The
Unchanging Character
of God's
Word
By Steve
Schlissel
I am here because you are heirs of the covenant that God
made
with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Someday the natural heirs,
the
Jewish people, my kinsmen according to the flesh, will have
the
veil removed from their eyes. Until then, the whole Word of
God,
which brings salvation, must be preserved. I am here to
tell you
that we have a fight on our hands to preserve the Word of
God,
and I charge you in the name of Christ to fight.
Make no mistake. We are engaged in a solemn and a holy war
for the truth, the honor, and glory of God. This war is
between
those for the Word and those against the Word, and it has
been
raging since the beginning of time.
The Word of God is unchanging in its divisive character. As
Calvin noted, "It is the native property of the divine
Word never
to make its appearance without disturbing Satan and rousing
his
opposition." We see the divisive nature of the Word in
the cross
of Christ: on the one hand, there is the Word of salvation,
and on
the other hand, the Word of condemnation. Everywhere the
Word is, there is division. God's Word is a separating
word, and
as a separating word, those who believe it are duty bound
to
protect it and defend it against all attacks. We must also
recognize the simple historical fact that the church's
greatest
attacks have always arisen from within the church itself.
We are
not the first, nor are we alone in the fight.
I have a very simple message from Hebrews 12:1:
"Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great
cloud of
witnesses, let us throw off everything that
hinders and the
sin that so easily entangles, and let
us run with
perseverance the race marked out for
us."
This passage from Hebrews 12, as P.E. Hughes notes,
uses the
dramatic imagery of an athletic contest in
which the
competitors in the arena are surrounded
by the crowded
tiers of an amphitheater....[O]ur
author pictures
himself and his readers as
competitors,
who, as they contend for the faith in the
arena of life,
are surrounded by a great cloud of
witnesses,
namely, those champions of the faith of
earlier
generations....They have triumphantly
completed their
course, and we, who are now
contestants in
the arena, should be inspired by their
example to give
of our utmost in the struggle. I am
inspired by
their example to give of their utmost in
the struggle.
In contemplating those who have gone before us, I am
inspired
by Phineas. When the Midianites threatened to compromise
the
covenant people, Moses said to Israel's judges, "Each
of you
must put to death those of your men who have joined in
worshipping the Baal of Peor" (Num. 25:4,5).
Then an Israelite man brought to his family a Midianite
woman,
right before the eyes of Moses and the whole assembly while
they
were weeping at the entrance to the tent of the meeting.
[1] When
Phineas, son of Eleazar, son of Aaron the priest, saw this,
he left
the assembly, took a spear in his hand, followed the
Israelite into
the tent and drove the spear through both of them. Then the
plague against the Israelites was stopped. But twenty-four
thousand people died in the plague.
The Lord said to Moses, "Phineas son of Eleazar, son
of Aaron
the priest, has turned my anger away from the Israelites,
for he
was as zealous as I am for my honor among them, so that in
my
zeal, I did not put an end to them. Therefore, tell him I
am making
my covenant of peace with him. He and his descendants will
have
a covenant of a lasting priesthood because he was zealous
for the
honor of his God and made atonement for the
Israelites" (Num.
25:11-13).
If we do not stand up today and do more than wring our
hands,
our grandchildren will have no sure Word of God.
I am inspired by the Levites. Moses saw that the people
were
running wild and that Aaron had let them get out of control
and
become a laughing stock to their enemies. So he stood at
the
entrance to the camp and said, "Whoever is for the
Lord, come
to me." All the Levites rallied to him (Ex. 32:26).
The camp was divided because the enemies of God had arisen
within the camp and had given themselves over to the lie.
Then [Moses]
said to them, "This is what Jehovah,
the God of
Israel says, `Each man strap a sword to
his side, go
back and forth through the camp from
one end to the
other, each killing his brother and
friend and
neighbor.'" And the Levites did as Moses
commanded, and
that day about 3,000 of the
people died.
Then Moses said, "You have been set
apart to the
Lord today, for you were against your
own sons and
brothers and He has blessed you this
day"
(Exod. 32:27-29).
I am inspired by these men who counted their personal
relations
with men as of no value compared to the glory of God and
His
commandments. I am even more inspired by the commendation
given to these heroes in Deuteronomy 33:8-9:
Your Thummim
and your Urim belong to the man
you favor. You
have tested him at Massah, you
contended with
him at the waters of Meribah. He
said of his
father and mother, `I have no regard for
them.' He did
not recognize his brothers or
acknowledge his
own children, but he watched
over your Word
and guarded your covenant. He
teaches your
precepts to Jacob and your law to
Israel."
Our battle is a covenant issue! This is the Word of God we
are
fighting for. This is not Dutch names. This is not friends
and
buddies. This is not status in the community. This is not
political
advantage. This is the Word of God!
I am inspired by Micaiah: In II Chronicles 18, Micaiah
appeared before Jehoshaphat and Ahab when Jehoshaphat
unwisely sought political alliance with Ahab, the king of
the
northern tribe. In that time Ahab asked, "Will you go
to war with
me, Jehoshaphat?" And Jehoshaphat told Ahab to consult
some
prophets who would tell them what they wanted to hear. The
false prophets declared, "Go, for God will give it
into the king's
hand." Ahab's itching ears were satisfied. Jehoshaphat
was a little
too godly for this and said, "Don't you have a prophet
of Jehovah
nearby?" Ahab responded, "I have one but he never
tells me what
I like." Nevertheless, the messenger called for
Micaiah and said,
"If you want to make it in the Christian Reformed
Church, you
had better tow the line. Everybody is telling them what
they want
to hear, and if you are smart, you'll tell the two kings
what they
want to hear or else the boards and agencies will come down
on
you."
We read Micaiah's response: "As surely as Jehovah
lives, I can
tell only what my God says." In verse 22, Micaiah
declares: "So
now the Lord has put a lying spirit in the mouths of these
prophets
of yours. The Lord has decreed disaster for you."
Similarly, for
some reason, God has put a lying spirit on the campus of
Calvin
College, a lying spirit in many of the faculty of the
seminary. There
is a lying spirit that teaches untruths, that perverts the
Word of
God, distorts it, twists it, and takes it away from our
covenant
youth.
