Pittsburgh Theological Seminary | Backwoods Presbyterian

Continuing my Walk 26 October, 2007

Posted by Benjamin P. Glaser in 1st Corinthians, A.W. Pink, Abraham Kuyper, Adam, Charles Hodge, Confessions, Discernment, Genesis, Original Sin, Pittsburgh Theological Seminary.
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For the second installment of my walk of discernment I would like to highlight two past posts I have made on “Adam”. They are not that old so some of you have already read them, but they serve our purpose well.

I thought a nice meaty topic would be in order so I want to discuss an issue that is bearing its head among colleagues and friends here at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary. That issue, as one can tell from the title, is whether or not Adam and Eve were actual beings, the Garden ever actually existed, and does “Original Sin” necessitate an “Original Sinner”? These are of course not new topics and though at first glance may seem to be third order worries I however take the position that without an actual Adam there would be no need for an actual Christ. So one could say that I hold this argument to be much more than a simple third order concern.

Why may you ask are people even doubting Adam’s reality? Does not Paul in Romans 5:12 say that all sin came into the world through one man? Jesus himself refers to Adam and Eve in Matthew 19:4,5 not to mention Luke 3 records Adam as being in his geneology. Calvin in his commentary on the Pentateuch recalls that:

So God created man The reiterated mention of the image of God is not a vain repetition. For it is a remarkable instance of the Divine goodness which can never be sufficiently proclaimed. And, at the same time, he admonishes us from what excellence we have fallen, that he may excite in us the desire of its recovery.*

Or Abraham Kuyper:

Like Job, we ought to feel and to acknowledge that in Adam you and I are created; when God created Adam He created us; in Adam’s nature He called forth the nature wherein we now live. Gen. i. and ii. is not the record of aliens, but of ourselves—concerning the flesh and blood which we carry with us, the human nature in which we sit down to read the Word of God.

Or A.W. Pink:

Now, strictly speaking, there are only two men who have ever walked this earth which were endowed with full and unimpaired responsibility, and they were the first and last Adam’s. The responsibility of each of the rational descendants of Adam, while real, and sufficient to establish them accountable to their Creator is, nevertheless, limited in degree, limited because impaired through the effects of the Fall.

Or Charles Hodge:

We are inherently depraved, and therefore we are involved in the guilt of Adam’s sin.

So here we have Scripture, greats of the Reformation, and contemporary scholars all pointing to a real Adam. So why do Orthodox people seem inclined to accept that Adam was a real being but we of 2007 seem not to think it either necessary or true? Is it because these old white men did not have access to “knowledge” that we have today and if they just knew about textual criticism, historical criticism, literary criticism, grammatical criticism, and J, E, P, and D then they would also see the “mythical” properties of the creation text? Well would Calvin change his mind on the necessity of Adam’s fall for the reality of Christ’s death if he knew of the Yahwist? The easy answer is to say that proponents of the allegory hypothesis are so taken by accommodation with the sciences that their theistic evolutionary stance forces them to concede that no “Adam” ever existed, regardless of what this position does to their theology, because science has proved Homo Sapiens developed independently. But is this answer sufficient? Is it just simple to say that those who hold there is no Adam because of the supposed inconsistencies in the Hebrew and the alleged “two creations” are “wrong” without delving deeper into the questions behind this stance?

What do you think? Does a Christ automatically support an Adam? Or do we think that the story of Creation, without an actual Adam, is a proper myth that helps us and the early Israelites, Jesus, and the Apostles understand our current predicament and that an actual Adam is not required for the Cross?

*-All quotes taken from http://www.ccel.org

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To continue the conversation about a literal Adam a little further let us examine how not having a “real” Adam destroys the need for an actual Christ. Those of you who do not believe in a physical Adam as expressed in the beginning chapters of Genesis need to reconcile how Christ, who Paul explicitly says in 1st Corinthians 15:42-49 is the second Adam, can be the so-called second of something that did not previously exist? Or put in other words how Adam being a metaphor calls for a Christ to die for a fake rebellion.

I think those of you who deny Adam’s reality do not truly comprehend how much the idea of there being no Adam affects the rest of Scripture. It would be like taking away the opening chapter of a novel and expecting to be able to understand the rest of the story. Someone who describes the creation text as myth or folklore must analyze what this does not only to the history of God’s relationship to Israel but to their Christology. Because not only does the non-existence of Adam necessitate that God created the world sinful and evil but it requires that Jesus’ death on the cross is an action that resolves God’s mistake in making an already fallen creation to himself. Not that Jesus was reconciling us, who share in Adam’s rebellion, to God but that God was reconciling his own blunder with himself. Michal Horton in his work Putting Amazing Back Into Grace quotes John Calvin who says,”The depravity and malice both of men and of the devil, or the sins that arise therefrom, do not spring from nature, but rather from the corruption of nature.” In other words it is not that nature itself was created evil but that nature had to of its own accord fall from the perfection in which it was formed to begin with. This has to mean that at some point in the past an “Adam” was given the free will to sin or as the Second Chapter of the Scots Confession defines it:

“We confess and acknowledge that our God has created man, i.e., our first father, Adam, after his own image and likeness, to whom he gave wisdom, lordship, justice, free will, and self-consciousness, so that in the whole nature of man no imperfection could be found. From this dignity and perfection man and woman both fell; the woman being deceived by the serpent and man obeying the voice of the woman, both conspiring against the sovereign majesty of God, who in clear words had previously threatened death if they presumed to eat of the forbidden tree.”

