Thinking some more about this quasi-roman-catholic theology, it occurs to me what a rank unbeliever I must seem to be to those blinded by it.
I mean, hereI am, in utterly misplaced faith, following that sixteenth-century unbeliever John Calvin (the embarrasing drunken great-uncle, if you will), thinking that the Bible is the lens by which we view all things, whether human persons, human societies, nature, nuclear weapons, health insurance plans, literary works, games, whatever. I think of the Bible as the document that is used by the Holy Spirit to break down barriers, to shatter idols, to divide the depths of the human heart and bring conviction and repentance–to rip off false perspectives and ideologies and presuppositions that blind people, and allow them to see the truth and discern all things rightly.
Of course, this is usually done through human speakers who know the Bible, but it still comes down to the Bible. And furthermore, the process of recovering the truth in all areas of life comes from continually learning the Bible and conforming one’s mind to its patterns.
But no, that is just idolatry. The Holy Spirit uses the Westminster documents for those purposes–at least when it comes to Scripture. You can’t even understand the Bible rightly unless you use the Westminster Confession and Catechisms in order to interpret it.
It is there objectively, of course. But it is just a dead letter. It can only be mishandled and misused until God raised up a pack of warring Englishman with Scot handlers (using their military aid as pressure) to drop into the world for the first time the one true necessary interpretation of all of Scripture that was the missing tool to actually allow sinful men to read Holy Writ aright.
It is now the job of all true believers to tell Christians everywhere to repent of their autonomous, idolatrous attempts to read the Bible, and go to the Westminster documents, where the Holy Spirit will correct their misconceptions, with the “Standard’s” self-interpreting truth–qualities God’s Word has never possessed.
Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers, before the mid 1600s, in vague signs and hints of the truth. But now but in these last post-Reformation days he has spoken to us by his Westminster Confession and Catechisms, which he appointed the heir of all things, through which also he created the world. The Westminster Standards are the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and they upholds the universe by the word of their power.
Or is Scripture the lens by which we interpret the Westminster Standards? Should this be a difficult question?
Mark, isn’t your Bible simply the Horne Confession of Faith? Is there really an uninterpreted Bible out there? In which case, the confession of a Committee like the Westminster Assembly is more Protestant than the interpretation of a single pope-like individual.
Sorry dgh, you missed it.
Plus, to claim a council is more Protestant than an individual studying Scripture is to ignore all of the most important events of the Reformation. Exhibit A: The Diet of Worms, the true launch of the Reformation. While Luther didn’t go into a closet all by himself, he argued that councils can and do err, and to sin against his own conscience is neither right nor safe.
On Protestant principles, Westminster must be evaluated by individuals & received insofar as it fits your reading of Scripture.
I’m a member in good standing of a Presbytery that has ruled on my understanding of the confession more than once. You, last I heard you live, when you were still being nice (or maybe I just never knew things I later realized) basically dismissed Church authority and authorized any individual to condemn the work of the Church courts in favor of their reading of the Westminster Confession of Faith.
This is soooo anti-intellectual and cretinous. Yes, the Bible is my confession of faith. And yes, my interprestation of the Bible (or the WCF etc) may be in error. They way you deal with that is by discussion of exegesis. But instead of arguments we get trump cards–and all too often they are actually from much later (eighteenth- or nineteenth century) lens grinders. Simply granting the Westminster Divines license to say what the Bible means was *never* an abomination that any of the Divines ever practiced. That is your heretical monster, Hart. You need to rip it from your jugular if there is still time.
Jeremy, and here I thought the Federal Vision involved a high view of the church.
Mark, you must not have been listening very carefully — maybe you were working on the reiview of Nevin — because I have never dismissed church authority. Exegesis is one thing. Theology is another. And I wasn’t all that impressed by the ability of FVers in the debate at deregno christi to construct and maintain a coherent theological argument. And that may be where your problem with the WCF comes in. You get the last word because you’re still exegeting. The divines are dead. But who says that your exegesis is the one to decide the validity of the WCF? There you go, making yourself pope again. (BTW, who is this papal “we”?)
DGH,
I made no pretense of representing the Federal Vision, only the Reformation tradition in general. Perhaps if you’d paid more attention to what I wrote as you did to my name, you might have chosen to respond to what I particularly said.
Conscience over Council is a Reformation tradition. Council over Conscience is a Papal tradition. A man of your caliber ought to no better than to lob such ridiculous and inaccurate accusations at others. That’s all.
