The Castle Church Door

07/03/08 - Should We be Patriots in the Pew

Albert Mohler — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 22:00:00 +0000

Should We be Patriots in the Pew

Happy Dependence Day!

Patrick Chan — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 21:55:00 +0000

Tomorrow is the 4th of July, our nation's celebration of its declaration and victory of independence from the British. Stinkin' redcoats! Just kidding. (I'm actually an Anglophile. For Queen and Empire! Okay, maybe not that much of an Anglophile...)

However, I just wanted to briefly suggest that as Christians we should think of the day (as we think of all our days, so that we'd gain a heart of wisdom) as our Dependence Day. Our dependence upon the Lord God -- the one, true, and living God, who revealed himself to us in the Holy Scriptures and ultimately in His Beloved Son, Jesus Christ himself.

We're dependent upon God for everything. From life itself, for every breath we breathe. For who we are as individuals, our personalities and the circumstances we were born into. For which families we were born into as well. For the time and place in which we were born. For our climate -- physical and moral. For our culture and background. For our friends and neighbors. For our physical needs like food, clothing, and shelter. For our jobs. For our communities. For the wonderful (and, yes, not-so-wonderful) people we've met in our lives. For our gifts and talents and opportunities. For the church, who is Christ's Bride and witness of himself in this fallen world. For our pastors and teachers who strive to hold out the Word of God to us, day by day. For our society, insomuch as the truths of God and Christians have been its salt and light -- and for not being as depraved as it could be by God's common grace. For our government and laws and leaders. For the soldiers who serve in our military. For the relative peace and security of our society, which allows for the gospel to advance. For our nation. And for so much more.

In all things we are dependent upon the Lord God.

Of course, at any time, these blessings could be taken away. We could lose our jobs. Our friends or loved ones could leave us. We ourselves could die at any moment. Our nation could suffer a major catastrophe. And that is why we are to be always humble and thankful for the blessings we do have, and to continue to pray to the Lord that he would do what best glorifies himself and is for our good as his people.

Let us pray that no matter what, even if it means our American liberties and freedoms and rights are taken away from us, even if it means all our goods and kindreds and very lives are themselves destroyed, we would nevertheless continue to live lives which honor and glorify the Lord Jesus Christ. How so? By always seeking intimate communion with our precious Lord and Savior in his Word and in prayer so that we would know him all the more, know his love for us, and thus by his grace working in us to love him with all our heart, soul, strength, and mind, and our neighbors. By seeking God and his kingdom first and foremost in our lives, that his kingdom would expand in our hearts and the hearts of others. By preaching the gospel with our lives and our lips. By humbly and joyfully doing good to our neighbors, from wherever they might come, and whoever they might be, even if they are our enemies. And by trusting and seeking to continue trusting, by repenting and seeking to continue repenting, by knowing and seeking to continue knowing, by loving and seeking to continue loving our thrice holy God, our fellow brothers and sisters in Christ, and all other peoples in our blessed nation.

In all things we trust in God from whom all blessings flow. In all things we thank and praise him -- not just for the blessings he has given to our nation but also for its difficulties and trials which turn our hearts in repentance and faith towards him. In all things we trust and know God is sovereign, and that he is so very good to us, infinitely far more than we deserve, either as individuals or as a nation. In all things we humbly trust and thank him, and ask that he might glorify himself in and through us, as he best sees fit, for we are ever dependent upon him.

Happy Dependence Day!

P.S. And let's hope we're not invaded by hostile space aliens. In case we are, though, I've updated my Blogger profile to meet the challenge.

The Kind of Church Old School Congregations Need to Be

Andrew Webb — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 21:28:29 +0000

I’m sure most of you already aware of this, but some Old School Presbyterian church planting efforts fail. The church fails to grow, and eventually the effort comes to an end. Obviously we need to acknowledge that even this was the will of God and will ultimately be used for the good of His people, [...]