For Jesus’ death on the cross to be as Scripture says it to be necessitates a literal Adam who fell from God’s grace. A fake Adam creates a Christ who has failed and is a liar. For what need do we have of a Savior that saves us from a death that was his fault to begin with? What do we say when we know that Christ did not die because of our own rebellion but because of his own mistake? How can we say that the literally hundreds of times Adam’s sin is called upon by the writers of the Old Testament to show forth the sin of Israel is mere allegory? How can we say Christ died for an allegory or a metaphor and be taken seriously? Adam’s reality is VITAL for the gospel to be real. Without an actual Adam our faith is in vain because Christ’s atonement is nothing more than a big “sorry about that”. This is not the message of the gospel.

Sermon October 7, 2007: World Communion Sunday 6 October, 2007

Posted by Benjamin P. Glaser in Lamentations, My Sermons, Pittsburgh Theological Seminary, Preaching, Worship.
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Oct. 7, 2007
Linway United Presbyterian Church
Lamentations 1:1-6
“The Roads of Zion are in Mourning”

As I was attending chapel at Seminary last week we began to sing a hymn that I had sung hundreds of times before. It was one of those hymns that as soon as the organist begins to play it you can feel your soul being lifted up and you may even step up a little onto the balls of your feet. You know what I am talking about. You know that feeling. It is a hymn that I have heard so many times that I can almost sing it without the help of the words on the page, I really need only to follow the musical notes and listen to the organ. We began with the first verse, I’ll save you the pain of listening to me sing and just read it to you, see if you recognize the hymn: “O worship the King, all glorious above, O gratefully sing His power and His love; Our Shield and Defender, the Ancient of Days, Pavilioned in splendor, and girded with praise.” And as we finished the first verse and the Organist began to begin again my voice raised just a little bit more as my singing became filled with gusto, when all of a sudden I fell silent as I noticed that what I had just sung was just a little bit different than what had been belted out by those next to me. It was not that I had forgotten the verse or that a large section of the hymn had been changed but I looked down and noticed that one single solitary verb had been altered to a noun. But this single solitary noun distorted greatly the whole meaning of the hymn. It is hard for us to imagine how a single word could change the meaning behind an entire hymn but lets look at both verses; now pay attention and listen to the difference. Listen as I read the original second verse of the hymn and the verse after it was changed and see if you can notice the discrepancy: Here is the version I knew: O tell of His might, O sing of His grace, whose robe is the light, whose canopy space, His chariots of wrath the deep thunderclouds form, And dark is His path on the wings of the storm. Got it? Now here is the changed second verse: “O tell of His might, O sing of His grace, whose robe is the light, whose canopy space, the chariots of heaven the deep thunderclouds form, And light is God’s path on the wings of the storm.” Did you notice the difference? Did you notice the word that was changed? Now you may be asking yourself what difference does it make that the revisionist of this great hymn changed the phrase, “chariots of wrath”, that Robert Grant had originally included in his hymn, to “chariots of heaven”? Well before I answer that question let us look at the Scripture lesson [the liturgist] read for us this morning.

The Prophet Jeremiah in the first 6 verses of the Book of Lamentations, which we read this morning, described Jeremiah’s anguish and torment for all that had befallen God’s people after the destruction of the Holy City and the desecration of God’s Temple by the Babylonians in 586 B.C. After the many years of God’s prophets warning the Jews that they had better start to follow God’s laws and commandments, that they had better change their ways here we read that Judah had once again disregarded the calls for Holiness and Righteousness deciding to head down their own path rather than listen to the counsel of the Almighty God. Jeremiah was so taken aback by the destruction that he could hardly contain his grief. He could only express his sorrow, John Calvin says, by expressing his astonishment. In our minds eye we can see Jeremiah down on his knees with his hands raised crying out to the Lord our God, “Why dear God have you forsaken your people!” “Why has Jerusalem deserved this punishment?” Listen to the imagery Jeremiah gives us in verse one and as you do try to place yourself in the shoes of Jeremiah and feel the pain of his words, “How lonely sits the city that was full of people. She has become like a widow who was once great among the nations! She who was a princess among the provinces has become a forced laborer!” and in verse 2, “She weeps bitterly in the night and her tears are upon her cheeks. She has none to comfort her among all her lovers, all her friends have dealt treacherously with her, they have become her adversaries.” Jerusalem has gone from being honored by God, separated and glorified from among the pagan and heathen cultures that surrounded her to a grand lump of broken stone that is but dust and desolation. The city that once had boasted the glory of Solomon’s kingdom, which had bragged about its own glorification to the nations, now, is but a pile of rubble and emptiness. Jeremiah continues in verse 4, “The roads of Zion are in mourning, because no one comes to her appointed feasts. All her gates are desolate; her priests are groaning. Her virgins are afflicted and she herself is bitter.” Not only has the physical city of Jerusalem been destroyed but even the worship of the Lord our God has been stopped. The priests wail because they no longer can offer sacrifice to the Lord. The feasts and traditions of the Jewish people have been ended. Even the roads of Zion feel the emptiness of the exile. Jeremiah presents to us this image of the roads grieving in which the highways of Judah that were once filled with people who are moving with joy and excitement approaching the Holy City to offer their worship has gone silent………. However what is the most disturbing for the Prophet Jeremiah and for us is to come in verse 5.“Her adversaries have become her masters, Her enemies prosper; For the Lord has caused her grief. Because of the multitude of her transgressions; Her little ones have gone away, as captives before the adversary.”If we read too quickly through verse five we may miss a phrase that none of us like to take notice of, certainly not the editors of the new Presbyterian hymnbook like to hear, but is a truth we cannot overlook. Jeremiah cries out, “Her adversaries have become her masters, Her enemies prosper; FOR THE LORD HAS CAUSED HER GRIEF…” We have a natural human tendency to skip over the hard sayings like this in Scripture. We do not like to hear about the wrath of God anymore than we like to hear Christ and Paul telling us that we have to pay our taxes.Jeremiah has recognized that the sorrow that he is now feeling, the emptiness of the plains of Abraham, is not the result of the natural expansion of the Babylonian Empire or because of the arbitrary whim of an uncaring God but is the consequence of a people who have broken their covenant with our God. Jeremiah shows that the destruction of Jerusalem in all its turbulence and confusion was neither accidental nor random but was the work of an almighty God acting in his role as a Righteous judge. Jeremiah understands that God is grieved by Jerusalem’s iniquity. He understands that God our Father does not act rashly in his judgment or out of pleasure like the Gods of Greece and Rome or Babylon and Egypt but acts only because of his righteousness demands that his creation be perfect so that it might glorify him.

