1. Start by being enthralled with one of the more arid and arrogant strains of “Reformed theology” being pushed on the internet. Be someone campaigning for the original clause in the Westminster Confession that claimed the pope was the prophesied antichrist. Insist that saving faith is nothing more than intellectual assent. Or carefully listen to seminar after seminar that reduces the essence of the difference between Reformed and Roman to differing soteriological mechanics that diagram in different ways.
2. Meet some real Roman Catholics in person or print.
3. Realize many things you’ve been taught about them are just wrong and rude.
4. Realize that the stuff that seems unquestionably unbiblical can still be rationalized by much the same process of reasoning that once convinced you that celebrating Christmas was sinful or that churches that failed to structure themselves along Presbyterian churches were not true churches.
5. Share these views with overzealous friends and get predictably alienated from them by their predictable reaction.
6. Spend some time among Protestants who have not hated clerical garb or who think the sacraments are actually sacraments. Receive more reaction from zealous friends who have always hated these other Protestants for not being pure enough.
7. Bury yourself in just about any book (church history) except the Bible.
8. Start constantly harping on the completely unconvincing rationalizations for venerating objects until you alienate yourself from your less zealous friends.

Of course, there are other ways to do this. Like

1. Be in a really unhealthy church that matches all your scruples.
2. Refuse to consider a more generic Evangelical alternative.
3. Start developing a theological rationale for a complete break that will put you in a place where the grass looks greener.

Or there’s an “ultra Protestant” passage:

1. Pursue some minority status among the Reformed.
2. Figure out that a displaced seventeenth century Puritan isn’t as exotic as a Roman Catholic who thinks the present Pope is apostate and the mass should be done in Latin, or as a “true vine” Orthodox follower of the Saint Timorous Monastery in Hobguffin, NJ that has discovered that the entire rest of the Church (EO, RC, Protestant) is not truly the church.

The Return of Idolatry in Worship

Friday, January 26th, 2007 in Theology, Church History

Alastair, over on Adversaria, makes mention today of this posting which urges churches to return icons to worship. Naturally such claims as “icons mediate grace” are theologically and exegetically improper. There is no indication whatsoever that icons or images mediate grace. Grace is mediated purely through the action of the Holy Spirit, not through a picture or a piece of bread or a drop of wine. Icons distract the worshipper from God rather than “aiding worship” by focusing the worshipper’s attention on God.

As Zwingli said, so rightly, “It is false religion or piety when trust is put in any other than God. They, then, who trust in any created thing whatsoever are not truly pious.” Indeed, Zwingli was so convinced of the impropriety of icon-olatry that he wrote an entire book about it, Eine Antwort Valentin Compar gegeben, published on April 27, 1525. In his Commentary on True and False Religion Zwingli discusses the problem in some detail as well. He was right then, and he is still right today. Icons have no place in Christian worship. They are not the “books of the illiterate” nor are they aids to piety. They are idols, and swiftly so, purely and simply and so any desire to return to their inclusion is a return to impropriety.

Mike Hyatt introduced me to Joel’s goals last month and I’ve been using it since. Unhappily, I’ve not used it that well, but that hasn’t discouraged me from the value of the site. I just deleted my checklist and began rethinking it to come up with more realistic goals or a better opportunity to starts some of them.

I’m pretty confident this will work. The rather shallow desire to use a “cool app” will keep bugging me about more important disciplines. The desire to be cool converges with the desire to make substantial improvement. It is a good thing.

But what I did not know until recently is that Joe’s goals is also Joe’s logbook.

Joe’s logbook works differently. With the goals you simply check off tasks you want to do (or not). With the log you actually write notes. Currently I’m using the log as a way to keep track of hours for various freelance projects I am working on. It is also a way for me to make sure I’m moving consecutively through the Psalms for devotions, through the Bible in general (I started going through Deuteronomy but am considering reverting back to Genesis and heading straight through) or any books. You don’t have to dogear pages or write notes in the margins.

Something in me responds a little bit more powerfully to seeing my page count, rather than simply checking off that I have read a chapter that day.

Joe’s logbook is a different site than Joe’s goals, but they both offer both forms of record keeping and progress monitoring. Give it a try.

1. Should icons be used in worship as a means by which God ministers to us?

Yes, we should find God’s presence and blessing mediated to us through true icons.

