A modern model which everyone knows
In discussing this matter of decisionism, perhaps the one most well known example of its practice is Billy Graham, who, by the way, identifies himself as a Baptist, although I am not sure that he would call himself a Fundamentalist. But his adaptations and practice of Finney’s “new measures” are starkly visible in our day, appearing of television regularly. Over the years, Graham’s practices have changed but little [though some might say that his theology has gone from bad to much worse]. The same ritual is observed over and over again. First comes the singing of songs, followed by the “testimony” of a famous person or someone recently in the news, followed by some more singing, which is followed by Graham’s message, usually rather straightforward evangelical fare which some have pilloried as “three points and a poem.” But then, after the message comes what most Fundamentalists would characterize as the most important part of the service: the “invitation” or “altar call.” In this [non-biblical] practice, an emotional appeal is made to the audience to step out of their seats and come forward, usually to a platform [the “altar,” I would surmise] in the middle of an arena or football field to make their decision to receive Christ publicly [no mention is ever made of baptism]. Rev. Graham continues to appeal to the audience for a few minutes and then the choir softly sings the standard “invitation” hymn “Just as I am.” This goes on until the telecast leaves the air. In the news the next day, there is often a claim that Graham had a very “successful” crusade [a strange name for an evangelical meeting, I might add] and that many people responded to the invitation, usually numbering in the thousands. This same ritual has been repeated many times during the last half of the 20th century. It is the theology that underlies this practice which I am interested in. Why is this done this way? Is this the way the Gospel was preached and evangelism practiced during the first 1900 years of the church? What Biblical practices of the New Testament church is Graham following? Is this ubiquitous practice the center of New Testament evangelism, as the modernFundamentalists claim? The answer for any fair reader of church history is a resounding no.
The Work of the Holy Spirit, or pragmatic humanism?
Let’s go back to Charles Finney again for a moment, the famous [or infamous, to some of us] evangelist of the middle 1800s. Why has he had such an impact on American Fundamentalism and evangelicalism? Was he himself a fundamentalist? Was he a Baptist? Were the “new measures” commonly used before his day? Why did he use them? What did he believe that would cause him to employ such [apparently] manipulative methods of evangelism? Is there something of substance that we can grasp onto? I submit that there is.
Finney was theologically a Pelagian. It was his view, like Pelagius of the 5th century, that man had the plenary ability of choose the good, that is, to rationally decide by an act of the will to believe in God and thus be saved. In his mind, salvation did not involve the work which is called “the new birth,” that is, a supernatural and spiritual work of the Holy Spirit that imparted new life to the spiritually dead soul of the sinner and enabling faith and repentance. Rather, he believed that man was equipped with plenary power of will, that man’s will was radically free, even to the power of contrary choice, that is, to be able to choose that which is against the ruling disposition of the will. These things are beyond our blog to treat to the fullest extent, but suffice it to say that Finney, because of these beliefs, was no Baptist!
The point that I am making is that Finney, with his underlying Pelagian theology, could in good conscience [so to speak] employ such persuasive techniques because he fully believed that man had the ability to be persuaded, given the right information and in the right manner, to believe to his own salvation. Given that understanding, for the sake of argument, the use of such persuasive and emotion-laden techniques and methods were quite consistent with his theology. In other words, there was a method to his madness; he practiced what he preached. Unfortunately what he preached was heresy, and consequently his methods were too.
Ah, but don’t wave a red flag in front of a Fundamentalist, for he is liable to charge the red flag without hesitation. Some of the Fundamentalists saw that Finney was “successful” with such methods, and immediately began to uncritically adapt them into their own practice. A kind of crass pragmatism became the rule of the day. Most of the Baptist Fundamentalists did not understand the nexus between theology and evangelical practice, so even today they are perplexed when someone criticizes Finney or Finney’s methods. “You have to give everyone a chance to be saved!” said one man to me when he saw that I did not employ the altar call in my ministry. For him it was heresy for me NOT to offer an invitation to come down the aisle and “receive Jesus into your heart,” as the saying goes. Little did he know that the Church existed worldwide for nearly 1900 years before these techniques were even seen. These innovations were to have a devastating eroding effect on evangelicalism for the next 100 years at least, and maybe more, as that train continues on down the track, propelled by an appalling ignorance but an equally powerful zeal, yet without knowledge.
Pragmatic Humanism takes the day
The Fundamental Baptists were enamored with these “effective” techniques, as far as producing numbers, that is. Statistics were and continue to be elevated to iconic status in Fundamental Baptist ranks, with more energy expended and more attention given to the tally of figures of attendance, professions of faith [so called] and the like than just about anything else. Indeed, ministries are ended by poor “performance” as it relates to numbers. As a result, Fundamentalist pastors turn over nearly as fast as professional baseball managers or professional football coaches who don’t win their division or go to the Super Bowl. And no wonder.
Do you not see it? If you have a theology that says that man is the determining factor in salvation (humanistic), and the pressure to produce conversions and professions (church growth), you have a potent temptation to employ just about every method that can produce a favorable outcome [usually having to do with numbers again]. In my own view, the church-growth, mega-church, give-them-what-they-want kind of “doing church” that we see in today’s world is nothing but a modern version of this same principle of pragmatism and nothing new at all. I suspect that if we scratch the surface a bit, we will find Pelagius underneath it all. That seems to be the one common factor in the whole phenomenon.
Pelagianism in a Baptist Church? Have mercy!
Actually, the central core elements of pure Pelagianism are less common today than in the 5th century when Augustine and Pelagius fought tooth and toenail over the issue of man’s depravity and the effects of the Fall on mankind. Today, Pelagianism has morphed into Arminianism and semi-Pelagianism, the doctrine approved by the Catholic Church at the Council of Trent and which it continues to practice and believe. Would it not be perverse to find that the Fundamentalists actually believed and practiced essentially the same thing as their mortal enemy, the Catholic Church? Indeed it would. But alas! It is true!
Next: Who are the real Fundamentalists?
Friday, November 18, 2005
Thursday, November 17, 2005
About my conversion
As I mentioned in a previous post here, I and another brother from our church make it a practice to visit a variety of other churches in our area to see first hand what is happening in the churches of our community. I selected a Fundamental Baptist church for a personal reason, really. I had been brought to faith by the Spirit back in 1964 and the first church I was sort of drafted into was a Fundamental Baptist Church in West Texas (Big Spring, to be exact). I was 22 years old at the time, back from a military stint in Turkey, in an area of Turkey known in the New Testament era as Pontus (some maps show Bythynia). I did not have a clue as to the importance of that geographical point of interest, for I was a sinner lost and undone at the time, having no interest in religion at all, indeed, scornful of religious people as those who were weak in the mind and required some sort of crutch to get through life. I had always believed that men who took to Christianity were just a little bit too effeminate for me, for in the military in my day it was considered common knowledge that the men who became pastoral assistants at the base chapels were predominately homosexual men, if not all of them. But I finally returned from my tour of duty on the backside of the world, transferred to the backside of the desert in West Texas.
My Backside of the Desert Experience
Little did I know it at the time, but the very first day I reported for duty at my new station in Big Spring (Webb AFB, a pilot training base), I met the man that the Lord had commanded to preach the eternal Gospel of Jesus Christ to me. His name was Jack Burkholder. He was a military man, too, and had only professed his faith in Christ a short time before. He began to witness the Gospel to me, but I was *not* a willing recipient. He began to list my house on the Thursday evening visitation which his Fundamental Baptist church conducted every week. Being a generally polite Midwesterner, I was reluctant to just tell them to go away, so I would let Jack and one of the deacons into my home and listen, if a little impatiently, to their assertion that I was a condemned sinner before God and that the only answer for my sinful condemnation was to believe on the Lord Jesus.
Having a gifted mind and a pretty good vocabulary, I discovered a multitude of ways to be sarcastic, mean and insulting to the men who came to my house. Tactically placed expletives were often used, and downright nasty epitaphs were common in my speech. I was determined to drive them out of my life. Mind you, that was difficult, for Jack was also assigned to my unit on the base and I saw him every day. But I was determined to make them so uncomfortable that they would leave me alone.
