and mission, especially in terms of changes going on in our culture that some people call a shift from modern to postmodern culture.”

In contrast to the cultural imperialism demonstrated by believers in the past, McLaren believes Christians should present Christianity through loving attitudes rather than logical arguments.

“Those of us in the west now … realize that there were a lot of bad consequences of European and American people trying to tell everybody else how things are,” he said. “We feel that there’s got to be a lot more humility and a lot more gentleness and that the Gospel is made credible not by how we argue and make truth claims. But it’s made credible by the love and the good deeds that flow from our lives and our community.”

R. Albert Mohler Jr., president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Ky., questions McLaren’s claim to be giving a credible witness for the Gospel. In an Internet commentary posted on crosswalk.com Mohler argues that McLaren’s claim to uphold historic Christian faith and simultaneously avoid articulating truth in propositional form is self-contradictory.

Responding to McLaren’s book, “A Generous Orthodoxy,” Mohler writes, “Embracing the worldview of the postmodern age, he embraces relativism at the cost of clarity in matters of truth and intends to redefine Christianity for this new age, largely in terms of an eccentric mixture of elements he would take from virtually every theological position and variant.”

“… As a postmodernist, he considers himself free from any concern for propositional truthfulness, and simply wants the Christian community to embrace a pluriform understanding of truth as a way out of doctrinal conflict and impasse.”

Mohler charges McLaren with speaking about clear-cut issues in an unbiblical and ambiguous manner.

“When it comes to issues such as the exclusivity of the gospel, the identity of Jesus Christ as both fully human and fully divine, the authoritative character of Scripture as written revelation, and the clear teaching of Scripture concerning issues such as homosexuality, this movement simply refuses to answer the questions,” Mohler writes.

“A responsible theological argument must acknowledge that difficult questions demand to be answered. We are not faced with an endless array of doctrinal variants from which we can pick and choose.

“Homosexuality either will or will not be embraced as normative. The church either will or will not accept a radical revisioning of the missionary task. We will either see those who have not come to faith in the Lord Jesus Christ as persons to whom we should extend a clear gospel message and a call for decision, or we will simply come alongside them to tell our story as they tell their own.”

McLaren answers Mohler by saying that he is seeking to contextualize the Gospel as many Southern Baptists do. At times contextualizing the Gospel may mean encouraging people to become followers of Jesus without encouraging them to become a part of the institutional church, McLaren added.

“Dr. Albert Mohler is one of the people who have talked about this,” McLaren said. “But yet there are many Southern Baptists who are doing this very thing. … Many missionaries are … realizing that the issue isn’t whether a person identifies with a religion that now is seen as a western European religion. But the important thing is to help people identify with Jesus and become followers of Jesus.”

When asked whether a person must trust Christ as dying to make atonement for sin in order to be a Christian, McLaren replied, “I want to help people understand everything they can about the cross. … I wouldn’t say that having that understanding (Jesus dying as a substitute for sinful humanity) is all that it means to be a Christian. I think that some people might have that understanding and not be interested in following Jesus. They want Jesus’ blood to pay for their sins so they can go to heaven, but they aren’t really interested in following Jesus in this life.”

McLaren declined to give his opinion on the morality of homosexuality, saying that the issue has become inappropriately political.

“I have my own opinions, but I don’t believe that the smartest thing for me to do is to go around and make those varying opinions a reason to separate myself from other Christians,” he said. “I fellowship with Christians who have a diversity of opinion of this (homosexuality).”

Because of his views on salvation and other issues, the Kentucky Baptist Convention recently withdrew an invitation for McLaren to speak at the convention’s evangelism conference Feb. 28-March 1.

“I respect Dr. McLaren greatly and have appreciated his insight on reaching people in today’s culture,” KBC executive director Bill Mackey said. “We try to bring dynamic speakers to the Evangelism Conference who will challenge and inspire their listeners. I felt that in this instance, however, Dr. McLaren’s position diverges too greatly to be appropriate for this conference.”

Mohler concludes that McLaren and other leaders in the Emergent Church represent “a significant challenge to biblical Christianity.”

“Unwilling to affirm that the Bible contains propositional truths that form the framework for Christian belief, this movement argues that we can have Christian symbolism and substance without those thorny questions of truthfulness that have so vexed the modern mind,” Mohler writes.