God’s peace,
jwb
DGH,
I made no pretense of representing the Federal Vision, only the Reformation tradition in general. Perhaps if you’d paid more attention to what I wrote as you did to my name, you might have chosen to respond to what I particularly said.
Conscience over Council is a Reformation tradition. Council over Conscience is a Papal tradition. A man of your caliber ought to know better than to lob such ridiculous and inaccurate accusations at others. That’s all.
God’s peace,
jwb
Jamey,
Perhaps you’re familiar with the WCF 20.4, which says, anyone who upon pretense of Christian liberty, shall oppose any lawful power, or the lawful exercise of it, whether it be civil or ecclesiastical, resists the ordinance of God. Since the Standards later also say that the work of synods and councils is an ordinance of God, you may want to modify your very New Side Presbyterian/New England Puritain idea of conscience over council.
dgh
Jamey,
Perhaps you’re familiar with the WCF 20.4, which says, anyone who upon pretense of Christian liberty, shall oppose any lawful power, or the lawful exercise of it, whether it be civil or ecclesiastical, resists the ordinance of God. Since the Standards later also say that the work of synods and councils is an ordinance of God, you may want to modify your very New Side Presbyterian/New England Puritain idea of conscience over council.
dgh
I sincerely hope that DGH is not a pastor somewhere.
DGH, you said lots of pro-church things but then you dismissed the idea of Presbyteries granting exceptions to ministers with a “what’s up with that?”
And that put the lie to everything you are saying. It really is the individual believer with his precious book of the Westminster documents condemning presbytery after presbytery for violating holy-though-the WCF-forbids-us-from-being-honest-about-what-we’re-doing writ. It isn’t about epistemology or sociology or government. It is about replacing the Bible with another text to have authority in the Church. It is exactly a kiltish if not cultish version of Eastern Orthodoxy.
The Confession explicitly condemns using a “rule of faith” and you don’t get around it by using the word “lens” for “rule of faith.” I am the one defending the Westminster Confession as it actually stands written and as it has been treated in North American Presbyterianism my entire ecclesial life and ministry. My crime is that such a defense is merely an accident. I really care about the actual Bible.
Mark, glad to know of your concern for the Bible. Here’s my problem. First you say I “basically dismissed Church authority and authorized any individual to condemn the work of the Church courts in favor of their reading of the Westminster Confession of Faith.”
Then you say that I “said lots of pro-church things but then [I] dismissed the idea of Presbyteries granting exceptions to ministers with a ‘what’s up with that?'” that remark “put the lie to everything you are saying.”
If you can make me say that, then maybe you can be similarly creative with the Bible. .
Okay…. I thank you for spelling out the issues. I don’t think my conclusion was creative at all.
It seems to me that a high view of the Church is one that defers to her, but recognizes she is capable of error, and is willing to criticize and exhort her according to Scripture when there appears an irresolvable tension between the two. Not one that blindly submits to ecclesiastical authority without holding that authority accountable to Scripture.
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Unbelievable. The WCF is our presupposition? Can anyone imagine what Cornelius Van Til would say to such a thing. Or B. B. Warfield?
Mark, it’s also hard to believe that Van Til would ever countenance the autonomous rational self of yourself merely sitting down with his Bible, as if he did not have any prejudices and was completely neutral. I really don’t think you want to appeal to Van Til.
“merely sitting down with his Bible, as if he did not have any prejudices and was completely neutral”
You are making up stuff.
It is still rank heresy to claim that another document must serve as the lens to give us a right interpretation of Scripture. It attributes the Spirit’s work in a document that is not inspired, when the Spirit has promised to guide the Church using Scripture.
It is a violation of what the WCF explicitly says about a “rule of faith.”
It is all heretical nonsense. The WCF is not the lens. The WCF does not claim to be the lens. No Westminster Divine ever used it as a lens. The WCF says it may not be used as a lens. “Neutral” autonomy is not the necessary alternative to such a lens. No one is claiming to be presuppositionless for contradicting you by affirming the Protestant doctrine of Scripture.
God has written the lens for interpreting Scripture and it is Scripture. God has given a teaching ministry to the Church that is not exclusively located in the WCF. Rather, the WCF is to be looked at through the lens of Scripture. On Judgment Day, that will be the question.
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re #16
Good stuff, Mark. That pretty much nails it.
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The above links a great statement by Robert Shaw about how a Confession can and should be properly used by a Church. This is, sadly, still smudged together with the idea of a “lens” which is obviously exactly the “rule of faith” that Shaw and the Confession and the Bible condemns. But despite that erroneous use of Shaw’s words, his comments are quite good. I reproduce them here: