“Don’t get me wrong, we need some Christians (though, undoubtedly, not as many as we have now) to participate in the maelstrom of cultural commentary, just like we need Christians in every non-sinful area of human activity. Political punditry is a legitimate calling. It’s just not the pastor’s calling. The man who comments constantly on the things “everyone is talking about” is almost assuredly not talking about the things the Bible is most interested in talking about. That word “constant” is important. It takes wisdom to know when jumping in the fray might be necessary, but we don’t need pastors looking like a poor man’s version of the Daily Wire or the New York Times.”
Dr. Rev. Kevin DeYoung
Just Another Confused “Reformed” Clergy
There has been a good deal of noise in the past few years about how “Pastors need to stay in their lanes.” This originally came from the R2K crowd who insisted and insists still that Pastors shouldn’t speak to public square issues. Recently, Dr. Stephen Wolfe and the whole Thomist crowd has likewise been seeking to shame pastors into shutting up about any number of issues because any number of issues aren’t theology and Pastors should only speak on theology. I am hopeful that Wolfe and his crowd are saying their version of the R2K mantra because so many Clergy are indeed idiots who probably shouldn’t even be preaching on theology proper, never mind any other subject.
However, all of this complaint about Preachers “staying in their lane,” or “preachers not being political pundits” really is driven by the reality that these people complaining don’t see the organic nature of either theology or reality. Because reality and theology both are organic a minister doesn’t have to have a terminal degree in this or that subject matter in order to speak to the issue with wisdom. A minister doesn’t have to have a Ph.D. in economics to preach a sermon on how the Federal Reserve or Inflation is a violation of the 8th commandment. A minister doesn’t have to have attended the London School of economics to point out that the Scripture and the confessions rail against the usury we see in modern economic systems. A minister can preach a sermon on Just War Theory from the 6th commandment without having had to secure a degree on International Relations. These are but a few examples of dozens that I could give wherein a minister is quite in his lane were he to preach on these subjects at any given point.
Inasmuch as there is clear theological commentary in the Scripture on any given subject (and there seldom is not clear theological commentary in Scripture on any given subject) then the minister is called to be a political pundit, a sociological pundit, an economic pundit, a legal pundit, etc.
The problem here is that the Church by in large is abominating Worldview thinking which provides a foundation for understanding that both reality and theology are organically intertwined. Worldview thinking grants us the ability to see that theology drives everything and as theology drives everything then theology as coming from the pulpit can speak to everything. Why should we leave God’s people in the pew to have to choose for themselves from a smorgasbord of contesting pundits who each might insist that, despite their differing punditry, they are all “speaking for the Lord.” Why shouldn’t God’s people hear a “Thus saith the Lord” from the pulpit on, for example, how to take care of widows, or how slaves should treat their Masters, or how Scripture requires money to have real value, or that God has created only two sexes, or that Kinism is God’s norm for peoples?
The problem we have from our pulpits today is that clergy are not trained to see all of life as organically related. Nor are they taught that everything is driven by theology. In point of fact there is a huge push now from both R2K and the Thomist crowd to insist that theology in point of fact does NOT drive everything. I guess, if I have to listen to a clergy member from that school, I wouldn’t want to have their punditry on just about anything. Indeed, I wouldn’t want to have to hear their punditry on how their are two ways to come to truth — we come to truth through faith which subject matter belongs in the church and through reason which subject belongs outside the church.
You see, DeYoung has quaffed the R2K poison. (Looking at some of his old articles demonstrates that.) Wolfe, being a Thomist, has likewise quaffed from the same receptacle. Because of that these chaps are forever telling clergy to shut up on any subject matter that isn’t narrowly defined as having to do with the individual soul or having to do with church life. Other areas like Jurisprudence, Education, Arts, Politics, International Relations, Economics, etc. are all areas that are outside the “grace realm” and so ministers should not preach on these matters. Never mind that they are each and all driven by theological considerations upon which the Scripture is quite clear.
I am glad that this type of thinking we see coming from so many of the “educated class” was not present among our clergy in the American Colonies as they resisted the tyranny of British Crown and Parliament. Famously known as “The Black Robed Regiment” the ministers of that time rose in their pulpits and gave the mind of God on the matter of British tyranny. DeYoung would have labeled it all “political punditry,” and waved his finger at them seeking to shame them.
Then there were the Crusade Preachers, led by Bernard of Clairvaux. They went across Europe preaching Crusade against both the Jews and the Muslims. I’m sure DeYoung looks back on that era and has a cow.
In the end DeYoung’s advice fails on three accounts;
1.) It implies that Pastor can’t speak on these matters since God has no divine Word on these matters.
2.) It implies that the Scriptures do not talk about every condition of man and as such defies the maxim; “All of Christ for all of life.”
3.) Kevin is guilty of the very same thing he tells others not to be guilty of. In this article Kevin is serving as a clergy political pundit who is telling others not to be clergy political pundits. Kevin is giving clergy everywhere political punditry by telling them to be a-political. Physician heal thyself.
Finally, I want to mention here a wee bit of how Kevin has tipped his hand here. He warns against clergy becoming poor men’s version of the New York Times or the Daily Wire. New York Times and Daily Wire? Has Kevin just revealed to us where he goes to for his punditry? Why didn’t Kevin say instead; “A poor man’s version of American Renaissance or the Barnes Review….or Human Events or the Occidental Review?”
In the end it is my conviction that Kevin is just a stale old neo-con and I for one am hoping he takes his own advice and steers away from political punditry from the pulpit and leave that kind of thing to experts like me. 😉
Amen