“The worldview of postmodernism — complete with an epistemology that denies the possibility of or need for propositional truth — affords the movement an opportunity to hop, skip and jump throughout the Bible and the history Christian thought in order to take whatever pieces they want from one theology and attach them, like doctrinal post-it notes, to whatever picture they would want to draw.”

Four Attitudes Toward Jesus

Fri, 25 Jun 2010 09:33:33 +0000

The celebration of Christmas is once again behind us. Most of us appreciate the spirit of good will that is often present at Christmas time. The joy and gladness of the season are worthy virtues. But now the trees have been dragged out of the house, hauled away, and recycled. The pretty wrapping paper has been torn from the packages and tossed aside. Mechanical toys eventually break. The mirth of Christmas festivities is over. Friends and loved ones, who had come home for the holidays, are now scattered to the ends of the country.
Sometimes the Lord Jesus Christ is crowded cut of the special day that is meant to honor Him most —but no human being can ignore Him and the demands He desires to make on our lives. The Baby born in Bethlehem was sent in order that He would save His people from their sins (Matthew 1:21). The Scriptures again and again—from the first preaching of the gospel in Genesis 3:15, to the final praise of the ransomed hosts in heaven (Revelation 5:13)—declare the necessity of Jesus’ birth so that He could die for sinners. It was man who sinned; it requires a Man to atone for sin. Jesus was “manifested to take away our sins” (1 John 3:5). God’s perfect justice demands that sin be punished; He cannot just pass it by. But being a God of love—and not willing to see mankind perish—God sent Jesus into the world, born in human form so that He could become the sacrificial offering for man’s sin. His death brings peace and reconciliation between our guilty souls and a holy God (Colossians 1:20-23). Christmas is much more than decorated trees, sentimental carols, office parties, and good will calls on neighbors. The Baby laid in a manger was God’s answer to sin.
Those who hold the popular view that there are many roads to heaven, make sincerity the way of salvation. Hinduism claims salvation through a series of reincarnations. Buddhism calls for an elimination of “desire” which supposedly leads to peace of mind and ultimate salvation. Islam contends that we must commit ourselves to the laws of Allah, and hope that good deeds will outweigh bad deeds. The Christian message claims that salvation comes by faith in the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross—provided solely by the unmerited grace of God.
Dr. Dale Bruner (professor at Princeton Theological Seminary) speaks clearly about Christ as the only way to salvation and heaven. He calls the belief Christo-exclusivity. Christ is the exclusive way to God, but we remember that Christ is also inclusive because all are invited.
The first chapter of Hebrews exalts Jesus the Son as the eternal God (Hebrews 1:8). He is the One who laid the foundation of the earth (Hebrews 1:10a). Even the heavens are the work of His hands (Hebrews 1:10b). Jesus is the effulgence of God’s glory (Hebrews 1:3a). In Hebrews 2 Jesus is lifted up again. He died in our place (Hebrews 2:9). He conquered our enemy the devil (Hebrews 2:14b). Jesus secured our salvation (Hebrews 2:17). He will some day reign over the entire earth (Revelation 19:11-16).
The question each human being must face is this: “Do you see Jesus as a helpless baby in a manger, or as the Authority to whom you must some day give an account for the way you have lived?” The cornerstone of the Christian faith centers on Christ’s humanity, His deity, His death and resurrection, as the only basis for our eternal salvation. Many view salvation through Jesus Christ alone as judgmental thinking, and see that belief as a form of bigotry. For some, Christians sound intolerant and narrow when they insist that there is only one way to salvation and heaven. But in declaring that fact, we are only being faithful to what Jesus himself said in John 14:6, and to what the apostles said in passages like Acts 4:12 and 1 John 5:11-12. The real question is: “What attitude will you take toward Jesus?”
The message featured in the current issue of the Witness is the reprinting of a sermon preached many years ago by the British preacher, W.E. Sangster. He was, for a number of years, minister of the Word of God at Westminster Central Hall, a noted preaching center in London. Before his death in 1960, he had written more than a dozen books. He held the conviction that each Christian can strive to live perfectly in an imperfect world. The sermon printed here names four judgments people over the years have held about Jesus.