Wes White, over at the Johannes Weslianus e-blogger blog has a recent addition to his valiant campaign against Federal Vision (FV) in the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA), “ The Reformed Soteriological System and the Federal Vision System” (new site home: http://www.weswhite.net/2010/10/reformed-soteriological-system-and/). I usually run into technical difficulty posting to Wes’ blog (it’s the e-blogger software and it’s lengthy url codes), so I’ll post a bit here. To inadequately sum him up:
The Federal Visionists will appropriate Confessional language that has been used to distinguish the Reformed system from other systems and use that language in a way consonant with their own system. However, it is often unclear that they are using these words in a different sense. The result is generally confusion and conflict.
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The general ethos of the PCA is that we do not press people very hard, especially ordained ministers.
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However, some within the Presbytery are still concerned. Many of them are not sure why. Some feel the need to press further but are rebuked as being Pharisees and witch hunters.The result will be that eventually those who continue to press these matters (in whatever forum they may do so) will be disciplined as compromising the peace and purity of the church.…Sadly, I think that this is what is happening in our Reformed Churches. There are those who hold this system of doctrine. There are those who are willing to defend it. There are those who hold to it inconsistently. There are those who teach that the differences are unimportant. The longer that this goes on, the harder it will be to deal with it. The more likely it will be that it will be so accepted that those who oppose it will actually be disciplined for opposing the Federal Vision system of doctrine.
I ardently agree with brother White’s succinct assessment and warning, a clarion call if you will, for some time now deserving of being nailed to some manner of PCA (or indeed, Reformed) wall or door, and no doubt the hall reverberates with a loving steady hammering. It is a theological pickle on several fronts, and not a recent one (I’m fond of throwing back at least as far as the Clark/Van Til Controversy of my early years, while Machen is well hailed), but as with many a theological controversy (and as Wes also notes) sometimes the main players in the debate become not simply the theologies at all, but other communal affiliations of loyalties, latitudes, machinations, nomenclatures, personalities, procedures, professional posturing, or psychological pastoring and pasturing. There usually is an abundance of smoke-and-mirror theatrics natural to the human condition, and some very real meat and heart of person, belief, and faithfulness beyond and even above the valid import of cerebral theology.
Wes follows up his excellent post of FV summary with Replay: Peter Leithart Nails It (new link: http://www.weswhite.net/2010/10/replay-peter-leithart-nails-it/). Though mostly about Leitnart’s teaching, Wes’ first sentence is, “The debate about Federal Vision is a debate about theology, not a debate primarily about persons, movements, or labels.” I find it is personal, very much so, and cannot be separated from the aspects of persons, movements, or labels, even where a clarity of theological expression in singularity is helpful. He posts, “When it comes to what the theological issues are, I think Peter Leithart has absolutely nailed it”, but while Wes certainly is appreciative that Leithart is clear on the issues, Wes himself immediately qualifies an opinion that Leithart “has wrongly caricatured the other side at points.” Wes’ post, as with any and all posts pertaining to FV or theology in general, indeed involves persons, their attitudes and characterisations of movements, and various labels (whether deemed accurate, pejorative, or praiseworthy) as much as the theology itself.
There’s no question purity and well-being of the theology affects purity and well-being of persons, and such as loyalties, latitudes, machinations, nomenclatures, personalities, procedures, professional posturing, psychological pastoring and the like. It’s rarely enough to challenge errant theology, warn of it, or shackle it’s voice; the peopleness of it must also be lovingly engaged, and I think we should be mindful of this. Yes, I agree, in many ways a measuring of the theology is critical and central to clarity of the issues, but it is people, the Church, we’re endeavouring to lovingly protect and instruct.