2. So then should icons be brought into public worship?

Not only should they, but they must be brought into worship on the Lord’s day. Those who do not bring their icons to worship need to repent of their behavior.

3. What are true icons?

True icons are images of God through whom he ordinarily acts and speaks and works. They are to be revered for the sake of the One whose image is stamped upon them.

4. Is it proper to bow to true icons?

Upon appropriate occasion it is fitting and right to bow to icons.

5. Is it proper to confess one’s sin to a true icon?

Upon appropriate occasion it is fitting and right to confess one’s sin to an icon.

6. How does one lawfully produce a true icon?

A husband and wife must have sex to produce a true icon, and God must bless them with conception.

7. Where in the Bible are icons first made?

Genesis 1.26-27

8. How are Christians taught to use icons in the Church?

“Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you. Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children. And walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.”

“Let love be genuine. Abhor what is evil; hold fast to what is good. Love one another with brotherly affection. Outdo one another in showing honor. Do not be slothful in zeal, be fervent in spirit, serve the Lord. Rejoice in hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer. Contribute to the needs of the saints and seek to show hospitality.”

“Therefore let us not pass judgment on one another any longer, but rather decide never to put a stumbling block or hindrance in the way of a brother.”

“Therefore welcome one another as Christ has welcomed you, for the glory of God.”

“Greet one another with a holy kiss.”

Etc.

Thanks for bringing this to my attention!

We read indeed, that God justifies the ungodly, Rom. 4:5; but this cannot, in fair construction, imply that the man when justified, is ungodly, still holding fast his sins, and refusing to return. For his being justified by God, is as a thousand arguments that he has returned to God…He who exercises [faith], cannot be called ungodly, in the usual sense of the word. He is radically holy, having holy faith. The true sense therefore of these words, that God justifies the ungodly, I conceive to be the same, as when our Lord said, the blind see, and the deaf hear, Luke 7:2. It cannot be that these persons were actually blind, when they saw; or deaf, when they heard: but that being once so, they now both saw and heard. In like manner, God is said to justify the ungodly, i.e. him who had hitherto been so.

The quote is from Thomas Bell. When I have time I will research who he is.

My fellow PCA minister, Lane Keister, thinks there was something wrong with Auburn Avenue Presbyterian Church hosting a conference with Richard Gaffin and N. T. Wright.

The reason is these stealth Bible conferences, where their teaching tries to get under the radar screen of “teaching.” I’m not talking about how visible the conference was (obviously). Rather, I’m talking about a forum where new ideas are being discussed; a forum there that is not accountable to any church body. Since they are not accountable, they can invite speakers like N.T. Wright to come and speak at their conference. And presbytery cannot do anything about that, except after the fact, and based on transcripts of something where the damage has already been done.

I think Lane needs to choose another example. If there was anything wrong with this conference why did Gaffin agree? What makes a conference like this “under the radar screen.” And what of the PCA pastors and professors from Covenant Theological Seminary, Reformed Theological Seminary, and Westminster Theological Seminary, who all went and were edified by both men?

The good news is that you can still purchase the CD of Wright’s first lecture and DVD’s of the rest. In fact, Lane has inspired me to listen to them while I ‘m working today. They were extraordinarily good.

Preston Graham is a PCA pastor. He is, for those who are counting, opposed to paedocommunion. As far as I can recall from a couple of years ago at General Assembly, he delays the admission of covenant children to communion longer than anyone else I have heard of. I bought his book at the PCA GA book table a few years earlier. Perhaps the latter half of the book includes a rationale for why covenant children should not be admitted to the table and a sample test they must pass in order to be given access.

My point in all this is not to criticize Graham, who is well within his rights in all these things. My point is simply to say that, no matter how familiar it may sound, what follows below was not written by Rich Lusk:

EXCERPT
A BAPTISM THAT SAVES: The Reformed Sacramental Doctrine of Baptism Argued and Clarified

1999 Christ Presbyterian Church, New Haven, CT 06510

Pages 14-16

The sacramental view [of baptism] most accords with the idea of God’s initiating a covenant by his sovereign decree in election–effecting this through effectual calling. This is because, instead of God “watching/witnessing” the transaction represented by baptism, He is present as mediated through the sacrament to initiate and effect the covenant. He is God the covenant Actor, not merely God the covenant witness, and this is related to the whole order of salvation held by the Reformed tradition. Therefore, we don’t think of baptism as something we do, but rather as something God does–at least in the ultimate sense. While the recipient physically gets wet, God washes the elect to with the Holy Spirit unto regeneration in effectual calling. (But keep in mind the WCF qualifications according to the principle of God’s sovereign grace.)

