Over here,
Doug Wilson gives a good thumbnail summary of R2K. However, I do take exception with Wilson when he says, “R2K is not a first-order heresy.” I will get into that below but allow me to say here that this is really quite generous of Doug given the way he has been pilloried by the R2K lads. I’m not sure they would be as generous with Doug as he has been with them here.
Below we find the dialogue I’m interacting with;
Doug Wilson — “It (R2K) is not a first-order error… I believe this is erroneous teaching. It’s not heresy.”
Interviewer — “You wouldn’t excommunicate over it then?”
Doug Wilson – “No.”
In my estimation, we need to qualify as to whether or not R2K is a first-order heresy. Certainly, we could extend the judgment of charity to laymen who haven’t thought through the implications of R2K and so admit them to non-office-bearing membership. We even could say something like, “While there is no doubt that there are people who are R2K who doubtlessly are Christians, it certainly is the case that R2K is not Christianity.” In short, I think for some people R2K is not first-order heresy.
However, for R2K types who are epistemologically self-conscious about their R2K I do think this is a first-order heresy that would require if the Church in the West were healthy, ex-communication of the epistemologically self-conscious would be warranted for both individuals and congregations.
Keep in mind that R2K effectively strips the Lord Jesus Christ of one of His three offices. R2K denies Jesus Christ, except in a very Gnostic-like tenuous fashion His office as King. For the R2K lads, the Kingship of Christ is “spiritual” and only is applicable in the public square in a barely implicit manner. Their explanation of this doctrine has no historical Reformed legs except for the nomenclature and is a complete innovation pushed on us by Westminster-Cal. @ Escondido and now taken up by every man Jack who holds a terminal degree and teaches at a Reformed Seminary.
And it gets worse because these scofflaws are training a-historical lemmings to bring this R2K bilge into pulpits all across the land thus guaranteeing the absolute evacuation of Jesus from His office as King in hundred if not thousands of churches with the consequence that God’s people are left confused at how they should engage in a culture that is becoming increasingly explicitly anti-Christ. Should the Church speak to sodomy? R2K says that there is not enough of Jesus’ Kingship that allows them to speak to the subject. Should the Church speak to men competing with women as trannys? R2K teaches that Jesus’ office as King does not extend to allow them to preach on that subject. If this isn’t first-order heresy then first-order heresy doesn’t exist. Maybe we can excommunicate for madness? Maybe gaslighting?
Don’t get me wrong. I am under no delusion that any church court is going to go after David Van Drunen, R. Scott Clark, M. Scott Horton, D. G. Hart, Sean Michael Lucas, and their ever-burgeoning ilk. However, let history record that some Reformed gadfly ministering in the hinterlands of Michigan said … “Throw the bums out.”
So, Doug is just wrong. R2K is a first-order heresy as it is taken up by those reputed to be pillars in the Reformed Church who are epistemologically self-conscious about what they are doing. A pox upon them until they repent.
