Considering The Righteous Mind, Part 2

The first section of Jonathan Haidt’s The Righteous Mind: Why Good People Are Divided by Politics and Religion developed Haidt’s Social Intuition Theory. He summarizes this as “intuitions come first, strategic reasoning second.” In his metaphor the rider serves the elephant, explaining why the elephant (intuitions) is going in the direction it is going.

The second section of the book develops the thesis that “there’s more to morality than harm and fairness”. His metaphor is that “the righteous mind is like a tongue with six taste receptors.” He’s going to develop the foundations of morality. In the process, he’s going to look at the differences in the moral foundation between conservatives and liberals, as well as how they lean differently in common ground.

WEIRD People

He begins with the concept of WEIRD. Many of his subjects for his dissertation research came from his time at McDonald’s. He was surprised “these working-class subjects would sometimes find my request for justifications so perplexing.” He began to note class and educational differences. His students at Penn were devoted to John Stuart Mill’s “harm principle.” They were the only group that didn’t express some form of disgust for one of his test questions. Haidt borrows the WEIRD acronym from Henrich, Heine and Norenzayan. It stands for western, educated, industrialized, rich and democratic. These people are statistical outliers but often form the sample for many studies in the West. “Even in the West, Americans are more extreme outliers than Europeans, and within the United States, the educated upper middle class (like my Penn sample) is the most unusual of all.”

As he lays out the differences, most people think holistically but the WEIRD are more analytical. They gravitate toward Kant and Mill. They see the world differently and have different moral concerns. They are more individualistic while other are more sociocentric in their morality, meaning groups and institutions are placed ahead of the concerns of the individual.

He leans on Shweder in recognizing that you can’t ignore culture when you study how people think. Conversely you can’t study culture and ignore psychology. Shweder discovered “three major clusters of moral themes”: autonomy, community, and divinity.

Autonomy: “People should be free to satisfy these wants, needs, and preferences as they see fit, and so societies develop moral concepts such as rights, liberty, and justice, which allow people to coexist peacefully without interfering too much in each other’s projects.” There is dependence on utilitarians Mill and Peter Singer.

Community: “based on the idea that people are, first and foremost, members of larger entities such as families, teams, armies, companies, tribes, and nations… they are real, they matter, and they must be protected. … Many societies therefore develop moral concepts such as duty, hierarchy, respect, reputation and patriotism.”

Divinity: “people are first and foremost, temporary vessels within which a divine soul has been implanted. … The body is a temple, not a playground.” Therefore people shouldn’t do things that degrade themselves or dishonor their Creator.

Becoming a Pluralist

Haidt was admittedly WEIRD, until he moved to India for a study. He wasn’t on vacation but immersed himself in the culture, “a sex-segregated, hierarchically stratified, devoutly religious society, and I was committed to understanding it on its own terms, not mine.” He learned that as people were kind to him, his elephant leaned toward them, and his rider began to look for reasons to defend them. I liken this, in part, to John Perkin’s idea that “love is the final fight.” If we are kind to one another we’ll begin to care for one another and seek reasons to defend one another (and their view points).

He began to understand the concept of moral disgust which “is felt whenever we see or hear about people whose behavior shows them to be low on this vertical dimension.” He says that while a man who robs a bank commits a crime, and we judge him, those who traffic in children disgust us and we consider them monsters rather than simply criminals. Haidt found himself adopting some Indian practices associated with disgust, including removing shoes before entering a house (since the streets are filthy).

He began to understand the moral outrage of conservatives when a crucifix is placed in a jar of urine and called art. He encourages people to consider what would happen if images of Martin Luther King Jr. or Nelson Mandela were treated this way. This, I think, is part of what is driving the move to remove confederate statues. They are viewed as polluting our society. He notes that “the ethic of divinity is sometimes incompatible with compassion, egalitarianism, and basic human rights.” Yet it also provides critique for the ugly parts of secular culture.

Leaving the Matrix

The creators of The Matrix built on William Gibson’s view of cyberspace in his novel Neuromancer. Neo took the red pill to leave the matrix and see reality for what it really was. Shweder’s ideas were Haidt’s red pill. He now understood “many moral matrices coexist within each nation.” Each one presents a “complete, unified, and emotionally compelling worldview”. Growing up Jewish his community saw unions and labor providing protection from the exploitation they faced. Since FDR was a President who supported labor and was in office when Hitler was defeated, Jews have been largely Democrat ever since. There is an emotional tie that doesn’t seem rational to others.

His own political views seemed so ethical, and the other party’s so obviously evil, that he and his friends looked for the psychological pathology to explain why anyone would be a Republican. They didn’t consider that moral choices were more complex than reducing harm and increasing fairness. When he returned to the States, Republicans didn’t seem quite so crazy. He had escaped from his “partisan mind-set(reject first, ask rhetorical questions later).” He felt freed from partisan anger.

“If you grow up in a WEIRD society, you become so well educated in the ethic of autonomy that you can detect oppression and inequality even where the apparent victims see nothing wrong.”

Moral Taste Buds

Who’d go to a restaurant that only focused on one taste receptor, he asks. Imagine Salt, with a menu filled with food focused exclusively on your salt receptor. From this he moves to morality. As our tongue has different receptors (sweet, salty, sour etc) so our righteous mind has variety of moral receptors or foundations. A balanced moral view encompasses all or most of them, but individuals and communities will prefer different blends.

“In this analogy, morality is like cuisine: it’s a cultural construction, influenced by accidents of environment and history, but it’s not so flexible that anything goes.”

He understands morality as a social or cultural construct (of your tribe). While it is not internally generated, it is internalized. We all have the same receptors but don’t all like the same foods, or ethical views. Here Haidt returns to his love for Hume. Moral judgement is a kind of perception, an intuition, not the result of reasoning (most of the time at least). In this, Haidt looks at Kant and Bentham, two of the great systemizers in ethical realms. Those who are autistic are high systemizers with low empathy (ability to put yoursefl in another’s shoes). Much of what we know about Jeremy Bentham, the other famous Utilitarian, indicates he’d likely be diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome today. Even Mill apparently despised Bentham. Kant, the leading Deontologist, also seems to be close to the “autism zone”. Both utilitarianism and Kant’s categorical imperative lack empathy and isolate one receptor above all others, excluding the others.

Haidt sought “links between virtues and well-established evolutionary theories.” He borrowed “modularity” from Sperber and Hirschfield. They are like switches in our brains, fight or flight for instance. I wasn’t enamored with his attempts to tie all this into evolution, so I’ll his Moral Foundations Theory (see chart above). He will add a sixth later but we can see the main switches in our minds that influence our ethical and moral views.

In the next chapter he sets out to apply Moral Foundations Theory to politics, showing that these foundations are used differently to support different moral matricies. He begins with homo economicus, or economic man. This means we make our choices based on self-interest. But his studies disproved self-interest. There were somethings people wouldn’t do no matter how much money you offered them.

Innate knowledge is not quite hard-wired. It is built in, but malleable. Our experiences shape how we express innate knowledge.

Compassion is the emotion linked to the care/harm foundation. Cuteness is tied to our care/harm foundation. You don’t want to hurt something cute, but an ugly bug … step on it. Media uses the care/harm foundation to shift people’s minds on moral issues. They want to trigger it, and so do many retailers in their ads. This is the point: “to get your vote, your money, or your times, they must activate at least one of your moral foundations.” He views bumper stickers are tribal badges: declaring who you are and your moral matrix. He argues that the moral matrix of liberals (remember, he is one!) rests more heavily on this modularity than others.

This doesn’t mean that conservatives don’t have compassion, they just express it differently (and for different causes). In keeping with loyalty, their compassion tends to stay home first. Not exclusively, but primarily. This is why they want to limit foreign aid so we can address issues here at home first. They also express it as individuals rather than seeking “compulsory compassion” through the government (aka taxes). So, liberals generally seek compassion through government while conservatives express compassion personally (studies indicate that conservatives are more generous to causes).

Fairness/cheating is about justice. “On the left, concerns about equality and social justice are based in part on the Fairness foundation”. The key there is equality. On the right, fairness is expressed proportionally: “people should be rewarded in proportion to what they contribute, even if that guarantees unequal outcomes.” So liberals tend to press for “equal outcomes” such as concern about income inequality and the wealth tax and limitations. Conservatives tend to press for “equal opportunity” which means each person can succeed or fail. Both want justice but see it differently.

In looking for a new-to-me car, I went to test a car with a great price. I liked the car but apparently that was the price “if”: if you had a trade in, and used them for financing. There was no such fine print in the Car Gurus information. My fairness switch was triggered. It was still a very good deal, but not the deal I came in expecting. I’m still on the horns of this, for me, ethical dilemma.

Loyalty/Betrayal addresses our communal life. Leaders arise in each group by consensus, even if unspoken. In the sitcom Community, Jeff Winger is the unspoken leader who naturally arose in the study group. People deferred to and followed him. He decided who was in or out. Until his role was challenged, then it all became more explicit as the rival was “put in their place” for his betrayal of the authority, and the tribe. Loyalty matters to people. Women focus on loyalty to persons. Men tend to focus on groups (teams or coalitions). We like team players, and punish the selfish. Those perceived as disloyal are ostracized. Swing votes, more moderate in their views, as criticized. They are the Blue Dog Democrats (aka Reagan Democrats), RINOs (Republican in name only) and the PCA’s “squishy middle”. Dante consigns the traitors to the innermost circle of hell. (One thing that Haidt does that annoys me, beginning in this section is using the term ‘universalism’ instead of ‘globalism’. I hear the former used in religious circles about salvation, and the latter in political circles. Many Liberals/Moderates I knew lamented the end of the “globalist dream” after the 2016 election.)

Authority/Subversion addresses the respect, or lack thereof, shown to parents, teachers and others in authority. This reflects the reality of the hierarchical impulse. Someone needs to be in charge. In some languages this is encoded through the use of the polite form. It is also reflected in the use or abandonment of titles. He spends time talking about the alpha male, and all I can think about is Negan. But we should remember that they “take on responsibility for maintaining order and justice.”

Haidt used to hold to the common liberal belief that “hierarchy = power = exploitation = evil.” He admits he was wrong and delves into “Authority Ranking”, asymmetric positions in hierarchy. There are people above you and below you. This modularity shapes how we respond to both. The political right builds on loyalty more often than the political left does. It is the party of law and order.

