Despite the morbidity of treating oneself like a galley slave, I have really appreciated this tip about ProdMe and FlexTime. (I’m sure Meridian is great, but I’m cheap.)
An added benefit of the ProdMe widget, by the way, is that, if you are using something like Classic NotePad, then you automatically glance at it when the alarm goes off. It is a great way to put up reminders to yourself.
Let me begin with an attempted brief recap. As some readers might know, I’m an ordained minster in the Presbyterian Church in America, an Evangelical denomination that worships God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and affirms that the Bible is a communication from God and is without error in all that it teaches. The PCA, like all Christian denominations, is the result of almost a couple of thousand years development, both from better study of what the Bible says and a growing need to further differentiate ourselves from other Christians. For those who care, here our our doctrinal standards, along with this and this.
Certain powers-that-be within the PCA have been shaking things up over the internet, in conferences, and even sometimes in “book length material,” about an alleged movement, “the federal vision.” Recently a study committee was mandated and more recently the members of this committee have been announced.
A committee can make rulings, if adopted by the General Assembly, that have some sort of authority. But they don’t have the judicial authority to make rulings about the orthodoxy of ministers of the Gospel, nor can their adopted reports count as additions to the secondary standards linked above. There is a process for altering the secondary standards that is quite rigorous and anyone who treated a committee report as a secondary standard would be something like an apologist for modern jurisprudence overriding constitutional authority.
So, the only way this committee report can really make a significant impact is if it is widely felt that it is made up of men who are genuinely searching for the truth of the matter without partiality, and who genuinely represent the spectrum of the denomination.
So, if I were asked, these are some of the men I would have thought of.
Addendum: these are names I would have provided if someone had wanted my suggestions. What follows, however, is not what I think would be the ideal committee. In fact, my ideal committee would have one or two of the same people who are on it now. After all, the suggestions below are weighted rather heavily toward Westminster East. And no one is represented from the denomination’s seminary. I hope this clears up any misunderstandings.
- John Frame
(Wikipedia entry / Website) John Frame is a true doctor of the PCA. He is widely respected as both judicious and charitable. He certainly represents the mainstream as opposed to the fringe (and I’m not trying to imply that the fringe should be trimmed or anything like that; simply pointing out a fact about him).Particularly, if he were the member of a study committee, everyone would trust that he would do his utmost to give the issue a fair hearing, and hold all other members’ feet to the fire to do the same.
I blog about this every once in a while and it is time to do it again. If you haven’t read Frame’s Doctrine of the Knowledge of God then you are missing something great and helpful and profound and easy to read.
- Vern Poythress
Dr. Poythress is a professor at Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia. He has written on a variety of subjects. One of his best, and the one most appropos is his Symphonic Theology–which deals briefly yet profoundly about the relationship between theological terminology and the Scripture.Again, I believe Dr. Poythress’ opinion would be widely respected in the PCA.
- Richard Pratt
Richard Pratt wrote an an excellent high schooler’s handbook in philosophical apologeticsAdditionally, both when he was an RTS Seminary Professor Third Millennium Ministries has dealt with issues of covenant theology. His website has also deal with the New Perspective on Paul. He would be an ideal person to be on the committee and he would carry a lot of weight in the denomination for his reputation as a scholar.
- Robert Rayburn
Dr. Robert Rayburn is the Senior Pastor of Faith Presbyterian Church in Tacoma, Washington. His father was the President for many years of my alma mater. Robert Rayburn, Sr. wrote a book on worship and the son has followed in his father’s footsteps, commonly speaking on issues like the ordained ministry, preaching, and other aspects of corporate worship. Dr. Rayburn received his doctorate in New Testament from the University of Aberdeen, Scotland. His dissertation involved the nature of the new covenant. His commentary on Hebrews was published in the Evangelical Commentary of the Bible. He authored the PCA minority report on paedocommunion and has been highly critical of “the New Perspective on Paul.” He would be thorough and he would be fair.
