Alienism is a Return to the OT Shadows

In the old and worse covenant if one desired to be part of the people of God one was required to have some kind of attachment to Israel. To have the one true religion meant being in some way attached to the one people of God. Women, in some few instances, could join Israel via marriage. Even this was an exception to the norm. Men could eventually come into the sanctuary of Israel but they could never own land since the land belonged to the blood Hebrews.

In the NT though, and the new and better covenant, members do not have to leave their people in order to attach themselves to the one true God. Instead, as all nations are discipled, all nations in their peculiar expression as a particular people can now be a Christian people serving the one true God.
The Alienists, in their insistence that once one is regenerated, one loses all their previous national attachment and so is free to disregard their ethnic identity because they are now Christian, are returning to a OT ethos where in order to belong to God one must be attached to a singular one people. In the OT that one people was the Hebrew tribe. In the Alienist worldview that one people is the Christian tribe. In making this one for one correspondence the Alienists have lost the NT theme that the Gospel goes to the nations and the nations in their particularity, all will become to God what Israel was alone to God in the OT.

The Alienists have thus errantly imported an OT shadow into the NT fulfillment. The Alienist desires to collect all converts into a New Christian World Order uni hybrid people. The Alienists lose the theme that the nations, in their unique national identities all stream to the mountain of the Lord (Isaiah 2:2 and Micah 4:1). The Alienist lose this same theme fulfilled as witnessed in Revelation 21 where we see the nations entering into the new Jerusalem nation by nation.

In the Alienist vision that is so promoted today in the NAPARC churches the nations lose their identities as particular nations because for the current Alienist (unlike their Kinist Christian forebears) conversion/regeneration means that all colors are allowed to bleed into one. This is the vision long held by the Marxists/Cultural Marxist. Now, it may not be the intent of the Alienists to have fallen into this Marxist paradigm. It may be the case that they have the best of intentions but the bottom line is that they are going back to the OT shadows when the NT teaches that the church is no longer a uni-polar people as it was in the OT but now is a multi-polar people with all the distinctness that necessitates.

Insisting that belonging to the Church means that your God given particularity of ethnos/race is given up and now can be bred out via inter-racial marriage is the same error that was pursued at Babel. It may be even a worse error since at least at Babel they were not pretending that such behavior was God pleasing.

Judas’ Replacement Demonstrating Covenantal Transition

Acts 1:16 Men and brethren, this scripture must needs have been fulfilled, which the Holy Ghost by the mouth of David spake before concerning Judas, which was guide to them that took Jesus…. 21 Wherefore of these men which have companied with us all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and out among us

There is a great deal of discussion whether or not the promises to OT Israel remain to be fulfilled or, rather, if the promises to OT Israel have been fulfilled in how Israel flowered into the Church as God’s people. This is one passage that is overlooked in that debate.

With this passage we see the Apostle’s convinced that there is a necessity that Judas be replaced. The explanation for this absolute necessity is that this moment of redemptive history marks the beginning of the fulfillment of the Spirit prophesied intentions for the new and better “Israel of God.” Israel in its OT infancy is being replaced by Israel in its NT maturity and so as there were twelve patriarchs who anchored the origin of God’s Israel in infancy, so the Israel of the new and better covenant is to have a twelve apostolic anchor serving as the foundation for the Israel of God in its maturity. The old has passed the new has come.

The Gospel of Luke underscores this interpretation wherein Jesus says in 22:30 to the new Apostolic patriarchs that they would “sit on thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel.”  This statement coupled with the action of replacing the traitor Judas underscores a pivotal transition in redemptive history away from OT Israel toward the NT “Israel of God — The Church.” Here we see both continuity and discontinuity. The continuity is found in the necessity to retain a twelve-man patriarchy. The discontinuity is found inasmuch as the patriarchy ruling over the “the kingdom of God has now been taken from OT Israel and given to a nation bearing the fruits of it (Mt. 21:43).”