Drifting …
The months passed by, and they continued for a time to visit my home, enduring my incessant insolence and insults towards Christ and them personally. I am sure that they were extremely discouraged after some months had passed. After a while, I began to make sure that I was gone on the nights of visitation from the church, or sometimes did not answer the door, though I am sure that they knew I was home. They endured the embarrassment with what now I know to be Christian courage. In a conversation with Jack at work, I angrily told him not to return to our house at all, to stay away. He reluctantly complied with my wishes and they suspended any further contact.
Again, weeks and then months passed, with little or no contact from the church. During the time that they first were coming, I was coerced into going to the church on at least one occasion, but I hated every moment, and believed that the men had “briefed” the pastor on all the things that I had ever said so that he could hone in on me. My response, however, was not conviction, but anger and disdain for anything Christian and against that church and Jack. I was, for all practical purposes, separated from them and for the most part had achieved my goal to be left alone. I settled in to enjoy life without their interruptions.
“The Wind Bloweth Where it Listeth”
Weeks and months go by. As the days and weeks slipped by, I suddenly became aware of a morose feeling in my mind and heart. Suddenly I was depressed, sullen and withdrawn. A sense of dread entered my mind and I fell into what today they would probably call a kind of clinical depression. I was not easy to live with and had this constant foreboding mindset and attitude. I suddenly felt that I was utterly worthless and completely without hope in life. Nothing made sense anymore, and I was in desperate despair, perhaps the lowest time in my life, now that I think about it.
That Withering Work
All those things that those men had read from the Scriptures kept leaping into my mind. I heard the Gospel preached, not now by the men, but from my own mind which had absorbed the things that they had said without even realizing it. But now something was different: I saw my condition and my condemnation so clearly that I was what the Scriptures would call “nigh unto death.” I did not know what to call this until much later. I had come under what Spurgeon called the “Withering Work of the Spirit.” I had been born from above, regenerated, brought from death to life and into a withering sense of sin and degradation. I recall that I had the idea that I was beyond the help of God; that I was without hope of ever recovering from this awful sense of sin and degradation. I was a miserable man, in the fullest sense of that word. What to do?
On the level of the flesh, I was far too embarrassed to tell Jack what was or had happened to me, for I knew he would say, “I told you so!” So, I continued alone in my misery for a number of weeks, slowing crumbling under a heavy load of sin and shame.
“I woke, the dungeon flamed with light…”
I do not know when it occurred, nor do I recall any verbalized prayer or anything, but one day I internally cried out to God for mercy, confessing my sins profusely before Him, privately surrendering my wounded soul to Jesus Christ in a way entirely antithetical to the thinking of the old Vic Edwards. Such a confession would have been out of the question for the old Vic, and only something explosive could bring me to that point of desperate and utter surrender.
In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, I was relieved of my guilt and despair and was immediately granted a spirit of joy. I can think of no earthly words to describe it. All of the guilt, of all the pain and despair was gone, nailed to the cross by Jesus Christ as the men had told me so many times. I had been running from God all my life, and in these last days was in a mad rush to run from the influence and drawing that I was experiencing. At no time could I remove the thoughts of Christ and the cross from my mind. Those thoughts haunted me like the hounds of heaven. I hated it at the time and tried desperately to use every ploy I could think of to escape the awful presence that I felt. Yes, there was even terror, which I could only admit much later after I was a believer for some time. I actually thought that God would kill me for my rebellion and hatred toward Him and his servants, and I experienced moments of abject terror in my mind.
No Seeker, I
I will tell you that I was never a “seeker” of God. Until the very last moment, I was running hell-bent from Christ and from God and from everything Christian. I thought that it was those things that were causing my agonies and pains, and in a way, that is what it turned out to be. Years later, I was to share my testimony with Dr. Curt Daniel, now a friend of mine, and I recall telling him that God chased me down, wrestled me to the ground and put a new heart in me so that I was enabled to come forth out of that spiritual grave. This is still my testimony. I never sought God; He ALWAYS sought me, with a relentless purpose that I now know was His sovereign purpose according to election. I was truly born from above, given new birth from above by the washing of regeneration, a compete and utter translation from the kingdom of darkness into the light of the kingdom of God’s dear Son, all in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye. One reason that I am a convinced Calvinist today is my own experience of the work of God’s salvation in my soul. I have no illusions that my faith warranted salvation; my faith was a gift of God’s almighty power enabling me to see the kingdom of God. I hated God one moment and loved Him the next. I cannot explain that, I can only report it.
Peace that Passes Understanding
Now that I have been in the Lord for more than 41 years, I have had many opportunities to reflect and do some analysis of that work that God had performed in my soul. Every time I do that, I am wonderfully blessed more than ever by seeing the awesome sovereign good pleasure of God at work to bring this filthy sinner to faith. I have little patience for those who claim that it was because they “decided to receive Jesus into my heart” that God then saved them. That is not my experience at all, indeed, quite the opposite. Since that time, I have been blessed to learn of Him more and more that “Salvation is of the Lord,” and not of him who runs, or of him who wills, but of God who shows mercy and effectually calls His sheep. Blessed be the name of Christ for His infinite love for this condemned sinner, and for the gift of His grace to give me new birth from above so that I might believe the Gospel and enter into that eternal kingdom of God!
If you become a regular reader of my blog, you will soon learn that my conversion experience plays a huge part of my understanding of doctrine and the ordo salutis, or how God goes about the work of saving His elect sheep. I am a convinced Calvinist for two reasons, primarily: 1) because that seems to be the manifest teaching of the Bible, and 2) it is entirely consistent with my own personal experience with God’s Spirit in His work of salvation in my soul. The work of God in my soul was for me no less dramatic that the work of the Spirit in the soul of the Apostle Paul. Both he and I were brought to faith while actively hating and “kicking against the pricks,” as Jesus said when He appeared to Paul on the road to Damascus. I have no illusions of wanting to come to Jesus, for there was nothing in my soul prior to the work of God Almighty to want me to do that. Only His sovereign, powerful work, the same power by which He raised Jesus from the dead, raised me from spiritual death to spiritual life. I owe an eternal debt to my Lord Jesus Christ for this great love with which He loved me. I am fully aware that there is no way that I can fill up the measure of my debt to him, but I can surely die trying. May God grant that desire of my heart.
My prayer: That God will finish that good work which He began in my soul; that my life will be spent praising and rejoicing because of this great redeeming love of God; that I might obey Him in every way, in honor of His great sacrifice for me, the greatest of sinners. May His name be glorified in my life and in my obedience to my precious Lord Jesus Christ and to God the Father who sent His Son into the world to save sinners like me. Soli Deo Gloria!
My Backside of the Desert Experience
Little did I know it at the time, but the very first day I reported for duty at my new station in Big Spring (Webb AFB, a pilot training base), I met the man that the Lord had commanded to preach the eternal Gospel of Jesus Christ to me. His name was Jack Burkholder. He was a military man, too, and had only professed his faith in Christ a short time before. He began to witness the Gospel to me, but I was *not* a willing recipient. He began to list my house on the Thursday evening visitation which his Fundamental Baptist church conducted every week. Being a generally polite Midwesterner, I was reluctant to just tell them to go away, so I would let Jack and one of the deacons into my home and listen, if a little impatiently, to their assertion that I was a condemned sinner before God and that the only answer for my sinful condemnation was to believe on the Lord Jesus.
Having a gifted mind and a pretty good vocabulary, I discovered a multitude of ways to be sarcastic, mean and insulting to the men who came to my house. Tactically placed expletives were often used, and downright nasty epitaphs were common in my speech. I was determined to drive them out of my life. Mind you, that was difficult, for Jack was also assigned to my unit on the base and I saw him every day. But I was determined to make them so uncomfortable that they would leave me alone.