A Pastor’s Commentary on 1-2 Peter

greenbaggins — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 15:23:45 +0000

1 Peter is my favorite book of the Bible, largely because it was a Bible study on this book by a previous pastor that made me want to become a pastor myself. So, I obtain all the commentaries on 1 Peter that I possibly can. I recently got a hold of this commentary on Peter/Jude. Every commentary that I have seen and worked with in this series has been of great benefit to preachers of the Word. So far, I have worked my way through Genesis, and am currently reading the excellent volume on Daniel. See here for my review of 1 Samuel.

David Helm is on the pastoral staff of Holy Trinity Church, a multi-congregational church in Chicago. He is also the director of Simeon Trust, an organization dedicated to helping pastors preach expository sermons with practical application.

David has written a very helpful commentary that majors on the majors. This is always a good thing in preaching. The payoff on 1 Peter is very helpful indeed, since the (in)famous passage about the spirits in prison is located in chapter 3. I appreciated his sermon on this text, as it was a refreshing approach that sought to major on the main point. There are a myriad of questions surrounding that text, of course, but David Helm concentrates on the fact that Christ is crucified, raised, and ascended, and that therefore, just as Jesus is victorious, so also should we be encouraged, knowing that we will be victorious in Christ as well.

Helm has a helpful way of reminding readers where in the letter they are (a big picture perspective). See, for instance, the section on pp. 47-49, which details the flow of thought from the first nine verses of chapter 1 into the second major section of chapter 1. He notes the movement from the future (vv. 3-5) to the present (vv. 6-9) to the past (vv. 10-12).

Helm affirms the full plenary inspiration of Scripture in his sermon on 2 Peter 1:16-21, and offers some helpful points about the lamp shining in a dark place, as well as an explanation of how the Holy Spirit carried the authors of Scripture.

Helm does not shortchange Jude, either, with nine whole sermons on the book (80 pages). All in all, a very good preacher’s aid. It should rank with Clowney and Schreiner for practical help in preaching these books.

The Unity of Theology

greenbaggins — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 14:12:52 +0000

One of the biggest hangovers from the Enlightenment is the fragmentation of knowledge. This is true of all departments of knowledge, not just theology. With the rush to specialization, there comes greater knowledge in specialty departments, but with a corresponding lack of general knowledge. No longer could one acquire a Ph.D. in Physics generally. You can only get a Ph.D. in Physics now if you do it in a sub-department of a sub-department of a sub-department of Physics.

Seminaries today are specialized. Faculties are specialized. This has some advantages. There can be a good division of labor this way. Specialists have a better chance of keeping up in their field. However, there comes a terrible price to pay that goes largely unnoticed by all but a few (usually in church history and systematics, who are more attuned to the unity of theology anyway): departments not only stop talking to each other, but start becoming suspicious of each other. The very worst part of this suspicion certainly surrounds the exegetical departments in their relation to systematics. The fault here is almost entirely on the part of the exegetes. Systematics professors have been warned for so long about the dangers of proof-texting that they are gun shy to a certain extent. But if I had a dollar for every time I read in a commentary ”That’s a systematic category, and we can’t talk about that in a commentary,” I would be exceedingly wealthy indeed. Exegete this passage, folks: “Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one” from Deuteronomy 6:4. Does not the Shema tell us that the Lord is one? Then shouldn’t theology also be one in some sense? I do not advocate the elimination of departments in seminaries. But there are some things that seminaries need to do if students are not to leave bewildered by the competing methodologies of the various disciplines.

First, have students read Richard Muller’s book The Study of Theology. And they should read it at the beginning and at the end of their seminary training. Either that, or read Edward Farley’s book Theologia (unfortunately out of print).

Second, the introductory classes to the various disciplines should have sections dealing with how their discipline is dependent on every other discipline.

Third, all throughout the courses, specific application should be made apparent as to how the knowledge they are acquiring is inter-dependent on all other disciplines in theology.

John 6 And The Eucharist

Jason Engwer — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 12:15:00 +0000

For anybody who's interested, there's an ongoing discussion in another thread concerning John 6 and the eucharist.

Lux Mundi

steve — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 00:24:00 +0000

In a parallel world known as Tellus, a controversy erupted over the rite of light. This controversy turned on interpretation of the words: "I am the light."

There were some heretical schismatics as well as some schismatical heretics who took the words figuratively. However, an Inquisition put a speedy end to their unspeakable impieties.

That, however, left many questions unanswered. When the Savior became a photon (at the words of consecration, “Lux ecce surgit aurea”), what kind of photon did he become?

The Infrareds took one position while the Ultraviolets took another.

There was yet another faction, known as the X-rays (which split into two groups, the Soft X-rays and the Hard X-rays), but no one under the age of 21 is allowed to consult the illustrated history of that particular sect.

His Holiness, Pope Terahertz IV, convoked the Council of Ozone to resolve the controversy before the rift was irreparable. But at that point I lost my uplink to Tellus, so I can’t tell you how the proceedings went until transmission is restored.

07/02/08 - Ask Anything Wednesday

Albert Mohler — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 22:00:00 +0000

Call with your question - you set the agenda.1-877-893-TALK(8255)

Caiaphas

steve — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 20:23:00 +0000

I’ve been sparring with Perry Robinson over at Green Baggins.

http://greenbaggins.wordpress.com/2008/06/25/a-word-from-dr-richard-b-gaffin-jr/

steve hays said,
June 29, 2008 at 7:46 am

Perry,

Let’s not lose sight of what’s at issue in the debate over Enns. Enns and his supporters are taking the position that God sometimes inspires errors, that Bible writers sometimes intend to make true assertions which we now know are false.

How is the case of Caiaphas relevant to that issue? He intended to make a true assertion, and he succeeded in making a true statement. God inspired him to speak, and what he spoke was true.

That is not comparable to the alleged case of an inspired Bible writer who meant to make a true assertion, even though his assertion does not, in fact, correspond to reality—according to our enlightened, modern viewpoint.

steve hays said,
June 30, 2008 at 7:32 am

Perry Robinson said,

“There is more than one theory of inspiration, particularly a more theanthropic model rather than a pneumatological one like what Lane proposes which isn’t really Chalcedonian IMO.”

I suppose Lane favors a pneumatological model of inspiration because the Bible consistently attributes inspiration to the agency of the Holy Spirit. It’s terrible the way Lane gets his doctrine of Scripture from the witness of Scripture—instead of some post-Biblical, Greek Orthodox construct.

steve hays said,
June 30, 2008 at 11:59 am

Perry Robinson said,

“Caiaphas’ case is relevant since he was wrong yet inspired. I thought that would be obvious.”

No, it’s not obvious. Are you claiming that his statement is erroneous? If so, in what respect.

“And I wouldn’t think that a theory of inspiration would turn on a specific theory of truth like correspondence theory.”

Now you’re changing the subject. I was pointing out what Enns’ theory entails, and then pointing out that Caiaphas doesn’t illustrate that principle.

The theory of inspiration turns on the self-witness of Scripture, not a specific theory of truth. However, inspiration is not an end in itself. It’s a means of securing certain objectives, of which a truthful record is one.

“Further, as I noted before, his own gloss entails unbiblical doctrines such as ‘created grace’, an artifact of medieval Catholicism. This can be seen in the material where he talks about the Spirit giving created graces to the humanity from the outside. The standard Roman dialectic between nature and grace, where grace is alien and eternal to nature is obvious. That is hardly a product of the witness of the Scriptures.”

You’re obfuscating the issue by attacking a particular formulation of “pneumatic inspiration” because that particular formulation gives you a pretext to attack what you disapprove of in Protestant theology generally.

That doesn’t change the fact that Scripture itself attributes its inspiration of the agency of the Holy Spirit rather than a theanthropic model. Attacking “created grace” is an exercise in misdirection.

