Paul's Passing Thoughts

This is a partial screen shot of a link I was sent today:

We hear a lot of odd verbiage in church like “Pastor of Spiritual Formation” etc., etc. that invokes the RCA dog response, “Er?” Does one go to seminary to get equipped to “shape” someone’s life? What does that mean?

I am in the middle of a project right now so I am looking for quick and short ways to respond to links I get. I think this post from the past nails it pretty well.

Originally Posted in 2011: 

“The ‘Gospel’ Coalition” Series, Part 13: Dr. John Street Joins the Noun Coalition

Just yesterday, when I was introduced to the new gospel upstart organization in our everything gospel church culture, I was verbless. Somebody sent me a link to the upstart’s Facebook page (the “Biblical Counseling Coalition”) which posted this statement: “Sanctification is the art of getting used to our full salvation: justification, regeneration, redemption, reconciliation.”

Rush Limbaugh often says “Words mean things,” but [do] they really? After all, I did some investigation and this new coalition is overseen by the spiritual brain-trust of our day. So, when the apostle Paul described sanctification as “abstain[ing]” (1Thess 4:3), “running” by obedience (Gal 5:7), also through obedience: “work[ing] out….with fear and trembling” (Phil 2:12), beating our bodies into subjection, discipline, running a race, and for a prize (1Cor 9:24-27); surely, we peasants of this contemporary dark age must be misunderstanding him because that’s a lot of verb-iage. Since Michael Horton says the purpose of corporate worship is for reviving our valley of dead bones by contemplating the gospel, should we forget all that stuff in Hebrews about encouraging each other unto good works? Should we rather relax and say, “Hey bro, how are you coming along in the art of getting use to you salvation?”

Inquiring minds, what’s left of them, want to know. Because one of the board members of this coalition is David Powlison, we could have a clue. In an interview with Nine Marks, Powlison said that the church forgets stuff, but when it is rediscovered by CCEF’s Research and Development Dept., it has to be reevaluated in a contemporary historical context. Hmmmm. Powlison also believes that a thorough search must be made of all past and present philosophies, literature, history, etc., just in case God has shown other people stuff that he hasn’t shown the church, or has shown the church in the past, but was forgotten, because the church forgets stuff. At this year’s TGC (The Gospel Coalition) 2011 conference, Powlison will be conducting a seminar on “Recent Advancements in Biblical Counseling.” So, for all of you that draw propositional truth from interpreting the verb, noun, subject, preposition, etc. structure of sentences in the Bible, you may not want to miss that seminar if you really want to able to take the word and help people.

Yet another clue may come from another board member of the BCC, Paul David Tripp. He believes that biblical verbs must be seen in their “gospel context.” In other words, all verbs in the Bible pertain to Jesus. In “How People Change,” Tripp says that the art of getting use to our sanctification is “resting and feeding” on Christ. In the same book, Tripp also writes, like Michael Horton in “Christless Christianity” (or, “Verb Christianity”), that Christians are dead, and as Tripp states it in HPC: “When you are dead, you can’t do anything.” Tripp also mentions in the same book that Christ is not a cognitive concept that we apply to life, but he is a “person.” Got that? No cognitive concepts, just the personal pronoun.

But another board member that caught my eye on the list was Dr. John D. Street who has actually counseled me in the past. I have been reluctant to write in regard to him previously because I am privy to the fact that he used to employ lots of verbs in counseling that applied to the counselee, and I didn’t want to get him into trouble. In fact, I was a perfect candidate for this new form of counseling when I came to him many years ago. I remember coming to one of our appointments and proudly proclaiming: “I have read my Bible and prayed for—four hours!” Now how do you like that for contemplative spirituality?! His answer? “I’m not going to tell you not to do that, but the power is in the doing.” Ouch! I can just imagine the look of horrific angst on Powlison’s face.

Back then, I think Street might have got this idea from the old way of interpreting the Bible. “But the one who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and perseveres, being no hearer who forgets but a doer who acts, he will be blessed in his doing.” “But” is a coordinating conjunction which indicates contrast in this sentence; so being interpreted, don’t do the previous verses—hearing only, and not doing. But that exact contrast that James warns us of is the mantra of the new biblical counseling movement. I was recently sent a webinar conducted by a NANC Fellow who was clearly propagating a hearing only model of change that left the results up to being “amazed by the gospel.” Apparently, James didn’t get the memo. He presents hearing and doing as two components that work together to bring about—at the very least, blessings. The blessings occur where? Well, if we answer that question by finding the preposition, the blessings are “in” the “doing.” Also note that James does not present the gospel as the primary motivator, but rather blessings.