Peter’s insistence cited in Acts 1 concerning the need for a replacement for Judas, consistent with OT prophecy, is another flag indicating that the redemptive historical moment has occurred wherein the old covenant is eclipsed for the new covenant. God is done with the old covenant Israel and is establishing the new Israel of God. The replacement of Judas is just one indicator of old and worse covenant now being fulfilled in the new and better covenant. There are no promises left for OT Israel.

God is done with them as a nation state, though individuals may certainly enter into the Kingdom of God.

 

A Short Treatise on the Unbelief of Bonhoeffer & His Neo-orthodoxy

Wishing and hoping and
thinking and praying,
planning and dreaming
each night of his charms
that won’t get you into his arms…

Dusty Springfield

I continue to expose the falsity of neo-orthodox/Barthian theology by exposing the non-Christian writing on Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Bonhoeffer, like all of the neo-orthodox do theology by way of contradiction. They do so by the usage of the Hegelian dialectic where two opposite statements or thesis are posited (thesis vs. anti-thesis) only to be resolved by a third statement (the synthesis) allegedly reconciling the two statements into a new thesis statement.

Because chaps like Barth, Bonhoeffer, Pannenberg, and Moltmann excelled at this neo-orthodox methodology they can be easily misunderstood. Because they write purposefully with the confusing dialectical theology method their writings more often than not become a bit of a Rorschach test that ends up telling us more about the reader than it does about the theology of the writer. The reader, because of the ubiquitous contradictions will end up interpreting the particular neo-orthodox theologian in light of their own presuppositions. This usually means that the interpretation is completely botched. Those who are orthodox, who do not understand the Hegelian dialectic will tend to be mesmerized by the “profundity” of the neo-orthodox writers when in point of fact those chaps are writing gibberish.

Bonhoeffer serves as a prime example. Consider this quote on the incarnation;

“Mighty God” (Isa. 9:6) is the name of this child. The child in the manger is none other than God himself. Nothing greater can be said: God became a child. In the Jesus child of Mary lives the almighty God. Wait a minute! Don’t speak; stop thinking! Stand still before this statement! God became a child!

“No priest, no theologian stood at the manger of Bethlehem. And yet all Christian theology has its origin in the wonder of all wonders: that God became human. Holy theology arises from knees bent before the mystery of the divine child in the stable. Without the holy night, there is no theology. “God is revealed in flesh,” the God-human Jesus Christ — that is the holy mystery that theology came into being to protect and preserve.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer 
God Is in the Manger: Reflection on Advent and Christmas

This sounds wonderfully orthodox until one keeps reading Bonhoeffer. Here Bonhoffer has only given one half of his dialectic. Elsewhere he can write,

“The question, ‘How?’, for example, underlies the hypothesis of the virgin birth. Both historically and dogmatically it can be questioned. The biblical witness is ambiguous. If the biblical witness gave clear evidence of the fact, then the dogmatic obscurity might not have been so important. The doctrine of the virgin birth is meant to express the incarnation of God, not only the fact of the incarnate one. But does it not fail at the decisive point of the incarnation, namely that in it Jesus has not become man just like us? The question remains open, as and because it is already open in the Bible.”

Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Christ the Center – p. 105

Here the virgin birth is only a “hypothesis.’ Here the virgin birth is both historically and dogmatically questioned. Here the biblical witness is ambiguous. Here the incarnation fails at the decisive point that Jesus had become a man just like us. Finally, the question of Jesus incarnation remains open as and because it is already an open question in the Bible. It is not God’s revelation that authorizes the incarnation. It is, as we shall see, some kind of mystical encounter with the idea of an incarnation that scripture does not have a final word on the validity of said incarnation.

Here we have the other side of the Hegelian dialectic – the other side of the purposeful contradiction. This is classic “theology by contradiction.” This is classic Hegelianism. This is not orthodox historic Christian theology. This is anti-Christ theology because the Scriptures are set aside as questionable and because the miracle is explained in neo-orthodox theology as myth and myth by definition strips the historical supernatural events of the scripture of both their historicity and their supernatural reality.