Of course this vision of God having the least bit of a hand in the workings of destruction is nearly a completely foreign concept in many of our minds. We have somehow over time created in our brain not a God who demands righteousness and allegiance to his will but a God who acts more like a kind Grandfather, patting us on our head, seeing us as generally good grandkids that just happen to “miss the mark” on occasion. We will have a hard time placing ourselves in the shoes of Jeremiah, understanding his pain and anguish if we have this muted understanding of God the Father. Even more dangerous is that if we fail to comprehend the Righteousness of the Father and the reality of his zeal for righteousness we can scarcely understand the cross upon which our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ was crucified.

Turn with me now if you will to the 27^th Chapter of Matthew’s Gospel. We are brought forward in the New Testament to a similar time and place as we read about in Jeremiah’s lamentations. The enemies of God have brought his son to Golgotha, the place of the skull, to crucify him. We see the followers of Christ dejected and full of sorrow. Peter has already denied Christ three times and gone out and weeped bitterly just as Jeremiah had done for Jerusalem. The Lord our God has been beaten. It looks as if all that Christ had promised and spoken of was about in the matter of hours to be done away with. Forget that you know the rest of the story for right now. Place yourself at the foot of the cross next to Mary and James and John. Kneel with them; look up as your brother is being physically and emotionally tormented. Feel their pain. Read with me starting at verse 45. Matthew says, “Now from the sixth hour darkness fell upon all the land until the ninth hour. About the ninth hour Jesus cried out with a loud voice, saying, ” ELI, ELI, LAMA SABACHTHANI?” that is, “MY GOD, MY GOD, WHY HAVE YOU FORSAKEN ME?” And some of those who were standing there, when they heard it, began saying, “This man is calling for Elijah.” Immediately one of them ran, and taking a sponge, he filled it with sour wine and put it on a reed, and gave Him a drink. But the rest of them said, “Let us see whether Elijah will come to save Him.” And Jesus cried out again with a loud voice, and yielded up His spirit. And behold, the veil of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom; and the earth shook and the rocks were split.” In Matthew’s telling of the crucifixion we are given these descriptions of the grief of God, that the earth trembled and was broken as his son was ruptured for our sins. All of creation moaned in unison with Jeremiah. As God had in his wrath destroyed the temple of Israel and the holy city of Jerusalem for their disobedience in the time of Jeremiah here in the Gospels the Son of God has been broken for our transgressions. Just as Jerusalem had paid the penalty for the multitude of its transgressions in its destruction by the Babylonians, Christ has paid the ultimate price for our iniquity in his crucifixion by the Romans. Just as the roads of Zion had gone silent after the destruction of Jerusalem the Christ our Lord was dead.

As I spoke of in the beginning about the neutering of the great hymn by Robert Grant, let us not be like those who denigrate the power of God to work his will in the world by trying to soften or, in the case of the revisionist hymn writer get rid of God’s wrath. But let us be transformed by the understanding that even though we each deserve the same fate as Jerusalem, Christ our Lord and savior has stood up for us directing the wrath of God for our iniquity upon his own body away from us. And in God’s greatest act of mercy has raised his son from the dead, who died to make men holy, securing for the elect eternal life with him.

So as we sit here this morning readying to partake together in the broken body of Christ our Savior and drink of his blood with literally hundreds of millions of other Christians joined as one by our common bond in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ let us not do so casually or without forethought. For what we are doing in the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper, as Paul explains in the 11^th chapter of his first letter to the Corinthian church, is not to be taken lightly. For our Lord’s body has been broken for us. His blood has been spilled. He has died so that we may be seen as holy and righteous before our God. Not so that we could come and have bread and juice as simply an act of remembrance but so that the elements of communion may be set apart from their common uses and that those who receive them with faith and repentance may be spiritually filled with the Grace of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To the Honor and the Glory alone be to Jesus Christ our Savior. Amen.