- Peter Lillback
Dr. Peter Lillback is Senior Pastor of Proclamation Presbyterian Church and the President of Westminster Theological Seminary. He earned his doctoral degree in part by researching and writing a stellar dissertation on Calvin’s view of the covenant.Dr. Lillback would be obviously qualified to sit on the committee and to be heard with respect as an impartial judge according to the Westminster Standards and the Bible.
- Jim Bordwine
- Rev. Bordwine is the pastor of Westminster Presbyterian Church in Vancouver, WA. He is Southern Presbyterian by conviction (I can’t find his website, Thornwell Hall, so I guess it is no longer in cyberspce). He is also astute and fair and quite knowledgeable. (And if you are seeking ordination in Pacific Northwest Presbytery, you had better catechize yourself real good!)
Time is failing me so I can’t fully list Mike Biggs (another quite Southern Presbyterian, former RUF minister, and now organizing pastor of Christ the King in Norman, Oklahoma), or Mark Balthrop, or John Owen Butler, or many others.
Now, all of these men do share the distinction of never calling another PCA minister in good standing “aberrant” in theology, or claiming that a PCA minister should become Roman Catholic or a mainline Presbyterian (or somehow do both). A couple of them are paedocommunionists but a couple or more are on record as opposing the practice (it doesn’t matter one way or the other to me since Paedocommunion is a separate issue that has already been dealt with in the PCA).
For what it is worth, if I were asked, these would be some suggestions I would make.
I was asked this yesterday at Presbytery in casual conversation and realized I have no idea. I know the Nicene Creed (“one baptism for the remission of sins”) is appealing to Ephesians 4 with Acts 2 and Peter’s call for repentance in the first sermon of the Church. But I have never researched if their is any contemporary evidence for some agreed upon theory about the hows and whys and whens of baptism and the remission of sins. I simply have no information about what the average Christian at the time of Nicea believed about baptism and forgiveness and all things related.
I do know that during the Reformation there was a debate about the forgiveness of sins and baptism between the Protestants and the Roman Catholics. Since it is commonly believed the Lutherans and the Reformed disagreed with each other about this issue, I’ll limit my remarks to what was held as being the difference with the Roman Catholics on the part of the Reformed.
John Calvin explained it this way:
I know it is a common belief that forgiveness, which at our first regeneration we receive by baptism alone, is after baptism procured by means of penitence and the keys. But those who entertain this fiction err from not considering that the power of the keys, of which they speak, so depends on baptism, that it ought not on any account to be separated from it. The sinner receives forgiveness by the ministry of the Church; in other words, not without the preaching of the gospel. And of what nature is this preaching? That we are washed from our sins by the blood of Christ. And what is the sign and evidence of that washing if it be not baptism? We see, then, that that forgiveness has reference to baptism. This error had its origin in the fictitious sacrament of penance, on which I have already touched. What remains will be said at the proper place. There is no wonder if men who, from the grossness of their minds, are excessively attached to external things, have here also betrayed the defect, not contented with the pure institution of God, they have introduced new helps devised by themselves, as if baptism were not itself a sacrament of penance. But if repentance is recommended during the whole of life, the power of baptism ought to have the same extent. Wherefore, there can be no doubt that all the godly may, during the whole course of their lives, whenever they are vexed by a consciousness of their sins, recall the remembrance of their baptism, that they may thereby assure themselves of that sole and perpetual ablution which we have in the blood of Christ (John Calvin, Institutes, IV, 15, 4; emphasis added).
The Council of Trent actively assaulted the Reformed on this very point. The condemning sentence reads:
If anyone says that by the sole remembrance and the faith of the baptism received, all sins committed after baptism are either remitted or made venial, let him be anathema.
Of course, many times in Trent one finds only a charicature of Reformed Doctrine being condemned. But in this case, the Reformed identified this cursing as a cursing of true doctrine. This basic position was still considered orthodox and Reformed as late as the time of Francis Turretin:
Does baptism… take away past and present sins only and leave future sins to repentances? Or does it extend itself to sins committed not only before but also after baptism? The former we deny; the latter we affirm against the Romanists.…
II… [T]he Romansists teach… “The virtue of baptism does not reach to future sins, but the sacrament of penitence is necessary for their expiation.” Thus, the Council of Trent expresses it: “If anyone shall say that all the sins which are committed after baptism are either dismissed or made venial by the recollection of faith of the received baptism alone, let him be anathema (session 7, Canon 10, Schroeder, p. 54)….