Sanctity/Degradation builds on divinity cluster. Those who are materialists tend to dismiss degradation in favor of autonomy. It’s just a body, after all. Others have a greater sense of disgust that is “irrational”. I was updating my license the other day and the organ donor question came up. I hate that question. I want to be philanthropic, but something about organ donation creeps me out (Frankenstein movies???). Perhaps it is that my body remains united to Christ even in death. I find I can’t overcome that hump. Many people have a strong sense of sanctity/degradation which drives moral choices. Conservatives are more likely to speak of the sanctity of life or marriage. This modularity means more to them. But it also shows up among environmentalists worried a bout degrading the environment.

“Kass argued that our feelings of disgust can sometimes provide us with a valuable warning that we are going too far, even when we are morally dumbfounded and can’t justify those feelings by pointing to victims…”

The Conservative Advantage

I’ve been going long so I’ll try to keep this last section short. As a liberal, Haidt believes that conservatives have an advantage. That advantage is that they utilize a greater number of moral modularities in their messages. Liberal politicians tend to focus on two: Care/Harm and Fairness/Injustice. Haidt notes how he’d criticize Kerry’s speeches in the 2004 election. Kerry’s slogans (“American Can Do Better” and “Help is on the way”) remind me of Biden’s “A Better America”. They really don’t connect with moral foundations. Haidt spoke to Charlottesville Democrats about how Republicans understand moral psychology much better than Democrats. Democrats, he argues, appeal to the rider while Republicans appeal to the elephant.

“Republicans don’t just aim to cause fear, as some Democrats charge.” Plenty of Democrats aim to cause fear too.

Republicans trigger a wider range of moral intuitions. Haidt devised a study to prove his theory. The study showed that while Care and Fairness were moderately high across the political spectrum, they were highest among liberals. The other three increased the farther right you went. Liberals largely reject loyalty, authority and sanctity foundations. This was not simply a U.S. phenomenon. Haidt notes that so much of the research seems to want to find out what is “wrong” with conservatives (being done by liberals). Haidt doesn’t seem to think this is the right approach (normalizing my view and disparaging theirs aka partisanship and demonization).

He notes that at first Obama showed great dexterity in triggering moral intuitions. But then he began to follow the familiar path of addressing Care and Fairness primarily (appealing to the base?). He still got elected twice, however. But you understand the criticism from the right for his globalism as disloyalty to our nation.

Liberals tend to gravitate toward John Stuart Mills’ position (which assumes people are basically good, which isn’t a good assumption to make). Conservatives tend to gravitate toward Emile Durkheimian society that values self-control, duty and loyalty to one’s own group. This explains Obama’s “God and guns” complaint about the heartland. Democrats focus on the pluribus (many), and Republicans the unum (one).

What I Missed

Haidt realized that he missed something. He got some strong responses to his Moral Foundations Theory which didn’t fully fit into it. There was another moral foundation: liberty/oppression. Alphas need to know their limits or oppressed subjects eventually rise up. Liberty operates in a tension with authority. Authority must exist, but not oppress. The Federalists saw authority as protecting liberty. I can see this, but see liberty and safety being in tension. You sacrifice one to get the other (this is the theme of the second and third Captain America movies).

“Liberals sometimes go beyond equality of rights to pursue equality of outcomes, which cannot be obtained in a capitalist system. This may be why the left usually favors higher taxes on the rich, high levels of services provided to the poor, and sometimes a guaranteed minimum income for everyone.”

He argues that in America, conservatives focus on liberty rather than equality. They want a limited government that treats people equally instead of one that tries to control outcomes. So, his Moral Foundations Theory now has (at least) 6 foundations for the world’s numerous moral matrices. Conservatives have the advantage because they address 6 foundations while liberals focus on 3.

And so we’re done with the second section of the book.

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Considering Recovering From Biblical Manhood & Womanhood, Part 8

Recovering the Responsibility of Every Believer is the final section of Recovering From Biblical Manhood and Womanhood. Byrd has been addressing what is wrong, and why it is wrong. Now are her attempts to move the church forward. The first chapter asks the question: Is This the Way It Was Supposed to Be?

Byrd begins with wanting you to put yourself in Martha’s shoes with Jesus coming over for dinner. That Jesus was coming to their home was remarkable in itself. On the streets rabbis and women wouldn’t speak. Mishnah, Aboth 1:5 says: “The wise men say: ‘Who speaks much with a woman draws down misfortune on himself, neglects the words of the law, and finally earns hell.” In other words, not only was it not worth their time, but was seen as a detriment and to be avoided. Women were not part of theological conversations, or political ones.

Having Jesus over violated some of the cultural boundaries that had been established. Jesus didn’t seem to be bound by cultural boundaries; recognizing them for what they were, and were not. While there were no women Apostles, there were women contributing to his ministry and traveling with them at times. But for as bold as Martha was in inviting him over, she kept to the kitchen when Jesus came over. But Mary didn’t. This in a culture when there was opposition to teaching a woman Torah. Some rabbis would teach women enough Torah to know their place, but not all of the Torah. Jesus, on the other hand, told Martha that Mary had chosen the one thing necessary. It was necessary for her to sit and be taught by Jesus. She was a disciple, not merely an interested bystander. Mary, and Martha, had a vested interest in sitting at the feet of Jesus. Women were welcome!

Jesus’ involvement with women reveals that in His kingdom women mattered. He healed women, talked with them in public, and taught them. He traveled with them, and received support from them. This leads to some difficult questions because some churches seem to keep women are arm’s length or only in certain roles.

“Many churches thus limit, in ways they do not limit for laymen, the capacity for laywomen to learn deeply and to teach. … Are the laywomen disciples in your church serving in the same capacity as the laymen?”

Notice what she is saying there. She is talking about laypeople, as distinct from officers. Are men and women able to do the same things in your congregation, or have you decided somethings are for men and some for women?

She returns to the idea of the ezer and the necessary ally. Adam cannot fulfill his mission without Eve, and not just the baby-making part. Women exist for more than bearing and raising children. Since they are members of the church by grace, just like the men, they should be discipled as necessary allies. They are not to be considered “optional, subordinate assistants.” Byrd tries to balance the reality of church offices and the priesthood of believers who get their hands dirty with the work of ministry.

Paul recognized a number of women for their work in the early church. In addition to Phoebe we find Prisca, Chloe, Nympha, Apphia, Lydia, and Junia. This is in addition to the Marys recognized in the Gospels for their role in the earthly ministry of Jesus. Many of them hosted church meetings (I’m not convinced that means leading the church, as Byrd says about Lydia).

We also see that often women were among the first people Paul recognized in his letters. The custom of the day was ordering reflected the status or influence of the individuals. You put the more important people first.

Do we value women like that in our churches? Do we trust women like that in our churches?

The Silence of Women?

1 Corinthians 11-14 give us a glimpse of worship in the early church. What it says about women is important, and part of how Christians today view the participation of women in church life, and the worship service. At the heart of this is 1 Corinthians 14:34 which some people take as absolute and the final and only word on this subject.

As in all the churches of the saints, ³⁴ the women should keep silent in the churches. For they are not permitted to speak, but should be in submission, as the Law also says.

This is universal, as indicated by “in all the churches”. But this passage is part of a larger context. That seems to be ignored by many who minimize the role of women in church and worship. Why do I say that? Well, because in 1 Corinthians 11 Paul talks about women prophesying and praying in the corporate worship service. Is this a conflict or contradiction? Not if we understand them in context.

Some argue that in 1 Corinthians 11 Paul is being ironic, and that if they were to pray and prophesy they should wear a head covering. But they don’t actually (the argument goes), as we see in 1 Corinthians 14. If he’d written that they were to be silent before saying they pray and prophesy, I could maybe understand this. Because of this strange way of looking at 1 Corinthians 11-14, Byrd talks about those places in many towns called Spook Hill when it feels like the car is rolling uphill. I lived near one in central FL. Things get “spooky” when we talk about these texts. “The landscape can be deceiving.”

The issue has to be resolved by examining the context of 1 Corinthians 14:34 which is the evaluation of the prophecies. Byrd follows an number of people including the other Keller, Kathy, as well as Stephen Um (a PCA pastor) and Ben Witherington in seeing the silence limited to the judging of the prophesies which is the exercise of authority (in keeping with 1 Tim. 2:12). They were not exercising teaching authority. They were not to speak when that was happening. But they could pray and prophesy while wearing the sign of authority. This implies that whatever the prophecy was, it was not authoritative and needed to be examined by the elders to see if it was consistent with the Scripture and teaching they had.

As Christians all contribute to the worship service (not just the men), they are to act in love (1 Cor. 13 is the hub of all this). Every Christian gets spiritual gifts, having been baptized by the Spirit (1 Cor. 12) and they are not distributed by sex. Don’t confuse gifts with office. All Christians were encourage to sing, to pray, to prophesy or speak in tongues (assuming there was an interpreter). When it came time for the prophecies to be judged, the women were to be silent. The silence was tied to a particular time in the service for the exercise of authority.

“Upholding the proper order of worship, respecting the officers of the church, and refraining from noninspired speech that disrupts worship all fall short under the command all fall under the command of the Lord to love- the very thing Christians should be known for. And these are lasting principles for the church today.”

Consequences for Worshiping Together

The church is the household of God. We should treat fellow members with affection and respect. That they did this was misinterpreted by many critics of the church. The early church was accused of incest, among other things. The imaginations of unbelievers had run wild. But instead of following the cultural practices of their culture, the Christians treated each other as brother and sister, with a pure affection for one another rather than avoidance or keeping a proper social distance.

This was a function of their identity in Christ, in whom there is neither male nor female. They are equal in His eyes, and equally sons and heirs of salvation. None are second class citizens. The shared a heavenly citizenship that shaped their social interactions. This is what led to some of the persecution they experienced.

Peel and Reveal

Byrd returns to the question of what men and women can do in a worship service. “Have we properly retrieved what the early church has passed down?” She wonders if there is something particularly masculine about collecting the offering. You might say that’s for the deacons, and in the PCA you’d be wrong. It is their responsibility to plan and organize it, but they don’t have to execute it (BCO 9-2). Women can technically be asked to help with it. We sometimes use unordained men to help if there aren’t enough deacons. We could, theoretically, as laywomen to help too. Then again, maybe they don’t want to be bothered.

Remember, Paul encouraged full member participation in most of the worship service. Whether or not our worship services reflect this matters in terms of how we are seen by the world. In the early church the participation of women was seen as scandalous by the world. Today the lack of participation of women in some churches is seen as scandalous by the world.

