So it’s not living faith, and it is not dead faith.
What, is it? Faith the Vampire Slayer?
Is Faith a vampire herself now? Did she finally lose a battle and get turned?
Maybe Dr. Clark is a member of the Watcher’s Council and is trying to get out alarming news without blowing his cover.
Sorry, but I’m struggling to find a rational explanation for the weird nonsense being broadcast. There is certainly no explanation from the Reformed standards, Reformed tradition more generally, or the Bible to explain the statements being made. There has to be something else going on.
Weird is the word. And Dr. Clark is a church historian!
Oh, and there’s still that annoying BIBLICAL passage in the book of James, that “faith without works is dead” and that kind of faith cannot be a saving, justifying faith.
Your vampire connection is not too far off, Mark, given that the apostle James describes “faith without works” as the faith of demons.
Simple or perhaps stupid question: Dr. Clark is not in the PCA and teaches at a seminary which is not officially PCA. So what weight does his statements have in the FV debate currently going on in the PCA? I realize that the debate is going on across several Reformed denominations but I’m just wondering how inter-related these debates are and how they might effect each denomination.
Clark quotes Wilson, and then Clark says
“Yes, obedient faith is the only kind of faith that God gives, Amen, but faith doesn’t justify because it obeys.”
Nowhere does Wilson say that it does. Nothing Clark quotes can be inferred to say that. This is a great example of an FV critic atcually misunderstanding/misrepresenting someone on the FV side. He’s got NOTHING.
Mark, you criticize Clark for implying that the FV people are teaching that faith is just a work.
Clark uses “Doesn’t faith, in the act of justification, have just a tiny bit of Spirit-wrought sanctity or my obedience in it? Just a wee bit?” to make this point
1. Clark totally misses that the FV and Shepherd and Wilson are totaly not saying that God accounts the “obedient” or “living” or “virtuous” quality of faith as what is worthy of justification. They’re just saying that the kind of faith you have to have to be justified is obedient faith (Just like Clark himself says above)
2. What seems unclear to me is how we’re reading clarks denials that “faith IN THE ACT OF JUSTIFICATION contains sanctity”. it’s very poorly phrased, obviously confusing, and reflects badly on Clarks communciative abilities. I’m not sure its wrong as he probably INTENDS it to be stated. I think Clark is trying to say that when GOD looks at faith in justification, he looks at it solely as it is empty and grasping Christ. It IS obedient, but its “obedient” quality is not what makes it “suitable” or “worthy” to function as an instrument. For Clark, if faith IN THE ACT OF JUSTIFCATION, WORKS becasue it contains sanctity or worth, then we’d be justfied in saying “Dear God, I trust jesus as my savior, please save me because I’m finally obeying you the way you ought, and this work of faith is what you see in me that makes me worthy of being saved”, where as both Clark and the FV would agree that the kind of faith God uses as an instrument to justify just says “I’ve got nothing, but I desperately need Christ’s work on my behalf”
3. So we need to keep reading even the worst and most confused critics charitably (P&PT and all!)
Yes. The MVP report had a similar neo-phrasism: “NS argues that justification contemplates faith not simply in its receptive capacity but also in its obediential capacity”, that was easy to demonstrate as false, as your quote does.
Since when does a theological term contemplate anything? God may be contemplating it, or a theologian may be contemplating it, or someone being justified might contemplate it.
If only these FV critics would write more clearly!
The only thing I can think of is that Clark is embarrased by the Lutheran critiques of the Reformed doctrine of regeneration (“first, get the LAW written on your heart, THEN have faith, THEN get justified by God??”), and is trying to purge Calvinism of that idea. Garver makes some interesting points about that in prior comment posts.
But still, unless he’d like to make explicit that he agrees with the Lutheran critique, we have to keep reading him with the best possible contruction.
[to Bob]
I’m still trying to figure that out too. I guess what I find appalling is that this sort of nouveau doctrine can be passed off to lay people and no one of stature thinks it is worth contradicting. In my seminary and, as far as I know, every Reformed seminary, students are taught the Biblical and Reformed position that the faith that justifies is an obedient faith (with the caveat that the obedience is not what justifies). How can people be trying so hard to find fault with the “federal vision” while this new doctrine is promulgated?
I don’t know the answer to my own question. But it does show you one reason to think that what Dr. Clark is able to say fearlessly in public reflects on the PCA’s own leadership.
What would be great is if the PCA’s (anti-)FV committee realized the danger we are in of de facto changing our doctrine under the guise of “protecting the gospel” and publicly addressed this error.
We’ll see.
Pduggie [to your first comment, regarding false accusation]:
Well that’s been the problem from the beginning because Norman Shepherd also strenuously denied that faith gains its power to justify from its obedience.
Here’s Doug Wilson:
And here’s Norman Shepherd:
So as you say, it is a great example.
Earlier, Clark made a big deal about whether or not he was an antinomian, treating it as a statement about his doctrine. I too wonder if Clark is an antinomian, not from his doctrine, but from his public life. He makes railing false accusations against the Brethren. He needs to stop.
Pduggie, [to your second comment]:
“What seems unclear to me is how we’re reading clarks denials that “faith IN THE ACT OF JUSTIFICATION contains sanctity”. it’s very poorly phrased, obviously confusing,”
Well, every time I read him saying that I want to ask why his seems to be implying that faith does the justifying. I understand “faith justifies” might be ok in a vague way. But when we’re getting precise don’t we have to say that “God is the one who justifies.” Faith is never “in” the “act” at all. Period.
Interesting. If you google search on “faith in the act of justification” You get 14 hits. The top 12 are so are all clark, or people responding to clark.
Another one is “Puritanism And The Church Of England”, recording the puritain complaints: “Some in the Church teach, say the
Puritan complainers, ‘that good works are concauses with faith in the act of
justification'”
And the last is “The Book of the Apocalypse Revealed, Uncovering the Secrets That Were Foretold There and Have Lain Hidden until Now”, by…,
wait for it…
EMMAUEL SWEEDENBORG!
He has a section where he has “A SUMMARY OF THE DOCTRINES OF THE CHURCH AND RELIGION OF THE REFORMED”
It actually doesn’t sound too bad.
There has GOT to be a way to connect someone with Swedenborg here in order to prove that his formulation is wrong.
(Not that I’m recommending it. Google is too powerful. Even an offhand, satirical remark on a blog can create or aggravate discord in this environment.)
Mark, I can’t believe you don’t get it. It is so obvious.
It is an undead faith.
“NS argues that justification contemplates faith not simply in its receptive capacity but also in its obediential capacity”
Well, since the statement is actually nonsense (as you show) it is, technically, impossible refute. That’s the tragedy: we’re seeing “sound of one hand clapping” zen-like statements being pawned off as technical theology.
The only meaning the above sentence can have is: “Norman Shepherd is not allowed to write those things because he is now allowed to write those things.”
I do think of the Reformed Theology much like a Romero film though.