Pathological paranoia

Until the D-blog gets fired up some time this weekend, you can enjoy the post-SBC antics at Peter Lumpkins blog.

Bring a lunch.

In which I eat crow

The temptation is to give a laundry list and then sort of duck out as I say what I ought to say, but that's bush league.

In the past, I have been a vocal critic of Ronnie Floyd, and of his one church in two locations -- specifically of their past record of Cooperative Program giving.

Today I read this post at Dr. Floyd's blog. We could fisk the number listed there and try to minimize it, but let me say this: $350,000 is a lot of money for any church to give over to the cooperative program of the SBC, especially in economic times like these, and I credit Dr. Floyd, his staff, and the members of his churches for giving.

That's real money, and it puts to shame any criticism of them on that front. May God bless them for it, and use it for the sake of the Gospel.

Two books, briefly

Crossway has dipatched more books to review in spite of my lack of earnestness in reviewing all the books they send me. The title to the left is Religion Saves, and 9 other misconceptions, by Mark Driscoll.

You heard the sermon series last year, I am sure. I was reading the other title I received this weekend while my wife was paging through this one. She says to me, "Are you going to review this one?"

Of course, I said. That's the deal.

"You better throw it away when your finished with it. Our kids are readers, you know. If you leave this laying around, they'll read it and it's not appropriate for them."

So I'll have to review that one pretty quick before my wife takes summary action with it.

The other one is the title you see to the right here -- Southern Baptist Identity, edited by David Dockery. On the one hand, thank God someone is talking about this besides me and iMonk. Seriously.

I was having an e-mail conversation with a Southern Baptist Missiologist who didn't ask to be drawn into this conversation but did contribute to this book (this was about 2 years ago) and he was going on about how the SBC was a denomination -- and I told him that this was the problem. He didn;t get my sly remark, so I clarified: the SBC was never intended to be a denomination: it is a convention. The distinction there is that a denomination can and will dictate terms to member churches because that's the point of a denomination: centralized leadership through which to force conformity. A "convention" ought to be a mode of cooperation by local churches who are seeking to do more for the Gospel collectively than they can do individually -- the agenda is driven from the bottom, up.

And in the ways that this book speaks to that truth, it's a useful book for Southern Baptists to read and think about and discuss vigorously.

You can look forward to some discussion about that book here in the near future.

And sometime this week a debate about the Trinity is going to break out at the D-Blog. I am sure it will edify someone.

Listen: when all these guys are one degree of FaceBook from me, they obviously need a better class of friends.

into the breech once again ...

I hate the CARM forums. Rather than being a place where actual intellegent apologetic exchanges are thoughtfully worked out, they're just petri dishes for vile things. I won't link to it.

But, sadly, someone there has volunteered me to debate some Oneness advocates, and you'll probably see that exchange come up at D-Blog in the next 5 days. The thesis is:

"The One God, even the One Father of both Testiments is the person Jesus enfleshed in his own Son, the Man Christ Jesus"

Long exchange - 10 questions - likely.

To prepare yourself, be in the Lord's house on the Lord's day with the Lord's people this weekend.

HT: Doug Wilson

Lovely.

HT: JT

Yeah, listen: Justin Taylor I think has a caucus of caucasian clerks culling computers from Canada to Calcutta to find everything which you might find useful for your spiritual health out there on the internets. he doesn't really blog much: he just finds all the interesting stuff on other blogs and links to it. It's brilliant.

Now, in that sea of (as he would say) "helpful" links, today he has posted something which every Christian man should read and consider repeatedly for the next 30 days.

The original link is here, but I have PDF'd the text and have stashed it on my private host site here in case the link ever breaks.

In particular, I want you to read this paragraph:

But in our unconstrained age, tradition is, at best, a quaint relic, a lifeless curiosity gathering dust in an unfrequented museum. At worst, it is synonymous with oppression, the destructive force that brought us slavery, misogyny, and imperialism. Seeing farther now than our ancestors ever did, we are no longer burdened by the prejudices of the past or bound by promises that linger long beyond the point of their initial inspiration. We are now entering a brave new world, where marriage is easily dissolved before it becomes tyrannical, where parenthood is the product of choice not mere biology, where reproductive technologies allow us to have the children of our own making, and where fathers have finally earned the hard-won freedom to follow their dreams and leave their children behind.

Even if you don't read the rest of that essay (and i forbid you to come back unless you do), think seriously and often about this: what dream is worth missing the delight on one of your children?

Maybe somebody has said this already

I just want to reiterate it for the record:

If David Letterman is willing to apologize for his coarse joking, you'd think that a pastor who does the same kind of thing would be willing to make at least the same kind of clear and contrite statement.

You'd think. I'd think, anyway -- you think what you want to think.