“Whatever our stance is on ordination, these are the questions we should be asking. And yet for some reason, even when we discuss the contributions of laypeople, the church is still stuck on this problem of women and where to draw the line. As one article published in CBMW News put it, “But What Should Women Do in the Church?”

This article by Grudem is mis-titled, in my opinion. “Should” isn’t the same as “can”, and this should be about what they “can” do. Grudem proceeds to list 83 different types of service in the church and evaluate them with guidance from the Danvers Statement. His personal lines are even stricter (at that time anyway). He discusses hierarchies of authority and influence. In this view, women shouldn’t have authority or influence over men. How exactly should a woman ask a men to set up a table for a pot lock, I wonder. Must she go to her husband and ask her to tell the man to put in a particular place? Is that actually authority? Does the man have to do it or face church discipline?

“We would define authority in general as the right and power and responsibility to give directions to another.” Piper and Grudem

In this way they separate laymen from laywomen ontologically and allow laymen to exercise authority in the church but not women except over kids, and maybe other women. This would all imply that no one is under the authority of the Session and being asked by them to fulfill that task or function. Any authority is delegated authority or responsibility. My wife has plenty of delegated authority at home.

Peeling Back Yellow Fractions

Byrd argues that these lists of hierarchy fall into a similar error as the egalitarians. These lines can be quite arbitrary and not reflective of Scripture, just as the egalitarian lines are not reflective of Scripture. The CBMW reveals a fractional complementarianism, broken down by what women can and cannot do. Most of this section is a series of questions. She plays the interrogator instead of providing the answers. She wants us to work through it.

This gets back to how one views women. In 1 Corinthians 11 a wife is her husband’s glory. In terms of creation she came from Adam’s side just as the Church comes from Christ’s wounded side. Together Adam and Eve were to fulfill the creation mandates. There was no division of labor based on gender. In heaven there will be no such division of labor either.

“Now let’s return to CBMW’s definition of authority … Is authorization (authority?) an ontological right that belongs to a particular sex, a power bestowed on men to always have the say-so in all things? … While church officers have a distinct authorization in teaching and ruling, brothers and sisters who hear the Word of our Groom are authorized as a priesthood under this ministry to testify to Jesus to one another.”

Time for a story. During a pastoral transition I applied for a job with a national insurance company. I was called for a series of interviews in another city. I brought CavWife and we enjoyed some time without the 2 kids. In my first interview I discovered that I had uploaded the wrong resume. I had uploaded the one for church positions which mentioned male headship in home and church. The woman interviewing me wanted to know if I could work for a woman boss. Well, I’ve worked for a number of them in the past (and would in the future as well) and never had an issue submitting to a woman in school or the workplace. If I struggled it was about what they asked me to do, not due to their gender. Women can exercise authority over men, and we need to stop arguing that they can’t. That is NOT biblical manhood and womanhood. That is closer to the oppression of women in the past.

The question we need to be asking is what are only ordained officers allowed to do. The rest would be left open to laypeople at the discretion of the Session (elders). Convictions produce practices, and our practices reveal our convictions.

I’ll give Aimee Byrd the final word today.

“What corresponding strength do your women have to offer? Rather than bury and hide what the Lord has given under an imaginary line on a hierarchical list, how can your church be counter-culturally capable as opposed to some of the accepted teachings of so-called biblical manhood and womanhood in evangelicalism? Why is this necessary?”

 

 

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Considering Recovering From Biblical Manhood & Womanhood, Part 6

Aimee Byrd begins What the Church Is For, the 5th chapter of Recovering from Biblical Manhood & Womanhood, with a story. This is a story that many parents can relate to. She began to bake a pizza for dinner but had to walk her son to the bus stop. So she called her daughter to ask her to remove the pizza when it was done. She was 14, but like Moses by the burning bush she came up with a series of excuses about why she couldn’t. It was just too intimidating for her. She hadn’t done this before. So her friend, whose parents were divorced, took it out.

“I stood there at the bus stop with a terrifying thought. My oldest child might be out of the house and away at college in three-and-a-half years, and she still couldn’t take a pizza out of the oven.”

This reminded Aimee that her job was to prepare her daughter to leave the home, and not be dependent on take out. She tells this as a metaphor for the church. Many churches are filled with perpetual adolescents spiritually. They don’t really know how to read and interpret the Bible. They don’t know how to serve. “The pizza revelation helped me to step back and recalibrate my parenting according to the big picture.” Many churches have forgotten why the exist.

She builds on the work of Scott Swain, whom she has referred to a fair bit throughout the book. One criticism of Byrd’s book is that she relies on egalitarians. While she does use work by some egalitarians, there are also plenty of references to people like Scott Swain who is not egalitarian. This may be shocking, but we can learn things from people who are egalitarian. Byrd expresses her dependence on a variety of people both complementarian and egalitarian in this book.

Earlier she used work from Swain (and Michael Allen) to talk about retrieval from Reformed Catholicity. Here she uses Swain’s work on communication and communion, a distinction she will use throughout the rest of the book. Communication is to “make common” between 2 or more persons. Communion is about “sharing, holding in common.” The first is the action that enables the second to be true. This communication and communion comes to us through Christ. She quotes John Owen here, “We are never more like God than when we love his Son through his Spirit.”

As a part of our salvation, Bryd brings us to the covenant of redemption made between the Father and the Son in eternity. In this she brings in Bavinck, another of those non-egalitarians, to help us understand this covenant. We are a gift from the Father to the Son as a reward for procuring our salvation. He doesn’t simply save us, but we become His Bride. Bavinck argues that without Christ there is no Church, and without the Church there is no Christ. This refers to the economy of redemption. It is not that the Son doesn’t exist, but there is no Messiah without a people to be His bride and body. This became Augustine’s hermeneutical key for the Psalms: Christ head and body (the totus Christus).

Our enjoyment of communion with Father and Son by the Spirit does not await the afterlife. Jesus has been restoring God’s household on earth to prepare it to dwell with Him in eternity. The church, as the household of God, exists to prepare us for the eternal state. “We are to communicate, make common, the gospel of Jesus Christ, so that all whom the Father gave to the Son will commune, share, hold in common, with him.” THIS is what the church is for.

Peel and Reveal

This is a short chapter and she gets to the application quickly. She returns to her opening metaphor. We don’t passively wait to be fed, like birds in a nest (my addition). She sees discipleship as foundational to church life; tasting and seeing that the Lord is good so that we are nurtured and equipped to serve Him. Church officers  are responsible to disciple men and women.

She makes the point that we don’t need new revelation but we still need the proclamation of the revelation we received, the Word. Both men and women need to be addressed by the Word.

Here she shifts to the work of Dr. Valerie Hobbs, a lecturer in applied linguistics. Hobbs’ point is that pastors address men more than they address women in the course of their sermons. They refer to men more (illustrations and application). I can understand her big point- pastors should make sure they make application to women and their general circumstances, as well as use illustrations that involve women. This is something Byrd has written and spoken about before. That is not a criticism, but this is a passion for her and something that pastors still need to work on.

Let’s take this out of the context of men and women for a minute. There are children in the worship service. As a pastor my sermons can’t just address the adults. I need to include some illustrations and stories they can understand, as well as some application to them. I do, but not enough. This is what Byrd is getting at.

She also returns to the “poor condition of women’s ministries”. This is not true of every church, but don’t assume it isn’t true of yours without talking to the women. One result of the neglect of women’s ministry by pastors and sessions is the prevalence of bad theology. Sometimes it is simply superficial, and other times it is dangerous. She’s calling us to exercise greater oversight, not less. She’s calling us to be more involved, not less. She wants there to be more theology in women’s ministry, not less.

Peel and Reveal 2

She has a second major peel and reveal in this chapter. Not only are women’s ministries generally neglected, but women are intended to be equipped for ministry. Women are part of the body being equipped in Ephesians 4. She sees the fruit of this in Romans 16. She points particularly to Phoebe whom Paul commends as a sister and servant (or deacon). Calvin, in his commentary, says she had the office. Some of us reject that notion, likely based on our understanding of the diaconate in our congregations and denominations. We aren’t necessarily looking at sources from the early church to see how the deacons functioned, particularly the role of deaconnesses who assisted deacons in serving the women of the congregation. Phoebe is central to her point here. Most people agree that Phoebe was the one who brought the letter to Rome. This was why Paul wanted them to welcome her. He’s establishing her creditials beyond carrying the letter.

Referring to Michael Bird’s work, Byrd believes Phoebe would also explain the letter to the Romans should they have questions. She delivered it, but did she have “his authority” or personal representative to address any questions as Bird and Byrd theorize? I’m not sure. Perhaps this is a stretch, as I wrote in the margin.

Phoebe was a patron of the church, and likely Paul himself at times. She refers to Philip Payne who indicates this is a position not only of wealth but also authority. We do see that women acted as patrons for Jesus’ ministry, but in that case Jesus was not under their authority, they were under his. Such women in Greco-Roman culture had more freedom than the average woman. A patroness “had liberty to exercise her ideas and interests with society’s blessings.”

Let’s separate speaking and teaching from authority. A patroness could speak and teach. She had influence due to the money provided. None of those is the same as authority. Paul didn’t have to do what Phoebe said. When I taught Sunday School as a layperson, I didn’t have authority.

For her to seemingly press authority here creates an unnecessary obstacle for some in recognizing she was more than a source of money or someone who delivered the letter. What Byrd is getting to is women being co-laborers. Phoebe certainly was that, and she was not the only woman who was a co-laborer for the gospel that Paul and Luke mention.

What Byrd wants us to see when we peel back the yellow wall paper is that lay women have a role in communicating the gospel, and that role isn’t necessarily limited to other women and children. In other words, Titus 2 is not a limitation on the teaching ministry of women but is indicated how those groups should interact with one another so Titus doesn’t feel like it is all on him.

“Therefore, we are to communicate, make common, the gospel of Jesus Christ together, so that all whom the Father gave to the Son will commune, share, hold in common with him.”

The church exists to disciple Christians, including women. Christians are not simply disciples but also disciple others. Woman have a role in discipling other Christians. Clearly they disciple other women and children. Byrd wants us to see that even within the context of qualified male leadership there is a place for lay women to communicate the gospel just like lay men. Not everyone will or can accept this premise. She will get back to it again.

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Considering the Report: Temptation, Sin, and Repentance

Before I begin, I want to commend the use of the Oxford Comma in the PCA Report on Human Sexuality.