Drifting …
The months passed by, and they continued for a time to visit my home, enduring my incessant insolence and insults towards Christ and them personally. I am sure that they were extremely discouraged after some months had passed. After a while, I began to make sure that I was gone on the nights of visitation from the church, or sometimes did not answer the door, though I am sure that they knew I was home. They endured the embarrassment with what now I know to be Christian courage. In a conversation with Jack at work, I angrily told him not to return to our house at all, to stay away. He reluctantly complied with my wishes and they suspended any further contact.
Again, weeks and then months passed, with little or no contact from the church. During the time that they first were coming, I was coerced into going to the church on at least one occasion, but I hated every moment, and believed that the men had “briefed” the pastor on all the things that I had ever said so that he could hone in on me. My response, however, was not conviction, but anger and disdain for anything Christian and against that church and Jack. I was, for all practical purposes, separated from them and for the most part had achieved my goal to be left alone. I settled in to enjoy life without their interruptions.
“The Wind Bloweth Where it Listeth”
Weeks and months go by. As the days and weeks slipped by, I suddenly became aware of a morose feeling in my mind and heart. Suddenly I was depressed, sullen and withdrawn. A sense of dread entered my mind and I fell into what today they would probably call a kind of clinical depression. I was not easy to live with and had this constant foreboding mindset and attitude. I suddenly felt that I was utterly worthless and completely without hope in life. Nothing made sense anymore, and I was in desperate despair, perhaps the lowest time in my life, now that I think about it.
That Withering Work
All those things that those men had read from the Scriptures kept leaping into my mind. I heard the Gospel preached, not now by the men, but from my own mind which had absorbed the things that they had said without even realizing it. But now something was different: I saw my condition and my condemnation so clearly that I was what the Scriptures would call “nigh unto death.” I did not know what to call this until much later. I had come under what Spurgeon called the “Withering Work of the Spirit.” I had been born from above, regenerated, brought from death to life and into a withering sense of sin and degradation. I recall that I had the idea that I was beyond the help of God; that I was without hope of ever recovering from this awful sense of sin and degradation. I was a miserable man, in the fullest sense of that word. What to do?
On the level of the flesh, I was far too embarrassed to tell Jack what was or had happened to me, for I knew he would say, “I told you so!” So, I continued alone in my misery for a number of weeks, slowing crumbling under a heavy load of sin and shame.
“I woke, the dungeon flamed with light…”
I do not know when it occurred, nor do I recall any verbalized prayer or anything, but one day I internally cried out to God for mercy, confessing my sins profusely before Him, privately surrendering my wounded soul to Jesus Christ in a way entirely antithetical to the thinking of the old Vic Edwards. Such a confession would have been out of the question for the old Vic, and only something explosive could bring me to that point of desperate and utter surrender.
In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, I was relieved of my guilt and despair and was immediately granted a spirit of joy. I can think of no earthly words to describe it. All of the guilt, of all the pain and despair was gone, nailed to the cross by Jesus Christ as the men had told me so many times. I had been running from God all my life, and in these last days was in a mad rush to run from the influence and drawing that I was experiencing. At no time could I remove the thoughts of Christ and the cross from my mind. Those thoughts haunted me like the hounds of heaven. I hated it at the time and tried desperately to use every ploy I could think of to escape the awful presence that I felt. Yes, there was even terror, which I could only admit much later after I was a believer for some time. I actually thought that God would kill me for my rebellion and hatred toward Him and his servants, and I experienced moments of abject terror in my mind.
No Seeker, I
I will tell you that I was never a “seeker” of God. Until the very last moment, I was running hell-bent from Christ and from God and from everything Christian. I thought that it was those things that were causing my agonies and pains, and in a way, that is what it turned out to be. Years later, I was to share my testimony with Dr. Curt Daniel, now a friend of mine, and I recall telling him that God chased me down, wrestled me to the ground and put a new heart in me so that I was enabled to come forth out of that spiritual grave. This is still my testimony. I never sought God; He ALWAYS sought me, with a relentless purpose that I now know was His sovereign purpose according to election. I was truly born from above, given new birth from above by the washing of regeneration, a compete and utter translation from the kingdom of darkness into the light of the kingdom of God’s dear Son, all in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye. One reason that I am a convinced Calvinist today is my own experience of the work of God’s salvation in my soul. I have no illusions that my faith warranted salvation; my faith was a gift of God’s almighty power enabling me to see the kingdom of God. I hated God one moment and loved Him the next. I cannot explain that, I can only report it.
Peace that Passes Understanding
Now that I have been in the Lord for more than 41 years, I have had many opportunities to reflect and do some analysis of that work that God had performed in my soul. Every time I do that, I am wonderfully blessed more than ever by seeing the awesome sovereign good pleasure of God at work to bring this filthy sinner to faith. I have little patience for those who claim that it was because they “decided to receive Jesus into my heart” that God then saved them. That is not my experience at all, indeed, quite the opposite. Since that time, I have been blessed to learn of Him more and more that “Salvation is of the Lord,” and not of him who runs, or of him who wills, but of God who shows mercy and effectually calls His sheep. Blessed be the name of Christ for His infinite love for this condemned sinner, and for the gift of His grace to give me new birth from above so that I might believe the Gospel and enter into that eternal kingdom of God!
If you become a regular reader of my blog, you will soon learn that my conversion experience plays a huge part of my understanding of doctrine and the ordo salutis, or how God goes about the work of saving His elect sheep. I am a convinced Calvinist for two reasons, primarily: 1) because that seems to be the manifest teaching of the Bible, and 2) it is entirely consistent with my own personal experience with God’s Spirit in His work of salvation in my soul. The work of God in my soul was for me no less dramatic that the work of the Spirit in the soul of the Apostle Paul. Both he and I were brought to faith while actively hating and “kicking against the pricks,” as Jesus said when He appeared to Paul on the road to Damascus. I have no illusions of wanting to come to Jesus, for there was nothing in my soul prior to the work of God Almighty to want me to do that. Only His sovereign, powerful work, the same power by which He raised Jesus from the dead, raised me from spiritual death to spiritual life. I owe an eternal debt to my Lord Jesus Christ for this great love with which He loved me. I am fully aware that there is no way that I can fill up the measure of my debt to him, but I can surely die trying. May God grant that desire of my heart.
My prayer: That God will finish that good work which He began in my soul; that my life will be spent praising and rejoicing because of this great redeeming love of God; that I might obey Him in every way, in honor of His great sacrifice for me, the greatest of sinners. May His name be glorified in my life and in my obedience to my precious Lord Jesus Christ and to God the Father who sent His Son into the world to save sinners like me. Soli Deo Gloria!
Tuesday, November 15, 2005
Ich ben ein Fundamentalist [Part 2]
From Meteoric Rise to Flaming Crash in One Century
In my previous article, I mentioned that there were two things about Baptist Fundamentalism that I found useful and good: their focus on the Bible as the inerrant Word of God and their zeal for evangelism. In this issue, we trace those two things as they played out in the Fundamental Baptist ranks in the United States, particularly in Texas, where I am most familiar with the movement, being part of it for a number of years.
Despite the fact that the two focuses of Fundamental Baptists seemed at first glance to be fine and proper things, the truth of the matter is that in an effort to be “successful,” both those commendable goals were soon corrupted in the ranks of Fundamental Baptists, and this state of affairs continues to plague the movement [what’s left of it] to this very day. I will use these two things to illustrate this corruption of truth.
First, there is the corruption of evangelism, expressed most clearly in Fundamentalism by the practice of decisionism, and its concomitant perversion, the “altar call,” or “invitation” system, sometimes called ritualized regeneration. The second corrupting thing is more a view than a practice. What is a sound doctrine, the verbal inspiration of the Scriptures and the assertion of the sufficiency and inerrancy of the Holy Scriptures, is by the Fundamentalists diluted into the pathetic, perverted and profoundly ignorant view called “King James Only-ism.” That these things are part and parcel of Fundamentalism is vividly displayed and attested to by the fact that I saw them both portrayed in use this very last weekend here in Holland, MI. These perversions have not abated a bit among Fundamentalist churches - and they seem all the more proud of the fact, instead of the shame that they ought to feel.