Then Zedekiah,
son of Kenaanah, went up and
slapped Micaiah
in the face, "Which way did the
Spirit from the
Lord go when He went from me to
speak to
you?" he asked. "Who made you a
prophet?"
Micaiah
replied, "You will find out on the day you
go to hide in
an inner room." The king of Israel then
ordered,
"Take Micaiah and send him back to
Amon, the ruler
of the city, and to Joash, the king's
son, and say
this is what the king says, `Put this
fellow in
prison and give him nothing but bread and
water until I
return safely.'" Micaiah declared, "If
you ever return
safely, then Jehovah has not spoken
from me (II
Chron. 18:23-27).
Micaiah knew a sure word of God.
I am inspired by Ezekiel, when God commissioned him:
"Son of man,
stand up on your feet and I will speak
to you,"
and as He spoke, the spirit came into me
and raised me
to my feet and I heard him speaking
to me. He said,
"Son of man, I am sending you to
the Israelites,
to a rebellious nation that has rebelled
against me.
They and their fathers have been in
revolt against
me to this very day. The people to
whom I am
sending you are obstinate and
stubborn."
Say to them, "This is what the sovereign Lord
says," and whether
they listen or fail to listen for they are a rebellious
house, they will
know that the prophet has been among them. And you, son of
man, do not be afraid of them or their words, don't be
afraid
though briars and thorns are all around you, and you live
among
scorpions. Do not be afraid of what they say or terrified
by them
though they are a rebellious house.
You must speak my words to them whether they listen or fail
to
listen for they are rebellious. But you, son of man, listen
to what I
say to you, do not rebel like that rebellious house. Open
your
mouth and eat what I give you (Ezek. 2: 1-8).
I am inspired by our Lord Jesus Christ, who, as it is
recorded
in John 2:
went up to
Jerusalem. In the temple courts he found
men selling
cattle, sheep and doves and others sitting
at the tables,
exchanging money. So He made a
whip out of
cords and drove all from the temple
area, both
sheep and cattle. He scattered the coins
of the
money-changers and overturned their tables.
To those who
sold doves, he said, "Get these out of
here. How dare
you turn My Father's house into a
market!"
His disciples remembered that it is written:
"Zeal for
your house will consume Me."
Where is the zeal for the Word of God as we have received
it?
Not hand-wringing, not preaching to the choir, not patting
each
other on the back for saying the right shibboleth for being
Reformed. Where is the zeal in your heart for the Word of
God?
Does it burn within you? Is it life or death to you? Do you
hate it
in your bones when you see it corrupted and distorted and
spat
upon? Where is your zeal for God's honor?
I am inspired by the great apostle Paul, who did not seek
to
please men but wrote in Galatians 1: "Even if we or an
angel from
heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we
preached to
you, let him go to hell!" "Oh, brother," I
can hear someone say to
Paul, "wouldn't you like to modify that statement? It
seems
divisive." So Paul says it again: "If anybody's
preaching a gospel
other than the one you accepted, let him be be condemned in
hell
forever."
This is the unchanging character of the Word of God. It
hasn't
changed just because the canon is closed. Everywhere
Scripture
goes, there is a fight.
I am inspired by Jude, who says in his letter:
Dear friends,
although I was very eager to write you
about the
salvation we share, I felt I had to write
and urge you to
contend for the faith that was once
for all
entrusted to the saints.
I am inspired by the very last chapter of the Word of God:
I warn everyone
who hears the words of the
prophecy of
this book, if anyone adds anything to
them, God will
add to him the plagues described in
this book. And
if anyone takes words away from
this book of
prophecy, God will take away from him
his share in
the tree of life and in the city which is
described in
this book.
I am inspired by Athanasius, who in his struggle against
Arianism, was willing to be banished and maligned in order
to
defend the truth of God's Word.
I am inspired by Augustine, who fought against Pelagianism
and
the error of free will and the doctrine that perverted the
true
doctrine of sin.
I am inspired by Luther who fought against Romanism.
I am inspired by Calvin, who fought against syncretism.
I am inspired by the fathers of Dort who fought against
Arminianism, recognizing it as an enemy of the church.
These are the witnesses who are now surrounding us and
looking
into the arena and saying, "What are you going to do
today in
the face of the challenge that God has laid before
you?" We
are once again engaged in battle. Know your enemies. Today
the
church does battle against humanism, spearheaded by
relativism,
with feminism (egalitarianism) in the lead. The only thing
that can
vanquish these foes is an unchanging Word from God. A Word
of
God that can change is no problem, as I will demonstrate,
but a
Word of God that doesn't change, that will destroy them.
Many
fail to see the critical nature of our struggle: a struggle
which
Christ Himself calls us to.
In the 1920s and 1930s, J. Gresham Machen was involved in a
painfully similar struggle against modernism in the
Presbyterian
Church in the USA. He wrote:
The plain man
in the church has difficulty
understanding
the nature of the struggle. He does
not yet
appreciate the real gravity of the issue. He
does not see
that it makes very little difference how
much or how
little of the creeds of the church the
modernist
preacher affirms, or how much or how
little of the
This modernist preacher might affirm
every jot and
tittle of the Westminster Confession,
for example,
and yet be separated by a great gulf
from the
Reformed faith. It is not that part is denied
and the rest is
affirmed, but all is denied because all
is affirmed
merely as useful or as symbolic, but not
as truth. A
thing that is useful may be useful for
some and not
for others, but a thing that is true
remains true
for all people and beyond the end of
time.
We would do well to familiarize ourselves with the struggle
that
occurred in that church that led to the formation of the
Orthodox
Presbyterian Church. There are those who remain saying,
"We're
going to just see what happens." But look at the PCUSA
today
and see what has happened.
We, too, have become a church that seems to echo Pilate's
pitiful
plaint, "What is truth?", when all the while,
Truth was standing in
front of him. The truth is in our hands and it is, as our
Belgic
Confession (Article 7) says,
unlawful for
anyone, though an apostle, to teach
otherwise than
we are now taught in the Holy
Scriptures. It
is forbidden to add unto or take away
anything from
the Word of God. It does evidently
appear that the
doctrine thereof is most perfect and
complete in all
respects. Neither may we consider
the writings of
any men of equal value with divine
Scriptures. Nor
are we to consider custom or the
great multitude
or antiquity or succession of times
and persons or
councils, decrees and statutes as of
equal value
with the truth of God, since the truth is
above all.
