All in the Family: A Primer in Covenantal Objectivity and Apostasy

Our problems are not small. The most cursory glance at the newspaper will remind us of global crises like AIDS, local catastrophes of senseless violence, family failures, ecological threats, and church skirmishes. These problems resist easy solutions. They are robust—powerful, pervasive, and systemic.

Do we have a gospel big enough for these problems? Do we have the confidence to declare that these robust problems, all of which begin with sin against God and then creep into the world like cancer, have been conquered by a robust gospel? When I read the Gospels, I see a Lion of Judah who roared with a kingdom gospel that challenged both Israel’s and Rome’s mighty men, gathered up the sick and dying and made them whole, and united the purity-obsessed “clean” and the shame-laden “unclean” around one table. When I read the apostle Paul, I see a man who carried a gospel that he believed could save as well as unite Gentiles and barbarians with Abraham’s sacred descendants. I do not think their gospel was too small.

I sometimes worry we have settled for a little gospel, a miniaturized version that cannot address the robust problems of our world. But as close to us as the pages of a nearby Bible, we can find the Bible’s robust gospel, a gospel that is much bigger than many of us have dared to believe:

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Hat Tip: Steve Wilkins

According to the Westminster Shorter catechism, baptism and the Lord’s supper are efficacious for salvation:

Q. 91. How do the sacraments become effectual means of salvation?
A. The sacraments become effectual means of salvation, not from any virtue in them, or in him that doth administer them; but only by the blessing of Christ, and the working of his Spirit in them that by faith receive them.

Thus, when we remember our baptism, we are supposed to trust that Christ’s blessing attended it and that the Spirit worked in it. Among other things this means we should

1. Give thanks to God for “the privileges and benefits conferred” by baptism,
2. Be humbled by “our sinful defilement, our falling short of, and walking contrary to, the grace of baptism“
3. Grow up  “to assurance of pardon of sin“
4. Grow up to assurance “of all other blessings sealed to us in” the sacrament of baptism.
5. Draw strength “from the death and resurrection of Christ, into whom we are baptized, for the mortifying of sin, and quickening of grace“
6. Endeavor “to live by faith“
7. Exhibit behavior “in holiness and righteousness, as those that have therein given up their names to Christ” in baptism
8. Walk “in brotherly love, as being baptized by the same Spirit into one body“

And when we receive the Lord’s Supper, we should trust that by the working of the Holy Spirit we truly (though not by any transmission of physical particles) partake of Christ’s humanity so that our union with him and with other Christians is strengthened, for our “spiritual nourishment and growth in Him.”

Presbyterians would seem a lot more familiar and acceptable to American fundamentalists and many Evangelicals if they would not teach and preach these things.  In fact, they would also seem a lot more rational to many Americans in general if they stripped the Faith down to simply some core affirmations one must profess and a list of behaviors–without including all this stuff about how rituals are effective for salvation.  But they would be doing violence to Scripture and even weakening the Gospel.

The obedience of faith:

• The obedience that results from faith — If you trust God this changes your behavior
• The obedience that is bare faith — God commands you to trust him alone for salvation so, when you do so, you are obeying.
• The obedience that is real faith — To trust someone as an all-sufficient savior and lord is to embrace following Him rather than other so-called gods and lords (faith as trust)
• The formal obedience that is faith — Confessing the truth rather than the lies of the world (faith as verbal formula)
• The faithfulness of faith — Continuing in faith rather than giving in to temptations to doubt or trust others (faith through time)
• What else?

Dr. Ligon Duncan’s Owning the Confession is well worth reading. Many may not know that it is still available on the internet:

• Part One
• Part Two

Here is the best quote:

Comparison of the old Scottish Formula and the second ordination vow of the Presbyterian Church in America provides an interesting study in contrasts. 1) The Kirk’s formula requires the ordinand to own and believe, while the PCA asks one to receive and adopt. 2) The Kirk’s vow entails commitment to the whole doctrine of the Confession as founded upon the Word while the PCA’s acknowledges the Confession as the system of doctrine contained in the Word. 3) The minister of the Kirk had to affirm both the Confession as the confession of his faith, and that he would practice the Confession. Neither of these clauses is found in the PCA vow. 4) Finally, the minister of the Kirk vowed to assert, maintain, and defend the Confession while the PCA minister promises to inform the presbytery if he is out of accord with it.

This was written before the BCO had been amended to officially show “system subscription” (and really shows the amendment was unnecessary).

By the way, I would love for someone to show me how this “observation and conclusion has anything to do with anything in the body of the essay, because I simply don’t see any relationship:

As to the core of doctrine in the Confession, it is clear that classic federal theology is so much a part of the warp and woof of the Westminsterian system, that removal of any component of its covenant theology would bankrupt the very idea of a Westminsterian system of theology of any meaning. Therefore, those who have expressed reservations about the Confession‘s covenantal system (in both the nineteenth and twentieth centuries) are not so much questioning particular doctrines of the Confession as they are the very heart of its theological system.

I have no idea what Dr. Duncan is talking about, unless he’s criticizing Dr. Wilson Benton’s essay on Federal Theology (“Federal Theology: Review for Revision” in Through Christ’s Word: A Festschrift for Philip E. Hughes ed. by W. Robert Godfrey, et al [Presbyterian and Reformed, 1985] 180-204).  I can’t think of anything else in print or in any other medium that would make that statement relevant to the Presbyterian Churches in America. It would great to see the two scholars discuss this issue. But nothing in his essay gives any context or explanation at all for this remark.  It reads to me like it came from some other essay or from a rough draft that contained material that was cut.

While I’m not prone to agree with the thrust of Dr. Duncan’s concern, I did find this paragraph both eerily prophetic and ironic:

There is good evidence from Scottish Church history to show that loss of confessional authority (in either the act of approval or formula of subscription) does not increase freedom, but rather it diminishes it. Having been freed from meaningful adherence to an established formulation, one finds oneself captive to the tyranny of a fifty-percent plus one majority of any General Assembly all the worse for its changeability.

Finally, I’ll end with a quotation that I think shows real wisdom:

It is evident from the Scottish practice, that subscription is not the answer if one is seeking to create theological unity out of diversity. Rather it is an instrument of enforcement and preservation of existing orthodoxy and consensus. Any who see strict subscription as a panacea for the conservative Presbyterian Churches in America, hence, have the cart before the horse. First there must exist a consensus to guard, before one discusses how best to guard it.

Well put.