Rev. Joseph Spurgeon Insistence That All Local Churches Must be Willing to be Polyglot – Part I

“Michael Spangler (whose ordination was revoked by his former Presbyterian denomination) and his followers argue that the error of Peter in Galatians 2 was only about Judaizing and therefore has nothing to do with ethnicity. They argue that because the underlying heresy was justification by works, Paul’s rebuke has no application to modern attempts to divide Christians along racial or ethnic lines.

But this misses the point entirely.”

Bret responds,

1.) Note how RJS seeks to poison the well by going out of his way to mention that Spangler’s was ordination was revoked without also telling us that on this point Spangler’s denomination formed a Kangaroo court in order to revoke his ordination.

2.) We should remember here that Spurgeon is not only arguing against Spangler but he is arguing against long recognized reformed theologian Dr. John Frame who wrote,

“Scripture, as I read it, does not require societies, or even churches, to be integrated racially. Jews and Gentiles were brought together by God’s grace into one body. They were expected to love one another and to accept one another as brothers in the faith. But the Jewish Christians continued to maintain a distinct culture, and house churches were not required to include members of both groups.”

John Frame,
“Racism, Sexism, Marxism”

3.) That the Church may indeed be divided along ethnic lines is clearly taught in Scripture in Revelation 21,

²² But I saw no temple in it, for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are its temple. ²³ The city had no need of the sun or of the moon to shine ^[l]in it, for the ^[m]glory of God illuminated it. The Lamb is its light. ²⁴ And the nations ^[n]of those who are saved shall walk in its light, and the kings of the earth bring their glory and honor ^[o]into it.

Here we see that it is the nations by nations that come into the new Jerusalem. The church is constituted as a nation of nations. One body… any member nations.

RJS writes,

No one denies that the Judaizers were teaching a false gospel. The question is how Peter participated in that error. Peter did not deny justification by faith with his mouth. Peter did not begin preaching salvation by circumcision. Peter’s sin was his conduct. He withdrew from Gentile believers and separated himself from them.

Why did Paul rebuke him so publicly?

Because Peter’s actions communicated something false about the nature of Christ’s church. His separation suggested that faith in Christ was not enough for full fellowship among God’s people. A dividing wall had been rebuilt where Christ had torn one down.

Bret responds,

Pretend that Peter and Paul had been eating with a bunch of converted Jews who were no longer trying to keep the ceremonial law in order to be justified, before the Judaizers arrived. Pretend that Peter pulled away when the Judaizers showed up and Paul spoke harshly to Peter for pulling away from the Jewish non ceremonial law table arrangements.  The issue for Paul was NOT ethnicity. Paul would have been just as upset with Peter if Peter had pulled away from eating with converted Jews  by the self righteous Judaizers. Spurgeon has misunderstood Galatians 2.

RJS,

In his article on race realism, Spangler spends much of his time defending propositions that are not actually in dispute. Churches are often homogeneous. Churches are often shaped by language, nation, culture, and providence.

Different peoples have different histories, customs, and strengths. None of that proves his point.

The issue is not whether churches are often homogeneous. The issue is whether race and ancestry may become a principle of ecclesiastical separation.

Bret responds

Quoting from a source that wishes to remain anonymous,

What Spangler et al are pushing back against is NOT the occasional exception or visitor but what is tantamount to ethnic invasion and replacement attempting to seek legitimacy in local churches whose foremost duty is to its own people and their God-given covenants of blood and kin.

Once again, Spurgeon is engaging in categorical conflation. A right to the general church doesn’t mean a right to all individual chapters and iterations of said church. An ancillary situation brings this into greater clarity: a stranger may be invited to family worship but cannot demand admittance. National and ethnic considerations clearly intersect with church worship. A Japanese Christian could not simply fly to Germany and demand membership and voting rights in a German church. He could visit or become a non-voting member who submits himself to the local customs and habits but his foreign expression of being mediated by his racial and cultural identity make him incompatible with the duties and privileges of full membership.

RJS writes,

Spangler appeals repeatedly to prudence. He argues that separation may be justified by social tensions, cultural differences, immigration, national concerns, or the preservation of a people. But the Judaizers also had prudential arguments. They wanted peace between Jews and Gentiles. They wanted continuity with ancient customs. They wanted to avoid scandal among conservative Jews. They wanted to preserve a distinct people.

Paul did not deny that tensions existed. He did not deny that practical concerns were real. He asked a different question: Was Peter’s conduct in step with the truth of the gospel?

Bret responds,

This is an untrue observation on Spurgeon’s part.

The prudential reasons that Spangler has for distinct bodies of people never excludes the doctrine of Justification by faith alone from any of the distinct bodies that might form, whereas the putatively prudential reason the Judaizers had for distinct bodies was the denial and elimination of the doctrine of justification by faith alone. That can hardly be considered a valid prudential reason. Spurgeon error here is monumental.

I would also doubt that the Judaizers ever wanted peace with Christians, except on the terms of denying the faith. Nothing Spangler writes denies the faith.

RJS writes

That is still the question.

A nation may have concerns about preserving its culture, customs, language, and people. Families certainly have an interest in preserving their own heritage and lineage. But the church is not a nation, and it is not an ethnic association. The church is the assembly of those united to Christ by faith.

Bret responds

The church universal certainly is not a single nation but the church is a nation of nations. We see that throughout scripture. We have already mentioned the Revelation 21 passage earlier. Here we quote from NT theologian Martin Wyngaarden,

“More than a dozen excellent commentaries could be mentioned that all interpret Israel as thus inclusive of Jew and Gentile, in this verse, — the Gentile adherents thus being merged with the covenant people of Israel, though each nationality remains distinct.”

“For, though Israel is frequently called Jehovah’s People, the work of his hands, his inheritance, yet these three epithets severally are applied not only to Israel, but also to Assyria and to Egypt: “Blessed be Egypt, my people, and Assyria, the work of my hands, and Israel, mine inheritance.” 19:25.

Thus the highest description of Jehovah’s covenant people is applied to Egypt, — “my people,” — showing that the Gentiles will share the covenant blessings, not less than Israel. Yet the several nationalities are here kept distinct, even when Gentiles share, in the covenant blessing, on a level of equality with Israel. Egypt, Assyria, and Israel are not nationally merged. And the same principles, that nationalities are not obliterated, by membership in the covenant, applies, of course, also in the New Testament dispensation.”

Martin Wyngaarden
The Future of the Kingdom in Prophecy and Fulfillment: A Study of the Scope of “Spiritualization” in Scripture — pp. 101-102.

Spurgeon isn’t escaping this “nationing” of the church. Spurgeon merely desires each individual church to be able to be a polyglot national church.

The missing context to a whites’ only church, that RJS seems to miss is that it should be normative on a national scale that immigration is so vanishingly small that in a white country whites only is the default. The current social order of racial and ethnic leveling and forced integration is itself illegitimate and so forces white churches into making choices that they should not have to make in the first place.

RJS writes,

The New Testament recognizes nations, tribes, tongues, and peoples. It does not make ancestry a term of communion.

Bret responds,

Again, Spurgeon misses the point. The Church universal is a nation of nations but not all local churches must turn themselves into outposts of the United Nations.

We repeat what Frame offered earlier,

“Scripture, as I read it, does not require societies, or even churches, to be integrated racially. Jews and Gentiles were brought together by God’s grace into one body. They were expected to love one another and to accept one another as brothers in the faith. But the Jewish Christians continued to maintain a distinct culture, and house churches were not required to include members of both groups.”

John Frame,
“Racism, Sexism, Marxism”