Theological Musings

n discussion following my recent post on sola scriptura, Earl pointed out that, for all of my complaints about the use of the Westminster Confession of Faith, I operate on a confession of sorts myself. He submitted as Exhibit A my very first post on this blog entitled “Getting Started“. In that initial post, I wrote the following:

These are the things I believe are absolutely essential for one to call themselves a Christian, and for me to recognize them as my brother or sister in the Lord:

1. Jesus Christ is God in the flesh
2. Jesus Christ died for the sins of all mankind, was buried, and literally rose from the dead to live forever.
3. Jesus Christ is the only way to the Father, and there is salvation in no other person, doctrine, or belief.
4. Each individual’s eternal destiny will be determined by their relationship (or lack, thereof) to Jesus Christ.

Earl pointed out that this is, in itself, a confession and compared it to the WCF in the following way:

The difference with your confession versus the WCF is that it is shorter, it is informal (not put into a standard form), you wrote it – and of course you think your confession is Biblical where in your opinion the WCF isn’t Biblical.

Earl has a fairly decent point about this being my “confession”, but I think in some ways, the differences are more essential than seems implied by the above comment. Allow me to elaborate on each of the points that Earl has made. I’m going to take them out of order because I want to spend the bulk of my time on one in particular.

My list is informal. This is partly due to the nature of blogging, but also actually comes from my belief that each person should be able to informally articulate their beliefs without just pointing to a confession written by someone else. Consider the fact that Jesus commissioned us to make disciples, not clones! Which leads to the next point…

I wrote it. Some time ago, I wrote on my frustrating experience at being shot down in my ordination council for attempting to write my own statement of faith. I was “encouraged” to simply use the words that others have written in the past. This illustrates the common perception that Christians should not really think too much for themselves, but should simply lean on what has already been done and said. While I don’t eschew the past, or those who have gone before me, this mindset does damage to the priesthood of believers by actually encouraging a lack of thinking.

I think my confession is biblical. Well, I should hope so! But seriously, there seems to be a major point to be made here. Each of my statements are informal representations of things that are specifically stated either by Jesus (statements 3 and 4) or about Jesus (statements 1 and 2) in Scripture itself. These are not statements that are “deduced” from putting various unrelated verses together, redefining a few key words within those verses, and then creating a propositional statement and stating that as truth. And this is one area where I feel the difference between what I wrote related to myself and what the WCF authors wrote is quite large.

My list is shorter (than the WCF). As a matter of fact, my list is shorter than most statements of faith I have come across in my lifetime. And this is the point that I want to focus most specifically on. Why is my list so short? And what are the implications for that list being short?

Earl has drawn some conclusions about the involvement of each of us in the other’s fellowship. In Earl’s opinion, neither one of us would be suitable for leadership in the other’s church. He has acknowledged that I would not be permitted to be a leader in his Presbyterian church. In his own words, “It is true that if you wanted to become an elder in our church, at this stage of your stated beliefs, that wouldn’t happen.” (I would like to know the biblical basis for this conclusion, but I’ll leave that up to Earl to offer at his discretion. It is not necessary at this point.)

However, he then goes on to explain why he thinks he would also be unsuitable for leadership in a simple church here in Boone.

I think it is very unscriptural to not have local bodies so unaccountable to the larger body of Christ. I would strongly encourage your church to move in that direction. I would see that your church is missing out on the wonderful doctrines of grace (as I see how it is taught in the Bible), I would teach those. Just as you would be a square wheel in being a leader at my church, so I would be a triangle wheel at your church. I would cause division and strife. You and I would tear at the peace of our respective churches while trying to put into practice pure doctrine.

This is why I think a short list is so valuable. And this is why I think it is completely necessary to understand the implications of adding to that list. The Westminster Confession of Faith itself acknowledges that some matters of church government do not even come from Scripture. And yet, I believe this is part of what is included in the things Earl says he would “strongly encourage” the church here in Boone to move toward.