“I am still waiting for an exegetical defense of that doctrine without an appeal to natural theology from you.”

What’s your problem, Perry? I’ve already stated my position on the Filioque. Don’t you remember?

The problem is that you only have ears to hear the answers your looking for. If any answer doesn’t conform to your polemical agenda, you’re deaf to what the person said. So you keep demanding an answer as if none was given.

“As for constructs, last I checked, Protestant views are the result of an attempt to reconstruct the Bible’s meaning and so at worst you’ve only put Orthodoxy on the same level as Protestantism. And since I don’t think you are going to find any churches in the first century with Calvin’s name on them, Reformed theology is ‘post-biblical’ as well. Wise cracks make bad arguments.”

Once again, we weren’t discussing Reformed theology in general. Rather, we were discussing the Reformed doctrine of inspiration. In particular, the self-witness of Scripture.

And, of course, Reformed theology in general has an exegetical basis, so the question of 1C labels is a red-herring.

steve hays said,
June 30, 2008 at 3:45 pm

“[Perry Robinson] Perhaps you don’t think that God can die or did die, but I do.”

Perry makes provocative comments like this because he wants to change the subject. He’s looking for a wedge issue to use against Protestant theology.
He doesn’t want to talk about, say, Warfield’s inductive case for the verbal, plenary inspiration of scripture.

Instead, he wants to turn this into a fight over Christology since he’d rather fight on his own turf, and he feels comfortable debating Christology. So he’s baiting commenters into riding his hobbyhorse instead of discussing Richard Gaffin and Peter Enns.

steve hays said,
July 1, 2008 at 10:46 am

Perry Robinson said,

“Caiaphas was wrong in terms of what was in fact better for the nation, not to mention the justice and morality of his statement or rather lack thereof.”

It was wrong for Caiaphas to say it’s better for the people if Jesus dies? How is that wrong?

John didn’t think it was wrong. To the contrary, John thought his statement was ironically right. That’s why John does a gloss on his statement, building on the truth of what he said.

Your interpretation cuts against the grain of John’s editorial comment—not to mention the broader flow of the narrative. You need to learn how to exegete a passage of Scripture.

“Actually I didn’t change the subject. You inserted a specific theory of truth upon which the problem supposedly in part turned. I just brought to light your mistake. To my knowledge Enns isn’t necessarily wedded to a correspondence theory of truth and I don’t see why one must be in discussing this problem. So I don’t think Enns account ‘entails’ a correspondence theory of truth.”

No mistake on my part. I summarized Enns’ position as follows: “Let’s not lose sight of what’s an issue in the debate over Enns. Enns and his supporters are taking the position that God sometimes inspires errors, that Bible writers sometimes intend to make true assertions which we now know are false…That [Jn 11:50] is not comparable to the alleged case of an inspired Bible writer who meant to make a true assertion, even though his assertion does not, in fact, correspond to reality—according to our enlightened, modern viewpoint.”

How, specifically, is that a misstatement of Enns’ position?

But while we’re on the subject—yes, an oral or textual statement that corresponds to extratextual reality certainly figures in what Bible writers would take to be a true statement, and securing true statements is very much an aim of inspiration.

“If inspiration turns on the self witness of Scripture then it is odd that you are injecting correspondence here. And I am not convinced that inspiration is merely instrumentally valuable. It may be true that inspiration serves a goal, but intrinsic goods can also have extrinsic value. You’re assuming quite a lot here without argument.”

And you’re resorting to weasel words like “merely.” But that actually concedes my point.

Take the divine promises and prophecies of Scripture. Do you think they would be true, as Bible writers understood truth, if the fulfillment (the future referent) didn’t correspond to the promise or prophecy?

And what do you think is the purpose of inspiration if not to secure true statements? We don’t need inspiration to secure false statements, do we? The absence of inspiration will secure false statements.

Why does Paul carry on in Rom 9-11 if the word of God doesn’t have to match up with this historical outcome? Why are false prophets subject to the death penalty if a “true” or “inspired” oracle doesn’t have to match up with the historical outcome?