Decisionism, the foundation of the altar call
We will speak to the issue of the perversion of Biblical evangelism which we termed ritualized regeneration or decisionism first, since I believe it is directly related to the other errors. What do I mean by ritualized regeneration? By this charge I mean to suggest that the Fundamentalists have abandoned Biblical evangelism altogether and replaced it with a ritual that to them passes for what among the Fundamentalists is thought to be the new birth. In fact, the idea that salvation or the new birth is a human decision or based on a human decision is in fact a horrible heresy which strikes at the very heart of the Gospel of Christ. Instead of a practice that should be pursued, it is a perversion that ought to be immediately condemned and eradicated from the earth. Strong language, for sure, but deserved; I will argue my case in future installments here on my blog.
In the Fundamental Baptist mind, the new birth is a decision made by man. To aggravate the matter, they follow the Arminian view of the ordo salutis, putting faith and repentance before the new birth. It is “man’s part,” the common verbal invitation puts it: “God has done his part, now it’s your turn to do your part.” Then there is this one: “Satan has cast his vote for you. God has cast his vote for you. Now you must vote to determine who will win your soul.” Those kinds of statements, or something close to them, are heard repeatedly in Fundamental Baptist churches even though such statement manifestly teach the very same doctrine of soteriology as the Catholic Church! That’s right: it is in essence the same as what the Catholic Church teaches, as well as the Arminianism of the Methodist Church. In fact, it is so obvious that I sometimes, with a bit of biting sarcasm, call my Fundamental Baptist friends “Catholic-Baptists,” or “Methodist-Baptists,” because their doctrine of salvation is far more closely related to the doctrines of those denominations than to any historic Baptist view. The irony of this is that Fundamentalism has always considered the Roman Catholic Church as its mortal enemy, with Methodism and its entire sanctification not far behind . And yet, at the turn of this new century, it is clear and obvious that Fundamental Baptists apparently teach essentially the same view as those two denominations: soteriological synergism.
Synergism versus Monergism
What it that? One excellent web site has this definition:
Monergism: The view that the Holy Spirit is the only agent who effects regeneration of Christians. It is in contrast with synergism, the view that there is a cooperation between the divine and the human in the regeneration process. Monergism is a redemptive blessing purchased by Christ for those the Father has given Him (1 Pet 1:3, John 3:5,6, 6:37, 39). This grace works independently of any human cooperation and conveys that power into the fallen soul whereby the person who is to be saved is effectually enabled to respond to the gospel call (John 1:13; Acts 2:39, 13:48; Rom 9:16).
B.B. Warfield, a noted Reformed theologian, says it most plainly in an article entitled “The Plan of Salvation.” He maintains, and rightly in my estimation, that there are at the end of the day but two forms of salvation: synergism and monergism.
The opposition between the two systems was thus absolute. In the one, everything was attributed to man; in the other, everything was ascribed to God. In them, two religions, the only two possible religions at bottom, met in mortal combat: the religion of faith and the religion of works; the religion which despairs of self and casts all its hope on God the Saviour, and the religion which puts complete trust in self; or since religion is in its very nature utter dependence on God, religion in the purity of its conception and a mere quasi-religious moralism.
Further, Warfield said of Pelagianism, the system which I believe is at the root of Fundamental Baptist theology as practiced in the churches today, the following:
The Pelagian scheme therefore embraces the following points. God has endowed man with an inalienable freedom of will, by virtue of which he is fully able to do all that can be required of him. To this great gift God has added the gifts of the law and the gospel to illuminate the way of righteousness and to persuade man to walk in it; and even the gift of Christ to supply an expiation for past sins for all who will do righteousness, and especially to set a good example. Those who, under these inducements and in the power of their ineradicable freedom, turn from their sins and do righteousness, will be accepted by the righteous God and rewarded according to their deeds.
This distinction is a telling one. A fair reading of the paragraph above, one can see the parallels with the modern Arminian Fundamentalist church. Phrases such as “inalienable freedom of will” and “fully able to do all that can be required of him” peal forth regularly from Fundamentalist pulpits. The Fundamental Baptist today would, upon reading the above, say: “So? What’s the problem with that?” The very notion which the practice of decisionism suggests is that the work of salvation is a cooperative work between God and the sinner and not the sole and sovereign work of the Spirit of God in granting spiritual birth from above. God has his part in convicting of sin, but man has his part in deciding whether or not he [the sinner] will allow God to save him. In that view, common in Fundamental Baptist ranks, God appears to be the Great Cajoler, who spends His time trying to get people to believe the Gospel but is unable to prevail with any sinner unless and until that sinner, by some plenary power of human free will, allows God to work his “magic.” It is this awful theology that ironically makes the Fundamental Baptist practice of decisionism a first cousin of Catholicism. Catholicism believes the exact same thing: man must cooperate with God to be saved. In the instance of Catholicism, man’s part is doing works of merit (good works), and though the Fundamentalist would be loath to admit so crass a thing as that, in fact their own system and practice equate to the very same thing. Man must first exercise his faith [which, they, the Catholics and Arminians say, God grants to all men] to give God permission or to allow God to give him the new birth. To put it bluntly, the new birth in the Fundamental Baptist mind is God reacting to the faith of man, not the sinner responding to God’s work of regeneration [the new birth; being born from above] by believing and repenting. In this they unfortunately put the cart before the horse. And it is a serious, and even an eternally fatal error.
In my previous article, I mentioned that there were two things about Baptist Fundamentalism that I found useful and good: their focus on the Bible as the inerrant Word of God and their zeal for evangelism. In this issue, we trace those two things as they played out in the Fundamental Baptist ranks in the United States, particularly in Texas, where I am most familiar with the movement, being part of it for a number of years.
Despite the fact that the two focuses of Fundamental Baptists seemed at first glance to be fine and proper things, the truth of the matter is that in an effort to be “successful,” both those commendable goals were soon corrupted in the ranks of Fundamental Baptists, and this state of affairs continues to plague the movement [what’s left of it] to this very day. I will use these two things to illustrate this corruption of truth.
First, there is the corruption of evangelism, expressed most clearly in Fundamentalism by the practice of decisionism, and its concomitant perversion, the “altar call,” or “invitation” system, sometimes called ritualized regeneration. The second corrupting thing is more a view than a practice. What is a sound doctrine, the verbal inspiration of the Scriptures and the assertion of the sufficiency and inerrancy of the Holy Scriptures, is by the Fundamentalists diluted into the pathetic, perverted and profoundly ignorant view called “King James Only-ism.” That these things are part and parcel of Fundamentalism is vividly displayed and attested to by the fact that I saw them both portrayed in use this very last weekend here in Holland, MI. These perversions have not abated a bit among Fundamentalist churches - and they seem all the more proud of the fact, instead of the shame that they ought to feel.
Decisionism, the foundation of the altar call
We will speak to the issue of the perversion of Biblical evangelism which we termed ritualized regeneration or decisionism first, since I believe it is directly related to the other errors. What do I mean by ritualized regeneration? By this charge I mean to suggest that the Fundamentalists have abandoned Biblical evangelism altogether and replaced it with a ritual that to them passes for what among the Fundamentalists is thought to be the new birth. In fact, the idea that salvation or the new birth is a human decision or based on a human decision is in fact a horrible heresy which strikes at the very heart of the Gospel of Christ. Instead of a practice that should be pursued, it is a perversion that ought to be immediately condemned and eradicated from the earth. Strong language, for sure, but deserved; I will argue my case in future installments here on my blog.
In the Fundamental Baptist mind, the new birth is a decision made by man. To aggravate the matter, they follow the Arminian view of the ordo salutis, putting faith and repentance before the new birth. It is “man’s part,” the common verbal invitation puts it: “God has done his part, now it’s your turn to do your part.” Then there is this one: “Satan has cast his vote for you. God has cast his vote for you. Now you must vote to determine who will win your soul.” Those kinds of statements, or something close to them, are heard repeatedly in Fundamental Baptist churches even though such statement manifestly teach the very same doctrine of soteriology as the Catholic Church! That’s right: it is in essence the same as what the Catholic Church teaches, as well as the Arminianism of the Methodist Church. In fact, it is so obvious that I sometimes, with a bit of biting sarcasm, call my Fundamental Baptist friends “Catholic-Baptists,” or “Methodist-Baptists,” because their doctrine of salvation is far more closely related to the doctrines of those denominations than to any historic Baptist view. The irony of this is that Fundamentalism has always considered the Roman Catholic Church as its mortal enemy, with Methodism and its entire sanctification not far behind . And yet, at the turn of this new century, it is clear and obvious that Fundamental Baptists apparently teach essentially the same view as those two denominations: soteriological synergism.