As I noted in discussion about the Twelve Statements, I wasn’t exceedingly pleased with the order. I understand some want to just get to the point. My wife reads the end of a novel, and then the rest. If I know the ending I think, “What’s the point?”. I wanted to see the work they went through, at times, to better understand their conclusion.

Some of the issues being discussed in our churches today have to do with understandings of sin and gospel expectations.

They were to examine the differences with Roman Catholic theology on the issue of concupiscence with regard to same-sex attraction. This is the overflow of the Revoice issue. Some of the speakers at Revoice were Catholic. Additionally, some of the debates among pastors centered on the question of when temptation becomes sin. As I noted previously, in those discussion I was thinking of sin as an act or transgression, not as corruption or original sin. But some were speaking of corruption. I suspect there was plenty of talking past one another, and accusing people of having a Roman Catholic view of concupiscence.

What is surprisingly missing here is interaction with Thomas Boston and his Human Nature and its Four-Fold State. Just saying, since he’s not only a personal favorite but also this is a standard work. But this is a personal thing. He notes that both our corruption and regeneration are total in that they affect the whole of us. They do not mean each has been affected completely.

The Report notes the Confessional distinction between the corruption and the active fruit of that corruption. This is part of why I try to maintain this distinction. However, those who speak of our corruption with regard to same-sex attraction seemed not to affirm it with regard to heterosexual lust.

I wish their distinction between original and actual had been more explicit in the Statements.

As a technical theological term, “actual”sin refers not to the reality or non-reality of sin, but to its being an act of the soul as opposed to a disposition or inclination only.

The summer of the original “debates” I preached on a number of these issues in a special series, taking an overtly redemptive historical approach. Internal temptation flows from our corruption. Internal temptation is sin in the sense of corruption. It is a desire, in this case, for something sinful in itself. It becomes an act when we entertain said temptation, not simply when we act on it.

Luther is noted for saying that you can’t stop a bird from landing on your head, but you can stop him from building a nest there. We can’t control that we experience temptation, but we are responsible for what we do with it. That was my point. This is what they are getting at in the Report.

After regeneration we do continue to be corrupt. This is part of the already/not yet. We are already renewed but not yet perfectly renewed. We still have that original sin or corruption from which our sins actual continue to flow. “The fact that the corruption remains highlights that justification is imputed, not infused.” We are simul justus et peccator as Luther also said. The change in regeneration is total, in that affects our whole person, but it is imperfect. They pull a number of chapters in the Confession in this: Of the Fall of Man, Sin and the Punishment Thereof, Of Sanctification, and Of Free Will. We continue to have disordered desires. At times we will and act good things, but not perfectly and exclusively. Our good works are truly good, yet mixed with our corruption. They bring us to Calvin.

“If the true standard of righteousness is to love God with the whole heart, and mind, and strength, it is clear that the heart cannot incline otherwise without declining from righteousness… The law, I say requires perfect love: we do no yield it. Our duty was to run, and we go on slowly limping.”

Those imperfect stumblings in the way are purified by the work of Christ. He accepts our sincere efforts despite their many weaknesses and imperfections.

They lay plenty of groundwork for our view before getting to the Roman Catholic view and the application to the current issues. They bring us to the Council of Trent. This affirmed there was an incentive to sin, concupiscence, but it was not properly considered sin unless you consented to it. The Report summarizes “the Council says that concupiscence is a result of sin and inclines to sin, but is not sin itself.” They anathemtize us and the Reformers. There seems to be an acknowledgment that the Bible calls it sin, but the Church doesn’t. So we return to one of the main emphases of the Reformation: the nature of authority. Their tradition was not in accordance with the Scriptures and they were okay with that. The Reformers weren’t, and should not have been. When our “tradition” departs from the Scriptures we should submit to the Scriptures. Sin, in Reformed Theology, is always connected to the Law of God.

Rome has a fundamentally flawed view of sin, and as a result salvation. Baptismal regeneration essentially removes corruption in their view. It accomplishes what Pelagius did with original sin. Sin becomes limited to transgression, act/actual in their view. Some of the main speakers at Revoice expressed this and similar views.

There is a danger shift in this away from the imputed righteousness of Christ toward a confidence in our own righteousness. This is why justification follows sanctification in their views. Christ only justifies the sanctified rather than sanctifying the justified. But if sin has been ontologically removed via baptism, then temptation itself has no connection to sin.

“The Reformers, however, stressed the importance of recognizing the ongoing presence of sinful concupiscence in the Christian precisely because it highlighted that the righteousness given is only and completely an imputation of that which is Christ’s.”

The Reformed view rests on the authority of Scripture, not the (ever-changing) authority of the Church. The Reformed view recognizes are on-going need for pardoning, purifying and empowering grace.

The Report than brings us to the “Common Dynamic of Concupiscence.” This is not just about same-sex attraction. It “is not unique to those who experience homosexual desire. All people experience it.” This cannot be downplayed. We all have spontaneous thoughts, of all kinds, that flow out of our corrupt nature. They are sin original and lack conformity to the law of God. The Report rightly warns us about thinking homosexual desire as qualitatively different from our disordered desires. “Or worse, some may be willing to assert the sinfulness of one category of spontaneous desire but minimize or remain largely ignorant of the sinful concupiscence that is common to all.” This doesn’t make homosexuality “less sinful” but reminds us of the actual sinfulness of our own disordered desires. “Good Reformed teaching on sin places us all on equal footing in our need of Christ’s imputed righteousness.” It seemed to me that some forgot that very important point.

Because of continued corruption we should not be surprised if homosexual attraction continues after conversion. Yet, some seem to think it should cease. Careful study of our continuing corruption should lead us to not promise removal such desires even as we encourage on-going sanctification. In this context they address “reparative therapy”. If there is a promise of such freedom, and a corresponding demand for such freedom then “that demand is an anti-gospel that only crushes and condemns- especially if the admonitions are applied selectively to this form of concupiscence but not to other common varieties, both sexual and other.”

I’ve interacted with people who have such a view of repentance that the Report warns against. If only people truly repented they would not experience homosexual desire, it is said. I guess many of us haven’t truly repented of all our sins if we commit them again. This is truly a perversion of the doctrine of repentance. As a result, all such claims or demands must be rejected and resisted. Not by a liberal or anti-confessional basis but precisely on a Confessional and Scriptural basis.

Does this mean we are being soft on same-sex attraction? Are we pandering to their sin? No. The Report then addresses real change. Regeneration is total, affecting the whole person, Boston notes. Sanctification is total as well. There should be progress as the Spirit sanctified the “whole man.” The person experiencing homosexual attraction needs to put it to death. They should seek real change “even if that change is incomplete and mixed.” Strides made are real even if imperfect.

This means we should “Celebrate Sincere Efforts.” While all gospel-change is “incomplete and mixed with corruption” it is still gospel-change. Christ is transforming them even if it is the putting to death of temptation one time this week. We celebrate, not the attraction, but our baby steps in sanctification.

This continues in establishing a moral difference between corruption and transgression. The initial desire/temptation is different morally than the desire or temptation that is turned over in our mind, and then to act on it. In this they use the language of WLC 151.

“The point here is not to encourage those with homosexual attraction to become comfortable with or accepting of it. Rather, it is to counter the undue heaping of shame upon them as if the presence of homosexual attraction itself makes them the most heinous of sinners.”

This has been one of my concerns, the reality of shame. They way some of us speak about homosexuality we just heap shame on people. No wonder they don’t want to talk to some of us about their same-sex attractions. This was my concern when focusing on their corruption but ignoring our own. The idea of repent of their orientation isn’t applied to other people’s sinful inclinations in the same way. We place improper shame on them: not the shame of being a sinner but of being a different & worse sinner than the rest of us.

Despite the fact they didn’t bring Boston into the discussion, there are a number of excellent points made in application of the doctrine we have in common. There are good correctives and clarifications so perhaps we can have more fruitful discourse in the future.

Addendum:

Of course after writing this, I read the chapter in Maturity by Sinclair Ferguson on Overcoming Temptation.

“In biblical teaching temptation as such is not sin.”

He also notes that “the distinction between temptation and sin is vital theologically and also pastorally.” He’s getting at that moral difference between them. As a “student” of John Owen’s, he’s not ignoring our corruption (he addresses that on the very next page) but focusing on sin as transgression in those statements. There is plenty here to apply pastorally. And Ferguson does just that. “We are conflicted. Christ dwells in us, yet sin remains.”

He’s writing for the tender-hearted, like I can be, who can be filled with guilt and shame over the existence of temptation in our lives. He offers a general rule of thumb to help such people.

“A rule of thumb that will be helpful if we are prone to confuse being tempted with actually sinning is this: Ask yourself: ‘Do I want this temptation? Do I want what it solicits me to do or have? Or is it distasteful to me?‘”

This is helpful, I believe, for those Christians tempted by homosexual attraction. Many don’t want those temptations that they experience. They wish it were different. They don’t yield to it, but due to indwelling sin still experience it.

“… sensitive Christians must learn not to listen to Satan’s sinister suggestions that by being tempted they have already sinned and are thereby condemned.”

He develops the doctrine of concurrence in this chapter looking at David’s sins in the affair with Bathsheba, as well as Job. This is not simply external temptation, but how Satan piles on when these desires arise from indwelling sin.

Ferguson also quotes the main passage from Owen that defines what he means by “entering into temptation.” This is a sentenced I missed while re-reading Owen for my sermon on the subject in 2018.

” Whilst it knocks at the door we are at liberty; but when any temptation comes in and parleys with the heart, reasons with the mind, entices and allures the affections, be it a longer or shorter time, do it thus insensibly and imperceptibly, or do the soul take notice of it, we ‘enter into temptation’.” (Owen, Works, VI, 97)

Ferguson develops this process from temptation to sin in the life of David, and applies it to us in what I find a helpful way. All in all, it is a very helpful chapter in his book regardless of the nature of our temptations. I heartily recommend it. I heartily recommend Ferguson’s books because I find him to have a pastor’s heart, not simply a theologian’s mind. I continually praise God for his ministry to my life and the model of doing theology in his writings.

 

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Considering the Overture on Deacons, Part 2

We previously looked at the rationale for the overture from Metro NY Presbytery to amend the Book of Church Order to permit local sessions to determine if their congregation may have women deacons.