“I am not obfuscating the issue because the issue was your claim that my views were unbiblical. I shot back that Lipton’s view entails unbiblical doctrines so the shoe is on the other foot.”

Trying to shift the issue to Tipton’s position does nothing to absolve your own position. That’s just a diversionary tactic.

“So far you have left that untouched, unless of course you think that your statements constitute an exegetical argument.”

I’m not here to debate Tipton’s article. The onus is not on me to debate Tipton’s article.

“And you are confused since Scripture wouldn’t attribute inspiration to a ‘model’ but to the God-man.”

“Model” was your word. I responded to you on your own terms.

Scripture doesn’t attribute inspiration to the God-man. The agent of inspiration is the Holy Spirit.

“In fact, Scripture does give reason for thinking that the primary revealing agent was the Son since the Hebrews never heard the Father nor saw his form, but rather the Son. Hence the irony of coming to his own and his own not recognizing him.”

So you’re a Marcionite. You dispense with the OT. Divine revelation begins with the Incarnation.

You’re also equivocating. The Son is the self-revelation of God. That doesn’t mean the Son inspired the Scriptures. The Son is revelatory in his own right. The person and work of the Son is revelatory.

That’s not the same thing as inspiring the words of the prophets, whether their spoken or written words.

“And since 'created grace' was an essential part of Lipton’s piece in glossing inspiration, my comments regarding it were hardly a red herring.”

It’s a red herring when you introduce that gloss as an excuse to disregard the self-witness of Scripture regarding the distinctive role of the Holy Spirit in the inspiration of Scripture.

“You confuse describing my alleged argumentative behavior with an evaluation of the arguments themselves. The former is quite irrelevant to the question of the quality of the arguments.”

I’m under no obligation to respond to you according to the way in which you’d prefer frame the argument. You don’t get to dictate my theological priorities or recast the questions to your liking, then impose that on everyone else.

“As for the Filioque, you sure did give an answer but you gave no exegetical defense of the doctrine, which is what I am still waiting for. So you mislead the reader. The claim wasn’t whether you supplied an answer but whether you gave an exegetical defense for it, which you didn’t, or don’t you remember?”

This was my initial response: “Historically, this has its Scriptural appeal in certain Johannine statements. And, traditionally, these statements are understood as having reference to an ontological subordination within the immanent Trinity. But, in context, they actually refer to the economic Trinity, not the immanent Trinity. When I recite the Filioque clause, I do so in the Johannine (economic) sense. This may or may not be in line with the original intent of the creed, but unlike the original intent of Scripture, which is divinely authoritative, creedal intent is not inherently authoritative.”

http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2007/08/ugly-duckling-of-orthodoxy.html

I then did a follow-up piece:

http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2007/09/perry-robinsons-bombshell.html

What, exactly, do you think I need to defend? My economic reading of the processional statements in John? But since you reject double procession, why would you object to an economic reading of those statements? Are you paying attention?

“Your personal remarks about what I am deaf to or my polemical agenda are irrelevant to the questions at hand and to the arguments I gave. It seems you haven’t learned how to keep the ad hom’s out of your puff pieces.”

I’ve had more experience dealing with you than some of the commenters here. They didn’t even know you were a convert to Eastern Orthodoxy. It’s quite relevant for me to apprise them of your tactics.

“Once again, you mislead the reader. You claim was that my Orthodox views were ‘post-biblical’ and so I responded in kind. No amount of fist pounding that Reformed theology has an exegetical basis will make it so, nor will it get you away from the fact that it is historically “post-biblical.” So my comments about Reformed theology being “post-biblical” only constitute a red herring if yours do.”

My usage was self-explanatory. I set up a contrast between the self-witness of Scripture and a post-Biblical construct. So exegetical theology was the differential factor all along.