There is no misunderstanding about how this false approach to counseling fleshes itself out in real life. I was a longtime member and former elder at Clearcreek Chapel, the church John Street founded in Springboro, Ohio. The church is presently endorsed by both CCEF and NANC, and is a NANC training center. Two members on the upstart BCC board, Robert Jones and Paul Tripp, speak there often. My information regarding this doctrine includes hundreds of hours of discussion with the Clearcreek elders, who again, are highly respected in biblical counseling circles. The pastor of the church, Russ Kennedy, has said, “Any separation of justification and sanctification is an abomination.” Obviously, this can only leave sanctification by justification as the dynamic for change. This can also be seen in the statement regarding sanctification as something we “get used to” as opposed to what the apostle Paul taught. Though the movement is hideously covert, if one pays attention, their noun-iage exposes them from time to time.

The former Clearcreek elder who was in charge of counseling at Clearcreek once announced from the pulpit (at Clearcreek) that he learned to read his Bible in “a whole new way” from Chad Bresson, Clearcreek elder and author of “Vossed World,” a blog that promotes the belief that the Spirit only illuminates the word of God in a gospel context. Bresson also believes the postmodern concept that because truth is in a person, it cannot be propositional or cognitive / objective, which is why the Bible is strictly a narrative and not for instruction. Presumably, this is why Dan Turner, another elder / counselor at Clearcreek, sometimes (if not all the time) draws diagrams of people’s lives and shows them where they are at in the diagram / picture / gospel narrative as a way of avoiding an instructive paradigm. I once heard Turner explain how a marriage was miraculously transformed before his eyes after showing them the glory of the gospel from the Scriptures. Turner also told me that I was like the Pharisees because I believed that Scripture should often be used to determine objective truth. No surprise then that the elders at Clearcreek were never heard (while I was there) saying, “How do we do that?” But were rather heard saying—often, “What does that look like.” In fact, we were taught that the “how” word was indicative of a heart problem, and the use of that word in a question to an elder resulted in a repeating of the word (how) back to the inquisitor in question form to correct the parishioner.

Will the BBC be able to help people with a counseling model based solely on nouns? I doubt it. Will John Street get kicked-off the BCC board for taking James literally? Or has he repented of such Phariseeism? Perhaps he now says: “I’m not going to tell you not to obey, but the power is in the contemplation.” I hope he hasn’t, but if not, what does that look like? “[Run] John, [run]!”

paul

We must thank the forefathers of  Neo-Protestantism (a return to authentic Protestantism) for creating the infamous Cross Chart. Nothing depicts Protestant orthodoxy better. Basically, there is only one difference between the lost and the saved; “If You’re evil and You Know It Clap Your Hands”…that makes the cross bigger, viz, degree of gratitude for our original salvation draws us close and closer to “final justification.” By the way, this is also the basis for John Piper’s “Christian Hedonism” which is just another way of stating Protestant soteriology. If you really understand the gospel, you will rejoice in your evil, or, hedonism if you will. Please don’t criticize Piper if you are a Protestant; he knows what he is talking about and you don’t. If you are going to be a Protestant, at least know what one is.

Other than the “praise and worship” participation on every Sunday celebrating the knowledge of our “sin as set against God’s holiness,” we have the following video. Just how confused are churchgoers? They are perplexed when their children start acting like heathens after hearing that’s what they are 24/7 in church culture…and even led in celebrating it. Of course, it is said that “grace” is what is being celebrated, not our evil. That’s like saying you are only celebrating “4” and not the “2+2.”

The apostle Paul said it: “Love does not delight in evil.” But any claim that church is a venue for love makes the cross smaller. It doesn’t add up.

Look, if you go to church, I understand why you do, but bless your heart, and I know you don’t mean to, but you are worshiping evil and how different you are from your Father.

I recently stumbled upon the latest from the The Babylon Bee .com which is a satire site dealing with church issues. The piece is short, so I will paste it here for the reference.

Pastor Assures Seniors Church Organ Sent Away To Nice, Big Farm In Country

MANCHESTER, NH—Senior church members who had begun to grow worried over the sudden disappearance of Manchester Baptist Church’s pipe organ were reassured by Pastor Claude Wednesday evening that the instrument simply went to live on a nice, big farm in the country where it could roam free.

The pastor was compelled to make a statement after the church’s older members began to spread rumors that the finely crafted church instrument had been sold on eBay due to a long period of disuse.

“Don’t you worry,” the pastor reportedly told one older woman as her eyes welled up with tears. “This is for the best—now the organ isn’t crammed up here on the stage where it doesn’t have any room to spread its wings. It’s free now, Gertrude. Don’t you want it to be happy?” The woman nodded, wiping her face with her kerchief.

The church further claimed that the beautiful pipe organ was adjusting “really well” to its new life on the farm in the country, where it had reportedly made several friends from among fellow pipe organs that other churches had sent to the idyllic paradise.

Mark Twain once said that humor is the good natured side of truth, and so it is. But there is a little too much truth in this one. The fact of the matter follows: when authority is truth, the absurdity of the “truth” is irrelevant because it is a law that governs stated reality for all intents and purposes.

People under law ALWAYS have to have additional mediators beyond Christ in order to remain under law. If people were free to ascertain truth from the Bible on their own, they would be led out of law and its human mediators to freedom in Christ. Under law and the authority of the church go hand in glove. Do you think the church has authority? Then you are under law.