Therefore we reject, with all our hearts,
whatsoever does
not agree with this infallible rule
[whether they
be teachings that are current at Calvin
College or the
philosophies that motivate some
boards and
agencies].
Do you reject them with all your heart? The dogmatic
statements
of our confession are very disagreeable to the modern
visionary.
He doesn't like them; he chokes on them, although he might
affirm them as useful.
Perhaps even more disagreeable are the unchanging
characteristics of the Word as is formulated in chapter one
of the
Westminster Confession of Faith. I wish I could spend all
day and
talk to you about chapter one, but alas. Ten sections are
devoted
to the doctrine of Scripture and every one of these
sections is
threatened by the relativists among us.
The Westminster Confession begins by declaring the
necessity of
Scripture. This section concludes by saying,
"Scriptures are most
necessary, those former ways of God's revealing His will
unto His
people, being now ceased." The necessity of Scripture
is
threatened by a universalism which suggests that people may
be
saved without the Word of God coming to them; that people
may
be saved, as we hear in the United States, without
repentance
and faith in Jesus Christ. These preposterous and heretical
notions
are entertained in the pages of the Banner (CRC's
denominational magazine) as being legitimate options to
consider,
not necessarily confessional, but something that should be
aired.
Nonsense! It is crucifying Christ all over again. The
Scriptures are
most necessary and not in any way optional.
The Confession then discusses the Canon and the Apocrypha.
Commonly, the Scripture itself is being
"apocryphalized" --
regarded as less reliable than reason and nature. The
fourth
section declares that the authority of the Holy Scriptures,
"depends not upon the testimony of any man in our
church, but
wholly upon God who is truth itself, the author thereof,
and
therefore, it is to be received because it is the Word of
God." I
recently read an article in a book called, Exploring the
Heritage
of John Calvin. Over and again the author said, "Paul
says, Paul
says, Paul says..." for ten, twenty pages. Not one
time "The Holy
Spirit speaking in the Word of God says..." But the
Bible and the
Confessions tell us that God is the author of Scripture,
every part.
The unchanging character of Scripture as authoritative
means that
we allow Scripture itself to tell us how to regard it.
Anyone who denies the authority of Scripture at one point,
has
denied it at all points. If we assert that we can set aside
the
six-day creation doctrine, we have asserted our supremacy
over
Scripture. Our mind and our convenience now have a higher
authority. Clearly, therefore, the question of authority is
at stake in
Genesis 1. Whose word is authoritative and final,God's or
man's?
Who has the last, as well as the first, word?
The Confessional doctrine of Scripture's self-attestation
is
threatened by those who subordinate God's testimony and
Scripture to a contrary, yet allegedly more reliable
testimony in
nature. We can only believe Scripture, they say, when
nature
agrees with what we read in Scripture. But they have it
exactly
reversed. Any Reformed six-year-old should be able to tell
you
that. You interpret nature in terms of the Word of God, not
vice
versa. The Fall has had effects -- noetic effects --
effects on our
minds that need to be corrected before we can understand
things
properly.
The sufficiency of Scripture is challenged on several
fronts. [2]
And what has happened to the perspicuity of Scripture? We
are
now told that we need a new elitist core of intermediaries,
a new
priesthood to stand between the "ignoramuses" in
the pew and
God. Have we even forgotten that there was a Reformation? I
may have been in this denomination a short time, but I have
been
in this struggle long enough to have heard some of the
attitudes
that are present.
For example, the regional home missionary that I mentioned
in
Messiah's Mandate, Vol. I, No. 1, [3] called me up and
objected saying,
"I never gave a sermon entitled, `God our
Mother.'"
I said, "OK, I'll print a retraction. Do you believe
`God our
Mother'?"
He said, "Oh, yes."
"Do you have any theological problem praying to Our
Mother,
who art in heaven?"
"Oh, no."
I said, "Have you changed the pronouns from the pulpit
when you
read the Scripture -- 'he' to 'she'? (Always, of course, 'he'
to
'she', never 'she' to 'he').
He said, "No, I don't."
"Do you have a problem doing that?"
"No, of course not."
I said, "Then why don't you do it?"
"People aren't ready for it yet!"
Such people despise you. I mean it. These arrogant people
really
think that it's just a matter of time before they railroad
you out of
your possession and your inheritance. For as far as they're
concerned, the battle is over and they have won. Now, only
money and institutions are at stake. Who gets to control them?
They have already made up their mind about the Scriptures.
They
are just waiting to train a generation of harlots and have
the
faithful die off, and it's all theirs. That is why we can
thank Jesus
Christ that Howard Van Till wrote The Fourth Day because
now we have what we might call an accelerated
epistemological
self-consciousness. Now we can see more clearly than when
they
were playing the game under the covers. The covers are
being
pulled off.
At the root of many of the attacks upon the Word of God, we
find research, writings, pronouncements, and policies
founded on
the presupposition of epistemological neutrality and a
bastardization of the common grace doctrine that
effectively
subordinates the Word of God to sinful, autonomous reason
and
observation. Everything that you hear from Calvin College
is
justified in the name of common grace.
The epistemological question is this: How do we know?
Originally
or after God knows? The unbelieving doctrine of knowledge
is:
Nothing is known unless man knows it. It is a mystery until
man
knows it. The doctrine of our faith is that God knows
everything,
and He shares knowledge with us. Therefore, He is the
original
knower and we are analogical knowers -- we know after the
pattern of God. We are dependent knowers; He is the
independent knower. Much of our denomination's thinking is
committed to the epistemology of unbelief.
We have here a frightening parallel to what occurred in the
Machen case. The modernists in the Presbyterian church had
been drinking deeply from the fountain of the world. Their
grumblings originated not exegetically, but from
extra-Scriptural
considerations which determined the way that they then
handled
Scripture. They were latitudinarian and anti-antithetical.
The
antithesis was obnoxious to them. I still meet Reformed
people
who tell me they were raised on antithetical preaching.
They were
taught there is an antithesis in this world. Now we are
told that the
antithesis is of the devil. Church leaders now want to tear
down
the antithesis so that they can have the respect and
approval of
the world.
