With this post I continue to dismantle the neo-orthodoxy of Dr. Clay Libolt in a series that he is doing wherein he seeks to dismantle the doctrine of Penal Substitutionary Atonement. Clay is extremely displeased that his denomination (Christian Reformed Church) voted to agree with what Scripture says about sexual perversion. Clay, properly understands that only once the theology of the denomination is changed can the anthropology of the denomination change so that perversion can be embraced as normative. Clay’s articles attacking Penal Substitutionary Atonement is to the end of normalizing sexual perversion.
Clay writes;
I was a reporter at Synod 2022 and reported on the PSA debate. What is not quite clear from the official record is how the delegates seemed to view PSA. Theologians from as long as there has been theology have viewed statements about God as analogical. What we have are our human languages and our perception of the world in which we live. We use these to speak by analogy of what we cannot otherwise know. No one can see directly into the divine world. We speak of it guardedly as a mystery. But not these synod delegates. They seemed to regard PSA simply as the way things are, not only on earth but in heaven. There was a distressing lack of humility in the debate.
Bret responds,
1.) Inasmuch as the delegates to Synod 2022 affirmed Penal Substitutionary Atonement (PSA) it is clear that the delegates viewed as taught in Scripture.
2.) What Clay does above is he changes the meaning of the word analogical to mean equivocal. For something to be equivocal means that it is open to a multitude of interpretations. That is not the meaning of analogical. To speak analogically is to see a parallel of truth in two similar but not exact things. For example, a canoe paddle is analogical of a screw on a Battleship propulsion. Both serve the purpose of propelling the ship forward, and yet they differ in size. When Clay, above, complains that the delegates to 2022 didn’t understand analogical reasoning what he is really complaining about is that the delegates didn’t understand that the atonements’ meaning was equivocal — which is to say that the atonement has no stable meaning.
Clay desires equivocal in language because only by equivocation can room be made for his heretical understanding of the atonement. If the atonement doesn’t have stable meaning then it can mean whatever Clay wants it to mean. So again, Clay complains about the delegates not understanding that there is analogical language used in the atonement, but what he really wants is to define “analogical” to mean “equivocal,” so that atonement can be made to be a wax nose that allows for nearly any interpretation.
3.) Clay continues to seek to try and muddy the atonement scene by insisting that “No one can see directly into the divine world. We speak of it guardedly as a mystery.”
a.) We can see directly into the divine world because we have the Revelation of God and nowhere in the Scriptures is the atonement spoken of as a mystery.
b.) Of course this statement undercuts Clay’s own nouveau revised version of the atonement as well as the long received biblical doctrine of the PSA. If Clay cannot see directly into the divine world, he should speak guardedly of any doctrine of the atonement he prefers only as mystery. By Clay’s own reasoning no doctrine of the atonement (including his) should be championed because “no one can see directly into the divine world.” You see, Clay champions uncertainty about PSA so that he can tell you in the next breath that he is certain about his heretical doctrine of the atonement — and that even though he can’t see directly into the divine world.
4.) Clay continues with the irony by complaining about the lack of humility of the 2022 synodical delegates while seemingly completely missing his own lack of humility as demonstrated by being so certain that they were wrong and he is right. Physician heal thyself when it comes to this lack of humility.
Clay goes on;
But however you understand PSA, whether as a metaphor for God’s grace or as the way things actually happen, the question remains: is it in fact biblical? Do “the Scriptures and confessional standards make clear. . ..” what PSA and the synod claim about God?
Bret responds;
It really is quite astounding and dumbfounding at the same time that Clay would suggest that the Confessions as well as the Scripture does not support PSA. Below we consider just a few statements of the Belgic Confession of Faith which with stark clarity, citing Scripture reference, gives a full throated affirmation of the PSA.
1.) Confessions on PSA;
a.) Article 19 of “The Belgic Confession of Faith” teaches;
Wherefore we confess that He (Jesus the Christ) is very God and very man: very God by His power to conquer death, and very man that He might die for us according to the infirmity of His flesh.
b.) Article 2o of the The Belgic Confession of Faith teaches;
We believe that God, who is perfectly merciful and just, sent His Son to assume that nature in which the disobedience was committed, to make satisfaction in the same and to bear the punishment of sin by His most bitter passion and death.1 God therefore manifested His justice against His Son when He laid our iniquities2 upon Him and poured forth His mercy and goodness on us, who were guilty and worthy of damnation, out of mere and perfect love, giving His Son unto death for us and raising Him for our justification,3 that through Him we might obtain immortality and life eternal.