The underlying disagreements center on ordination and authority. Those opposed to women deacons regularly cite these issues. First that ordination is only for men. I’m not sure I buy into this presupposition. It is an argument of “good and necessary consequence” and therefore you have to make sure the initial statements are true. Which comes first, the chicken or the egg? Do  we see that only men may fulfill the offices in view and therefore only men can be ordained? Or do we see that ordination is limited to men and therefore only men can fulfill the offices?

If we look at the messianic offices of prophet, priest and king I think we have the picture of ordination or appointment to office. Priest and king were, in fact, limited to men. There was a queen mother who usurped the throne after the death of her son the king. But she was an illegitimate authority who would finally be overthrown and executed.

But we see women prophets operating in Israel as well as the NT church. One of them, Deborah, also functioned as a judge since Barak was cowardly. As prophets, however, we see one of the messianic offices filled by women (even in a vibrant NT assembly) even though no books of the Bible were written by them. On this basis, I’m not so convinced that ordination is limited to men. We need to think a bit more deeply about ordination.

R.C. Sproul in his older audio series on the Westminster Confession of Faith said that he generally believed in women deacons. Based on the authority granted to deacons in the PCA, however, he stated that there should not be women deacons in the denomination to which he belonged.

This issue of authority is one that is not really settled in the PCA. From the PCA Report on Diaconal Ministries we read:

E. The Authority of the Diaconate.
The BCO gives specific direction regarding the authority level of the diaconate and its relationship to the session of the church.[35] The specific wording is open to interpretation; however, as to the extent to which the deacons, both in authority level and practical function, are to be directed by the session and how much they are to function in a separate sphere close to the level of the session but nevertheless ultimately subordinate to it. The range of viewpoints on this issue is made clear in the following statements.

Coppes (OPC) defines a role of direct subservience of the diaconate to the session: “We conclude, therefore, that the deacons are assistants to the elders. The deacons are part of the ruling office in the New Testament, a subordinate and yet ‘separate office raised up by our Lord.’ “[36] Furthermore, “To them (New Testament Church) a deacon , although an officer in the church, was a servant to the elders. He was not someone who functioned on a par with the elders.”[37] Lee (PCA) reflects a perspective almost at the opposite extreme: “Toward the session, the diaconate is subordinate in ultimate government control but coordinate in ultimate importance… The work of the diaconate is just as important as is the work of the session. The diaconate is ‘sovereign in its own sphere’ of ministering mercy–even over against the session.”[38]

Coppes also addresses the relationship of women to the diaconate. “Women were used (in the church) probably in an auxiliary capacity to the deacons. They were not ordained, but there were stringent requirements to be met before they could be so employed.”[39]

While they may possess authority, as a Body they are under the authority of the Session. I see this as similar to a wife who has authority over children and any servants or contractors employed by the family, even as she is under the authority of her husband. She’s granted authority to discharge or implement the actions approved by her husband. The diaconate is not free to whatever they want, but are to operate under the direction of the Session. I’m not sure the diaconate can decide to help a person or family that the Session says they should not. While the diaconate prepares the budget, it is approved by the Session for the diaconate and treasurer to implement. We don’t want two bodies tearing the Body apart.

We also see that Coppes notes that women were not ordained as deacons, but served to support them. Perhaps, as I noted in the earlier post, this is the solution to our conundrum: shifting from assistants to the deacons to deaconnesses who serve the women of the church under the authority of the deacons. In this way, the widows and single., poor women are not taken advantage of by particular deacons, or form overly intimate mutual relationships (we see this type of protection advocated, I believe in Titus 2 and 1 Timothy 5).

These questions need to be  addressed in the Overture, or they will continue to sabotage discussions. Controversy will be stirred up and no resolution found.

Let’s look at the changes to BCO 5, 7, 9 17,  24 and 25 (a whole new chapter). They forgot to mention 5-9 in the initial therefore even though it appears as the first two emendations.

 

• THEREFORE, be it resolved to amend BCO 7-2, 9-3, 17-3, chapter 24, and add a chapter 25 in order to allow local sessions to decide whether women are allowed to serve as deacons [Proposed deletions are shown below by strikethrough, and additions are underlined]:
  • 5-9.c. When the temporary government determines that among the members of the mission congregation there are men who appear qualified as officers Elders, the nomination process shall begin and the election conclude following the procedures of BCO 24 so far as they may be applicable.
  • 5-9.i (1) The organizing commission shall ordain and/or install ruling elders and/or deacons according to the provisions of BCO 24-6, and/or install deacons according to the provisions of BCO 25-6 so far as they may be applicable.
  • 7-2. The ordinary and perpetual classes of office in the Church are elders and deacons. Within the class of elder are the two orders of teaching elders and ruling elders. The elders jointly have the government and spiritual oversight of the Church, including teaching. Only those elders who are specially gifted, called and trained by God to preach may serve as teaching elders. The office of deacon is not one of rule, but rather of service both to the physical and spiritual needs of the people. In accord with Scripture, these offices are open to men only the office of elder is open to men only.
  • 9-3. To the office of deacon, which is spiritual in nature, shall be chosen men members of spiritual character, honest repute, exemplary lives, brotherly spirit, warm sympathies, and sound judgment.
  • 17-3. As every ecclesiastical office, according to the Scriptures, is a special charge, no man member shall be ordained unless it be to the performance of a definite work.

Cav Commentary: Many of the changes are shifting from the general language of officers to the specific language of elders. What is currently being said about church officers is now being largely directed to or limited to elders in these paragraphs.

In a quick read 5-9 it seems to be indicating that we would no longer ordain deacons. This would be an important move. It would take some of the obstacles away. One of the big impediments is “ordaining women”. The language of ordination is a deal-killer for some people. No longer ordaining deacons change at least some of the geography upon which this debate takes place.

This interpretation is rendered null and void by 17-3 however. It extends ordination to members, not simply men. 7-2 still treats deacon as an office in the church. The office of elder is open only to men, but the office of deacon is open to members. But said offices are apparently ordained.

5-9i was not as clear as it could and should be. A more thorough reading indicates that the earlier mentioning of ordain is to be understood as also pertaining to deacons due to the “and/or”. All that changes is the chapter of the BCO in which we find the provisions for ordination of deacons. Ordination is a loaded term in the PCA, and while this is used of all deacons, I don’t see this or any overture passing. But let’s move on to BCO 24.

CHAPTER 24

Election, Ordination and Installation of Ruling Elders and Deacons

Election

24-1.       Every church shall elect persons to the offices of ruling elder and deacon in the following manner: At such times as determined by the Session, communicant members of the congregation may submit names to the Session, keeping in mind that each prospective officer should be an active male member who meets the qualifications set forth in 1 Timothy 3 and Titus 1.  After the close of the nomination period nominees for the office of ruling elder and/or deacon shall receive instruction in the qualifications and work of the office. Each nominee shall then be examined in:

1. his Christian experience, especially his personal character and family management (based on the qualifications set out in 1 Timothy 3:1-7 and Titus 1:6-9),
2. his knowledge of Bible content,
3. his knowledge of the system of doctrine, government, discipline contained in the Constitution of the Presbyterian Church in America (BCO Preface III, The Constitution Defined),
4. the duties of the office to which he has been nominated, and
5. his willingness to give assent to the questions required for ordination. (BCO 24-6)

If there are candidates eligible for the election, the Session shall report to the congregation those eligible, giving at least thirty (30) days prior notice of the time and place of a congregational meeting for elections.

If one-fourth (1/4) of the persons entitled to vote shall at any time request the Session to call a congregational meeting for the purpose of electing additional officers, it shall be the duty of the Session to call such a meeting on the above procedure. The number of officers to be elected shall be determined by the congregation after hearing the Session’s recommendation.

24-2.       The pastor is, by virtue of his office, moderator of congregational meetings. If there is no pastor, the Session shall appoint one of their number to call the meeting to order and to preside until the congregation shall elect their presiding officer, who may be a minister or ruling elder of the Presbyterian Church in America or any male member of that particular church.

24-3.       All communing members in good and regular standing, but no others, are entitled to vote in the election of church officers in the churches to which they respectively belong. A majority vote of those present is required for election.

24-4.       The voters being convened, the moderator shall explain the purpose of the meeting and then put the question:

Are you now ready to proceed to the election of additional ruling elders (or deacons) from the slate presented?

If they declare themselves ready, the election may proceed by private ballot without nomination. In every case a majority of all the voters present shall be required to elect.

24-5.       On the election of a ruling elder or deacon, if it appears that a large minority of the voters are averse to a candidate, and cannot be induced to concur in the choice, the moderator shall endeavor to dissuade the majority from prosecuting it further; but if the electors are nearly or quite unanimous, or if the majority insist upon their right to choose their officers, the election shall stand.

Ordination and Installation

24-6.       The day having arrived, and the Session being convened in the presence of the congregation, a sermon shall be preached after which the presiding minister shall state in a concise manner the warrant and nature of the office of ruling elder, or deacon, together with the character proper to be sustained and the duties to be fulfilled. Having done this, he shall propose to the candidate, in the presence of the church, the following questions, namely:

1. Do you believe the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments, as originally given, to be the inerrant Word of God, the only infallible rule of faith and practice?
2. Do you sincerely receive and adopt the Confession of Faith and the Catechisms of this Church, as containing the system of doctrine taught in the Holy Scriptures; and do you further promise that if at any time you find yourself out of accord with any of the fundamentals of this system of doctrine, you will, on your own initiative, make known to your Session the change which has taken place in your views since the assumption of this ordination vow?
3. Do you approve of the form of government and discipline of the Presbyterian Church in America, in conformity with the general principles of biblical polity?
4. Do you accept the office of ruling elder (or deacon, as the case may be) in this church, and promise faithfully to perform all the duties thereof, and to endeavor by the grace of God to adorn the profession of the Gospel in your life, and to set a worthy example before the Church of which God has made you an officer?
5. Do you promise subjection to the Session?
6. Do you promise to strive for the purity, peace, unity and edification of the Church?

The ruling elder or deacon elect having answered in the affirmative, the minister shall address to the members of the church the following question:

Do you, the members of this church, acknowledge and receive this brother as a ruling elder (or deacon), and do you promise to yield him all that honor, encouragement and obedience in the Lord to which his office, according to the Word of God and the Constitution of this Church, entitles him?

The members of the church having answered this question in the affirmative, by holding up their right hands, the candidate shall then be set apart, with prayer by the minister or any other Session member and the laying on of the hands of the Session, to the office of ruling elder (or deacon). Prayer being ended, the members of the Session (and the deacons, if the case be that of a deacon) shall take the newly ordained officer by the hand, saying in words to this effect:

We give you the right hand of fellowship, to take part in this office with us.