The spirit of the modern world which threatens us is far
more
sophisticated and subtle than it was in the days of Dort
and
Westminster, even than it was in the 20s. But if we stand
back a
bit, we will hear the same question being asked now that
was
asked in the Garden of Eden and ever since -- "Yea,
hath God
said?" This doubt was followed by denial -- "You
will not surely
die." This is a word of possibility, a word of flux, a
word of
chance as over against God's certain word. This is the
basic
issue. Who speaks the certain word? Is it God or man? The
modern compromisers still pay lip-service to the Bible.
They say
that it is indeed God's Word, but it's not the last word.
This is the
original temptation.
Sinners will always choose a word of possibility over
against the
word of absolute authority, even if it means their death.
Rather to
rule in hell than to serve in heaven. But God and man do
not run
on a continuum. God is uncreated, man is created. God is
infinite,
eternal, and unchangeable in His being, wisdom, power,
holiness,
justice, goodness, and truth. Man is finite, temporal, and
changeable. Therefore, we are utterly dependent on God for
our
being, our ethics, and for our knowledge as well. That is
why we
always say, "What do the Scriptures teach?" Adam
and Eve were
tempted to determine knowledge and ethics for themselves,
not
according to a Word of God. "Look at the
possibilities. Look at
the world opened up before you. All you need to do is to
forget
that other certain word about dying and just take and eat.
All
kinds of things will open up." That is what is being
offered to us
today. The effort amounts to the attempt to bring God down
to
our level of being, even though He remains higher up the
scale, so
they can pay lip-service to God.
Some assume the following: we are little fish, and God is a
big,
big, big fish, so He has a lot to offer us. He can protect
us, we
can talk to Him. He is very smart, but we are really
floating
around in the same sea of possibility. That is how radical
the
change is at the presuppositional level. A compromise here
is the
end of the faith in seed form. In their efforts to make
their own
rules, the visionaries must pay lip service to the
confessions. They
talk about unity and peace, but they want it on their
terms.
Recently, the Banner called for a truce about women in
office,
the new Psalter hymnal, and evolution. Should Paul have
called a
truce with the Galatian heretics? Should Jesus have made a
truce
with those who were occupying the temple and corrupting it?
A
truce in this battle is defeat.
Note the following:
If our
contention that the evolution hypothesis is part
of an
antitheistic theory of reality is correct, then we
must do away
with every easy-going attitude. The
evolutionist is
then a soldier in that great, seemingly
all-powerful
army of anti-theists that has from time
immemorial
sought to destroy the people of God.
We must then
prepare for a life and death struggle, if
not in the
courts of the land, then in the higher courts
of human
thought.
Do you know where this was written? This call to action was
written in the Banner, 1931. The 1931 Banner says evolution
is
an enemy to the people of God. The 1987 Banner has two
weeks of Van Leewen laying the groundwork of three weeks of
Van Till, without so much as a whisper that the man was
under
investigation, without so much as a hint that his views are
considered heretical by everyone sitting here and by untold
numbers in the rest of the denomination. What has happened?
Has truth changed? If truth has changed, then I tell you,
God
Himself has changed. But the Bible says, "I am the
Lord, I change
not." The Bible says, "Every good and perfect
gift comes down
from the Father of heavenly lights, who does not change
like
shifting shadows."
Churches used to split about what was true,but now we're
arguing about "what is truth?" We are seeing two
radically
different answers evident in this discussion. Some in the
Christian
Reformed Church, say that the truth we desire to explicate,
preach, and live out is the truth that was once for all
delivered to
the saints. But others believe that the truth is found in
the search
itself. We may simplify this as a conflict between two
factions:
those who believe that truth is in the content and those
who
believe that truth is in the process. Therefore, you see
there is
such a very great tendency tofocus on style and not
content. Of
course, truth for the church involves process. There is history,
time, and providence under our sovereign God as the
Scriptures
were compiled, distributed, studied, systematized and lived
out.
But those who have succumbed to the lie of seeking truth in
process have elevated history, not as the realm of
revelation and
redemption, but as prior to and determinative of both
revelation
and redemption. Thus they tend to view all Scripture as an
accommodation. Therefore, it is relative. Truth is behind,
above,
or outside of Scripture. We have people who view every
portion
of Scripture subject to cultural scrutiny. A careful
reading of
Bavinck would help these people learn that there is a
difference
between condescension, which is involved in revelation, and
accommodation. God necessarily condescends to speak to us,
but He doesn't necessarily accommodate Himself to our
prejudices. For example, the accommodation view allows
Jesus
to speak about Lot's wife turning into a pillar of salt,
and since the
ignorant Jews of His day believed that and to make a
spiritual
point, Jesus accommodated Himself to their ignorance.
That's
accommodation. That's garbage! Because then you don't know
what to believe. But condescension is necessarily involved
with a
God who is so transcendent as ours.
Viewing revelation as an accommodation puts it in our
hands. It
becomes anthropocentric, not simply anthropomorphic. Both
God and man are seeking to find themselves in history. We
and
God become co-strugglers to attain truth. Only He is much
further
down the road. This is why we could read in a publication
of the
Committee for Women:
Changing sexist
language did not come easy for me.
Due to peer
pressure I first began altering people
words, you know
chairperson, mailcarrier, and no
more generic
"he." These terms still provoke
laughter and
they felt awkward to me as well, with
some more
radical women addressing God as she. I
just laughed
some more. But God finally caught up
with me. I had
just heard that our pastor had once
again failed to
recruit any women to preach at our
church during
his vacation. Driving home that night I
was screaming
and crying with the car windows up,
of course. It
was unfair that God would never
understand what
it meant to be a woman. How
could He help
but be on the men's side? God broke
into my rage
with the thought, "But I am not on their
side. I am not
one of them. I'm at least as angry over
this situation
as you are." What? God was not He?
Slowly I began
to explore my previous perception
of God as male.
It is hard to describe the depth of
freedom I felt
as I experimentally called God "She."
Over time I
gained a new vision of God and myself.
No doubt about
it, changing the way we talk about
God and God's
people will change us and change is
hard. The
National Council of Churches Inclusive
Lectionary
explored this issue where this is
excerpted from
and has changed traditional Biblical
language. These
changes are causing incredible
controversy as
we ponder the pros and cons of
speaking
inclusively. Let's be open to what the Spirit
may be saying
to the church today.