The History of Justification 19 September, 2007

Posted by Benjamin P. Glaser in John Calvin, John Gerstner, Pittsburgh Theological Seminary.
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History of the Doctrine of Justification

by Dr. John Gerstner

“The doctrine by which the church stands or falls.” So said Martin Luther about justification by faith alone. John Calvin agreed, calling justification by faith the “hinge” of the Reformation. But was that the historic Christian view?
One may say generally of the history of the doctrine of justification that solafideanism (justification-by-faith-alone-ism) was taught implicitly, but not explicitly, from the beginning of the church. That is, it was known in the early church that salvation was by faith alone, but not until the sixteenth century was the church called upon to define that teaching more precisely. Those in the church who had quietly apostasized opposed this essential truth (adherents of Tridentine Roman Catholicism), while the faithful (Protestants), affirmed it. The Reformers defined and refined the doctrine in the fires of controversy.
The historian of doctrine, Louis Berkhof, correctly observed that in the early church faith “was generally regarded as the outstanding instrument for the reception of the merits of Christ, and was often called the sole means of salvation.” Faith rather than works were “repeatedly expressed by the Apostolic Fathers, and re-occur in the Apologetes. . . .”
The most influential theologian of the early church was certainly Augustine (354-430). Before we consider his teaching about our crucial doctrine, we note in passing that the standard creed of the Reformation, the Augsburg Confession (1530), found solafideanism in Augustine’s mentor and predecessor, Ambrose, under whose preaching Augustine was converted. Article VI of the Confession speaks of solafideanism: “The same [justification by faith] is also taught by the Fathers: For Ambrose says, ‘It is ordained of God that he who believes in Christ is saved freely receiving.’”
In spite of this, many cannot find the doctrine in Augustine. Many historical theologians interpret him as confusing justification with sanctification, of which justification is merely a part. This is not accurate, however. Though Augustine finds justification and sanctification inseparable, they are not indistinguishable. Augustinian justification leads into sanctification, but is not confused with it.
According to Augustine, man’s faith in Christ justifies him. Confession of Christ is efficacious for the remission of sins. We are justified by the blood of Christ, and we have no merits which are not the gifts of God. Of course, faith is active through love (fides quae caritate operatur), but this does not imply that justification is on the basis of love.
Before we leave Augustine, a relatively recent Roman Catholic work requires attention. Bergauer shows clearly that Luther disagreed not only with the Epistle of James but with Augustine as well. Luther became convinced that James was opposed to Paul’s doctrine of justification by faith alone and thus dismissed the epistle as non-canonical. Bergauer also notes that in so doing, Luther was consciously departing from Augustine as well. We agree with Bergauer that Luther erred with respect to James and Augustine. Bergauer’s work confirms, however, what we will shortly note, that Luther was clearly a solafideian, although without recognizing that James and Augustine were also. The Reformer erred, apparently because he could not find explicit forensic language in either James or Augustine.
Ian Sellers sees that it is the post-Augustinian movement which “conflates the immediacy of the act of justification with the later process of sanctification.” Nevertheless, many post-Augustinians kept their concepts clear as we will see even in the Scholastic era, though many did not.
Some Roman Catholics like to cry “Forward to the Middle Ages,” thinking that they there find authority for their antisolafideian doctrine. But Adolf Harnack insisted that if the medieval church had followed its favorite teacher, Thomas Aquinas, on justification, the Reformation would not have been necessary. The great earlier Scholastic theologian, Anselm, was also solafideian. He wrote his belief in a tract for the consolation of the dying, quoted by A. H. Strong:

“Question. Dost thou believe that the Lord Jesus died for thee? Answer. I believe it.
Qu. Dost thou thank him for his passion and death? Ans. I do thank him. Qu. Dost thou believe that thou canst not be saved except by his death? Ans. I believe it.” And then Anselm addresses the dying man: “Come then, while life remaineth in thee; in his death alone place thy whole trust; in naught else place any trust; to his death commit thyself wholly; with this alone cover thyself wholly; and if the Lord thy God will to judge thee, say, ‘Lord, between thy judgment and me I present the death of our Lord Jesus Christ; no otherwise can I contend with thee.’ And if he shall say that thou art a sinner, say thou: ‘Lord, I interpose the death of our Lord Jesus Christ between my sins and thee.’ If he say that thou hast deserved condemnation, say: ‘Lord, I set the death of our Lord Jesus Christ between my evil deserts and thee, and his merits I offer for those which I ought to have and have not.’ If he say that he is wroth with thee, say: ‘Lord, I oppose the death of our Lord Jesus Christ between thy wrath and me.’ And when thou hast completed this, say again: ‘Lord, I set the death of our Lord Jesus Christ between thee and me.’” See Anselm, Opera (Migne), 1:686, 687. The above quotation gives us reason to believe that the New Testament doctrine of justification by faith was implicitly, if not explicitly, held by many pious souls through all the ages of papal darkness.