Earl also believes that we are “missing out” on something by not subscribing to Calvinism. (Lest anyone here not understand how I got this, you need to understand that “doctrines of grace” is used as a synonym for the five points of Calvinism.) And so, he would feel compelled to teach these. Earl believes that in doing so, he (by his own words) would cause division and strife.

This is a very important point to understand. And I’m grateful that Earl has made the point for me without me having to assume anything here. The major reason I believe that we need to keep our list short is because this is a good step towards preserving the unity of the Body of Christ. By adding to the list things that are legitimately up to interpretation (such as Calvinism, cessationism, eschatology), and by imposing systems on to our practice that are not based on Scripture alone, we end up causing division and strife in the Body.

Take a look at the numerous denominations and divisions in the Body of Christ over the centuries, and tell me that this is what Jesus pictured in John 17 when He prayed that we would be one with each other and with Him. Yet what is the source of most of the denominations that have come into existence? Divisions over non-essential things!

It’s not enough for people in one denomination to say, “We believe baptism should be done in this way.” Instead, they feel like they have to say, “We believe baptism should be done in this way, and any other way is not acceptable to us.” So we divide over sprinkling vs. immersion. Or infant baptism vs. believer baptism. But by not putting that on my list, even though I personally am of the opinion that believer baptism is what is best, I have no problem being in a fellowship with someone who believes in infant baptism. I wouldn’t even have a problem with that person being an elder in our fellowship. Unless they started teaching that infant baptism is the only correct interpretation.

And see, the words I highlighted in bold in the previous paragraph are very important. It is my opinion that a particular interpretation is correct, but I must, must, must be humble enough to recognize that it is still an opinion. I don’t mean this directly at Earl, but a very good and pertinent example is Calvinism vs. Non-Calvinism. The Calvinist must be able to recognize that their systematic theology is still based on interpretation and should be subject to re-evaluation and difference of opinion. I grow very weary (again, this is not directed specifically at Earl) of Calvinists referring to their theology as “biblical theology”, stating that elements of that theology are “clearly” taught in Scripture, even when it is pointed out that words are being redefined, verses are being taken out of context, etc.

But Calvinism isn’t the only system that does this. When I spent some time in a Oneness Pentecostal church, I witnessed quite a few verbal assaults on Trinitarian beliefs without any humility or caution. Likewise, I have gotten into discussions on blogs where (and this happens a lot), people will claim that Trinitarianism is absolutely essential for salvation and therefore for fellowship. Trinitarianism, while I believe it probably comes closest to how I interpret Scripture, is in and of itself an interpretation that should not be held so highly as to slander other interpretations as being “heretical”.

Regardless of whether one holds to “sola scriptura” as a literal statement of “Scripture alone, and only Scripture”, or whether they hold to “sola scriptura” in the sense of “Scripture is the only inspired communication from God, and therefore trumps everything else, but I still can use other documents for evidence”, let’s at least start with what Scripture actually says and draw our boundaries there! If you’ve got to derive some understanding from various passages being cut and pasted together in a very loose fashion, redefine some words, throw in some logical progressions, and then spit out a statement that you believe best represents God’s view on something, be willing to acknowledge the process that got you there, and recognize that some misunderstanding along the chain of progression might have skewed your final result.

Having said all that, you are most welcome in our fellowship, Earl. And if God put you in a place in our fellowship where you were recognized as an elder, I would not be drawing a line and saying that you couldn’t be an elder because of your beliefs in these areas. Expect those beliefs to be challenged, and expect to be asked to defend them biblically (not from the WCF), but also expect hearts to be open to what you had to say. I can only pretty much speak for myself, but in doing so, I would say that the only division and strife that would result would have to be by your own volition, and not from mine.

Until next time,

steve

This entry was posted on Sunday, September 17th, 2006 at 2:08 pm and is filed under General, Scripture Interpretation, Doctrine. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.