Synergism versus Monergism
What it that? One excellent web site has this definition:
Monergism: The view that the Holy Spirit is the only agent who effects regeneration of Christians. It is in contrast with synergism, the view that there is a cooperation between the divine and the human in the regeneration process. Monergism is a redemptive blessing purchased by Christ for those the Father has given Him (1 Pet 1:3, John 3:5,6, 6:37, 39). This grace works independently of any human cooperation and conveys that power into the fallen soul whereby the person who is to be saved is effectually enabled to respond to the gospel call (John 1:13; Acts 2:39, 13:48; Rom 9:16).
B.B. Warfield, a noted Reformed theologian, says it most plainly in an article entitled “The Plan of Salvation.” He maintains, and rightly in my estimation, that there are at the end of the day but two forms of salvation: synergism and monergism.
The opposition between the two systems was thus absolute. In the one, everything was attributed to man; in the other, everything was ascribed to God. In them, two religions, the only two possible religions at bottom, met in mortal combat: the religion of faith and the religion of works; the religion which despairs of self and casts all its hope on God the Saviour, and the religion which puts complete trust in self; or since religion is in its very nature utter dependence on God, religion in the purity of its conception and a mere quasi-religious moralism.
Further, Warfield said of Pelagianism, the system which I believe is at the root of Fundamental Baptist theology as practiced in the churches today, the following:
The Pelagian scheme therefore embraces the following points. God has endowed man with an inalienable freedom of will, by virtue of which he is fully able to do all that can be required of him. To this great gift God has added the gifts of the law and the gospel to illuminate the way of righteousness and to persuade man to walk in it; and even the gift of Christ to supply an expiation for past sins for all who will do righteousness, and especially to set a good example. Those who, under these inducements and in the power of their ineradicable freedom, turn from their sins and do righteousness, will be accepted by the righteous God and rewarded according to their deeds.
This distinction is a telling one. A fair reading of the paragraph above, one can see the parallels with the modern Arminian Fundamentalist church. Phrases such as “inalienable freedom of will” and “fully able to do all that can be required of him” peal forth regularly from Fundamentalist pulpits. The Fundamental Baptist today would, upon reading the above, say: “So? What’s the problem with that?” The very notion which the practice of decisionism suggests is that the work of salvation is a cooperative work between God and the sinner and not the sole and sovereign work of the Spirit of God in granting spiritual birth from above. God has his part in convicting of sin, but man has his part in deciding whether or not he [the sinner] will allow God to save him. In that view, common in Fundamental Baptist ranks, God appears to be the Great Cajoler, who spends His time trying to get people to believe the Gospel but is unable to prevail with any sinner unless and until that sinner, by some plenary power of human free will, allows God to work his “magic.” It is this awful theology that ironically makes the Fundamental Baptist practice of decisionism a first cousin of Catholicism. Catholicism believes the exact same thing: man must cooperate with God to be saved. In the instance of Catholicism, man’s part is doing works of merit (good works), and though the Fundamentalist would be loath to admit so crass a thing as that, in fact their own system and practice equate to the very same thing. Man must first exercise his faith [which, they, the Catholics and Arminians say, God grants to all men] to give God permission or to allow God to give him the new birth. To put it bluntly, the new birth in the Fundamental Baptist mind is God reacting to the faith of man, not the sinner responding to God’s work of regeneration [the new birth; being born from above] by believing and repenting. In this they unfortunately put the cart before the horse. And it is a serious, and even an eternally fatal error.
A Reluctant Snapshot
I am quite reluctant to include a photo on my blog, but I must admit that I desire to see and know the brothers with whom I fellowship and imagine that they might feel the same. I do not wish to attract any groupies, either [he says, tongue in cheek]. I am afraid that the quality of the picture is not good, as it was taken with a really low-quality digital cam which we got free with the purchase of a computer. So, though the picture is not that good, if you have trouble getting a good idea of what I look like, you should just think of Tom Cruise, for whom I am quite often mistaken. Another mental picture that might help you is to imagine Phil Johnson without facial hair.
Thursday, November 10, 2005
Ich ben ein Fundamentalist [Part 1]
Last Sunday evening I visited a local Baptist church which holds itself out proudly as a "fundamental Baptist" church. That piqued my interest, of course, as my Fundamentalist Baptist creditials are probably as fine or better than those of anyone I know. I am familiar with Fundamentalism in the Baptist ranks, for I was ( and am, rightly defined) one. But judging from what I heard and observed during my visit to this "fundamentalist" church in the year 2005, I would sadly have to conclude that the modernism that fundamentalism sought to repulse at its inception has won the day, so much so that what I heard from a self-proclaimed fundamentalist pulpit was nothing less than that supposed enemy itself - modernism. Let me explain.
I was introduced to fundamental Baptists when I was first converted by God. The man used of God to preach the Gospel to me was a member of a dyed-in-the-wool Fundamental Baptist church in Big Spring, Texas. We were "independent, fundamental, premillenial, Dispensational, missionary, Bible-believing, soulwinning, separated" Baptists. Because I had no early training in religion and/or Baptist fundamentalism, I did not know but that the beliefs of the people of my new church were essentially those that all Baptists held. Later I would learn that all that calls itself fundamentalist Baptist is not necessarily fundamentalist - or Baptist.
The first thing that I was instructed in was the practice of the altar call, which by the time I was converted to Christ had become nothing less than a quasi ordinance of the fundamental Baptists. It seemed that responding to the altar call was elevated as the sine quo non of Christian conversion, and compared to it baptism was of little importance. The fact was that I had come to trust Christ in the privacy of my own home and not in the presence of anyone but myself and God. Only afterwards, with my now dear Christian friend that had first preached the Gospel to me did I make that confession public. He faithfully took me to a conference with the pastor and the head deacon of the church to instruct me as to what I should do now that I had professed Christ as Savior. I was told that the "way Baptists do things" is for me to wait for the altar call at the end of next Sunday's sermon, at which time I was to come forward and "make my profession of faith." I was struck a little by the language, for even as a new convert, I knew that I had already done so. If they had added the word "public" I might have understood. I recall asking them why this was necessary [I was never one for public show of anything]. They repeated the instruction that "that is the way Baptists do things." I obeyed explicitly and responded to the "invitation" which the pastor of the church felt duty-bound to employ every time he spoke. There was much rejoicing over my profession, but somehow I would later reflect on the whole thing a bit and wonder if there was not a planful attempt to make it appear that it was the powerful preaching of the pastor that brought me down the aisle, as they put it.
Chiliastic indoctrination
After I was baptized [something of an afterthought, really, as the altar call seemed much more important to the congregation] I was immediately introduced to premillenial dispensationalism. I was told that the only Bible that had relevance was the Scofield Reference Bible and so I obtained a rather fine one of leather with my name embossed in gold on the front. Even now, I considered myself a full-blown fundamental Baptist. I was almost perfect in attendance and attended to every word that the teachers and the preachers said. I absorbed everything I heard and unfortunately took it in without critical analysis, which later I would learn was a serious mistake, if not fatal. I learned my Scofield reference Bible so well that I could recall exact pages and notes, even if I did not do so well with the Biblical text, as it seemed at the time secondary to the study notes. In but a few weeks I had learned the entire gamut of premillenial dispensationalism, what with its rapture [mentioned in nearly every sermon, as I recall, as the great hope of the church], the seven year tribulation [which, thankfully, we would not endure, since we would be raptured out. We would not want to be involved with anything like the saints in Hebrews 11, would we?], the marriage of the Lamb, the judgment seat of Christ and the Great White Throne judgment, the battle of Armageddon, the 1,000 year millenial reign of Christ in the reconstructed Jerusalem temple, with its restored sacrificial system and all. At this time, I was also exposed to the complex "charts" or "maps" of premillenial dispensationalism, although I would learn later that their measly local charts would pale into insignificant when compared to what I would encounter from the "professional" Dispensationalist professors when I went off to Bible Baptist Seminary in Arlington, Texas, and came to know men from Dallas Theological Seminary, the center of the Dispensational world, as it were, in 1966. Only John Hagee with his auditorium-sized projected charts could match or top those earlier Dispensational divines.