What the Spirit is saying where? In the Bible? Then it is
an
exegetical issue. The Spirit says nothing to the church
that is not in
His Word. If it is true, it isn't new, and if it is new, it
isn't true. Is it
in the Scripture?
The original temptation suggested that freedom was to be
found in
liberating oneself from the awful determinative Word of
God, but
such freedom always equals death. In the Arminian
controversy,
proponents sought freedom from God's decrees. They said of
the
God who decrees salvation and damnation, "I just can't
live with
that." A refuge was imagined in having God somehow
made
dependent on man's will. The argument was that freedom from
man required a measure of independence. But even just a
little
"freedom" requires us to place ourselves outside
a total
sovereignty of God. But the Synod of Dort said that God
alone is
absolutely free. B.B. Warfield noted long ago that it is
not
predestination as such that bothers man, but rather
predestination
by someone other than himself, and particularly God. We
don't
want God to do it.
The women's issue is part of a worldview which doesn't see
decrees and laws and God as ultimate, but potentiality
itself. This
is why you'll always see this language of potentiality and
"becoming" and "struggling." These
words are throughout their
literature. It's a different motif. Freedom is not found in
Psalm 1
or Psalm 119, "I walk at liberty because I keep thy
commandments." Rather, these feminists view the law as
a
springboard to freedom. You leap to freedom from the Word,
but you don't find it in the Word. Thus the character of
the Word
of God that is propositional, eternal, unchanging and
normative is
changed.
The God of Scripture did not speak to the feminist quoted
above.
It was a demon. For her, the Bible has become a mystical
tool
and a mere collection of principles. Her new view of
reality is just
really the old Greek view of Heraclitean flux, revivified
and
dressed up in Biblical language. For feminists, a final
word is
anathema. They want a possible word, as do evolutionists.
Thus Howard Van Till finds it impossible to do what he
considers
to be true science under a sound exegesis of Genesis 1-11.
For
Howard Van Till true science requires an open universe. It
must
be completely open so that any hypothesis he offers to fit
particular facts is to be regarded as possible. Openness.
At the same time, Van Till requires an absolutely closed
universe
which operates according to rules knowable to man. If God
were
allowed to unexpectedly come into Van Till's universe at
any time,
say, by a miracle, then all the hypotheses would be thrown
off.
They would become conditional upon God, who would retain
the
final word. This is why unbelief is at the same time
rationalistic
and irrationalistic. It requires perfect consistency and
perfect
inconsistency. It requires perfect order and perfect chaos
at the
same time.
The faculty at Calvin College are offended when people use
the
Bible to "shackle academic freedom," because
academic
freedom, they say, requires openness. We have to be open to
where we are going. The Banner chafes at an orthodoxy which
believes it has found the truth, for truth is in the search
and
requires openness. Home Missions has visions that are aided
by
continuing revelations. They have conferences that call for
"openness." They should read their own
literature. In one issue,
there is a little cartoon of a guy opening his head with a
zipper. It
says "Don't have such an open mind that your brains
fall out."
All the struggles we face today can and must be seen in
light of
this hatred of a final and unchangeable Word of God and
willingness, if not a lust, to cash it in for a few thrills
and some
possibility. Everyone pays lip service to the Word in
confessions.
Please, don't think that just because someone says "I
believe the
confessions" that they, therefore, believe them. You
have to
watch how they are put into practice. In Ezekiel it says:
Son of man, my
people come to you as they usually
do and sit
before you to listen to your words, but
they do not put
them into practice. With their
mouths they
express devotion, but their hearts are
greedy. Indeed
to them, you are nothing more than
one who sings
love songs with a beautiful voice and
plays an
instrument well, for they hear your words,
but they do not
put them into practice.
Why do they call Christ, "Lord, Lord" yet they do
not do what
He says? Not everyone who says "Lord, Lord" will
enter the
kingdom. Merely listening causes no pain, but doing often
does.
When I became a Christian in my mid-twenties, I realized I
must
be baptized. When I first told my parents about my belief
in
Christ, they did not mind it so much. They thought there
was
room in the Jewish world for people who had high views of
Jesus.
When I told them I was going to be baptized, my father
said, "If
you do this, you are never welcome in my home again."
I found courage in Matthew 10 and Luke 6 where Christ tells
me
what it costs to be a Christian. I don't think there is a
trade
involved. You just do what God says. I told my father this,
and he
came that night and gave me a few things that my wife had
left at
his house. He hugged me, and he was prepared never to see
me
again. [4] Doing something means you really believe it.
Without
doing it, you don't believe it at all.
Belief that doesn't do isn't Biblical belief. We have
teachers and
ministers who want the name but won't play the game
according
to their rules. This is their version of I Timothy and
Galatians:
"God says no women are allowed to rule, that is very
clear. God
says women are utterly equal, therefore they are allowed to
rule,
that is perfectly clear. They both can't be wrong because
they are
the Word of God. That is perfectly clear. They can't be
both
unchangeably correct because they contradict, so how do we
resolve these seemingly conflicting passages of I Timothy 2
and
Galatians 3? One will give way to the other in time. One
will
become history and the other will bring us into the
fullness of the
revelation." That is such cheap handling of the Word
of God.
There is a better way, a faithful way that does not produce
contradiction.
I Timothy 2 says: "I do not permit a woman to teach or
have
authority over a man. She must be silent, for Adam was
formed
first, then Eve. And Adam was not the one deceived, it was
the
woman who was deceived and became a sinner."
Galatians 3:28: "If you belong to Christ, there is
neither Jew nor
Greeks, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all
one in
Christ Jesus."
In the book of Galatians, Paul was arguing that you are
justified
by faith and not by works of the law. The Jews, in their
daily
prayers, pray: "Blessed are you, Lord our God, King of
the
Universe, who has not made me a Gentile. Blessed are you,
Lord
our God, King of the Universe, who has not made me a slave.
Blessed are you, Lord our God, King of the Universe, who
has
not made me a woman." I want to remind you that that
is in
precisely the same order as you find in Galatians.