Jiggling one's Jenga

See: I know you people have read the bit by Dr. Peter Masters about the massive failings of the “New Calvinists”, particularly his criticism of loud music and Colin Hansen’s apparently-wrong evaluation of Calvinism in the U.S. in the 20th century.

And then some of you have nothing else to do but wait for iMonk to write the next thing which will make me call him a turkey, and you have read his response to Dr. Peter Masters which, in effect, says, “eh. So what? He’s a fundamentalist, and that’s what a fundamentalist would say about this.”

And now, because I baited you, you are hoping for the show because you bought your popcorn and a large coke, and it’s refillable, so this better be long and good.

Well, it’ll be good. Turns out it’s also pretty long – standard 3 pages.

First thing: I agree with both of these guys. I mean: there’s no question that the Calvinism of John Piper and John MacArthur are not really much like each other, let alone like the Calvinism of Owen or Edwards – and that’s actually a good thing in spite of Dr. Master’s claxon of warning. But it’s not hardly as bad as Dr. Masters makes it out to be – which is where I find fault with the Appalachian podcasting genius in his assessment of Dr. Masters.

Here’s what I mean: it’s a good thing that Calvinism in 21st century America doesn’t look like Calvinism in puritan England because these are two different cultures. Calvinism will not look like Puritanism in the center of modern China; it will not look like Puritanism in the middle of the Sudan. It will not look like Puritanism in Labrador amongst the isolated white Canadians there, and it won’t look line Puritanism if it ever breaks out in Mexico. In fact, the Puritans themselves were not hardly as uniform and frankly-rigid as Dr. Masters would have us believe.

For example, John Milton is often counted among their number because of his non-conformist views, but he was in fact also non-trinitarian in spite of his idolization of Cromwell as an epic, religious hero. Speaking of which, Cromwell is another kind of Puritan really not much like Owen or Baxter or Sibbes. So I think that the actual diversity among the 2 centuries of actual English puritans (not to mention their American pilgrims) sort of jiggles Dr. Masters’ Jenga tower a little harder than he’s letting on.

I will give him this: the central concern for holiness is a serious and useful concern. There’s no question at all that many (a-hem – yes, that’s what I mean) younger guys could be more serious and could get more serious about what it means to consider God’s holiness. Therefore our own holiness would be a good bit more consequential in what we say and do as a reflection of the actual work of Christ for us and in us.

I might even give Dr. Masters a half-credit for his distinction between edifying music and other genres like metal and rap – that somehow there really is a place where the art in a culture reflects its depravity, and we can and should avoid aping the culture because we can’t think of ways to simply be right-mindedly foolish, or right-mindedly creative.

But is it really anti-sanctification to praise God loudly with music and song? My thought here is that there’s a difference between edifying conference music and corporate worship at the local church – and I would think that Dr. Masters, in his experience and wisdom could see that difference. Especially, if I may be so bold, when one is posting one's newsletter on the internet. Something can be edifying, and public, and not be formal, ecclesiastical worship – and can therefore also be held to a more informal and populist standard.

That said, iMonk is actually right about Dr. Masters in this respect: he honors and confesses a proto-fundamentalist view of all things, down to making even matters of style and context into urgent doctrinal crises and therefore matters over which to separate. And it’s a shame – because in Dr. Masters’ view, Calvinism has always been alive and well and living in America because there have been Calvinist presses and Calvinist bookstores and Calvinist congregations which have invited him to speak. Sadly, that’s a provincial view of where Calvinism has been for the last 150 years in America – because with the sharp decline in Presbyterianism and true Episcopalian/Anglicanism, and the Baptists not hardly holding up their end of the bargain (becoming by and large a theology-free zone in spite of the SBC resurgence) what America has had, frankly, has been a drift away from the historic reformational truths.

Ignoring that for a rosy view of one’s own movement doesn’t do anyone any good.

So here’s what I’m thinking: if Dr. Masters is right about “us”, and iMonk is right about Dr. Masters, maybe what “we” have to do is receive what they both have said about “us” and step it up. Get serious about your filthy mouth and your infatuation with movies and comic books and the down side of town. Stop thinking you can be the pastor who finally can say from the pulpit, “and the colored girls sing, ‘do-do-do-dotodo-do-do-do’,” like Lou Reed and people will think you are cool.

You’re not cool. And they are not going to think you are cool if they hear you preach the Gospel, because the Gospel is not cool. You don’t have to be a self-righteous thundercloud of disapproval – you could be the mortified chief of sinners. It’s a time-honored tradition. Let’s try that, and then we won’t have to worry about edicts from either the chapel of Spurgeon or the tavern bar stools.

Release the Hounds!

I have been Twitter-accosted by these two matters in the last week or so:

On the one hand, the well-respected Dr. Peter Masters begins shelling from across the pond because the "New Calvinists" are a lot more new and not so much Clavinist in his view.


On the other hand, iMonk sort or waves him on and waves him off for being a fundie.




What do I think?

I'll tell ya tomorrow ...