Thus medieval Scholastics still taught justification as an instantaneous act. It was not until the Council of Trent (1545-1563) that justification was officially confirmed as a process based on human merit derived through divine grace. This was the article in Session VI, Canon 7 of the Council of Trent which led the Roman Catholic Church away from the orthodox teaching on justification.
For Luther, Rom. 1:17 and Mat. 4:7 taught that the righteousness of God was his mercy and pardon. Out went all human merit from indulgences to works of supererogation. As Article IV of Melanchthon’s Augsburg Confession, of which Luther approved, phrased it: “Men can be justified freely on account of Christ through faith, when they believe that they are received into grace and that their sins are remitted on account of Christ who made satisfaction for sins on our behalf by his death. God imputes this faith for righteousness in his own sight.” Luther elsewhere affirms that Christ’s righteousness is ours and our sins are his. Thus, he who was innocent became guilty of depravity, while we who were depraved became innocent.
Calvin, in his Institutes, citing Augustine and Peter Lombard, taught the same doctrine. Though the Genevan saw union with Christ preceding faith (whereas for Luther it followed faith). Berkhof is justified in saying “however Calvin may have differed from Luther as to the order of salvation, he quite agreed with him on the nature and importance of the doctrine of justification by faith.” Yet Edward Boehl is correct that Calvin avoided basing justification on the mystical union which equaled intercourse with God. However, this does not justify Boehl in saying that later Reformed theologians did so identify and thus approached the Lutheran heretic, Osiander. Osiander held “essential righteousness” where the Reformed tradition never deviated from imputed righteousness.
Nevertheless, John Tillotson;, Samuel Clarke, and some other Anglicans did introduce Tridentine thinking into the Church of England by confusing the inseparability of faith and works with the meritoriousness of each.
This same tension toward meritorious righteousness in and by the justified threatened Puritanism from the beginning. That Anglican John Donne (1573-1631) and Congregationalist John Owen (1616-1683), champions of solafideanism, admitted infused righteousness while denying any merit in it shows their sensitivity to the problem. Allison in his The Rise of Moralism has traced this English development into Arminianism and beyond in a somewhat parallel way to Joseph Haroutunian’s American sketch in Piety Versus Moralism.
Puritanism could admit — in fact, insist upon — sanctification (infused righteousness) as strenuously as imputed righteousness. It was inseparably connected with it. The one thing sanctification did not do, for the Puritans, was supplant justification. As we saw, Owen did not even hesitate to speak of justitia inhaerens. Righteousness was wrought in a man because it was first imputed to him. The evidence that it was imputed to him was its being wrought in him.
There is a sense in which Puritans saw righteousness as being wrought-in before being imputed — to. This was the prior union with Christ as the psychological basis of justification. Thus the foundation of imputation became union.
The offense which some found in solafideanism was that it taught acceptance by faith only. If this is so, the Arminians argued, an unsanctified man could go to heaven, and that could never be. They were partly right, since an unsanctified man can never go to heaven — without holiness. But they were partly wrong, for one justified by faith alone is not justified by the faith that is alone. Faith is inseparably connected with works, or sanctification, or inherent righteousness.
Once again, the error was in a failure to understand the truth. A correct objection was based on an incorrect apprehension. How often had the Reformers proclaimed with James (and Paul) that faith without works was dead. Justification without sanctification did not exist. As we have seen, solafideans were not opposed to inherent righteousness except as a justifying righteousness, which was precisely what Rome claimed it to be. The orthodox were as opposed — more opposed — to Antinomianism than the unorthodox.
Not understanding that solafideanism gave works a proper role, Arminians found an improper role for them. Since works, they felt, had to justify — and sinners had none — they used faith to bring down works to a sinner’s level. That is, they saw the work of Christ as satisfying God with the imperfect works of men. “Christ has brought down the market,” according to Henry Hammond. Our inadequate righteousness was made acceptable through Christ. Allison says that this was the imputation of faith of Baxter, Goodwin, and Woodbridge versus the imputation of Christ’s righteousness of Owen, Eedes, Gataker, Walker, and also of the early Anglicans Hooker, Andrewes, Downame, Davenant, Donne, Ussher, and Hill. Commenting on Arminianism, A. H. Strong has agreed with other scholars that the “Wesleyan scheme is inclined to make faith a work. This is to make faith the cause and ground, or at least to add it to Christ’s work as a joint cause and ground, of justification. . . .”
This, however, is a rather infelicitous way of expressing the difference. It amounts to a pun on the word impute. The imputation of Christ’s righteousness construes imputation as a reckoning of, or accrediting to, of Christ’s righteousness. The imputation of faith in this contrast means regarding faith as acceptable which, by legal definition, it is not. Even the Arminians admitted, as we shall see, that it was not really acceptable to God (as Christ’s righteousness was); but on their view the Son twisted his Father’s arm to make him act as if it were. This soteriological perversion was called Neonomianism (new-law-ism) because it was not the perfect law of God which was maintained but a new, stepped-down, imperfect, “lawless” law of God. So it became a apse into justification by works which were not even works.

Calvin And Denominational Division 30 August, 2007

Posted by Benjamin P. Glaser in Dr. Robert A, J. Gagnon, John Calvin, PC (USA), Pittsburgh Theological Seminary.
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The following is an article written by Dr. Robert A.J. Gagnon, Associate Professor of New Testament at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary, an elder in the PC (USA), and a member of the Board of the Presbyterian Coalition. I commend this not only to those of us still members of the PC (USA) but also to our friends in other denominations as well. We would all do well to read this and understand it.

Calvin on Unity and Sexual Immorality
A Comment on a Presbyterian Coalition Document
by Robert A. J. Gagnon
Aug. 13, 2007

In a new Presbyterian Coalition paper, “Let Us Rise Up and Build (Neh. 2:18): A Plan for Reformation in the Presbyterian Church (USA),” which I commend as a continuing effort to bring renewal to the PCUSA, Calvin is cited on the question of unity and the case of Corinth:
John Calvin, in his Institutes of the Christian Religion (Book IV, Chapter 1), recites the long history of doctrinal and moral corruption in Israel and the church. He refers to the church in Corinth, where “it was not a few that erred, but almost the whole body had become tainted; there was not one species of sin but a multitude; and these not trivial errors, but some of them execrable crimes” (section 14). Calvin notes that “Paul, instead of giving them [the Corinthian Christians] over to destruction, mercifully extricated them” (section 27). The reformer concludes, “Such, then, is the holiness of the Church: it makes daily progress, but is not yet perfect; it daily advances, but as yet has not reached the goal” (section 17). Our hope is that “the Lord is daily smoothing its [the Church’s] wrinkles, and wiping away its spots” (section 2). (p. 5 n. 1)

These references buttress the assertion on p. 2 that “the church always stands in need of reformation” and justify staying in the denomination despite its problems. The comment is made on p. 4: “Even individuals and congregations that move to another Reformed body will soon discover that that body, too, stands in need of biblical reformation.” In short, these remarks suggest that affirmation of homosexual unions in the PCUSA would not be grounds for leaving the PCUSA.