In the Jewish religion you are righteous if you keep the
law. The
more law you keep the more righteous you are. Paul says
that is
not why you are righteous. But the Jews thank God that He
gave
them the law instead of the Gentiles so they can reckon
themselves as more righteous than other people. Because
they are
not slaves, they can keep all the Sabbath commandments so
they
can be more righteous. One Jewish tradition denies that all
of the
commandments are obligatory for women. Men alone are
required to fulfill all the Mitsvah, and all the
commandments, such
as traveling to Jerusalem three times a year. The men thank
God
that they were made men so that they would have more
opportunity to be self- righteous. And that's all Paul is
addressing.
Paul says that when it comes to our righteousness before
God,
there is no advantage to being a Jew over a Gentile, or
slave or
free, or male or female. That is the whole nine yards.
Feminists
have so beaten this passage into delirium that the heads
are
swimming in our denomination. You ask a feminist about I
Timothy 2, and they respond, "Galatians 3:28!" By
all means
Galatians 3:28! Only, interpret it correctly. The devil
also quoted
Scripture out of context to our Lord. Jesus' response was
based
on his view that Scripture can neither be broken nor
self-contradictory.
If you can change the Word at one point, you can change it
at all
points because God's Word is one. It has an unchanging
character. The Reformed faith is an organic system of
truth. God's
Word is not unclear; it's too clear. But they don't like
what they
hear. The people at Calvin College and elsewhere, their
scattered
lackeys, are not as honest as a particular United Church of
Canada minister. He just comes right out and says,
"The Bible's
view of women is invalid." Something honest -- a guy
who says
what he thinks. He claims: "As churches struggle with
this issue of
equality in the sexes, Christians have to look beyond the
Bible to
reason and experience for guidance. The Bible is clear with
respect to the status of women. There is no possibility of
misunderstanding the Bible." He just doesn't like what
it says, and
he's not going to follow what it says. He says that we have
to
understand God's Word for our times. His authoritative base
is
not Sola Scriptura but Scripture, church tradition, reason,
and
personal experience. That is the standard he and others
advocate.
But any change in our responsibility to obey one word from
God
is contingent upon another Word of God that explains,
modifies,
expands, or rescinds the first word.
If you give a command to your child: "Don't go
outside." They
have to listen to you until you change the commandment.
"You
can go outside now." Or if it's manifest that there
was a condition
(four feet of snow), and when spring comes around and the
snow
disappeared, and they still haven't gone outside; then when
they
go outside, they are not disobeying your command because
the
condition has been fulfilled that required the obedience.
Scripture
has some commandments like that, when there is a change in
circumstances which form, at least in part, the reason for
the
command. So, for example, Levitical sacrifices are no
longer
obligatory, nor are the dietary commandments, but the
important
part to note is that the New Testament explains this to us.
We
have a complete book that tells us what we are to obey and
what
we are not to obey. God can tell us to do something today,
and
tomorrow He can tell us to do the opposite. He is God and
can
do whatever He wants.
The point that we must maintain as Reformed Christians is
that He
has already completed what He has to say. If God reveals a
new
word, then we could go away from the Bible. That is why
feminists and evolutionists are listening to hear what
"the Spirit"
may be saying to the churches. That is why, when push comes
to
shove, we see an ever-widening embrace of other revelation,
whether it is from nature or private spirits or the
charismatic
movement. They are trying to find another Word of God that
will
free them from this Word of God which they believe
shackles-in
their agenda. And it does shackle. Evolution fits their
purposes so
nicely. The appeal that Paul makes in I Timothy 2 is that
Adam
was formed first and then Eve. If evolution becomes
accepted as
dogma, the foundation of the commandment in I Timothy 2
goes
with it. Everything is up for grabs. Each man does that
which is
right in his own eyes.
We're not faced here with merely a different preference.
Some try
to compare this to other historic struggles in the
Christian
Reformed Church. But this issue is not whether you are
going to
have a service in Dutch or English. This is a much bigger
issue.
This is not "I'll have vanilla, you'll have
chocolate." We are not
even looking at the same menu. We are not even in the same
restaurant, but they still expect us to pay the check!
There are two very different kingdoms being constructed by
and
in the same denomination, and they are not compatible.
Someone
has got to leave the Christian Reformed Church. Abraham
Kuyper rightly said,
Satan knows
that he can undermine the structure of
the church by
slyly removing just one fundamental
doctrine at a
time. He frequently loosens a large
foundation
gradually, chiseling it away bit by bit.
That is why
tolerance for the sake of peace may be
dangerous. By
giving in, one step will lead to a next
step; and will
not God visit us with blindness if we
deliberately
darken the truth He has graciously
entrusted to us? How shall we justify
ourselves if we
permit even a
little of the truth to be laid aside? Is
that ours to
do? When peace is injurious to the truth,
peace must give
way. Peace with God is of greater
value than
peace with men.
We have a war on our hands, and it won't go away -- a
cancer
that begs to be cut out. Popular author Tom Wolfe commented
on the criticism that he receives when, as a journalist, he
writes
about other journalists. If they don't like it. Wolfe said,
"You are
called a neo-conservative. If they really don't like it,
they call you
a reactionary." But, he says, "I'd much rather be
called that than
`liberal.' That just means you are orthodox, which means
you
have nothing interesting to say." Well said, Mr.
Wolfe, but one
man's boredom is another man's excitement. The Westminster
Shorter Catechism, to use the vernacular, turns me on. But
one
man's heresy is another man's orthodoxy. Wolfe's point is
that
when you just say what is already true and what has already
been
believed, people don't want to listen to you. It is not
interesting.
But God has solved that problem for us by giving us
children.
They have never heard it before we tell them. So it is
interesting
to them. That is the way we keep interest in the CRC:
process
and content. Make no mistake, a new orthodoxy is emerging,
and
if it's not cut to death now, it will emerge triumphant in
our
denomination. The orthodoxy of egalitarianism,
hermeneutical
elasticism, and humanism.
While the troublers among us are bored of being accepted by
us
as orthodox, they do not therewith lose their desire to be
accepted. Not at all. They are lifting their skirts at the
highway,
hoping to catch a ride with those moving away from Biblical
orthodoxy. Dr. John Whitcomb has described this attitude as
the
New Evangelicalism:
A desperate
desire to be accepted, not so much by
the Lord as by
others prominent in the visible church
who deviate to
some extent from the teaching of the
Word as we
understand it. In the interest of being
accepted, the
New Evangelical attitude is willing to
sacrifice truth
on the altar of ecumenical expediency.