Fact is, in reality, parishioners believe things that are far less believable than this satire. And to chuckle at this satire is to laugh at the devil. The devil is no laughing matter.

When people are under law…law is the reality and not reasonable truth. Believing the laws enacted by human mediators is the best hope for obtaining eternal life. The proof? Just look at what Catholics believe, and Catholic Light, viz, Protestantism. Look at what Charismatics believe. Look at what people in “cults” believe. And by the way, cult orthodoxy is no more or less believable than church orthodoxy when placed side by side. Let us not forget the true definition of a cult: it is religion’s use of mind control as an alternative to faith and force which was taken away from the church by the American Revolution.

Politics are little different. That’s under law as well. Come now, look at what Democrats believe in the face of hard facts. Look at what socialists believe. Why do they believe it? The laws pronounced by the socialist elites. The works of the law written on the heart by God are totally abandoned for the gods that we can see. Look at how Christ consistently taught by appealing to individual reason. How many lessons did He begin with, “What do you think, if…”? He constantly called on His hearers to believe certain things based on the logical deduction of a hypothetical situation or parable. And remember, those hearers were both lost and saved.

The Bee could have just as easily used a narrative from what the church actually teaches. But that wouldn’t be funny. Instead, they used a supposedly absurd narrative that is somehow less absurd than what parishioners already believe. You see, the rationality of the law isn’t the issue, believing the law set down by the priests of orthodoxy is what gets you to heaven. You see, if everyone would just submit to who was here first, the Catholic Church, there would be unity, no? In this way, the religions of Islam and church are religions of peace; there will be peace when everyone obeys God’s anointed which are those who win whatever war is currently in process. But not really. Once sin gains such control, the depths of the control-lust knows no boundaries. Sin seeks to control and its ultimate weapon for doing so is murder. This is what’s behind abortion; not only does it keep the population of the great unwashed manageable through lesser numbers, it eliminates many who might inspire individualism. Under the banner of individualism, or “freedom” to choose, abortion is really a tool to enslave useful idiots. Any physiological mass on foot can be taught to live under law, but the fewer hard cases reduced through carpet bombing, the better.

No? Then you tell me why so many people think Machelle Wolf’s abortion jokes are so funny. Like the Bee, it covers for lies we use to deliberately suppress righteousness in the name of the human gods we trust for our salvation. “Love” is obeying the dumbed down laws of orthodoxy which keeps individualism in check for the collective good. This makes bath time for the great unwashed children of humanity a fun time with lots of rubber duckies floating in the playful splashing, though the tub is filled with blood.

Hurry with the satire, so we may quite our consciences with laughter.

paul

“By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another” (John 13:35). 

It could be said the church is not the love of God based on what has been observed in previous chapters; church orthodoxy keeps so-called Christians under law rather than under grace. The latter does not exclude law, but rather uses the law lawfully to fulfil it through love. Faith works through love. The big three of Protestantism, Augustine, Luther, and Cavin, with Augustine also being the Catholic Doctor of Grace, all agreed and taught that NO person is capable of doing a good work. That would obviously include acts of love. Though church posits itself as a love venue, its orthodoxy denies that any person is capable of doing any good works. Christians only experience graces that are manifested by God and imputed to the “believer’s” account to keep him or her saved. God does this through the Spirit when parishioners make use of the church’s “means of grace.” Though churchgoers would deny this on the one hand, on the other hand, we constantly hear them say things like, “I didn’t do it; Christ (or God or the Spirit) did it!” Indeed. These truisms are not created from nothing, they flow from ideology.

But following is the larger point. Church is made up of the big two: Catholicism and Protestantism. And remember, all denominations were birthed by one or the other. ALL claim to be church, and are the church. And…the bloody history of the church was only rivaled by the addition of Protestantism. Christ said that if His kingdom was of this world, His servants would fight. Yet, the church did not cease to wage war at any given time until the American Revolution ended the church-state. Even then, Catholic/Protestant hostilities, in the form of terrorism, continued well into the 20th century between Ireland and Britain. We all understand that humanity is weak and would not take notice of a few wars here and there, but again, Christianity has a history saturated with wars. Furthermore, the blood not only flowed up to the horse bridles outside the church walls, but inside as well with the slaughter of heretics and witches. While the banner over the church is love, its history is defined by merciless violence. Its so-called martyrs were rarely executed for matters of faith, but for perceived treason.

The church is loveless in its doctrine and history both. It is loveless inside and out. By its very own admission, it is returning to its “confessional roots” through Neo-Protestantism. James, in his letter to the Jews scattered abroad, warned that mere confessionalism without works is like a body without a spirit, it is dead faith. This warning by James is the very thing that the contemporary church brags about. This is only one among a myriad of contradictions that define church, yet, no one even blinks. While bemoaning the supposed evils of “legalism” which is nowhere found in the Bible, it is the epitome of the ekklesia’s real nemesis, antinomianism, which is the absence of love in sanctification.

The church is not the love of God.