“As for Warfield’s inductive case, why would I need to discuss it? I favor a more presupp approach. I don’t think induction can get you to where Warfield wants to go and I think his gloss on inspiration, inductive or not is mistaken. I have addressed this before both here and on my own blog, but perhaps you missed that as well.”

Now you’re confusing two different things:

i) Does our doctrine of Scripture derive from the self-witness of Scripture. That’s an inductive question. A question of exegetical theology.

ii) How do we defend the doctrine of Scripture (thus derived)? That’s a question of apologetics, which might (or might not) involve a transcendental argument.
One doesn’t establish a Biblical doctrine of inspiration by presuppositional reasoning. Rather, that has to be established on the basis of what the Bible says about the nature of its own inspiration.

“So is it true to say that a divine person died on the cross or not? Let’s see if you can answer it in a straightforward fashion or not.”

I’m not going to step into your trap. Your question is irrelevant to the inspiration (and inerrancy) of scripture.

And even if you question were relevant, you have no interest in Scriptural answers. You want to frame this in terms of historical theology. You don’t care about a Biblical Christology.

“You talk quite often about what I ‘want’ and try to put my on the couch as it were and you do this on a regular basis with people, imputing all kinds of motives.”

Because I’ve dealt with you before. I know your modus operandi. And you’re reaching for the same bag of tricks here. You try to bait people into debating the issues you care about according to your rules. You try to reorient the thread so that you can take it where you want it to go.

“In any case, such comments are irrelevant to the arguments I gave and the degree that you engage in such behavior shows your inability to show exactly where my arguments supposedly go wrong.”

You want to dictate what the answers are by dictating what the questions are. I, for one, won’t take the bait.

Perry likes to pose trip-wire questions and redirect the conversation to his own turf. He wants to maneuver the conversation into a debate over the fine points of Cyrillian Christology, then score rhetorical points by accusing his opponents of the Nestorian heresy.

I understand why Perry’s upset. It’s hard for him to stage a successful ambush when I’m standing right behind him, exposing the hidden location of his guerilla warriors.

I hardly think that Lane wants to turn this thread into a debate over the Filioque. But I’ll leave that to the moderators.

steve hays said,
July 2, 2008 at 12:32 pm

Why does Perry keep harping on the Filioque anyway? He acts as if this is a big problem for Protestant theology. But, if so, then it’s an even bigger problem for Orthodox theology given internal divisions over this issue:

“At the Second Council of Lyons in 1245, and at the Council of Florence in 1439-45, Orthodox delegates accepted the filioque. Western theologians faced the Easterns with persuasive collections of patristic texts that used language suggesting that the Orthodox doctrine was not incompatible with the filioque,” The Blackwell Dictionary of Eastern Christianity, 198.

If Eastern Orthodoxy can’t speak with one voice on this issue, even within the solemnity of two church councils, then why is this a problem for us, but not for them?

He’s making grander claims for his ecclesiology that we make for ours. Look at the mismatch between the authoritarian claims and the end-product.

The sufficiency of Scripture

steve — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 19:52:00 +0000

Perry Robinson has been a very busy boy, popping up on Evangelical blogs to market Eastern Orthodoxy. He’s done so at Green Baggins, and he’s done so at Parchment & Pen. I attempted to post a reply, but my comment was “truncated per site policy.”

I take it that Patton wants to pitch his blog to the attention span of a kindergartner. Well, it’s his blog, so he’s welcome to be a merchant of mediocrity on his own blog.

But since I have my own blog, I’ll repost my comment here, minus the preschool word limit.

“[Perry Robinson] Your examples are irrelevant . Theological liberalism is relatively new. You’d expect in the 400 years prior to the advent of theological liberalism that Classical Protestants would be converging theologically, but they didn’t. In fact, they did the opposite.”

“If the theory were true, you’d expect the intelligent people with competence in the languages over a long period of time just using the same ore data to come to significant agreement.”