The minister shall then say:

I now pronounce and declare that ____________________ has been regularly elected, ordained and installed a ruling elder (or deacon) in this church, agreeable to the Word of God, and according to the Constitution of the Presbyterian Church in America; and that as such he is entitled to all encouragement, honor and obedience in the Lord: In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

After which the minister or any other member of the Session shall give to the ruling elder (or deacon) and to the church an exhortation suited to the occasion.

24-7.       Ordination to the offices of ruling elder or deacon is perpetual; nor can such offices be laid aside at pleasure; nor can any person be degraded from either the office but by deposition after regular trial; yet a ruling elder or deacon may have reasons which he deems valid for being released from the active duties of his office. In such a case the Session, after conference with him and careful consideration of the matter, may, if it thinks proper, accept his resignation and dissolve the official relationship which exists between him and the church.

The ruling elder or deacon, though chargeable with neither heresy nor immorality, may become unacceptable in his official capacity to a majority of the church which he serves. In such a case the church may take the initiative by a majority vote at a regularly called congregational meeting, and request the Session to dissolve the official relationship between the church and the officer without censure. The Session, after conference with the ruling elder or deacon, and after careful consideration, may use its discretion as to dissolving the official relationship. In either case the Session shall report its action to the congregation. If the Session fails or refuses to report to the congregation within sixty (60) days from the date of the congregational meeting or if the Session reports to the congregation that it declined to dissolve such relationship, then any member or members in good standing may file a complaint against the Session in accordance with the provisions of BCO 43.

24-8.       When a ruling elder or deacon who has been released from his official relation is again elected to his office in the same or another church, he shall be installed after the above form with the omission of ordination.

24-9.       When a ruling elder or deacon cannot or does not for a period of one year perform the duties of his office, his official relationship shall be dissolved by the Session and the action reported to the congregation.

24-10.    When a deacon or ruling elder by reason of age or infirmity desires to be released from the active duties of the office, he may at his request and with the approval of the Session be designated deacon or elder emeritus. When so designated, he is no longer required to perform the regular duties of his office, but may continue to perform certain of these duties on a voluntary basis, if requested by the Session or a higher court. He may attend Diaconate or Session meetings, if he so desires, and may participate fully in the discussion of any issues, but may not vote.

Editorial Comment:  The General Assembly explicitly provided that those Elders and Deacons granted emeritus status prior to June 22, 1984, retain the privilege of vote. (By order of the Fifteenth General Assembly 15-83,III, 31).

Cav Commentary: Essentially all this does is scrub deacons from the chapter. It now only pertains to the elder. This is to maintain, however, the masculine language of the material pertaining to elders. This is because Scripture permits only men to serve as elders as is clear from 1 Tim. 2-3 and Titus 1. They necessarily teach and exercise authority. As a Session they evaluate the doctrine and exercise church discipline.

CHAPTER 25

Election, Ordination and Installation of Deacons

Election

25-1.       Every church shall elect persons to the offices of deacon in the following manner: At such times as determined by the Session, communicant members of the congregation may submit names to the Session, keeping in mind that each prospective officer should be an active member who meets the qualifications set forth in 1 Timothy 3. While the Church shall not neglect the raising up of qualified men to serve in this position, particular sessions may determine whether women can serve as deacons in their own particular congregation. After the close of the nomination period nominees for the office of deacon shall receive instruction in the qualifications and work of the office. Each nominee shall then be examined in:

1. His/Her Christian experience, especially their personal character and family management (based on the qualifications set out in 1 Timothy 3:8-13)
2. His/Her knowledge of Bible content,
3. His/Her knowledge of the system of doctrine, government, discipline contained in the Constitution of the Presbyterian Church in America (BCO Preface III, The Constitution Defined),
4. the duties of the office to which he/she has been nominated, and
5. His/Her willingness to give assent to the questions required for ordination. (BCO 24-6)

If there are candidates eligible for the election, the Session shall report to the congregation those eligible, giving at least thirty (30) days prior notice of the time and place of a congregational meeting for elections.

If one-fourth (1/4) of the persons entitled to vote shall at any time request the Session to call a congregational meeting for the purpose of electing additional officers, it shall be the duty of the Session to call such a meeting on the above procedure. The number of officers to be elected shall be determined by the congregation after hearing the Session’s recommendation.

25-2.       The pastor is, by virtue of his office, moderator of congregational meetings. If there is no pastor, the Session shall appoint one of their number to call the meeting to order and to preside until the congregation shall elect their presiding officer, who may be a minister or ruling elder of the Presbyterian Church in America or any male member of that particular church.

25-3.       All communing members in good and regular standing, but no others, are entitled to vote in the election of church officers in the churches to which they respectively belong. A majority vote of those present is required for election.

25-4.       The voters being convened, the moderator shall explain the purpose of the meeting and then put the question:

Are you now ready to proceed to the election of additional deacons from the slate presented?

If they declare themselves ready, the election may proceed by private ballot without nomination. In every case a majority of all the voters present shall be required to elect.

25-5.       On the election of a deacon, if it appears that a large minority of the voters are averse to a candidate, and cannot be induced to concur in the choice, the moderator shall endeavor to dissuade the majority from prosecuting it further; but if the electors are nearly or quite unanimous, or if the majority insist upon their right to choose their officers, the election shall stand.

Ordination and Installation

25-6.       The day having arrived, and the Session being convened in the presence of the congregation, a sermon shall be preached after which the presiding minister shall state in a concise manner the warrant and nature of the office of deacon, together with the character proper to be sustained and the duties to be fulfilled. Having done this, he shall propose to the candidate, in the presence of the church, the following questions, namely:

1. Do you believe the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments, as originally given, to be the inerrant Word of God, the only infallible rule of faith and practice?
2. Do you sincerely receive and adopt the Confession of Faith and the Catechisms of this Church, as containing the system of doctrine taught in the Holy Scriptures; and do you further promise that if at any time you find yourself out of accord with any of the fundamentals of this system of doctrine, you will, on your own initiative, make known to your Session the change which has taken place in your views since the assumption of this ordination vow?
3. Do you approve of the form of government and discipline of the Presbyterian Church in America, in conformity with the general principles of biblical polity?
4. Do you accept the office of deacon in this church, and promise faithfully to perform all the duties thereof, and to endeavor by the grace of God to adorn the profession of the Gospel in your life, and to set a worthy example before the Church of which God has made you an officer?
5. Do you promise subjection to the Session?
6. Do you promise to strive for the purity, peace, unity and edification of the Church?

The deacon elect having answered in the affirmative, the minister shall address to the members of the church the following question:

Do you, the members of this church, acknowledge and receive this brother (or sister, as the case may be) as a deacon, and do you promise to yield him/her all that honor and encouragement in the Lord to which his/her office, according to the Word of God and the Constitution of this Church, entitles him/her?

The members of the church having answered this question in the affirmative, by holding up their right hands, the candidate shall then be set apart, with prayer by the minister or any other Session member and the laying on of the hands of the Session, to the office of deacon. Prayer being ended, the members of the Session and deacons shall take the newly ordained officer by the hand, saying in words to this effect:

We give you the right hand of fellowship, to take part in this office with us.

The minister shall then say:

I now pronounce and declare that ____________________ has been regularly elected, ordained and installed a deacon in this church, agreeable to the Word of God, and according to the Constitution of the Presbyterian Church in America; and that as such he/she is entitled to all encouragement and honor in the Lord: In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

After which the minister or any other member of the Session shall give to the deacon and to the church an exhortation suited to the occasion.

25-7.       Ordination to the office of deacon is perpetual; nor can such office be laid aside at pleasure; nor can any person be degraded from the office but by deposition after regular trial; yet a deacon may have reasons which he/she deems valid for being released from the active duties of the office. In such a case the Session, after conference with him/her and careful consideration of the matter, may, if it thinks proper, accept his/her resignation and dissolve the official relationship which exists between him/her and the church.

The deacon, though chargeable with neither heresy nor immorality, may become unacceptable in his/her official capacity to a majority of the church which he/she serves. In such a case the church may take the initiative by a majority vote at a regularly called congregational meeting, and request the Session to dissolve the official relationship between the church and the officer without censure. The Session, after conference with the deacon, and after careful consideration, may use its discretion as to dissolving the official relationship. In either case the Session shall report its action to the congregation. If the Session fails or refuses to report to the congregation within sixty (60) days from the date of the congregational meeting or if the Session reports to the congregation that it declined to dissolve such relationship, then any member or members in good standing may file a complaint against the Session in accordance with the provisions of BCO 43.

25-8.       When a deacon who has been released from his/her official relation is again elected to the office in the same or another church, he/she shall be installed after the above form with the omission of ordination.

25-9.       When a deacon cannot or does not for a period of one year perform the duties of his/her office, his/her official relationship shall be dissolved by the Session and the action reported to the congregation.

25-10.    When a deacon by reason of age or infirmity desires to be released from the active duties of the office, he/she may at his/her request and with the approval of the Session be designated deacon emeritus. When so designated, he/she is no longer required to perform the regular duties of his/her office, but may continue to perform certain of these duties on a voluntary basis, if requested by the Session or a higher court. He/She may attend Diaconate meetings, if he/she so desires, and may participate fully in the discussion of any issues, but may not vote.

Editorial Comment:  The General Assembly explicitly provided that those Elders and Deacons granted emeritus status prior to June 22, 1984, retain the privilege of vote. (By order of the Fifteenth General Assembly 15-83,III, 31).

Cav Commentary: This new chapter pertaining to the election, ordination and installation of deacons is essentially the same as the previous chapter pertaining to elders, but with both masculine and feminine pronouns used. 25-1 grants local sessions the right to determine whether women are permitted to serve as deacons in their congregation. It expressly states we should seek to raise up men for this office. It should not degenerate into a body comprised of women, but either men alone or a mixed body.

One question that emerges for me is whether this would require a separate service since now each paragraph indicates a sermon warrant and nature of the offices as well as the character necessary to perform them. I’m assuming that the separate votes can take place at the same meeting. Presumably the sermon could concisely state the necessary information for both offices, but some may quibble and follow the letter of the law.

One significant and meaningful change is the vow of the congregation. Obedience to the deacon-elect is removed. The authority of the diaconate is lessened, but how much is not clear. This is an important change, reflecting that “the office is one of sympathy and service” (9-1).