In response:

1.

It is not clear to me that Calvin intended to say, in the quotations given above, that believers should remain in a denominational structure indefinitely that blessed incestuous unions between a man and his mother or stepmother, among church officers no less, and did so as part of the doctrine of the church. Indeed, it strikes me as historically bizarre to suggest that Calvin would long have remained in such a denomination as prospects dimmed for turning the denomination around. The only question, it seems to me, is whether Calvin would have tried to have recalcitrant offenders burned at the stake or not. The same question would have applied, indeed more so, to the case of homosexual offenders. (Here, of course, I do not wish to condone burning at the stake but merely suggest that the intensity of Calvin’s opposition would have been greater, not lesser, than ours.)

2.
Calvin’s remarks have to be taken in context. First, he appears to presume a realistic possibility of repentance on the part of offenders. Hence his remark in Book IV, ch. 1, sec. 27 (all further references to sections are to Book IV, ch. 1, unless otherwise noted): “Nay, the very persons who had sinned . . . are expressly invited to repentance.” This is exactly Paul’s expectation in 1 Cor 5. Paul has only just received news of the case of the incestuous man (5:1) and still expects to be able to have an effect on the community. He orders them “in the name of our Lord Jesus . . . to hand over such a one to Satan for the destruction of the flesh” (5:4-5), meaning, minimally, that they are not to associate with the offender, “not even to eat together with such a one” (5:9-11). As founder of the community and as supreme apostle to the Gentiles, he feels that he has a reasonable expectation of succeeding in his order. Indeed, it is possible that the reference to restoring quickly a penitent offender in 2 Cor 2:5-10 (cf. 7:8-13) alludes to the incestuous man, with whom Paul may have ‘had it out’ in an intervening visit to Corinth. But Paul also speaks of ongoing “sexual uncleanness, sexual immorality, and sexual licentiousness” that the Corinthians have not repented of, which puts them at risk of not inheriting God’s kingdom (2 Cor 12:21; cf. 1 Cor 6:9-10). Such conduct may necessitate a harsh visit by Paul, with ultimatum (2 Cor 13:1-10; cf. 1 Cor 4:18-21).

The situation with the incestuous man that Paul faced at the time that he wrote we today call “1 Corinthians,” is very different from a situation extending over decades in which the Corinthians would have not only adamantly refused to submit to Paul’s ruling but also installed the incestuous man as a leader of the church and where reconciliation with the teaching of “our Lord Jesus” on incest (implicit teaching, of course, since Jesus did not speak directly against man-mother incest) no longer seemed a reasonable prospect. Under the latter set of circumstances the continuance of the church in the Pauline orbit seems highly unlikely, to say nothing of Paul insisting that believers must continue to submit to the leadership of such a renegade church in the name of “unity.” Unity for Paul was a Christological concept, not a sociological concept—unity around the one who was crucified for us and into whose name we were baptized (1:13) and who therefore had a right to be Lord of our lives (5:13; 12:3).

3.
A second contextual factor in Calvin’s discussion is that Calvin was primarily thinking of the context of his own ‘denomination,’ where he exercised great influence, and about matters of doctrine and behavior that were not major and so did not constitute sufficient grounds for leaving the denomination. As regards doctrine he cites the example of whether the soul on leaving the body definitely lives with the Lord or makes no commitment about the soul’s abode other than it goes to heaven (sec. 12). As regards behavior, he cites the case of the Anabaptists and others who tolerate no “imperfection of conduct” and “spurn the society of all in whom they see that something human still remains”—what Calvin refers to as “immoderate severity” (sec. 13). He is not thinking of institutional teaching that declares a good what God in Scripture defines as “abhorrent.” It is doubtful that Calvin in his day could even have conceived of the possibility of the Church’s ordaining persons who were actively and unrepentantly engaged in homosexual practice, so extreme would such a development have been to him. Calvin summarizes his remarks in Book IV, ch. 1 as: “trivial errors in [the] ministry [of the Church] ought not to make us regard it as illegitimate” and “prevent us from giving the name of Church” (ch. 2, sec. 1).

4.
A third contextual factor is that Calvin does see a place for dissolving denominational ties. “Who may presume to give the name of Church, without reservation, to that assembly by which the word of God is openly and with impunity trampled under foot. . . ?” (ch. 2, sec. 7). In his own day Calvin viewed dissolution from the Roman Catholic Church as justified by the latter’s adoption of “superstitious worship” in connection with a particular priestly interpretation of the Lord’s Supper. “The communion of the Church ought not to be carried so far by the godly as to lay them under a necessity of following it when it has degenerated to profane and polluted rites” (ch. 2, sec. 9). The PCUSA is currently degenerating into allowing, at least, the “profane and polluted rites” of blessing homoerotic unions and ordaining homosexually-active officers of the church. Calvin rightly notes that “the Church was not instituted to be a chain to bind us in . . . impiety . . . , but rather to retain us in the fear of God and obedience of the truth” (ch. 2, sec. 2). In severing ourselves from churches that promote impiety, Calvin says, “we run no risk of being dissevered from the Church of Christ” (ibid.).