1 Heb. 2:14; Rom. 8:3, 32–33 2 Isa. 53:6; John 1:29; 1 John 4:9
3 Rom. 4:25
c.) Belgic Confession of Faith Article 21
Article 21
The Satisfaction of Christ, Our Only High Priest, For Us
We believe that Jesus Christ is ordained with an oath to be an everlasting High Priest after the order of Melchizedek,1and that He hath presented Himself in our behalf before the Father to appease His wrath by His full satisfaction,2 by
offering Himself on the tree of the cross, and pouring out His precious blood to purge away our sins, as the prophets had foretold. For it is written, He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon Him, and with His stripes we are healed. He was brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and numbered with the transgressors;
3 and condemned by Pontius Pilate as a malefactor, though he had first declared Him innocent.4 Therefore, He restored that which He took not away,5 and suffered the just for the unjust,6 as well in His body as in His soul, feeling the terrible punishment which our sins had merited; insomuch that His sweat became like unto drops of blood falling on the ground.7 He called out, My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me? 8 and hath suffered all this for the remission of our sins.
Wherefore we justly say with the apostle Paul, that we know nothing but Jesus Christ, and Him crucified;9 we count all things but loss and dung for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus our Lord, 10 in whose wounds we find all manner of consolation. Neither is it necessary to seek or invent any other means of being reconciled to God than this only sacrifice, once offered, by which believers are made perfect forever.11 This is also the reason why He was called by the angel of God, Jesus, that is to say, Savior, because He should save His people from their sins.12
1 Ps. 110:4; Heb. 5:10 2 Col. 1:14; Rom. 5:8–9; Col. 2:14; Heb. 2:17; 9:14; Rom. 3:24; 8:2; John 15:3; Acts 2:24; 13:28; John 3:16; 1 Tim.
2:6
3 Isa. 53:5, 7, 12
4 Luke 23:22, 24; Acts 13:28; Ps. 22:16; John 18:38; Ps. 69:5; 1 Peter 3:18
5 Ps. 69:5
6 1 Peter 3:18
7 Luke 22:44
8 Ps. 22:2; Matt. 27:46
9 1 Cor. 2:2
10 Phil. 3:8 11 Heb. 9:25–26; 10:14 12 Matt. 1:21; Acts 4:12
Clay may not like PSA but in order to avoid it the Christian Reformed Church would either have to change their confessions or failing that, ignore them in order to arrive where Clay arrives.
Part IV to follow.
I’ve commented previously that I believe the substitutionary atonement to be the foundational doctrine of authentic Christianity, and I’m heartened to see you addressing and defending it. I just commented to my pastor yesterday how the church should be focusing on attacks at the heart as opposed to ancillary shield deflections or flesh-wound issues: substantial Luther-Erasmus type issues.
Have you ever read Houston Stewart Chamberlain’s “Foundations of the Nineteenth Century”? He opens questions about how the early church fathers contested canonicity (citing Jewish interpolations in the text), the weight of Jewish oral traditions and how some may have found their way into the written text (the Haggadah), apocryphal writings like the ‘Apocalypse of Baruch’ and the ‘Epistle of Peter to James’.
It would be easier to be dismissive of these arguments if respected early Christians such as Justin Martyr, Eusebius, Chrysostom, Jerome &c. had not held different views regarding all these questions.
My pastor replied that apologetics exists to strengthen and establish the faith of believers, more than to convert the lost. Surely there must be better reasons to hold to the inerrancy of only 66 books than because some church councils in the past took a vote on it?
I’m not so much looking for a reply, as sowing an idea in your mind for a future series of articles in accordance with 1 Peter 3:15. You and I have some very real differences on positions I feel competent to contest, but I’m hopeful your reading and understanding in this area will vastly exceed my own.
Hello Ron,
I might return to this later but w/ all due respect to your pastor I would say he is in error when he says that;
My pastor replied that apologetics exists to strengthen and establish the faith of believers, more than to convert the lost.
My training has taught me that there is no evangelism without apologetics. Nor should there be any apologetics that doesn’t include evangelism. In the end, of course, God must open eyes and raise the dead to life but that most normatively happens in the context of an evangelism that is laden with apologetics.
As it concerns the canon, Protestants have held that the books of the canon are self-attesting. Which is to say that they are not in the canon because someone voted on them to be in the canon but someone voted on them to be in the canon because they were canonical. The voters merely recognized the self-attesting nature of the books in question. The Church did not make the Bible. The Bible made the Church.
I’ll see if I can find some reviews on the Chamberlin book.
Thank you for the encouragement and also for when you challenge me.
Bret