“As for belief about what, lets take a major Christian teaching like say baptism. You’d think that in 500 years, give or take, Calvinists, Lutherans and Baptists would make some significant headway. Or take polity, the eucharist, predestination, Christological differences, etc.”

http://www.reclaimingthemind.org/blog/2008/06/23/in-defense-of-sola-scriptura-part-two/#comment-60267

He keeps repeating and paraphrasing this objection, but you get the drift.

i) Why would we expect various Protestant traditions to converge over time? Perry is very naïve about human psychology.

Once a theological position wins enough converts, it tends to be self-reproducing. Social conditioning kicks in. Kids grow up in a home with a particular religious tradition. They attend a church with the same tradition. They may be sent to religious schools with the same tradition.

Consider countries with national churches. The whole culture indoctrinates and reinforces a particular religious tradition. One’s individual identity is bound up with one’s social identity. Kin, clan, and country.

Religious adherents have emotional ties to their fellow adherents. We certainly see this in the case of the high-church tradition, with its national churches. Where religious affiliation and ethnic loyalty merge.

So, unless you suffer from Perry’s sociological naïveté, what you’d expect is stability rather than fluidity as a particular theological tradition becomes institutionalized and handed down from one generation to the next.

ii) Moreover, there’s a period of theological consolidation following the initial “revolution.” A period of internal development as second-generation theologians produce a more systematic version of original position, taking various elements to their logical extreme and trying to create a tight-knit set of mutually supportive propositions. For example, Lutherans formulate their Christology to underwrite their sacramentology.

So what we’d actually expect is increasing divergence rather than convergence over time as the tradition hardens, as adherents develop what is distinctive to their position,

Moreover, opponents raise stock objections to the position, while proponents respond with stock answers. So, pretty soon, there’s very little room for progress since both sides are merely recycling the same arguments and counterarguments rather than advancing the argument.

iii) Furthermore, people have an emotional reaction to certain doctrines. They find some doctrines appealing and others repellent. For example, many people reject predestination because they dislike it. And they’re quite candid about their motives. They don’t like the consequences of predestination, and that’s it.

To take another example, high churchmen have a deep emotional stake in sacramental realism. Their assurance of salvation is vested in the ability of a priest to confine Jesus to a piece of bread. They know they have Jesus by having him in a wafer—like grace in spray cans. As such, they’re very resistant to anyone who would rob them of their shortcut to heaven.

“Is Scripture sufficiently clear on baptism? The Eucharist? Christology? You’d think that after 500 years and running the Lutherans, the Reformed and the Baptists, using the same data (scripture) and being competent in the biblical languages would be making some kind of convergence in these areas, but they haven’t.”

Here Perry’s ploy is to prejudge the scope of Scriptural sufficiency, then deem Scripture to be insufficient because Christians don’t agree on certain issues. But that begs the question.

Perry is beginning with his own theologian priorities, then measuring the sufficiency or insufficiency of Scripture by that extraneous stipulation. But why in the world should we accept that assumption?

Like all high churchmen, Perry never begins with God. Never begins with revelation. Never begins with divine precedent.

Rather, he begins with his preconception of the way things ought to be. If Scripture doesn’t measure up to his preconception, then Scripture is insufficient.

But a truly pious mind would broach the issue from the opposite end. God’s word is sufficient for his purposes. One reason we have ongoing debates between paedobaptists and credobaptists is because the Biblical data is someone inconclusive.

Does that mean Scripture is insufficient? If would only be insufficient on the gratuitous assumption that if it were sufficient, it would settle this issue once and for all. But why should we assume that?

Why not judge God’s intentions by God’s performance? It was certainly within his power to reveal more on the subject of baptism than he did. If God didn’t speak to that issue in enough detail to resolve the debate beyond reasonable doubt, then shouldn’t we leave it where God left it? Shouldn’t we respect God’s silence?

Why should we try to be more certain about something than God has given us cause to be certain about? If God, in his wisdom, has disclosed more of his mind on some things than others, then shouldn’t we calibrate our beliefs accordingly? Degrees of belief commensurate with degrees of revelation?