XII. …However, we maintain that by baptism is sealed to us the remission not only of past and present, but also of future sins; still so that penitence (not a sacramental work and what they invent, but that which is commanded in the gospel) and especially saving faith is not excluded, but is coordinated with baptism as a divinely constituted means of our salvation (Francis Turretin, Institutes of Elenctic Theology, vol. 3).
So the difference between the Reformed and the Romanist seems to be that the Roman Catholics limited baptism’s efficacy more than the Reformed thought was right. Also, the Reformed saw no conflict between faith and baptism whereas the Romanists seemed to divide these things so that faith became understood as insufficient for salvation.
The members of the PCA’s study commission on the Federal Vision have been announced:
TE Paul Fowler, Convener
Assistant Pastor, First Presbyterian Church
Augusta, GATE Ligon Duncan
Pastor, First Presbyterian Church
Jackson, MSTE Grover Gunn
Pastor, Covenant Presbyterian Church
Jackson, TNTE Sean Lucas
Assistant Professor of Church History
Covenant Theological Seminary
St. Louis, MORE Robert Mattes
Christ Presbyterian Church
Arlington, VARE William Mueller
Kendall Presbyterian Church
Miami, FLRE John White
Westminster Presbyterian Church
Atlanta, GA
This program looked cool but too complicated. I don’t know if what I’m doing is more work or not, but you can find my template here:
You might need to add or delete tabs to make things line up right.
The basic premise I’m working with is that, no matter how good your calendar system, wheter it is the iCal and Mail apps or Microsoft Entourage on the Mac, or Microsoft Outlook, or the Mozilla email/calendar system, you have to review your schedule regularly. Recently I made an appointment with someone and thought it was already in my calendar system when it wasn’t. There is still plenty of room for error in these systems.
Planning each week out in a text file gives you that opportunity. Even if you don’t think you need to review, typing stuff gives you a chance to make sure you haven’t missed anything. And the text file is the most universal format you could us. You can email it and expect it to work on any system.
Also, I find that using a text program (whether .txt or something more elaborate) is helpful for other reasons. My Entourage programe doesn’t display my week in two three day columns (unlike Outlook on the PC), so this gives me a format that is easier to review at a glance. Also, I am somewhat frustrated that calendar systems don’t have reminders that work without requiring you to block out time. Sometimes I just need to plan to work on something and see how long it takes rather than blocking. This is also true with reminders about what other people are doing, which you need to keep in mind, but don’t necessarily need to be taking up block space on your calendar.
So, this is the format I’m working with now. I put two brackets in front of items like this:
[] Read _Software Testing_ chapter two
Thus, when I have done it I insert an X between the brackets:
[x] Read _Software Testing_ chapter two
I list (mostly horizontally) “to do” items (“actions”) at the top of the page to remind me to schedule them during the week. I also list items at the top of each day above the line. I put other marks to designate reminders.
I’m not trying to over think this because I’m pretty sure this needs to be intuitive. I simply explain my week to myself, spending a short time Monday morning creating the sheet (though I usually start a little bit the week before) and a few minutes each morning evaluating and updating. I still use entourage and the alert system, but the textfile is really helpful.
I mentioned that Doug Wilson began responding to Waters. He has continued and is doing an excellent job. Here are links to the first three in order.
Trying to describe Peter Leithart’s work is a bit like trying to pin down a definition for “science fiction,” when it is obvious the category is too broad. Peter’s work includes children stories and literary studies, medieval, classical, and modern (i.e. Jane Austen) as well as Biblical and theological studies.
I haven’t read every one of his works yet. Heroes of the City of Man, Ascent to Love, and Miniatures & Morales are all outside my experience. I & II Kings is not published yet (but it is on my wishlist). Here are brief descriptions of three of the books I have read.