Neo-orthodoxy does not believe that the supernatural is possible in the sense of an event demonstrably happening in space and time. However, Neo-orthodoxy saves the impact of the miraculous by insisting that even though the miraculous didn’t occur in space and time history, it did occur in the sense of being part of the belief paradigm of the disciples and the early church. The event, be it incarnation, resurrection, or ascension are not events that actually occurred but were necessary myths that carried the church forward.

With that in mind we understand that Bonhoeffer, like all neo-orthodox theologians are talking out of both sides of their Hegelian mouths. These men believe in a closed universe where the supernatural can’t literally transpire. However, they also understand that an outside word is needed in a fallen world and so they take that which is subjective (the beliefs of the early church that the miracles really happened) and objectify the subjective beliefs of the disciples and the early church so that the result is a subjective objective. The miracles didn’t really occur but the subjective (non-true) beliefs of the disciples regarding the miracles and supernatural, which are recorded in a non-supernatural scripture, end up serving in the stead of the miraculous and the supernatural. Further, the subjective of the early church which has become the objective outside word for the continuing church cannot be really objective until any future convert encounters these same subjective objectives in their own lives, in some kind of mystical personal and private encounter, thus turning the early church’s subjective objectives into their own subjective objective.

What needs to be seen is that there is no objective objective in all this. All there is subjectivity pretending to provide an objective outside word. What happens here is that personal experience is blown up like a helium balloon and that helium balloon subjective experience replaces any notion of an objective Word that genuinely comes from outside of us that is the inspired Word of God.

So, while Bonhoeffer can talk in flowery tones about the incarnation the fact of the matter is that the man does not believe that it actually happened in space and time history. Nor does he believe that Holy Scripture gives a objectively true word regarding the incarnation. However, Bonhoeffer does believe in the incarnation in the sense that it is true for him and for all those who have had a personal and experiential encounter which serves to give the objectively true status of the incarnation.

However, where the neophyte reads Bonhoeffer they can come away being overawed by his piety and feigned humility.

So, having noted all this where is the hegelian dialectic in Bonhoeffer’s writing on the incarnation?

Thesis: The incarnation of Jesus is dubious and scripture certainly does not warrant belief in the fact that Jesus became a man just like us.  The biblical witness does not give clear evidence of the incarnation.

Anti-thesis — God became a child. In the Jesus child of Mary lives the almighty God. God is revealed in the flesh.

Synthesis – Christian theology finds its origin not in the revelation of Scripture but in the subjective “wonder of all wonders.” Theology finds its origins not in the revelation of God but in the subjective “holy mystery.” Note the incarnation is acknowledged but it is acknowledged as unwitnessed by theologians and this despite the presence of the theologians Mary & Joseph who the inspired historian Luke gives record. The emphasis in Bonhoeffer’s wonder lies not in the revelation of Scripture but in the Holy Mystery of it all.

In giving us this dialectic the emphasis falls on the personal encounter and experience of the sovereign individual resting on that same experience and not on the objective inspired Word of God. The incarnation is a myth that becomes true only when someone has a mystical encounter that amounts to putting faith in faith and not faith in God’s revelation.

In this Hegelian dialectic the objective reality of the incarnation (and all miracles) as recorded in Holy Writ fades into the non-reality and is replaced with faith in an event (myth) that we have no objective certainty actually transpired in real space and time.

Neo-orthodoxy is heretical and Bonhoeffer was no Christian.

 

 

Lessons Learned for Clergy from the Massie Defeat

The Massie defeat in the Republican Primary in Kentucky’s 4th congressional district reminds me that it seems one has to make a choice between being right and principled as opposed to swallowing hard having to be wrong so one can retain “leadership” position.

