What Paul said.

What have we heard lately about “trying to nail jello to the wall”?

Evan Donovan makes an observation about the “total sacramental action” (I’m not sure how it comports with the “in the elements” clause) that I think is right and should be emphasized. Here is something that Peter Leithart wrote in 1991, relying on some contemporary Franciscan theologizing. I reproduce it below:

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I should not have said this because Andy’s false and unwarranted statements about me and other PCA ministers–which are consistent with similar statements he has been making for years–could conceivably have some other cause. I am sorry I said them. Having recovered a bit, I do think they have some other cause. I repent of what I said.

That Chris Hutchinson has now decided to bring this against me, while he has listened to Andy accuse me of pushing Roman Catholic doctrine and associate my teaching with a false and anathematized Gospel (always on the internet, never to my face or my presbytery), is rather amazing. I’ve written about this kind of thing elsehere.

That Andy, who has been putting me under Anathemas for years now, over the internet (never to my presbytery) should now say that he can’t submit to the brethren, is an amazing thing. How am I supposed to react when minister claim I am a “gateway drug” for Roman Catholicism or that I am an “opponent” waging a “bltzkrieg” “attack” on “sola fide”? How was I supposed to “submit to the Brethren” for the last five years?

Finally, a general statement. I teach and preach Reformed theology. I have taken received exceptions to some details of the Westminster Standards: paedocommunion, Lord’s Day activity, and pictures of Jesus in Sunday School books, which have been received by my presbytery (and in every presbytery in which I have been a member, with restrictions on preaching paedocommunion in only one–for those who care, I don’t think I’ve ever preached paedocommunion in a PCA Church).

Some people I respect, who are ministers in good standing in the PCA, may have other exceptions, but I don’t.

So why the fuss.

As far as I can tell, people object that I promote Reformed views. I promote Charles Hodge’s historically Reformed views of the Roman Catholic Church and the RC priesthood. I believe what the Westminster Confession says about the obligations of baptism toward Romand Catholics and others (though Andy is totally wrong about my view of apostasy from Protestantism. Just because the Northern Kingdom was in covenant with God does not mean that a Jew who defected from Jerusalem in order to worship at Jeroboam’s shrine would not be damned to Hell as an unbeliever).

I believe that what the Confession and catechisms teach about the relationship between faith, repentance, obedience and eternal life. I believe and teach that all this is perfectly consistent with what the Confession teaches about sola fide.

I teach what the Westminster Standards say about the sacraments.

It’s all on the public record.

A couple of final thoughts. I’ve listened to Guy Waters and watched the Mississippi Valley Pby report try to pull aberrant teaching out of my (rather prolific) web writings. Even apart from the repeated decision of every presbytery that has received me, that alone would give me assurance that I am quite orthdox. Furthermore, for a web debate, the accusations hurled against me have been astounding for their lack of hyper-linking. Where is the interaction? Why not just point to it and show how bad it is? Why such reliance on pull quotes?

I repeat what I said earlier. I renounce and repent of what I said about Andy Webb. By God’s grace I hope he will some day do the same.

Though I haven’t read her book yet (I’m not really in her demographic), I like Dawn Eden (as much as someone can say that on the basis of a blog and youtube), I really do. I don’t want to pick no her. But it is hard not to comment on this.

In the Bible, you get this ambiguity in the prophetic critique: When the Northern Kingdom institutionalized improper shrines they are in danger of, and often compared to, idolatrous pagans. But as far as we know God never sent any prophets to Sparta or Carthage, and he certainly never called them “my people.” He continued to do that for Israel. They seem to be pagan and covenanted at the same time.

So, I’m not denying the historical Protestant position here, but I have to admit that reading about shrines in airports where the “real presence” is kept for adoration is pretty alien. It doesn’t look any different from something you might see in India or some other pagan culture where they still bow to idols.

When did this practice arise? Is someone going to seriously suggest that the Christians were carrying concecrated bits of bread around and adoring them as God’s presence and this never became a point of controversy between Jews and Christians that an Apostle had to address in writing? The reason we read so much about circumcision in the NT is because it was a huge point of controversy.

We simply have no hint of this practice in the first century in the Church. Rather, we find it when the Church spread out over time and space to convert the pagans, it found these and other practices to be acceptable. And now, of course, just like revivalistic meetings among Evangelicals, or laughter among some Pentecostals, there are a whole army of feelings and pious words arrayed around this practice to protect it from scrutiny.