This editorial is incredible.
Apparently, it is somehow wrong for Apple to only sell music in a format that works exclusively with iTunes/iPod. Why? Because there is a great moral principle that sellers put customers first.
Fine. Let’s pass a law that all consumable goods on the market must be given away for free.
If you see a problem with that scenario (i.e. mass poverty), then you have to know that the principle needs some elaboration if it is going to mean anything.
Here’s a newsflash. No one knew at Apple that iPod was going to be a complete success and revolutionize the music industry. I realize someone probably confidently predicted that it would happen in Apple, but so what? That is what entrepreneurs do: bloviate about what an incredibly important and inevitably successful their new gamble will be. And many–probably most–go boasting in to that black night of bankruptcy and failure. The ones who are truly entrepreneurial find some other gamble to claim as a sure success and gain backers and try again.
But when Apple came out with the iPod it is not as if they were puppetmasters pulling our strings by some sort of heinous monopoly. C’mon! We’re talking about Apple the joke of the computing world in much of the nineties while PCs took over. They had no reason to think their succes with iPod was guarranteed. They weren’t an omnipotent empire simply finding a new way to squeeze extra taxes from their subjects–they were producers trying to invent a new product.
So, if they came up with the idea that they would sell only a format that their program iTunes can play, this isn’t some self-evident violation of the putting-the-customer-first principle. Is anyone really going to claim that consumers were better off without iPods? They give people a new way to buy and listen to music and they get accused of some sort of sin? They get hauled before the socialist republics of Western Europe and asked to explain themselves? Explain what exactly.
Look, I simly don’t use the iTunes store for music. I haven’t bought an iPod yet, so I figure I don’t want to be locked into anything. But I have looked around for mp3 stores, and as far as I could find, they were pretty much pathetic in their selectiong. As far as I know, an exclusive music program might be the only way the iTunes store is able to offer the selection it does. If you don’t like it, there are these silver disc things that are still sold both new and used in music stores. They are called “CDs” (“Compact Discs). If you own a computer you can put it in the drive and use your completely free iTunes program to convert it to mp3. Then you can use any device you want, including but not limited to an iPod, to play it. In other words, you’re not “forced” to do anything. And I know from personal experience that even without an iPod or use of the store (except for the mysteriously free Tuesday download) a consumer is still much better off than he was before the iPod revolution. You can make do and enjoy a better life.
Or you can get your politicians (who are, of course, always the best people to make business decisions for us all) to use fines and jails to force people to do whatever you want in the hope it will produce an even better life that you imagine.
Which of these two options sounds like the civilized one?
It is almost a measurable cycle. Lots of businesses try new ventures. The ones that succeed are appreciated for a time until everyone regards their success as unfair and starts demanding they give everyone more goodies. In best case scenarios this corresponds to when their success might allow the company to change business models. But even then it is hardly right to act like people who make nice things need to answer for it like they have committed a crime.
Well, I almost let this die in draft mode. So what you read is all Doug Wilson’s fault. I got motivated again.
Moreover, seeing we cannot bring anything to redeem ourselves out of his hand: let us resort to the ransom which he has given us in the person of his own son, according also as S. Peter tells us, hay we be not bought with gold nor silver, but with the precious blood of the unspotted Lamb ( 1 Pet. 1:8,19). Thus ye see that the point whereunto we must come for the concluding of this text, is that after we once know that we be bereft of all means to escape God’s hand, and that we should of necessity be utterly consumed, but that he uses pity towards us: we must understand that he has given us a good remedy, in that it pleased him to offer up his only Son in sacrifice for us: for then were we fully ransomed, and that is a sufficient discharge to put away all our faults, so as the Devil shall not have any interest in us. For although we were overwhelmed with the infinite multitude of our sins: yet notwithstanding if the blood of Jesus Christ answer for us, it is a sufficient satisfaction for all our offences, and enough to appease the wrath of God. Ye see then whereunto our refuge must be. But we cannot come to the blood of Jesus Christ, until we bereft of all stateliness, as well past as to come. Past, to the end we may consider that we should utterly perish in our sins, & be quite and clean overwhelmed if God had not given us this means of being purged by the blood of his Son. And to come to the end, we be no more carried away with such rage, as to lift up ourselves against God, as though we could escape his hand, but rather hold ourselves in such awe, even with a willing mind, as we look not that God should chain us up like wild beasts, but as every [one] of us may bridle himself of his own accord. Let us have such modesty in us, as not to attempt anything against him: but whensoever it shall please him to chastise us, let every [one] of us thing thus himself: Go to, my God chastises me for such sin, and after such a manner: and it behooves me to make my profit of it. Therefore let us not be deaf when God warns us after that fashion: according to the examples he gives us, to the intent we grow not past grace, and so the thing befall us which is spoken heretofore, namely that we heap up continuously a greater wrath and a more horrible vengeance of God upon us (Calvin, Sermons on Job, Sermon 141, 36:15-19, p., 665).