The pronouncement also removed obedience,and therefore lessens the authority of the office.

While this overture deals with the question of authority (though perhaps not as clear as it should), it does not deal with the issue of ordination (what it is really?) and particularly the powder keg of women’s ordination.

The better routes would be to either no longer ordain deacons or to create the role (not office!) of deaconness to work with the diaconate among the women in the church. Perhaps this means we get rid of the assistant to the deacons. For the foreseeable future I see this issue continuing to churn and frustrate both sides. Perhaps we will continue to deal with issues like this until we learn a better way to handle them, and begin to treat each other better when we disagree.

 

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Considering Theology in Three Dimensions

For quite some time I’ve been utilizing triperspectivalism to understand, apply and communicate the Scriptures and theology. I have wished that John Frame would release an introductory book for people. It is tough to invite everyone to read books like The Doctrine of the Knowledge of God. His shorter systematic theology, Salvation Belongs to the Lord, has a section on triperspectivalism. But a small book that I could hand out to those intimidated by big books would be great.

If you read that first sentence and thought “what in the world is triperspectivalism?” this book is for you.

“Triperspectivalism is simply a teaching tool to help us grasp some of the deep things in Scripture. It highlights a pervasive pattern of three-fold distinctions, or triads, in the Bible.” Don Sweeting from the Forward

Theology in Three Dimensions: A Guide to Triperspectivalism and Its Significance is incredibly short (about 90 pages) and each chapter has review questions to help people process the information. It is therefore a relatively quick read. Frame has chapters on:

1. Perspectives
2. Perspectives and the Trinity
3. The Threefold Gospel
4. Perspectives in All of Life
5. The Normative Perspective
6. The Situational Perspective
7. The Existential Perspective
8. What to Do with Perspectives

“A perspective, literally, is a position from which a person sees something. … Ultimately, all this knowledge comes to me through my own body- through my senses and the operations by which my brain organizes my sense impressions into knowledge.”

While Frame speaks of three perspectives on truth, these perspectives are distinguished but not separated from one another. They include each other. The normative has to do with authority. God possesses all authority and gives His Word to us as a source of authority. The Word does not simply give norms, but describes our situation and ourselves. God exercises His authority in controlling our situations (circumstances). These circumstances reflect both His norms and our influence as sinners. God exercises His authority and control as He is present in creation and with His people. He is not to be confused with creation, but is present. This provides a brief example of where John Frame goes with this.

“These are multiple perspectives, but they all are part of the general personal perspective that constitutes my experience and assessment of the real world.”

I will come back to blog on the Trinity and his understanding of God’s simplicity in particular. This has been the subject of a recent controversy. I will also come back to blog on apologetics and how he things triperspectivalism can rescue use from the tribalism that divides the church in terms of apologetics. He lamented this tribalism after the death of R.C. Sproul last week. He and Sproul were born in raised around Pittsburgh, had a love for philosophy and studied it, and both taught systematic theology. He expressed that the fact that he and R.C. were on different apologetic teams may have been part of why they didn’t become friends. The fact that spent most of their time teaching in different parts of the country (before the days of the internet) didn’t help either.

It is hard for me to fully judge this volume. I tried to suspend my knowledge and view it as one who doesn’t think triperspectivally. But I ultimately couldn’t. I enjoyed the volume and thought he communicated his material clearly. But I didn’t arrive to the book with contrary presuppositions or “innocence”. My presupposition was that he is on to something very helpful and illuminating.

So, if you aren’t familiar with triperspectivalism and read this let me know how clear it is. I’m not so much concerned with whether he convinces you but if you understand it when done with reading the book.

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Considering the Role of Women in the Church

Someone recently sent me a link to R.C. Sproul’s lesson on The Role of Women in the Church. She had only a little info about the PCA study committee and was concerned. I allayed some fears, but since this is probably one of the few older Sproul lessons I haven’t heard I decided to listen to it with the officers of our congregation at a combined meeting.

This is so old that Bill Hybels made a guest appearance. I believe the context is that R.C. was asked to talk to a group of people at Willow Creek. In the intervening years, it would be safe to say that they have probably changed their position on this subject.

Here is something of a summary from the notes that I took.

Protest movements have real pain behind them at their roots despite their sometimes illegitimate actions. The Feminist movement is no different. It is a response to patronizing attitudes and exploitation. Women have not been treated well by men in society, and in the church.

On the other hand, the church has not missed the truth about women and ministry for 2,000 years. The question of who may be ordained is either determined by God, or my subjective evaluation of who is gifted to serve. The qualifications, particularly with regard to character, either matter or they don’t.

R.C. alluded to when he was in the United Presbyterian Church. The largely egalitarian denomination permitted men to hold the complementarian position. This changed after an ecclesiastical court case and officers like R.C. were told to change their views, leave for another denomination or face disciplinary action.

R.C. noted that he wrote a minority report for the PCA favoring the ordination of women deacons. This requires some explanation, obviously. He has no prejudice against women. He wants to be as liberal on this question as the Scriptures allow him to be. In this context he mentioned a debate at Gordon-Conwell (or perhaps he said Gordon College where he taught for a time) years earlier when he was the only faculty member willing to take up the complementarian position. For him, the question always traces back to 1 Timothy 2.

¹¹ Let a woman learn quietly with all submissiveness. ¹² I do not permit a woman to teach or to exercise authority over a man; rather, she is to remain quiet. ¹³ For Adam was formed first, then Eve; ¹⁴ and Adam was not deceived, but the woman was deceived and became a transgressor.

This passage, he believes and I concur, does not allow women in positions of authority in the church. Some kind of teaching and some kind of authority are prohibited. He noted there were different kinds of “authority”. There can the authority of expertise or influence. The type in question is judicial or governing authority.

Judicial authority is the right to command and demand the actions of others. Paul restricts judicial authority over men in the church. The context is ecclesiastical, so this is limited by that context. Women may have authority in the workplace or school and other contexts. He rejects patriarchy.

There is also the general vs. technical sense of teaching. He believes this refers to teaching with ecclesiastical authority.

The general term for office is diaconos- service. Church office is an office of service. We do not lord it over others like the Gentiles do.

Women are not allowed to sit in judicial power- to be on the session or an elder.

The PCA ties government to ministry in way he thinks is an unbiblical way. This is why he generally supports women deacons, but doesn’t in the PCA. The BCO indicates that though an office of service, it has power or authority (though not a court so it is fairly confusing and one of those things I’d love to see clarified in the BCO). Sproul thinks that preaching does not necessarily have governmental authority because the court is not in session during preaching. At this point R.C. and Bill discussed Elizabeth Elliot who refused to preach at Willow Creek on a Sunday morning. Bill invited her to come during the week. R.C. had her “speak” a few times at Ligonier c0nferences (that is not a local church and does not have an ecclesiastical governing body).

Our officers commented that perhaps this means a woman could be an assistant pastor since they don’t serve on the Session (this was largely sarcastic since we don’t like the assistant pastor position). But they do serve in the courts of presbytery and General Assembly so don’t take the joke seriously.

R.C. noted that he sometimes worries that his position is too liberal (and some PCA pastors would agree). But he needs to be faithful to the text, which his opponent in the aforementioned debate agreed supports the complementarian position. P.K. Jewett agreed that the complementarian interpretation of the text was correct. As a result, Jewett denied the authority of the text in his defense of women’s ordination.

Different denominations have different working definitions of ordination. All it means is to be consecrated to an purpose or office. Scripture nowhere explicitly says women are not to be ordained. We have to talk about the particular office in question, and build an implicit argument regarding ordination in general.

He main principle was that the parameter are to be those set forth in Scripture, not culture or the “light of nature.”

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Considering the Household of God

In our men’s study last night we talked about 1 Timothy 3:14-16. We talked about a number of things but I want to focus on our discussion of verse 15.

¹⁴ I hope to come to you soon, but I am writing these things to you so that, ¹⁵ if I delay, you may know how one ought to behave in the household of God, which is the church of the living God, a pillar and buttress of the truth. ¹⁶ Great indeed, we confess, is the mystery of godliness:

He was manifested in the flesh,
    vindicated by the Spirit,
        seen by angels,
proclaimed among the nations,
    believed on in the world,
        taken up in glory.

Paul has a very high view of the church. He points out two things. It is the household of God, and the assembly of the living God.

Household! The household of the day was run by the pater familias. There would be a wife and children, perhaps extended family and servants. Everyone in the household was under the authority of the pater familias. There was a household code of conduct that was to be followed by all.

This is what is behind the idea Paul expresses about conducting oneself in the household of God. God, the Father, determines how we are to live as part of His household by adoption. He regulates the household, not us.

In a household there is love, acceptance and discipline (an essential part of fatherly love, see Hebrews 12). This means there is forgiveness. This also means there are relationships between other members of the family. We are connected to one another. We help another when one is hurting or sick. Yes, sometimes a household is like an infirmary ward. And a classroom. Sometimes it is a party hall, as the family celebrates a birthday, anniversary, holy day, etc. A household has many functions, which is why it is such a helpful metaphor for the church. Paul, and the Spirit, knew what they were doing.

Too often people treat the church as anything but a household. They often view it as a service center of sorts. Not realizing they are part of a family we often treat others like they are there to serve us. Not realizing we are connected, too easily slip from congregation to congregation whenever someone does something we don’t like. We can think little to nothing of the relationships we leave behind.

(Yes, sometimes you have to leave a church. Sometimes you can choose to leave a church. What we shouldn’t do is burn bridges by either how or why we leave.)

Another aspect of a household is that the pater familias assigns tasks within the household. Each family member has responsibilities, except maybe the youngest children. In our family our kids learned a song when they were very young- “Clean up, clean up, it is time to clean up.” This was so they would learn to … clean up.

If we are to view the church as a household, we should think along the lines of JFK’s famous words: ask not what your church can do for you, but what you can do for your church. Yes, you should receive benefits from your church, just like every other member of the family. But you also have responsibilities just like every other member. Your place may be to teach, or help others heal, perhaps helping everyone to celebrate, or enjoy a clean environment. There is something for everyone to do.

It isn’t about guilt. It is essentially about love. You are a part of a household formed from God’s adopting love. The ones we serve are supposed to be the ones you love.

The church is also the assembly of the living God. That word, ekklesia, is used in the Septuagint to translate the word for assembly or congregation. The church is not just those called out, but also called together. We assemble.