The visionaries in Grand Rapids are like bored girls who
can't
wait to get out of a small town for no other reason than
because it
is small. They are trying every way to make an escape,
trying to
do away with the wooden shoes. Only the escape has this
twist:
they haven't the guts to really leave because Daddy still
pays the
bills. So they stay at home, and they bring their lovers
into our
town and into our home in the hope that we will get used to
them
and that someday we will get tired of arguing. Finally, we
will just
give in. "Alright, alright, alright -- Have your
stinking heretics at
the college. Have your whores at the seminary. Have your
double-talkers and deceivers in boards and agencies."
Eventually,
they expect to convince a generation to forsake the stuffy,
limited
and boring village that we call Orthodox Junction. They
really
believe that they have found the better way and they want
us to
follow them with their lovers to Broadway.
We are at a crossroad. The Siren's Song calls us from the
narrow, the particular, the well-defined and the precise to
the
broad, the general, the sweeping, "to go with the
flow" -- to the
blurred from the distinct.
The drift toward indistinctiveness was seen in the recently
adopted Contemporary Testimony, a modern quasi-confessional
document adopted by the synod. It is not so much that it
contained anything particularly harmful, but it contains
nothing
particularly helpful. A statement of the great theologian
William
Shedd is most pertinent in helping us understand the
trouble with
this approach: "When the popular feeling of a period
is becoming
less correct and healthy, nothing in the way of means does
so
much toward a change and restoration as strict accuracy,
which is
the same as strict orthodoxy in the popular creed."
This is true,
yet we find ourselves floating in the very opposite
direction. Like
Jonah we have been called to preach against the specific
sins of
our generation to our generation, but we have taken a ship
called
Vague in the direction away from our calling. No one wants
to
say anything specific. The last analysis is not just a
matter of a
New Evangelicalism, a new reformation or a new hermeneutic;
it
is the Word of God in the balance. It is the world in the
grip of an
idea: time versus God's Word. The questions are: Who is
God?
How do you know it? And where does it say so?
I want to suggest that we have answered these questions in
our
confessions which serve the function of skin. Skin keeps in
what
you want in and out what you want out. Our confessions
should
form the basis of who is allowed to stay in and who must go
out.
Scripture is unchanging in its character precisely because
its
author is unchanging. Here we must stand. But I am afraid
that the
Christian Reformed Church has contracted Ecclesiastical
Aids.
We seem not to have the will to fight those microbes that
are
invading the body. Be they ever so insidious, calculating,
dishonest, arrogant or destructive, above all, we want
comfort.
We do not want the truth; we want to be polite. We are
polite-ing
ourselves to death. Along with a loss of the will to fight,
many
have lost the will to live. Where, my brothers and sisters,
is your
heroic Dutch blood, and why is it not boiling? I do not
know.
I would like to offer a twelve-point program-- one for each
tribe!
We are not the ones who ought to leave, but we dare not
promote decay. We had best fight it as this cloud of
witnesses
looks on.
1. Cancel subscriptions to the Banner. It doesn't measure
up.
"Whatever is true, noble, pure, profitable...."
The Banner fails.
We must recognize that the Banner is the mosquito which
carries
the virus to the body. It gives us feminist poems
ridiculing the
godly opposition to women's ordinations; calls those
"simple-minded" who believe that God regards
homosexuality as
an unqualified abomination; promotes birth control, hinting
at
more occasions for abortion than saving the life of the
mother,
and on and on.
The latest abomination is a column on family affairs by an
associate pastor of the Crystal Cathedral, the biggest
little
whorehouse in Southern California. The Crystal Cathedral is
not
the Church of Christ because it preaches another gospel.
Why is
a denominational magazine getting someone from that church
to
write a weekly column in our newspaper? Why not Jay Adams?
Or someone whose credentials and fidelity to the Word of
God
are unquestioned? The Banner: vague, open...cancelled!
2. Expand and improve the Christian Renewal and Outlook.
Get these journals into the hands of all consistory
(session; board
of elders) members. I have heard of and from, consistory
members who hadn't heard of Howard Van Till until very
recently. One individual called me about something I had
written
and told me that he had never heard of the man. This is
inexcusable. We have to get this information into the hands
of
council members (elders and deacons). In articles in these
journals, let's aim at providing more names, dates, and
witnesses
so that the factuality of our concerns will be self-evident
and thus
accelerate the self- consciousness of our denomination. I
still must
believe that the body at large is faithful and sound and we
have to
inform them.
3. Provide solid and simple expositions of our confessions,
especially Belgic Confession articles 27-32 on the Church,
to all
consistory members. We need to clarify holy obligations on
particular issues of moment. We need to provide guidance
for
them.
4. Compel your consistories to take stands on issues in
writing.
Don't accept double-talk and equivocation. Exercise your
confessional rights as a congregant. Require Biblical
justification
from your council and consistory for important decisions
and
policies. Watch the form of subscription (in which all
office-bearers swear to God to defend the truths of the
Bible as
summarized in the confessions), and keep it fresh in
everybody's
minds.
5. Plan and strategize like Joshua. Do it before and at
classis
(presbytery meetings; regional meetings of elders) and
synod. We
have been outmaneuvered so many times that it's nauseating.
At
the synod of 1986, the Banner editor was approved on the
floor
of synod for another four-year term without one single
question
from the floor by any elder or minister. Not one comment.
Everything is done in committee, buried and rubber-stamped
on
that floor. There is so much opportunity, but we get
outmaneuvered. Let's get smart. Let's learn how to play the
game.
It's unfortunate that we have to do it, but it must be
done. Use
church order. It's used against us, so let's use it against
the forces
of compromise.
Provide a speakers' bureau like the Committee for Women
has.
They send a list to every consistory in the denomination,
saying
they have all these speakers who are willing to speak on
these
subjects. Moreover, we too should have a lot of conferences
around the country and in Canada.
