Paul's Passing Thoughts

While some continually comment here at PPT that they can’t understand a thing John Immel and I write, they understand more than they realize. And some advice: not understanding a teaching A-Z doesn’t  = “don’t understand it.” Focus on the elements that you do understand and add it to your knowledge. Those are building blocks used to build something; specifically, knowledge.

Also, say that John and I are diving way deep to look for sharks, and you see one swimming around the boat. That’s the experience I had yesterday when it was brought to my attention that New Calvinist elders are now plainly stating that they = “local church” and the “authority” of the local church. But the way the reader explained it was simple and profound:

“I thought there is only one mediator between God and man?”

Bingo. “But Paul, can we really say that New Calvinist elders think they are salvific mediators between us and God?”

ABSOLUTLEY.

New Calvinism is a return to the authentic Reformed gospel. Because Augustine, Gregory, Luther, and Calvin were Platonists and didn’t interpret reality with the grammatical normative, Protestants migrate away from Reformed authenticity into a hybrid, or light form of the original. That is why today, you have historical grammatical Calvinists (Jay Adams et al), and historical redemptive Calvinists (John Piper et al). It all boils down to mystical (mystical doctrines are always married to tyranny because it presumes the masses cannot understand reality) Calvinism and objective Calvinism. The latter retains contradictory vestiges of the former; primarily, sound soteriology, combined with Augustinian eschatology. You don’t have to understand all of these terms; simply file the concept away in your mind. The concept is a simple one.

The Reformation was really nothing more than the same Gnosticism (Gnosis: secret or lofty knowledge) that has plagued God’s people from the cradle of civilization. The Catholic Church was born of the Gnosticism that wreaked havoc on the first century church. Much of the New Testament is written with Gnosticism as a backdrop. Augustine et al were always Catholics and never left the foundations of the Catholic Church. I believe the present-day landscape of the church is absolutely identical to what was going on in the first century except for the technology.

Part and parcel with Gnosticism is the idea of the spiritual elite mediating between the masses and God; in particular, the salvific part (because the masses cannot comprehend reality). Augustine believed that one could not know for certain if they were saved or not, but posited the idea that your best shot is obedience to the institutional church. This is deep within the psyche of Western thought, and why there is so much money in religion. The American landscape is saturated by churches with $500,000 yearly budgets because that is where salvation is found—no matter how you live. Give at the office, and live any way you want to during the week.

And that’s why the Reformation also distorts the Trinity. The Trinity is applicable truth. Sometimes we look at the Trinity as One for certain applications, and sometimes we make the separate distinctions for other applications. In regard to mediation, God must be Father and Son must be mediator. The Reformed gospel makes Father and Son the same and elders the mediators. But there is only “one” mediator.

Like I said, New Calvinism is a return to the authentic Reformed gospel. Calvin et al clearly believed in the authority of elders to forgive sins on earth in God’s behalf:

Wherefore, our initiation into the fellowship of the church is, by the symbol of ablution, to teach us that we have no admission into the family of God, unless by his goodness our impurities are previously washed away (20).

Nor by remission of sins does the Lord only once for all elect and admit us into the Church, but by the same means he preserves and defends us in it. For what would it avail us to receive a pardon of which we were afterwards to have no use? That the mercy of the Lord would be vain and delusive if only granted once, all the godly can bear witness; for there is none who is not conscious, during his whole life, of many infirmities which stand in need of divine mercy. And truly it is not without cause that the Lord promises this gift specially to his own household, nor in vain that he orders the same message of reconciliation to be daily delivered to them.

On the other hand, the Lord has called his people to eternal salvation, and therefore they ought to consider that pardon for their sins is always ready. Hence let us surely hold that if we are admitted and ingrafted into the body of the Church, the forgiveness of sins has been bestowed, and is daily bestowed on us, in divine liberality, through the intervention of Christ’s merits, and the sanctification of the Spirit.

22. To impart this blessing to us, the keys have been given to the Church (Mt. 16:19; 18:18). For when Christ gave the command to the apostles, and conferred the power of forgiving sins, he not merely intended that they should loose the sins of those who should be converted from impiety to the faith of Christ; but, moreover, that they should perpetually perform this office among believers. This Paul teaches, when he says that the embassy of reconciliation has been committed to the ministers of the Church, that they may ever and anon in the name of Christ exhort the people to be reconciled to God (2 Cor. 5:20). Therefore, in the communion of saints our sins are constantly forgiven by the ministry of the Church, when presbyters or bishops, to whom the office has been committed, confirm pious consciences, in the hope of pardon and forgiveness by the promises of the gospel, and that as well in public as in private, as the case requires. For there are many who, from their infirmity, stand in need of special pacification, and Paul declares that he testified of the grace of Christ not only in the public assembly, but from house to house, reminding each individually of the doctrine of salvation (Acts 20:20, 21). Three things are here to be observed. First, Whatever be the holiness which the children of God possess, it is always under the condition, that so long as they dwell in a mortal body, they cannot stand before God without forgiveness of sins. Secondly, This benefit is so peculiar to the Church, that we cannot enjoy it unless we continue in the communion of the Church. Thirdly, It is dispensed to us by the ministers and pastors of the Church, either in the preaching of the Gospel or the administration of the Sacraments, and herein is especially manifested the power of the keys, which the Lord has bestowed on the company of the faithful. Accordingly, let each of us consider it to be his duty to seek forgiveness of sins only where the Lord has placed it. Of the public reconciliation which relates to discipline, we shall speak at the proper place (Calvin Institutes 4.1.20-22).

In contrast, the apostle Paul said there is only ONE mediator, and made a clear distinction of terms between “mediator” and “teacher”:

1 Timothy 2:5 – For there is one God and one mediator between God and mankind, the man Christ Jesus, 6 who gave himself as a ransom for all people. This has now been witnessed to at the proper time. 7 And for this purpose I was appointed a herald and an apostle—I am telling the truth, I am not lying—and a true and faithful teacher of the Gentiles.

When is the discernment blogosphere going to hunker down on this simple concept and demand that those who play both sides of the fence clarify their position on this? And why is it important? Because the idea of mediators other than Christ always leads to tyranny. Mysticism is the mother because it presupposes a truth/reality beyond the five senses that the masses cannot understand. It is anti-grammatical, and posits a redemptive stargate. Grammatical rules are merely guardrails, and empirically hinder orthodoxy on God’s behalf. Grammatical interpretation empowers the individual.

This was the forte of the first century Nicolaitans, which means, “power over the laity.” And this is exactly where we find ourselves today—history repeating itself.

paul