Erecting fundamentalist icons
As I was quickly and thoroughly indoctrinated into premillenial dispensationalism and Baptist fundamentalism [they're the same, are they not?], certain men were introduced and burned into my mind as the heroes of faith. First and foremost was Dr. J. Frank Norris, who by the time I had been converted had gone home to his reward. He was painted to me as a holy man, a modern day Elijah. Story after story was emblazened in my brain about this man and what could only be described as his "exploits," for his life involved wild and crazy behavior, even his killing of a man in his downtown Ft. Worth church office! He was known in Ft. Worth as an anti-booze zealot, ready to name local luminaries as drunkards and reprobates, which he did often from the pulpit, excoriating local politicians and others in authority.
I also heard other names [William Bell Riley, G. Greshem Machen, Billy Sunday, and others], but in the minds of Texas Baptist Fundamentalists, J. Frank Norris was the Fundamentalist par excellence. Every young Texas Fundamentalist preacher boy that went off to seminary [the one founded by J. Frank Norris, of course!] hoped to be the one who would inherit the mantle of him who was considered the Elijah of the Fundamentalist movement not only in Texas, but across the nation. At the same time that Norris climbed to fame in Fort Worth, Texas, as pastor of First Baptist Church there, with thousands in attendance, he also pastored, simultaneously, Temple Baptist Church in Detroit, MI, where Dr. G.B. Vick was co-pastor. That's right; J. Frank Norris was the first "jet-setter" pastor, flying from one church to the other in the same day, and all before there were jets at all! He was pastor of two of the largest congregations in the nation at a time when mega churches were extremely rare. To hear Texas Baptist Fundamentalists tell it, Dr. Norris had an almost unworldly aura that was to be revered and not challenged. For a time, I fell into that very train of thought - until I met his son, Dr. George Norris, at seminary. More on that later.
The Dark Side(s) of Fundamentalism
I was never, as I recall it today, comfortable with my fundamental Baptist indoctrination. Though I was somewhat religiously naive, I was not dumb, and soon began to cautiously question much of what I had learned. There was a definite strain of anti-intellectualism that was proudly (arrogantly?) professed publicly. Genuine scholarship was not encouraged, indeed, the proof of your fundamentalist credentials was that you implicitly trusted in what your leaders told you without questioning. Judging from my recent visit to a fundamental Baptist church, those poisonous traits are still alive and well in Baptist fundamentalism.
Biblical evangelism, or disguised humanism?
If there is anything that I will today credit as positive in my fundamentalist years, it is two primary focuses: evangelism and their focus on the Bible as the inerrant Word of God. But even those things that could be termed positive turned out to be somewhat sullied by the ignorance and anti-intellectual bent of the fundamentalists. Evangelism, touted to be the very purpose of the faith, turned out to be but the ploy of Arminian and semi-Pelagian doctrines, popularized by Charles Finney in the middle 1800s. The fundamentalists had imbibed the theology and the methods of Finney so thoroughly that the two things were sometimes hard to distinguish. Finney had popularized a variety of "new measures" of evangelism which were naturally born out of his Pelagian theology. Why any Baptist would wish to follow such Pelagian theology is quite beyond me, but it was most surely the testimony of history that it was so. Indeed, the "new methods" which Finney pioneered became the bread and butter of Baptist (and other brands of) fundamentalism across America, the "altar call," the evil spawn of his "mourner's bench" being the most obvious and most ubiquitous.
Coming next: The Great Downgrade to Arminian humanism: the disasterous 20th century for Fundamental Baptists
I was introduced to fundamental Baptists when I was first converted by God. The man used of God to preach the Gospel to me was a member of a dyed-in-the-wool Fundamental Baptist church in Big Spring, Texas. We were "independent, fundamental, premillenial, Dispensational, missionary, Bible-believing, soulwinning, separated" Baptists. Because I had no early training in religion and/or Baptist fundamentalism, I did not know but that the beliefs of the people of my new church were essentially those that all Baptists held. Later I would learn that all that calls itself fundamentalist Baptist is not necessarily fundamentalist - or Baptist.
Initial Indoctrination into all things fundamental Baptist
The first thing that I was instructed in was the practice of the altar call, which by the time I was converted to Christ had become nothing less than a quasi ordinance of the fundamental Baptists. It seemed that responding to the altar call was elevated as the sine quo non of Christian conversion, and compared to it baptism was of little importance. The fact was that I had come to trust Christ in the privacy of my own home and not in the presence of anyone but myself and God. Only afterwards, with my now dear Christian friend that had first preached the Gospel to me did I make that confession public. He faithfully took me to a conference with the pastor and the head deacon of the church to instruct me as to what I should do now that I had professed Christ as Savior. I was told that the "way Baptists do things" is for me to wait for the altar call at the end of next Sunday's sermon, at which time I was to come forward and "make my profession of faith." I was struck a little by the language, for even as a new convert, I knew that I had already done so. If they had added the word "public" I might have understood. I recall asking them why this was necessary [I was never one for public show of anything]. They repeated the instruction that "that is the way Baptists do things." I obeyed explicitly and responded to the "invitation" which the pastor of the church felt duty-bound to employ every time he spoke. There was much rejoicing over my profession, but somehow I would later reflect on the whole thing a bit and wonder if there was not a planful attempt to make it appear that it was the powerful preaching of the pastor that brought me down the aisle, as they put it.
Chiliastic indoctrination
After I was baptized [something of an afterthought, really, as the altar call seemed much more important to the congregation] I was immediately introduced to premillenial dispensationalism. I was told that the only Bible that had relevance was the Scofield Reference Bible and so I obtained a rather fine one of leather with my name embossed in gold on the front. Even now, I considered myself a full-blown fundamental Baptist. I was almost perfect in attendance and attended to every word that the teachers and the preachers said. I absorbed everything I heard and unfortunately took it in without critical analysis, which later I would learn was a serious mistake, if not fatal. I learned my Scofield reference Bible so well that I could recall exact pages and notes, even if I did not do so well with the Biblical text, as it seemed at the time secondary to the study notes. In but a few weeks I had learned the entire gamut of premillenial dispensationalism, what with its rapture [mentioned in nearly every sermon, as I recall, as the great hope of the church], the seven year tribulation [which, thankfully, we would not endure, since we would be raptured out. We would not want to be involved with anything like the saints in Hebrews 11, would we?], the marriage of the Lamb, the judgment seat of Christ and the Great White Throne judgment, the battle of Armageddon, the 1,000 year millenial reign of Christ in the reconstructed Jerusalem temple, with its restored sacrificial system and all. At this time, I was also exposed to the complex "charts" or "maps" of premillenial dispensationalism, although I would learn later that their measly local charts would pale into insignificant when compared to what I would encounter from the "professional" Dispensationalist professors when I went off to Bible Baptist Seminary in Arlington, Texas, and came to know men from Dallas Theological Seminary, the center of the Dispensational world, as it were, in 1966. Only John Hagee with his auditorium-sized projected charts could match or top those earlier Dispensational divines.
Erecting fundamentalist icons
As I was quickly and thoroughly indoctrinated into premillenial dispensationalism and Baptist fundamentalism [they're the same, are they not?], certain men were introduced and burned into my mind as the heroes of faith. First and foremost was Dr. J. Frank Norris, who by the time I had been converted had gone home to his reward. He was painted to me as a holy man, a modern day Elijah. Story after story was emblazened in my brain about this man and what could only be described as his "exploits," for his life involved wild and crazy behavior, even his killing of a man in his downtown Ft. Worth church office! He was known in Ft. Worth as an anti-booze zealot, ready to name local luminaries as drunkards and reprobates, which he did often from the pulpit, excoriating local politicians and others in authority.