6. Watch boards and agencies and get written answers to
specific
questions. Home Missions is especially manipulative and
avoids
adequate accountability. I am not referring to
missionaries, but to
the company boys. Calvin Seminary lies through its teeth,
and it
has a feminist agenda that is so manifest that it is
unbelievable to
me that they can deny it. We have to sit on these guys and
let
them know that the denomination is watching. We are not
going
to accept it.
7. We ought to engage an investigative reporter to
chronicle the
near demise of our denomination, to expose the politicking,
to
expose the double-dealing, that has gone on in the last
fifteen
years or so. Get a graduate student at a school of
journalism
whose Reformed credentials are excellent. Let them do it as
a
project for the salvation of our denomination. Let them
bring the
truth to light so that what has gone on can be known.
8. Explore alternatives to Calvin College. Even better,
let's clean
house there and at the seminary. Let me inform you, the
Missouri
Synod Lutherans had trouble and exercised stringent
discipline in
their main seminary, Concordia, in St. Louis. They
dismissed
every unorthodox teacher and instructed all students who
were
sympathetic to them to leave within one week. That was one
of
the most dramatic, drastic, and successful examples of
institutional
church discipline that this writer was aware of in the
history of the
church. The theologically radical groups, students as well
as
faculty, all left and started their own seminary, Seminex
(Seminary
in Exile), in another part of the city. They actually
marched out
under banners as if they were Moses and the children of
Israel
leaving Egypt, and they gained great sympathy in the media.
Nevertheless, in twenty years, their school, having no
solid
doctrinal position, finally collapsed. In the meantime,
Concordia
Seminary, under the Missouri Synod Lutheran Church, quickly
regained its size. The rest of the evangelical world noted
with
amazement how these Lutherans handled the New Evangelical
invasion of their main training center. Clean house. Let's
get these
guys out, however we can do it. This is life and death we
are
talking about.
9. Ordain qualified men from Westminster Seminary, Reformed
Seminary, and Mid-America Reformed Seminary without a fifth
year at Calvin. That requirement is unbiblical, and,
therefore,
cannot be made a requirement for office. Ordain qualified,
holy
men, even if we need to gather an ordination council from
beyond
the boundaries of a single classis. Let's get people
together while
we remain in the church and ordain men that are recognized
as
preaching the Word of God. We ought not be dependent on
agencies that do not serve Christ.
10. Quota is acceptable only when there is heartfelt and
justified
confidence in the integrity of an agency. It is foolish to
pay for the
knife that would stab us. Forget about being good little
quota
payers or forget the Christian Reformed Church. If we
continue
to fund them, we could never defend the faith. It's defend
and
defund. We don't realize that they are depending on us just
to
continue to be good little boys and girls and to do what
we're
told. If your consistory tries to whittle away around this
by saying,
"You don't pay your quota, we're going to make it up
with
somebody else," then don't give money to your church
at all.
Send it to another Christian Reformed Church. You may not
subsidize wickedness and sin. God will hold you accountable
for
that. We have a cloud of witnesses who are looking down to
see
how we are doing in this struggle.
11. Repent, not of conservatism, but of an unwillingness to
examine yourselves and your practices in light of the Word
alone.
Repent because there are valid points brought up, even by
our
adversaries, concerning particular beliefs and practices
that may
not stand the test of Scripture. We sin when we refuse to
recognize any of them, saying, "We don't want to go to
the Word.
We just want to do what we've always done. But if you're
going
to say, "Sola Scriptura," you had better practice
it too. Repent
of the timidity and self-interest which permitted things to
get this
bad, this gangrenous relativism which has spread so far.
Repent
of a lack of zeal in sharing with others your confessional
treasures
and thus giving opportunity to the enemy to get a foot in
the door
and slander us with justification.
12. Pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of
prayers
and requests. This is a battle but in I Chronicles 5:18-22
we read:
The Reubenites,
the Gadites, and the half tribe of
Manasseh had
forty-four thousand seven hundred
and sixty men
ready for military service, able-bodied
men who could
handle shield and sword, who could
use a bow and
who were trained for battle. They
waged war and
they were helped in fighting. God
handed over
their enemies because they cried out to
Him during the
battle. He answered their prayers
because they
trusted in Him. They also took a
hundred
thousand people captive and many others
fell slain
because the battle was God's! They cried
out to God in
the battle and He was with them.
We are in the arena. Many have gone before. The battle is
tough,
and it will get tougher, but God is able. We are surrounded
by a
great cloud of witnesses. Is the Spirit of Phineas among us
today?
Has the zeal of the Levites been handed down to you as well
as
the Word that they carried? Is Micaiah in the audience
today?
Too many are telling us that the battle is over, but I want
to call
two witnesses from the pages of Scripture: What say you,
Joshua
and Caleb? Should we fight or should we run away? Hear
their
testimony: The land we passed through and explored (even
this
Christian Reformed Church), is exceedingly good. If the
Lord is
pleased with us, He will lead us into that land, a land
flowing with
the milk of the Word and the honey of the heritage of
confessional
truth and many faithful sheep. Only do not rebel against
the Lord.
Do not be afraid of the relativists because we will swallow
them
up. Their protection is gone but the Lord is with us. Do
not be
afraid of them. We should go and take possession, for we
can
certainly do it. That is from the Word , which like our
God,
changes not.
Steve Schlissel is pastor of Messiah's Christian Reformed
Church in Brooklyn, New York and co-contributor to the
recently released book Hal Lindsey and The Restoration of
the
Jews (Still Waters Revival Books).
NOTES:
1. This is analogous to the decision of the CRC synod to
ordain women to the diaconate. While we were still reeling
from that, evolutionist professor, Howard Van Till,
introduced his new hermeneutic to be a norm for Calvin
College -- right in the face of the faithful of the
denomination. Those who have been entrusted with the
sacred charge of teaching covenant youth have spit in the
face of the Lord.
2. See Noel Weeks's excellent book, The Sufficiency of
Scripture, (Banner of Truth).
3. Subscriptions to Messiah's Mandate are available from
Messiah's Christian Reformed Church, 2662 East 24th St.,
Brooklyn, NY 11235-2610.
4. My father and I have since renewed communication.
Through Christ stands between us, our love for each other
is
strong and expressed. You know my heart's desire and
prayer.
Copyright © by Covenant Community Church of Orange
County 1991
(From Antithesis, Vol 2 No. 1): 1-17-96 tew