Moreover, Calvin recognized the problem in staying in a denominational structure that would require obedience to that structure’s erroneous teaching. “We cannot concede that they have a Church, without obliging ourselves to subjection and obedience.” He argued that a person will “greatly err” to regard “as churches” the meetings constituting the Roman Catholic Church, which he viewed as “contaminated by idolatry, superstition, and impious doctrine,” since “full communion” requires a certain degree of agreement in doctrine (ch. 2, sec. 10). Although the PCUSA does not currently require ‘subscriptionism’ on the validity of homosexual bonds, it does exert pressure at many different levels to conform to this view, or at least acknowledge the credibility of such a view, if one is to be a ‘player’ holding office on the national and, in some cases, the synod or presbytery levels. The equation of “civil rights” for homosexually active persons with civil rights for African Americans and for women indicates that the current de facto local option will not be optional over the long term. No one in the PCUSA church today has the right to refuse candidacy to a woman or to an ethnic minority on the grounds of being a woman or minority. The same will eventually accrue for persons who are homosexually active. Already, in various ways, we find ourselves in positions where we must respect and even submit to church bodies (like the 2006 General Assembly and some judicial bodies in the PCUSA) that are pursuing a homosexual agenda for the church; and to respect the national leadership of a Stated Clerk, and sometimes the Moderator, promoting the homosexual agenda and eviscerating the plain meaning of the Book of Order on ordination standards for sexual behavior in various subtle and not so subtle ways.

It is interesting that Calvin did not declare the “church” from which he separated to have ceased in all respects from being a “church.” “While we are unwilling simply to concede the name of Church to the Papists, we do not deny that there are churches among them. But we contend only for the true state of the Church, implying communion as well as everything which pertains to the profession of our Christianity” (ch. 2, sec. 12).

5.

A fourth contextual factor is that we live today in an inter-denominational world where a plethora of valid Christian denominations exist, where the differences within a given denomination are often greater than across denominations, and where, consequently, “changing denominations” no longer has the significance that it once had. Today Presbyterians, Methodists, Lutherans, Episcopalians, Baptists, and Pentecostals, to say nothing of Roman Catholics and persons belonging to the various Orthodox churches, are by choice of denomination necessarily “divided” from other Christians, at least in an institutional way. This is different from the regional sway held by reformed churches of Calvin’s day and the relatively limited array of options for going elsewhere. When I came to Pittsburgh thirteen years ago as an American Baptist and joined the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)—nobody in the PCUSA accused me of violating the Scripture’s commands on church unity, even though there were (and are) American Baptist churches in the area.

So the issue that the renewal movements in the PCUSA must face is not whether there are justifiable grounds for leaving a denomination but rather on what grounds departure would be justifiable. In answering this question one should take the following syllogism into consideration:

A.) MAJOR PREMISE

A denomination renders itself illegitimate when, through enactment, it willfully ordains persons actively involved in adult incest, adultery, polyamory, or like acts, and blesses sexual unions constituted by such behavior.

B.) MINOR PREMISE

Homosexual practice is, according to Scripture, at least as bad as—and probably worse than—adult incest, adultery, and polyamory.

C.) CONCLUSION

A denomination renders itself illegitimate when, through enactment, it willfully ordains homosexually active persons and blesses homosexual unions.

When we compare the current and soon-to-happen circumstances of the PCUSA to the problems that will beset those who leave the PCUSA for more orthodox bodies—even if only to make the comparison at the point of ongoing “need of biblical reformation” (p. 4)—we do an injustice to the foundational importance that Scripture attaches to having sexual bonds consist only of “male and female” and, conversely, the abhorrence with which Scripture’s authors treat homosexual practice of any sort. In short, we underestimate the sacred importance of what is now seriously endangered in the PCUSA.

The current “Let Us Rise Up and Build” document does the renewal movement of the PCUSA a disservice if it does not address the elephant in the room; namely, what constitutes legitimate grounds for departure in the PCUSA. This question is on the minds not of those who have already left—for them it is no longer a question. It is foremost a question for those who remain. The actions of the General Assembly one year from now could well render the entire strategy of this report irrelevant. We must now, and not next year, begin to address the “what if?”

© 2007 Robert A. J. Gagnon 5

PCUSA Moderator Goes Awry in Her Claims of a “Deeply Pernicious Heresy” 14 August, 2007

Posted by Benjamin P. Glaser in Dr. Robert A, J. Gagnon, PC (USA), Pittsburgh Theological Seminary.
2 comments

Below is a selection of the response by Robert A. J. Gagnon, Ph.D, Associate Professor of New Testament at my Seminary (Pittsburgh Theological Seminary) posted on Aug. 10, 2007 to Moderator Joan Gray on her recent letter.

When Rev. Joan Gray was elected Moderator of the PCUSA at the last General Assembly I, as a voting delegate, felt that, though we could done better (had one of the other candidates been elected), we also could have done far worse (had either of two other “Covenant Network” candidates been chosen). She is certainly a much better moderator than a couple of recent ones. However, recent remarks by Joan Gray should be filed under the “we could have done better” category—unless, of course, she has the courage and humility to acknowledge publicly her error.

Moderator Rev. Joan Gray has declared that anyone who believes that impenitent, homosexually active persons should not be granted church membership is guilty of “a deeply pernicious heresy” (so the title given to an Aug. 4, 2007 editorial in www.presbyweb.com found here). These are very strong words, which I take to heart since I hold the view to which she is referring. She even goes so far as to cite the apostle Paul in support of her position, claiming that such a view is “a form of works righteousness” that “leads us back into the bondage Paul rails against in Galatians.”