I also heard other names [William Bell Riley, G. Greshem Machen, Billy Sunday, and others], but in the minds of Texas Baptist Fundamentalists, J. Frank Norris was the Fundamentalist par excellence. Every young Texas Fundamentalist preacher boy that went off to seminary [the one founded by J. Frank Norris, of course!] hoped to be the one who would inherit the mantle of him who was considered the Elijah of the Fundamentalist movement not only in Texas, but across the nation. At the same time that Norris climbed to fame in Fort Worth, Texas, as pastor of First Baptist Church there, with thousands in attendance, he also pastored, simultaneously, Temple Baptist Church in Detroit, MI, where Dr. G.B. Vick was co-pastor. That's right; J. Frank Norris was the first "jet-setter" pastor, flying from one church to the other in the same day, and all before there were jets at all! He was pastor of two of the largest congregations in the nation at a time when mega churches were extremely rare. To hear Texas Baptist Fundamentalists tell it, Dr. Norris had an almost unworldly aura that was to be revered and not challenged. For a time, I fell into that very train of thought - until I met his son, Dr. George Norris, at seminary. More on that later.
The Dark Side(s) of Fundamentalism
I was never, as I recall it today, comfortable with my fundamental Baptist indoctrination. Though I was somewhat religiously naive, I was not dumb, and soon began to cautiously question much of what I had learned. There was a definite strain of anti-intellectualism that was proudly (arrogantly?) professed publicly. Genuine scholarship was not encouraged, indeed, the proof of your fundamentalist credentials was that you implicitly trusted in what your leaders told you without questioning. Judging from my recent visit to a fundamental Baptist church, those poisonous traits are still alive and well in Baptist fundamentalism.
Biblical evangelism, or disguised humanism?
If there is anything that I will today credit as positive in my fundamentalist years, it is two primary focuses: evangelism and their focus on the Bible as the inerrant Word of God. But even those things that could be termed positive turned out to be somewhat sullied by the ignorance and anti-intellectual bent of the fundamentalists. Evangelism, touted to be the very purpose of the faith, turned out to be but the ploy of Arminian and semi-Pelagian doctrines, popularized by Charles Finney in the middle 1800s. The fundamentalists had imbibed the theology and the methods of Finney so thoroughly that the two things were sometimes hard to distinguish. Finney had popularized a variety of "new measures" of evangelism which were naturally born out of his Pelagian theology. Why any Baptist would wish to follow such Pelagian theology is quite beyond me, but it was most surely the testimony of history that it was so. Indeed, the "new methods" which Finney pioneered became the bread and butter of Baptist (and other brands of) fundamentalism across America, the "altar call," the evil spawn of his "mourner's bench" being the most obvious and most ubiquitous.
Coming next: The Great Downgrade to Arminian humanism: the disasterous 20th century for Fundamental Baptists
Tuesday, November 08, 2005
Seeking an Indulgence
Indulge me a bit and allow me to introduce you to my precious grandson Cameron. This is a picture of his costume for Halloween [yes, his parents do allow him to dress up in a costume]. Unfortunately, Halloween this year in Cam's hometown was a bit rainy, and the results are obvious, are they not?
Monday, November 07, 2005
Limping In (a poker term)
The whole process of blogging is a bit foreign and even a bit intimidating to me at the moment, but I suspect that in a fairly short time, I will be up and running. If Leverton can do it, surely I can, too.
I need to talk about the name of my blog. I took it in a similar fashion as the early Christians took the name "Christians," that is, as a term which was intended as pejorative, but gently so, I suspect. Two delightful Christian brothers with whom I was talking at a bond fire and cookout in Champaign, IL, had asked me about dealing with persons in the church who profess to be believers but whose lives demonstrate a pattern of sinfulness. I merely shared with the brothers what I have said to many such professors of faith: "I'm afraid that I can't receive you as a regenerate believer, seeing as there is no convincing evidence that the Spirit is at work in your life." One brother responded, "Vic practices X-Christianity!" By that he was referring to the current craze of "X," [for "extreme"] programs on television, particularly The X-Games, which weekly chronicles a bunch of people with death wishes doing silly things to themselves that might hurt them real badly.
At first, I was a little taken aback that my approach to a sinning believer would be seen as anything extreme, but I then came to realize that such candor and plainness is rare in this day of effeminate religion. For myself, I think that if I were not to confront the sinning professor, I would betray my calling and do dishonor to my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. But as I thought on it a bit more, I decided to own the title, for if straighforwardness is considered X-Christianity, then I am guilty of it; and may God grant me grace to remain so.
Yet this is not my primary reason for putting up the blog. That is an entirely other matter. Here is a bit of my motivation.
Our church recently made a major change in our schedule of services. We hold regular morning services, then have a communal lunch at church and then convene an afternoon service, the afternoon service being somewhat more like an interactive discussion that a formal sermon [though sometimes I as pastor break that rule a little]. After that service, our day is finished, and a Spanish-speaking Baptist church uses our building in the evening for their services.
In that way, it frees me up to attend other churches on Sunday evening, so that I and a wonderful brother have been visiting various congregations to see what is really happening and what is being preached in and around our area. At this point we are not discriminating at all, but going to just about anything that strikes our fancy each week. We have, though, gone to a goodly number of Baptist churches, since we are Baptists ourselves and desire to have fellowship with those Baptist brothers that are of "like precious faith." It was to be a most enlightening experience, because as a preacher who loathes being away from my pulpit, I had not had opportunity to visit and hear other men preach except for an occasional conference or visit with a pastor friend, in which I was often asked to preach in the pastor's stead.
My people had told me that I was going to be surprised, for many of them had come from out of churches in the community and they reported things that I simply did not believe. So I went with a sense of discovery, really, and with the hopes that I could identify those with whom I might wish to establish closer relations. The reality was to be like a roadside IED to me. I was, figuratively speaking, blown completely away.
The state of affairs in the churches in our area are so devastatingly disastrous as to cause me to suffer a kind of spiritual depression. Suffice it to say that in one thriving "Christian" church which was highlighted in the Grand Rapids Press for its uniqueness and attraction to thousands of people every time they opened their doors, my Christian brother and I listened intently to every word spoken for nearly two hours, seeking to know the message that was being taught in what could only be termed a dramatic role-play skit. We also experienced the music, the prayers and all the related activities of the "worship" service. But here is the kicker: Never once did we see or hear the name of Jesus Christ!
I am not kidding. Not in the music lyrics projected on large screens, for it seemed that songs were chosen especially because they did *not* have the name Jesus Christ in them. Other songs were projected and sung, but they were contemporary lyrics and did not once mention the name of Jesus Christ. Even the prayers did not use the name but were finished with the phrase "In your son's name, Amen." That is forgivable, I suppose, but in the context of a "Christian" service where it was apparent that the name of Jesus Christ was being carefully avoided, that phrase slapped me across the face, as it were. I was flabbergasted, to say the least. There were several thousand people present, and my heart sank that not one of them had any concerns that the name of our dear Savior and Lord was not spoken one time by the leaders of the services.
Mind you, I am not a raving fundamentalist rabid dog who gets bent out of shape over anything that he does not believe or practice. I am theologically conservative, as I am a Calvinist of the 5-point sort. But I am not at all opposed to contemporary music that honors God and our Lord Jesus Christ with its lyrics and arrangement. But never in my Christian life did I imagine that I would attend a so-called "church" with the name Christian that would blush rather than use the name Jesus Christ. In a way, I am still, months later, reeling from this experience. And I haven't even yet spoken about my experience in some Baptist churches, in which the experience was only slightly, and I do mean slightly, better. Devastating. Maddening. Irritating. Pure soul-rotting stuff that needs to be condemned, not encouraged.