Reformers: Knox, Calvin, Luther, Melanchthon
We mention Wes and Leithart and Rayburn by name (and rightly personalise with many others), and we investigate and characterise people every bit as much as espoused theology, and cannot but help to so do. Wes posts, “… it is all the more surprising to me that Pacific Northwest has defended this man, that TE Rob Rayburn has defended this man, and that TE Rayburn made the comments that he did to the SJC …in defending TE Leithart (where, in defending Leithart’s twice exoneration at Pacific Northwest Presbytery (PNP), Rayburn briefs that Leithart has been inadequately explored in context, not extended due sympathy and courtesy, and offers suspicion that the SJC has been rigged, is politicised, and has failed even the Church (using such fierce language as “to betray our theology with a kiss”) in being fractious of the reformed community). Of a surety it is Leithart’s theology of which Wes objects, as do I, but, as much as we aim in debate to address the issue and not ad hominem any person, in the above Wes doesn’t express surprise at Rayburn’s defending a theology, but the man, Leithart, even if he intently means his theology; or that PNP is not wrong to defend, even in loving discipline, a man in its jurisdiction and care, which certainly requires a lack of defending errant theology, requires promoting sound theology, and requires necessary effort of discerning between the two in the life of said man, especially where teaching others is concerned.
One might just as personally adjure our beloved Dr. Rayburn to sympathy and courtesy of the SJC and PCA courts, if his discernment be at similar fault as in the tale I’ll relate below, where a pastor regarded as brother and a fatherly help, who was early praised as of “a splendid, attractive, consistent Christian testimony”, who “practices what he preaches”, and “not only talks about Jesus Christ, but lives Jesus Christ every day”, yet proved to be most devilish, most hateful, of blatant and bold-faced perjuring in the courts, and an eager destroyer of many lives and churches in decades of abuse. Even where timeliness is a virtue, I would not be quick to allude to a ‘Judas kiss’ for either Leithart or the SJC, even where each of us at times may feel betrayed by persons and courts. Any misconstrued ad hominem aside, I find it right and wise to recognise that any debate involves persons and movements and nomenclature, and usually as sensitive of persons, even personal theology, as analytical theology.
Internet bullying, for example, has come under scrutiny in recent years, especially with headlines of teen suicide associations. Inquiry of questionable blogging has come up as applied regarding cases of FV, even if I be found sensational to compare the two in emphasis. Now, I don’t think a Moon or Carpenter are likely candidates of self-destruction, and theological history is ripe with far more bloody a conflict than true of FV, even if the blood be sacramental or some holy supernatural ectoplasmic baptismal water (not that anyone has particularized that it is – again the allusion is hyperbolic and ethereal). It’s almost a universal stamp of Great theologians that embarrassing bloody scuffles will ensue, with men incurring some harm; but it should come as no surprise to us that ‘birds of a feather flock together’, even where the occasional Babe wants to be a sheep-pig instead of Thanksgiving dinner for the family he loves. The PCA, the Church, is no place for gang violence, especially in matters of discernment or discipline.
To reference another ‘theological’ movie, a sick Kathleen Kelly sits in pjs and a coat, scrunching a pillow on her sofa, pondering Joe Fox, who’s lightly forced his stay, made them tea with honey, and sits with the sign from Kathleen’s defunct children’s bookstore, Shop Around the Corner, perched on the piano behind him. He’s fallen in love with her and she with him, but to her he’s still fragmented between flesh-and-blood reality and an anonymous online persona. She doesn’t quite fully realize his entire person, though she certainly knows him in person as the big box bookstore that ended her dreams of carrying on her mother’s pride and joy. Hearing she’s sick, and loving her with some clarity of knowledge, Joe has come to be Kathleen’s friend, tend to her, and apologise for killing her family business (or, um, theology). He sets the crucial dialog by falsely framing her argument as, “I am a horrible person, therefore I have no choice but to be horrible”, whereas charming people seem without excuse for being horrible. Joe says, “I put you out of business, so you’re entitled to hate me.” “I don’t hate you”, protests Kathleen. “But you’ll never forgive me”, wonders Joe. And here’s the crux, where we may as well be talking about theology and the Federal Vision:
Joe Fox: It wasn’t… personal.
Kathleen Kelly: What is that supposed to mean? I am so sick of that. All that means is that it wasn’t personal to you. But it was personal to me. It’s *personal* to a lot of people. And what’s so wrong with being personal, anyway?
Joe Fox: Uh, nothing.
Kathleen Kelly: Whatever else anything is, it ought to begin by being personal.
After a few encouraging pleasantries of reconciliation, Harry Nilsson’s song theologically kicks in, “I’m so tired of gettin’ nowhere seeing my prayers gone unanswered. I Guess the Lord Must Be in New York City. Well, here I am, Lord, knockin’ at your backdoor…” (Warner Bros.’ You’ve Got Mail (1998) with Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan). This seems particularly apropos now that our ‘successfully’ blessed PCA’s Metro New York Presbytery has entered the FV discussion mix (is it any wonder?).