On a another note (see comments), what is “modified amyraldianism”?
Amyraldianism claimed that God sent his son “for all.” My direct research in the subject is scarce. It came up in Boersma’s Hot Pepper Corn and in J. I. Packer’s dissertation on Richard Baxter. Other than that, I only have John Frame’s book review to work with. But I know enough to know that Amyrald was a “four-point” calvinist, the missing point being limited atonement.
Well, lets start with “four-point calvinism” for a moment, and try to fix it. Let’s add limited atonement into the picture. What results? Suprise! One kind of “modified Amyraldianism” is orthodox five-point Calvinism.
In other words, calling someone a “modified Amyraldian” is a disquised admission that the villain in question is not an Amyraldian at all. It is meaningless to use this language. In fact, descriptions of this sort are almost invariably used as an excuse for writing someone off as not needing any refutation because such a refutation has already been made (which is an amazingly charitable interpretation of John Owen, by the way). But if logic and/or sense mattered in the midst of such rhetoric then the only rational conclusion would lie in the exact opposite direction–that a genunely new thing is present that calls for a new response–a detailed, careful response.
Think about it. If these “modified Amyraldians” are so dangerous, they can be compared to a computer virus. When a new form of a virus suddenly appears, do software companies just laugh it off and say, “Not to worry. This is just a modified version of the virus we dealt with ten years ago. You don’t need any new antivirus protection.” No, they don’t. If it is modified, then they have to modify their antiviral work. Warnings to only go to safe websites is not an option.
Of course, I don’t think any of this is a virus, but, if I did, I would hope I would actually deal with it.
By the way, Beisner is a Clarkian. He doesn’t believe in the free offer of the Gospel. That’s his right, of course, but it is a minority position that dictates he would have a negative reaction to other strands of Calvinism (which he would then name into a movement for ease of disposal). On the other hand, as a Clarkian, Beisner teaches that saving faith is nothing more than assent to the right propositions.
The Apostle Paul in Romans 3:19-20 concluded his case against law keeping as a means of right standing before God. It is a case that he had built relentlessly from 1:18 right through 3:18. He raised it to vindicate his declaration in 1:16-17 that the gospel “is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes . . . . For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith [or perhaps “beginning and ending in faith”], as it is written, ‘The righteous shall live by faith.'” Salvation, Paul asserted, was by belief–by voluntary assent to understood propositions.
Thus, the fact he was asked to write a preface to a book purporting to defend the doctrines of the Westminster Confession is case study in the bizarro world of Reformed identity revision.
So why does anyone care what he has to say about this issue?
Just to be clear here, I’m all for Dr. Beisner constructing rational arguments. But so much is simply him reporting on his own conclusions without any means of following them. It is precisely when a person expects you to simply bow to his authority that question of unspoken commitments on his part become relevant. If his presbytery is happy with his views on faith I don’t want to trouble him. But if he is going try to set fire to the brambles to burn fields in other vineyards, I think I have a right to bring up what might be heating the blaze.
Some genius at Amazon decided to make “The Fifth Element” and “Gattaca” a package deal.
Well, at least I now have a perfect example of what a useless label “science fiction” is.