This is so different from the “de-churched” movement which thinks we don’t need the assembly but relies on Christian friendships. The Father appointed some to be pastors and teachers for a reason. He believes in the organized church, so to speak, even if we don’t. He gave instructions, like earlier in 1 Timothy 3, for how the church functions because there is organization to the organism called the church. The God who lives dwells in this living temple (1 Peter 2, Ephesians 2). To reject attendance, participation and membership is quite contrary to God’s revealed intention for the church.

The living God is present when the church is assembled in a way in which He is not when we are alone. I am basing this on Paul’s comments on worship in 1 Corinthians. He inhabits our praises, stirring us up to delight in Him, to confess our sins and our faith. We come together into His presence particularly as we pray and during the Lord’s Table. Corporate worship is distinct from our personal worship due to the preaching of the Word and the Sacraments. Those who neglect corporate worship miss the gracious presence of the living God for their maturity in a significant though hard to express way.

Paul’s vision of the church is far greater than the average American Christian’s. It is time for us to toss our meager conceptions of the church in the trash where they belong and receive God’s many, rich and high view of the church.

 

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Considering The Creedal Imperative, Part 1

Since Carl Trueman’s The Creedal Imperative came out last year it has been on my unofficial list of books to read. With a week of study leave, I thought it was time to get started. This book, with a strange title, is an important book in defense of the use of creeds and confessions. As a Presbyterian, and a confessional one at that, (I was referring to myself, but Trueman is one as well) it may sound strange to defend the use of creeds and confessions. However, we do live in a culture in which the use of such things is suspect at best and often denigrated, even in the church. This would be why Trueman wrote the book, and this is the subject he picks to begin the book: those societal forces against creeds.

He begins with 3 assumptions:

1. The past is important and has something to teach us. Cultural forces that diminish or reject the importance of the past for the present argue against the use of creeds and confessions.
2. Language is an appropriate means for communicating truth across time. Cultural forces that minimize or undermine the use of language argue against the use of creeds and confessions.
3. There must be a body or institution that can authoritatively compose and enforce creeds and confessions. Anti-institutionalism in its various forms militates against the use of creeds and confessions.

These are reasonable assumptions when you think about creeds and confessions, and they are assumptions that will guide his work in the first, and second chapters of the book. Trueman argues, briefly, that those evangelicals who hold to “no creed but Christ” are more in tune with the spirit of the age than the teaching of Scripture.

What societal forces diminish the value of the past? He begins with science. His beef is not with science itself but the attitudes that scientific development fosters in people. Scientific advancement means that the present is better than the past, and (hopefully) the future will be better than the present. Unfortunately this view neglects the fact that scientific discoveries are often used in dangerous and even nefarious ways. Think the Holocaust, biological weapons, nuclear weapons, and the increase of identity theft. It is not all progress and joy. This view also forgets that this progress rests on the knowledge and developments of the past. Creeds and confessions form the foundation and boundaries for the church.

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Considering Some of the Tools of Parenting

I am slowly making my way through Gospel-Powered Parenting by William Farley.  I’m going slower than desired.  I have lost track of how many books I’m currently reading.  As he describes one of his sons, I have hope for my son.  He’s one stubborn little guy.  Days like today make me wonder if I’ll survive the parenting process.  It is not must about their character changing, but also mind.  Not only does the Boy need the gospel, the Dad needs the gospel.

The first tool of parenting he addresses is marriage.  “Huh?” you might say.  Yes, marriage.  The gospel we live must be the same as the one we preach.  If our lives make the gospel unattractive, our children will be repelled by what they think is the truth.

“Frank and Kim’s marriage preached an unattractive gospel to their children.  It contradicted the gospel preached at church and school.”

Farley gets this largely from Ephesians 5.  Sadly, it seems so novel in evangelical circles.  This points to how little we pay attention to the Scriptures.  M’ Cheyne once commented that the church’s greatest need was for his holiness as their pastor.  Similarly, your children’s greatest need is for your personal holiness to adorn the truth of the gospel.  Your marriage will preach a message that will either attract or repel your children.

“Proud parents are ill equipped to help their children escape the clutches of pride.”

In my margin I wrote that you could replace pride with any other sin.  We cannot teach our kids to escape the clutches of any sin that has us in its clutches.  Our only hope to escape the clutches of any sin is the gospel.  If we are not applying the gospel to our sin, how can they learn to apply it to their sin.  All we could offer them is moralism.

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Considering Instructing a Child’s Heart

I was not raised in a family that understood the gospel and raised children with a God-ward orientation or focused on our hearts.  As I seek to raise the 2 little lives (with more to come?) He has placed in my care, I recognize I need help.  I found Shepherding a Child’s Heart to be helpful.  So when Ted & Margy Tripp released Instructing a Child’s Heart, I believed it would be helpful for me.

I was not wrong.  Unlike the previous book, which focused on corrective discipline, this book focused on formative instruction-

“Formative instruction gives children principles and absolutes by which to live- hooks to hang life on.”

They address 5 goals for formative instruction, and the call to formative instruction from Deuteronomy 6, communicating formative instruction, and topics including authority, sowing & reaping, a vision for God’s glory, the importance of the church and ultimately the centrality of the gospel.  The book is humbling, as I reckon with how often I fail as a parent (therefore the gospel is for me too!).

This is a very good book, but not a perfect book.  There are statements they make that I would disagree with, as in Shepherding a Child’s Heart.  One of those was in the chapter on authority.  There is much in that chapter that is good, true and right.  But not this:

There is a popular method of child management that powerfully illustrates my point.  “Honey, you can wear the red shirt, the green shirt, or the blue shirt.  It’s up to you.”

It does not occur to a three-year-old that there are more than three shirts in the closet.  He makes his choice.  Mother is indifferent to which shirt the child chooses.  All are equally appropriate.  On the surface it seems like a win, win.  The child feels like he is a decision-maker, mother gets him to wear something appropriate, and there is no fight.  What could be better than that?

While all that sounds very good and quite enlightened, in reality the subtext for the child is, “You are the decision-maker here.  You have the right to choose.  I may suggest the various alternatives, but it is your right to choose.”

As made in God’s image, our children need to learn to choose wisely.  There is no magical age at which this happens.  We are to teach them how to make decisions while under authority.  The parent here sets the proper boundaries, and provides some freedom.  My 3-year-old knows she has more than 3 shirts in her closet.  My child is not my slave, though she is my responsibility.  I must teach her about living under authority- but an authority that loves and nurtures her (and him), not one that will squelch.  Refusing to teach them to make decisions within boundaries, in my opinion, gives them an unhealthy view of authority.  Obviously the Tripps disagree with me.

You don’t have to agree with every jot and tittle to find a book helpful.  I still found it very helpful, and CavWife plans on reading it too.  Some of what was helpful was the discussions about how we tend to reinforce our children’s idols, as well as the culture’s and our own as parents.  Part of good, godly parenting is to turn from our own idols, helping them to see their own idols and to lay hold of Christ instead.  The gospel is not a parenting add-on, but at the very core of parenting.

Paul found joy in the gospel and never moved beyond the gospel because he knew the gospel was the power of God for salvation- including everything fron initial calling by grace, to justification, to ultimate glorification.  We never move beyond the centrality of the gospel.

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Considering Word and Spirit

Finally I’ve had some more time to make progress in Calvin’s Institutes of the Christian Religion.  He spends some time interacting with a Roman view of Scripture and then images.  While discussing Scripture, he also exposes the folly of the extreme anabaptist view that created problems during the Reformation.

The authority of Scripture comes from its origin in God.  Often some will say that the Church confers authority on the Scriptures by its recognition of them as God’s Word.  But Scripture is authentic and authoritative even if we don’t recognize it as such.  The issue is whether or not we will submit to God as He has spoken in the Scriptures.

“… the testimony of the Spirit is more excellent than all reason.  For as God alone is a fit witness of himself in His Word, so also the Word will not find acceptance in men’s hearts before it is sealed by the inward testimony of the Spirit.  The same Spirit, therefore, who has spoken through the mouths of the prophets must penetrate into our hearts to persuade us that they faithfully proclaimed what had been divinely commanded.” (I, VII, 4)

God spoke through the prophets by the Spirit.  The same Spirit must work in our hearts that we accept those words as God’s.  Bare reason is insufficient due to our fall into sin.  God must illumine us (2 Cor. 2-4).  So the Spirit speaks and authenticates God’s Word.

The authority of God’s human messengers, the prophets, was strengthened by the miracles they performed.  Here we see the idea of miracles as authentication of God’s true messengers.  This idea is behind the Reformed view of cessation of the gifts.  Not all Reformed people affirm this view, nor does Calvin go there.  But the roots of Warfield and Gaffin’s views are here.  Fulfilled prophecy is another basis for affirming the authenticity and authority of Scripture.  These are things the Spirit will illumine for us as we read that we might believe that Scripture has divine origins and is authoritative.

But what captures my attention is Calvin’s joining Word and Spirit.  This emphasis is lost in our day and age.  On the one hand there are those who think that bare reason is sufficient to understand Scripture.  On the other there are those who think that the Spirit thinks apart from Scripture.  Calvin argued that we only rightly understand Scripture through the work of the Spirit, and that the Spirit speaks thru the Scriptures.

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Scientific Consensus?

Glenn Beck had Dr. Richard Lindzen on his show tonight.  Dr. Lindzen is a professor of meteorology and atmospheric and planetary sciences.  Teaching at MIT, one would think he would be a respected voice on the matter of global warming.  Guess again! He worked on the IPCC- a lead author by the way.  Yet, he disputes the Summary for Policymakers which was not put together by scientists.  It was literally Shanghai-ed.  It has been politicized and used by the fear mongers as their latest pet project to get people up in arms. In his interview he stated (best as I can remember) “In 1998 Newsweek was claiming scientists were all in agreement.  Agreed on what?  That the overall temperature had increased slightly, yes.  That Antartica was going to melt?  No.” He likens belief in Global Warming to religious belief.

“With respect to science, the assumption behind the [alarmist] consensus is science is the source of authority and that authority increases with the number of scientists [who agree]. But science is not primarily a source of authority. It is a particularly effective approach of inquiry and analysis. Skepticism is essential to science- consensus is foreign.”

That’s enough on global warming for awhile.

Update: Climate Scientist Roy Spencer has questions for Al Gore about his movie. Other scientists not part of the ‘consensus’ include: Dr. Timothy Ball, Dr. Robert C. Balling Jr., Dr. Robert E. Davis, Dr. David LeGates, and I could go on.  Apparently these gentlemen are too difficult to find.

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