What ever else theology is, it begins by being personal, and it is right that it always is, even where we often stumble in the rightness of it or as an esoteric enterprise. I ardently disagree with the way the 9th Commandment, or the Westminster commentary concerning it, has been assailed against Wes, Carpenter, Kiester, Aquila, and even the SJC and others; but so too do I take issue with our lack of care and concern otherwise in offensive and defensive rhetoric, especially if lacking in real personal attachment and love. It might of propriety avail the courts to usually deign to be civil and careful, as courts usually want to be, and with greater proficiency of corporate affection and charity than individual temperaments often upholds; but gatherings of men may work either way, to civility or the mob, and have proven so even of Christian courts. We may ‘aspire’ that a debate is essentially about the theology, but that is not how the FV debate has frankly played out to date, by any ‘side’, and the attitude and real-life flesh-and-blood of the debate is as important of recognition and reconciliation to piety and propriety as any theological care of loving expression. The ‘little sheep’ of Rayburn’s bonnie Faith Presbyterian are as likely to feel betrayed and bruised by assaults on their pastor as any theological damage from Federal Vision theology, and every good shepherd of the PCA and Church ought to be mindful and diligent of protecting from every harm, whether from met vigilance of doctrinal purity, online position posts, any lack of honourably defending one another, or sacrificial damage by associations. Theology is about people, and doctrine means little without due love, even when professed in the tongues of angels, with prophetic powers, understanding all mysteries and knowledge, or surrendering of body to flame (especially if it’s the body belonging to someone else, which each body does).
I’ll babble vaguely on to say I know of an early graduate from a seminary respected by the PCA who, while trained as a PCA minister, knew and practiced little of theology in his ministry, and wandered from Presbyterian to General Baptist congregation, to politics and beyond, causing a discord of ruckus, conflict, splintering, and worse wherever he went, and never over theology. The PCA was nonetheless very protective of him against his congregants. God’s providence withstanding, he and his inner-circle of friends were sheltered, even coddled by PCA shepherds, despite his obvious failings and harms. Now, as he was not vigorous of theological orientation, he was not vigorous of theological ill, and he was not without some tearfulness of the harms in his wake (perhaps especially of his false and fraudulent testimony in civil and federal court against members of his own flock – testimony many PCA shepherds knew with absolute certainty to be false). His very serious life-long harms reverberate to this day, in lives destroyed and lost, even as he was to the last well-tended as a pastor in good-standing with the PCA, even hailed in national stage. PCA shepherds never once exercised due diligent care of members outside the veil of fellow shepherds, not at local church, presbytery, or General Assembly level, even when witnessing and well-aware of this man’s evils and need of discipline, and even when the care of due intervention was so begged to honourable court officials. Yes, he was investigated more than once, and persistently surrounded by rumour and more, but he was a clever fellow who knew how to work a crowd, how to feign remorse, and no one wanted to see him out of work and unable to provide for his family. I wonder though, if PCA shepherds were so sure they did this dear man and his family any real favour of eternal personal significance? They certainly did not his congregants, and coddling is rarely a true expression of genuine love or godly protection. The Lord our Judge intervened in His time, granting ease from misguided and misguiding shepherds, and I trust prayers are answered for all.
I tell the tale because whether for a moon up in the sky or a carpenter at the wood rasp or a white man in the Dakotas, there are significant issues of the FV having nothing at all to do with the headiness of theology, and just as needful of getting right, of the personableness of the heart; and though everyone involved seems intent of getting things right, there is real danger of neglectful abuse and sin of omission beyond the active warfare of immediate engagement. If one wants to discuss betrayal by either FV proponents or opponents, ask for the perspective of the bleating and bleeding sheep in the tale I tell, and be mindful of our errant past and storied history lined with such people we’ve strewn aside as so much collateral damage. This ought not be the legacy of the PCA, Presbyterians, Reformed theology, or the Bride of Christ. I indict us all for any such cavalier callous where one of the least of these languish from spiritual abuse, whether from a blogger, a pastor, movements, disparate loyalties, congregational differences, or posturing personalities. Little children, let us love in deed and truth (1 Jn. 3:18).
Thanks again, Wes, for your beacon of light.
- grit