So I am determined in the days ahead to use this blog to expose, rebuke, admonish, teach, preach, and whatever else it may take to begin to oppose this awful downgrade of the Christian faith in our area. I suspect that the situation is the same, really, all over. But I must address that which I see, hear and experience, and that means that I must limit myself to local issues, primarily. I do think that our discussions here may have wider implications, however, and may be of some help to others who are of like mind with us.
I do not come with a mean spirit at this task. Indeed, I invoke the Spirit of God to grant me a stable and peaceful mind in accomplishing the task at hand. But because I am known to practice X-Christianity, I doubt that I will be mealy-mouthed about anything. It is just not my character - nor my calling.
I cannot help but connect our current state of affairs with that which C.H. Spurgeon warned of more than 110 years ago. He warned of a great "downgrade" in the Baptist ranks in England and especially London. I believe that he was spot on with that prediction, and we have just come out of an entire century of continuous downgrade among the Baptists. I am sick at heart because of it, and find myself somewhat alone in my sentiments here in Holland. Perhaps the blog can produce some spiritual support in our efforts to put an end to the downgrade by the vigorous and vital proclamation of the truth of God's grace and sovereignty. Perhaps God will grant us success if we are faithful to seek Him in all things and reverse the awful erosion of faith in our area. It is providential, it seems, that only recently our church changed its name from Grace Baptist Church to Spurgeon Heritage Church. The reason for that change is that we see ourselves as standing in the line with that great "Prince of Preachers" against the degradation of the Gospel and the Baptist denomination.
Later, I will share with the readers some personal notes from my own Fundamentalist Baptist background, for my Fundamentalist credentials are probably better than most of the Fundamentalists that I have heard and seen in this area. But that is for another time. For now, I hope only to begin the process of reformation, as we often sign our communications with the reformation era cry of "semper reformanda" - always reforming. It is high time.
Vic
I need to talk about the name of my blog. I took it in a similar fashion as the early Christians took the name "Christians," that is, as a term which was intended as pejorative, but gently so, I suspect. Two delightful Christian brothers with whom I was talking at a bond fire and cookout in Champaign, IL, had asked me about dealing with persons in the church who profess to be believers but whose lives demonstrate a pattern of sinfulness. I merely shared with the brothers what I have said to many such professors of faith: "I'm afraid that I can't receive you as a regenerate believer, seeing as there is no convincing evidence that the Spirit is at work in your life." One brother responded, "Vic practices X-Christianity!" By that he was referring to the current craze of "X," [for "extreme"] programs on television, particularly The X-Games, which weekly chronicles a bunch of people with death wishes doing silly things to themselves that might hurt them real badly.
At first, I was a little taken aback that my approach to a sinning believer would be seen as anything extreme, but I then came to realize that such candor and plainness is rare in this day of effeminate religion. For myself, I think that if I were not to confront the sinning professor, I would betray my calling and do dishonor to my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. But as I thought on it a bit more, I decided to own the title, for if straighforwardness is considered X-Christianity, then I am guilty of it; and may God grant me grace to remain so.
Yet this is not my primary reason for putting up the blog. That is an entirely other matter. Here is a bit of my motivation.
Our church recently made a major change in our schedule of services. We hold regular morning services, then have a communal lunch at church and then convene an afternoon service, the afternoon service being somewhat more like an interactive discussion that a formal sermon [though sometimes I as pastor break that rule a little]. After that service, our day is finished, and a Spanish-speaking Baptist church uses our building in the evening for their services.
In that way, it frees me up to attend other churches on Sunday evening, so that I and a wonderful brother have been visiting various congregations to see what is really happening and what is being preached in and around our area. At this point we are not discriminating at all, but going to just about anything that strikes our fancy each week. We have, though, gone to a goodly number of Baptist churches, since we are Baptists ourselves and desire to have fellowship with those Baptist brothers that are of "like precious faith." It was to be a most enlightening experience, because as a preacher who loathes being away from my pulpit, I had not had opportunity to visit and hear other men preach except for an occasional conference or visit with a pastor friend, in which I was often asked to preach in the pastor's stead.
My people had told me that I was going to be surprised, for many of them had come from out of churches in the community and they reported things that I simply did not believe. So I went with a sense of discovery, really, and with the hopes that I could identify those with whom I might wish to establish closer relations. The reality was to be like a roadside IED to me. I was, figuratively speaking, blown completely away.
The state of affairs in the churches in our area are so devastatingly disastrous as to cause me to suffer a kind of spiritual depression. Suffice it to say that in one thriving "Christian" church which was highlighted in the Grand Rapids Press for its uniqueness and attraction to thousands of people every time they opened their doors, my Christian brother and I listened intently to every word spoken for nearly two hours, seeking to know the message that was being taught in what could only be termed a dramatic role-play skit. We also experienced the music, the prayers and all the related activities of the "worship" service. But here is the kicker: Never once did we see or hear the name of Jesus Christ!
I am not kidding. Not in the music lyrics projected on large screens, for it seemed that songs were chosen especially because they did *not* have the name Jesus Christ in them. Other songs were projected and sung, but they were contemporary lyrics and did not once mention the name of Jesus Christ. Even the prayers did not use the name but were finished with the phrase "In your son's name, Amen." That is forgivable, I suppose, but in the context of a "Christian" service where it was apparent that the name of Jesus Christ was being carefully avoided, that phrase slapped me across the face, as it were. I was flabbergasted, to say the least. There were several thousand people present, and my heart sank that not one of them had any concerns that the name of our dear Savior and Lord was not spoken one time by the leaders of the services.
Mind you, I am not a raving fundamentalist rabid dog who gets bent out of shape over anything that he does not believe or practice. I am theologically conservative, as I am a Calvinist of the 5-point sort. But I am not at all opposed to contemporary music that honors God and our Lord Jesus Christ with its lyrics and arrangement. But never in my Christian life did I imagine that I would attend a so-called "church" with the name Christian that would blush rather than use the name Jesus Christ. In a way, I am still, months later, reeling from this experience. And I haven't even yet spoken about my experience in some Baptist churches, in which the experience was only slightly, and I do mean slightly, better. Devastating. Maddening. Irritating. Pure soul-rotting stuff that needs to be condemned, not encouraged.
So I am determined in the days ahead to use this blog to expose, rebuke, admonish, teach, preach, and whatever else it may take to begin to oppose this awful downgrade of the Christian faith in our area. I suspect that the situation is the same, really, all over. But I must address that which I see, hear and experience, and that means that I must limit myself to local issues, primarily. I do think that our discussions here may have wider implications, however, and may be of some help to others who are of like mind with us.
I do not come with a mean spirit at this task. Indeed, I invoke the Spirit of God to grant me a stable and peaceful mind in accomplishing the task at hand. But because I am known to practice X-Christianity, I doubt that I will be mealy-mouthed about anything. It is just not my character - nor my calling.
I cannot help but connect our current state of affairs with that which C.H. Spurgeon warned of more than 110 years ago. He warned of a great "downgrade" in the Baptist ranks in England and especially London. I believe that he was spot on with that prediction, and we have just come out of an entire century of continuous downgrade among the Baptists. I am sick at heart because of it, and find myself somewhat alone in my sentiments here in Holland. Perhaps the blog can produce some spiritual support in our efforts to put an end to the downgrade by the vigorous and vital proclamation of the truth of God's grace and sovereignty. Perhaps God will grant us success if we are faithful to seek Him in all things and reverse the awful erosion of faith in our area. It is providential, it seems, that only recently our church changed its name from Grace Baptist Church to Spurgeon Heritage Church. The reason for that change is that we see ourselves as standing in the line with that great "Prince of Preachers" against the degradation of the Gospel and the Baptist denomination.
Later, I will share with the readers some personal notes from my own Fundamentalist Baptist background, for my Fundamentalist credentials are probably better than most of the Fundamentalists that I have heard and seen in this area. But that is for another time. For now, I hope only to begin the process of reformation, as we often sign our communications with the reformation era cry of "semper reformanda" - always reforming. It is high time.
Vic
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