The SBC’s “Founders Ministries” is a Fraud
Founders Ministries is an organization supposedly dedicated to bringing back the SBC’s Calvinistic/Reformed roots. Four years of research went into “The Truth About New Calvinism,” but I never had any reason to doubt that. And as far as New Calvinism in the SBC via Mohler, Dever et al, I figured it could have entered into the SBC in any number of ways after the explosion of Sonship Theology and it wasn’t worth pursuing.
Last night, I was reading an article written by John H. Armstrong. It was his article on Time Magazine’s assessment of New Calvinism, and the following statement caught my attention:
Look at the divisions in the Southern Baptist Convention and you will see my point. I have watched this movement for neo-Calvinism from its infancy. I personally attended the first meeting (and several more the years following) of the group that started this effort back in the 1980s. I personally knew the founder who dreamed up the idea of recovering Calvinism in the SBC and then spread the “doctrines of grace” very widely. He is now with the Lord. Look at the quarrels between these neo-Calvinists and the various strands of emergent (and emerging) Christianity. I was also involved in the various “gospel” recovery groups which were begun, now creating large gatherings of folk who believe they are the people who are preaching and recovering the “biblical gospel.”
Armstrong’s involvement with the original group seeking to spread the doctrine in SBC circles was of interest to me because Armstrong is one of the few who openly admit that he adopted his theology from the Australian Forum via Present Truth, the Forum’s theological journal: here , and here .
“I personally knew the founder who dreamed up the idea of recovering Calvinism in the SBC….” Hmmm, who is he talking about? I emailed a few of my sources and didn’t get a reply, so I started asking myself questions: “Isn’t Founders Ministries the one spreading Calvinism in the SBC? But which Calvinism? New or old?” So I went to their website and started poking around. I found a historical essay about the ministry here .
So guess who the founder was? Earnest Reisinger, one of the forefathers of New Covenant Theology. In fact, he goes way back before the doctrine was dubbed New Covenant Theology by Jon Zens. As I document in the book, Jon Zens and the founder of the Australian Forum worked together to develop NCT. According to Zens:
At the fall Banner of Truth Conference in 1979, Ron McKinney spoke with lain Murray, Ernie Reisinger and others about the possibility of having a conference where some aspects of Reformed theology could be discussed and evaluated by men of differing viewpoints.
That conference ended up being the first “1980 Council on Baptist Theology” held in Plano, TX. It was the coming out party for New Covenant Theology.
Furthermore, Ernie Reisinger’s “Law and Gospel” is a staple reference for students of Sonship Theology (Gospel Discipling—The Crying Need of the Hour: Stephen E. Smallman; Executive Director, World Harvest Mission, November 1997). The fact that Reisinger’s theology is based on New Covenant Theology can be observed in this article written by him and posted on the Founders blog: See article here.
The totality of my research on this will be compiled and added as an addendum to the second addition of volume one: “The Southern Baptist Connection.” Obviously, Armstrong’s deceased friend who started the movement was Reisinger, who passed away in 2004. And the movement he spoke of is Founders Ministries.
Founders Ministries is a fraud. They are not bringing Calvinism back to the SBC, they are ushering in what Walter Chantry called a contemporary “novelty” and selling it as Calvinistic theology. Chantry also called it “neo-antinomianism.” Think what you will about Calvin, but he was not an antinomian. It is all a big, fat LIE.
paul
Paul's Passing Thoughts 
Say no more. Now, you have betrayed your real intention … true nastiness. I must have hit a nerve.
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David,
Yes, you did hit a nerve: I don’t like bullies, and I like bullies that are hypocrites even less.
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…and notice that my article will include extensive citations, but you think what you say has authority just because you said it. Pure arrogance.
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New Covnant folks are NOT antinomian any more than Reformed folks such as Acts 29 preachers. We do not believe the law can save or sanctify for it has NO power. Paul said, you are under a curse if you place yourself back under the Mosaic law and not stay under grace. Grace given faith is the ONLY way any of us are saved or sanctified and that Is about as clear as anything stated in the Word of God you can find. I f one can’t see that blindness exists spiritually and prayer for mercy and grace to see Christ and His Gospel is needed. Grace given faith produces repentance and also gives continued strength and enablement’s to the redeemed to live out the Gospel in real life, but we all fail even in this posture of our spiritual life. One thing is surely clear, no one can get any where spiritually by using the LAW for their power or strength. It will always Condemn!
Come to Christ for redemption by faith through grace and walk in freedom and receive no condemnation.
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Lamar,
ALL NCT and Reformed people are antinomians, the religion of the Antichrist, or “man of anomia,” because the law is not ended and apart from justification. The “Christian” continues to be under the law. IF “we” live by faith alone in sanctification, Jesus’ perfect obedience to the law is imputed to our Chrsitian lives which keeps us saved. As John Piper states: the gospel continues to save believers by faith alone. This is salvation by Jesus plus Jesus keeping the law for us which is the essence of antinomianism.
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I don’t know any of these folk above. But I did know Ernie and John Reisinger. I only wish to say that, in my understanding, John was one of the ‘forefathers’ of NCT, not Ernie. And Ernie may have been an ‘immersed Presbyterian’ but I don’t believe he was an antinomian.
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I just stumbled across this posting. Your opine is seriously skewed, especially regarding Ernest Reisinger. You have confused Ernest Reisinger with John Reisenger. John is the one who got tangled in NCT, not Ernie. Secondly, remember that Jesus’ ministry also had an original founding member of very bad theology. Would you accuse or fault Jesus’s ministry as fake or fraudulent due to the erring ways of one founding member? Take another look at your bias.
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Bias? At the time I wrote that article I saw New Calvinism as error regarding Protestantism in general and Calvinism in particular. It wasn’t until John Immel encouraged me to read the Calvin Institutes where I saw that New Calvinism is not new at all. As one who was alone in researching these issues for myself and maneuvering through uncharted church history, I didn’t have it all right. Excuuuuse me. But, now I know that Protestantism is a lie and by far the biggest hoax ever perpetrated on intellectual mankind, and a law-based gospel. And BTW, being wrong about one member of a cult doesn’t vindicate the cult from being a cult. Your reasoning is ridiculous.
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