Why should a question be more important to me than it is to God? If God has chosen not to answer all our questions, then the problem is not with the lack of answers, but with the questions. We’re asking the wrong questions. We should limit ourselves to questions that God has answered. Where God is silent, that’s a point of liberty.

It’s not my Christian responsibility to answer questions God has chosen to leave unanswered. It’s not my Christian responsibility to be more specific than God’s word.

I’m not saying for a fact that the paedobaptist/credobaptist debate is stalemated. In part, I’m accepting Perry’s illustration of the sake of argument. Assuming, ex hypothesi, that the Biblical data does not permit a definitive or even probable conclusion, how does that impugn the sufficiency of Scripture?

Sufficient for what? Sufficient is a relative term. Sufficient in relation to what? In relation to God’s intentions—that’s what. Sufficient to discharge our duties to God and man.

“That being the case, I think this points to the formal insufficiency of the Scriptures. More to the point, if the Scriptures were formally sufficient, you wouldn’t need words like homoosious because Biblical language would always and only map on to one concept. But natural languages don’t work that way, which is why you do need words like homoousios.”

Other issues aside, if this proves the formal insufficiency of Scripture, then it also proves the formal insufficiency of Perry’s alternative. How did Christians manage before the Council of Nicea? Did they need a word like homoousios before Nicea? If, on the one hand, they needed that word, but didn’t have it (in the centuries before Nicea), then Perry’s rule of faith is “formally insufficient.”

But if, on the other hand, they didn’t need it, since they didn’t have it, then Perry’s rule of faith is superfluous. What’s the point of an ecumenical council (according to Robinson) if not to supply a need? But if the need went unmet before the council was convened, then how needful is the need of “homoousios”?

“As I noted before, the fact that we require words like homoousios seems to show that the bible is not formally sufficient. As far as I know, the Scriptures no where declare that they are formally sufficient.”

This is tendentious. He posits a condition which Scripture is supposed to meet. If Scripture were sufficient, it would be “formally” sufficient. Yet it never claims that for itself—hence, Scripture must be insufficient.

But that conclusion is an artifact of Perry’s premise. He holds Scripture to a standard of his own making, then deems Scripture to be deficient if it doesn’t submit to his demands. But that begs the question of whether the Bible must be ‘sufficient’ as Perry defines sufficiency.

With Perry, it’s always a game of question-framing. Act as though there’s a standing presumption that if Scripture were sufficient, it would be “formally” sufficient, and—what is more—it would declare itself to be formally sufficient. Absent that declaration, then Scripture must be insufficient.

But his reasoning is viciously circular. There’s no prior expectation that Scripture must be “formally” sufficient, or declare its formal sufficiency, for Scripture to be sufficient for God’s purposes.

“I think people can correctly interpret the Bible apart from tradition (of which the bible is part). That is possible, but that is not the question. “The question is whether the interpretation is binding and can actually require assent.”

Why is a correct interpretation insufficient? Why do you need something over and above a correct interpretation for that interpretation to be binding or constrain our consent?

Isn’t truth sufficient to constrain assent? Shouldn’t you believe something simply because it’s true?

“If not, then there will be no interpretation and hence nothing in any confession that is beyond revision.”

Why would a correct interpretation be subject to revision? Is truth revisable?

Or is Perry attempting to say that a correct interpretation would still be subject to revision inasmuch as someone might fail to recognize the right interpretation? Mistake the right interpretation for the wrong one, and vice versa?

But short of rendering every individual believer infallible, the possibility of misinterpretation is unavoidable. Perry’s rule of faith does nothing to preclude the possibility of misjudgment.

“This is why I focused on the council in Acts 15. Was that infallible or no? If so, then it significantly undermines SS.”

How would the infallibility of that “council” undermine sola Scriptura? During the apostolic age, the spoken word of an Apostle was authoritative.

But we’re not living in the apostolic age. All we have to go by are inspired written words, not inspired spoken words.