As a scholar of Paul who has worked heavily on sexuality issues for a decade, and is nearly finished a 100+ page annotated translation of Galatians for future publication, I must say that her announcement about Paul in particular and Scripture in general is ‘news to me.’ If there is “a deeply pernicious heresy” here, it is the position that no repetitive, unrepentant behavior of any sort, no matter how extreme the departure from Jesus’ teaching, can have any relevance for membership status in the church, much less for inheritance in God’s kingdom….

See here for the rest:

http://www.robgagnon.net/JoanGrayResponse.htm

Was Adam Real? 9 August, 2007

Posted by Benjamin P. Glaser in Adam, Genesis, Original Sin, Pittsburgh Theological Seminary.
1 comment so far

After a little frivolity that is the beginning of the Soccer season in Europe (an event I look forward to with almost as much passion as the dawn of American Football, College as much as Pro, Go Marshall!!!) I thought a nice meaty topic would be in order so I want to discuss an issue that is bearing its head among colleagues and friends here at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary. That issue, as one can tell from the title, is whether or not Adam and Eve were actual beings, the Garden ever actually existed, and does “Original Sin” necessitate an “Original Sinner”? These are of course not new topics and though at first glance may seem to be third order worries I however take the position that without an actual Adam there would be no need for an actual Christ. So one could say that I hold this argument to be much more than a simple third order concern.

Why may you ask are people even doubting Adam’s reality? Does not Paul in Romans 5:12 say that all sin came into the world through one man? Jesus himself refers to Adam and Eve in Matthew 19:4,5 not to mention Luke 3 records Adam as being in his geneology. Calvin in his commentary on the Pentateuch recalls that:

So God created man The reiterated mention of the image of God is not a vain repetition. For it is a remarkable instance of the Divine goodness which can never be sufficiently proclaimed. And, at the same time, he admonishes us from what excellence we have fallen, that he may excite in us the desire of its recovery.*

Or Abraham Kuyper:

Like Job, we ought to feel and to acknowledge that in Adam you and I are created; when God created Adam He created us; in Adam’s nature He called forth the nature wherein we now live. Gen. i. and ii. is not the record of aliens, but of ourselves—concerning the flesh and blood which we carry with us, the human nature in which we sit down to read the Word of God.

Or A.W. Pink:

Now, strictly speaking, there are only two men who have ever walked this earth which were endowed with full and unimpaired responsibility, and they were the first and last Adam’s. The responsibility of each of the rational descendants of Adam, while real, and sufficient to establish them accountable to their Creator is, nevertheless, limited in degree, limited because impaired through the effects of the Fall.

Or Charles Hodge:

We are inherently depraved, and therefore we are involved in the guilt of Adam’s sin.

So here we have Scripture, greats of the Reformation, and contemporary scholars all pointing to a real Adam. So why do Orthodox people seem inclined to accept that Adam was a real being but we of 2007 seem not to think it either necessary or true? Is it because these old white men did not have access to “knowledge” that we have today and if they just knew about textual criticism, historical criticism, literary criticism, grammatical criticism, and J, E, P, and D then they would also see the “mythical” properties of the creation text? Well would Calvin change his mind on the necessity of Adam’s fall for the reality of Christ’s death if he knew of the Yahwist? The easy answer is to say that proponents of the allegory hypothesis are so taken by accommodation with the sciences that their theistic evolutionary stance forces them to concede that no “Adam” ever existed, regardless of what this position does to their theology, because science has proved Homo Sapiens developed independently. But is this answer sufficient? Is it just simple to say that those who hold there is no Adam because of the supposed inconsistencies in the Hebrew and the alleged “two creations” are “wrong” without delving deeper into the questions behind this stance?

What do you think? Does a Christ automatically support an Adam? Or do we think that the story of Creation, without an actual Adam, is a proper myth that helps us and the early Israelites, Jesus, and the Apostles understand our current predicament and that an actual Adam is not required for the Cross?

*-All quotes taken from http://www.ccel.org

Sorry about my two-month long absence from Posting 14 February, 2007

Posted by Benjamin P. Glaser in General, Pittsburgh Theological Seminary.
8 comments

My apologies for being so tardy in my keeping up with this blog. Life can sometimes get in the way of fun and engaging speech. I still promise to finish my writings that I promised back in December on the dangers of the Big box churches. Between school and supply preaching not much time has been available for the upkeep of this blog. I am currently helping to establish an online student blog at PTS that you can find here:

ptslogos.blogspot.com

I also have been preaching every sunday for the past two months as well as establishing contacts for Field Education next year. Hopefully I will be able to keep this blog operational. ?If not you can always check out my writing at PTS Logos as I am on the editorial board. If you have any questions/comments please let me know.

Benjamin P. Glaser

Baby’s 1st Halloween 25 October, 2006

Posted by Benjamin P. Glaser in Baby, Halloween, Pittsburgh Theological Seminary.
4 comments

Here are some pics from my daughter’s First Halloween at the Seminary DayCare.

Daddy has LOTS of Candy!!!

Discussion on “Wealth and Christianity” 18 July, 2006

Posted by Benjamin P. Glaser in General, Pittsburgh Theological Seminary.
4 comments

I am having a very interesting conversation with a fellow seminarian on wealth and what the church’s position should be. We also have had some ancillary discussions on poverty and racial tension. You can find the conversation here:

http://poesistheou.blogspot.com/

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