Massie was as principled as they come. I did not like his Libertarianism but there is no doubt the man stuck to his principles. That resolve contributed to his defeat at the hands of a Trump lackey.

This same principle applies in the church. Clergy can be principled standing on truth, resulting in getting tossed by either their congregation or their denomination or they can be compromisers in order to retain their position with the hopes of being able to steer the congregation in the future into a better place with the added benefit of keeping their jobs.

It is fairly obvious that most politicians and clergy are not like Thomas Massie who decided his principles were more important than continuing to give into a President who has repeatedly broken his word to the American public so that Massie could retain his seat. As a result, Massie was defeated by those who wanted to control him but couldn’t. Now his ability, at least for the short term, to have any input into the National conversation is gone, though his principles remain.

Joe Kent, who is now largely forgotten, made the same kind of decision as Massie. He gave up any influence he might have continued to wield in order to stand on his principles.

The conundrum here is found in the fact that if Massie were to have been willing to bend on his principles in order to retain influence, can it really be said that Massie owned those principles he abandoned in order to stay in power?

The lion’s share of clergy are not principled people like Thomas Massie and Joe Kent. They will not stand for the truth come hell or high water. Instead, desiring to keep their position, they will compromise. Some compromise could be understood but the kind of compromise that the putative white hat clergy are involved in right now is sinking the church and sinking the broader culture.

Having said this, I appreciate that clergy are in a tight spot. They have mouths to feed and a future to think of. Taking a strong stand on issues, like Machen did long ago, is a real launching out on faith in God’s ability to provide.

There are clergy, Elders, Deacons, and laity out there who have made a stand and are paying the price for making that stand. Greg Williams, Michael Hunter, Andrew Duggan, Phil Lovelady, Ryan Louis Underwood, the Holden Brothers, Sam Ketchum, etc. I receive phone calls from all across the country inquiring “what should I do.” I don’t have a ready or easy answer. I can only tell folks who phone me, “if you decide to stand on your principles be willing to count the cost and pay the price because your enemies are vicious Marxist dogs who will delight in ripping you apart.” Naturally, I want those who contact me to take a stand because until more come out of the shadows and raise their Ebenezer the promise of Reformation will continue to wane but I understand the incredible pressure that will descend if people determine to fight like Machen did long ago or like Massie and Joe Kent did recently.

I’d like to tell folks, “if you would just plant your flag and make a stand, all will be well.” I can’t and so don’t tell them that. In this life it doesn’t always end with, “and they lived happily ever after.” It may be the case that they have to pay a steep price if they make a stand on their principles. Machen was driven from his denomination in shame. Massie lost an election. Many other have lost a great deal more.

I do admire people for even wrestling with the tension despite how they eventually choose. I imagine Joe Kent spent many sleepless nights before deciding to resign. Most clergy don’t wrestle at all. They lick their fingers and stick them in the air to see which way the wind is blowing and tack in that direction. Those clergy that are even more inept than the finger lickers don’t even understand the issue. They are just floating downstream with the current, collecting their checks week in and week out.

It is not an easy path for someone who is continuing to grow in epistemological self consciousness. Such growth promises peril, and resistance.

Being postmillennial in my eschatology, I do believe the truth will win out. I do believe that there are deep and wide Reformations ahead of us. However, that path to Reformation is going to be blazed by those who were willing to hoist the black flag and wage war against the spirit of the age according to the principle of “no quarter asked for and no quarter given.” Goodness knows, the clergy enemy is waging that kind of war against the saints.

ARP Special Moderator Report on Kinism Discovered to Have Invented Facts

https://pactuminst.substack.com/p/arp-special-moderators-committee

Wherein it is demonstrated by the Director of the Pactum Institute, Dr. Adi Schlebush, that not only does the ARP get the facts wrong, but also that the ARP was creating “facts” and footnotes out of thin air.

How can this kind of mistake be made in an official document and any credibility be retained by the organization inventing facts and footnotes in order to try and substantiate their libel?