Consider then the following passages of Scripture that, by a plain reading, will clearly depict baptism effecting salvation rather than merely signifying salvation–although it certainly does this as well–and ask yourself, Why impose a meaning that is not most natural and obvious from the language itself?

1. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, by baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and by teaching them… (Matthew 28.19)
2. he saved us, not because of any works of righteousness that we have done, but according to his mercy, through the water of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit (Titus 3.5)
3. And baptism, which this prefigured, now saves you–not as a removal of dirt from the body, but as an appeal to God for a good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ (First Peter 3.1)
4. For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have been clothed with Christ. There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave nor free, there is no longer male and female, for all of you are one in Christ Jesus (Galatians 3.27-28).
5. For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and we were all made to drink of one Spirit (First Corinthians 12.13).
6. The one who believes and is baptized will be saved; but the one who does not believe will be condemned (Mark 16.16).
7. And Peter said to them, “Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ so that your sins may be forgiven; and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit (Acts 2.38).
8. And now why do you delay? Get up, be baptized, and have your sins washed away, calling on is name (Acts 22.16).
9. Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? Therefore, we were buried with him by baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life (Romans 6.3-4).
10. But by refusing to be baptized by him, the Pharisees and the lawyers rejected God’s purpose for themselves (Luke 7.20).

If you read these passages as if you have never even thought about the issue before, try telling yourself that each passage does notso seem on the surface at least to treat baptism as somehow effecting something–namely salvation from sin in its various dynamics. So what is the most simple and honest reading of “be baptized … so that your sins may be forgiven and our sins washed away” except that baptism is in some sense effecting the washing away of sins? And again, if this were the only passage that seemed to imply this, we may then see if there is a less natural, albeit grammatically possible, way of reading it. But then we read Peter’s exhortation to “be baptized… so that your sins may be forgiven and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.” What does the contingent and future language most naturally say except that baptism is in some sense viewed as transacting the gift of the Holy Spirit to the person being baptized? Or, we read that God “saved us, not because of any works of righteousness that we have done, but according to his mercy, through the water of rebirth and renewal of the Holy Spirit.” What “water” is this except the waters of baptism? And what does it do except “effect,” in some sense at least, “rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit”?

THUS ENDETH THE EXCERPT

Now, let me ask you. Is Preston Graham the only one who says these sorts of things? Why no. Other also. Like who? Well, like Michael Horton, for one.

When you hear hysterical screams of terror about allegations of “baptismal regeneration” being imported into Presbyterianism, you should ask yourself who is being accused and why them and not others. You might also ask yourself why a broad cross-section of Presbyterians, whose only commonality seems to lie in a genuine interest in and respect for the Reformed tradition, seem to be saying such similar things.

Look at this another way, in keeping with my recent fiction reading: Say someone who was “anti-FV” was given a machine that would unmake anyone he wished was unable to influence the PCA. I don’t mean make them disappear; I mean go back in time and ensure they were never born at all. No John Frame. No Steve Wilkins. No Preston Graham. No Rich Lusk or Mark Horne or, for that matter, eighty-five churches. None of them was ever around to contaminate this history of the PCA.

And lets add Karl Barth and Thomas Torrance and anyone else of the “Barthians” who may be thought to be secretly influencing the PCA.

What would happen?

Quite simply, other people who read the Westminster Standards with genuine interest–others with an interest in the Bible and with Zacharias Ursinus and with the history of the Reformed liturgies, and with an interest in the scholastics and Puritans–would fill the vacuum. The problem is not Rich or Steve or me, or Al Gore’s invention of the internet. The problem is that the Westminster Standards say things that don’t fit what certain Presbyterians want them to say.

If you want to change time and free us from these conflicts, you’re going to need to go back in time to the Westminster Assembly itself. Or perhaps further.

Well, as this post continues to generate interest, it might be helpful to direct readers to this post entitled “No nanosecond necessary.”

For what it is worth.