Author: jetbrane

I am a Pastor of a small Church in Mid-Michigan who delights in my family, my congregation and my calling. I am postmillennial in my eschatology. Paedo-Calvinist Covenantal in my Christianity Reformed in my Soteriology Presuppositional in my apologetics Familialist in my family theology Agrarian in my regional community social order belief Christianity creates culture and so Christendom in my national social order belief Mythic-Poetic / Grammatical Historical in my Hermeneutic Pre-modern, Medieval, & Feudal before Enlightenment, modernity, & postmodern Reconstructionist / Theonomic in my Worldview One part paleo-conservative / one part micro Libertarian in my politics Systematic and Biblical theology need one another but Systematics has pride of place Some of my favorite authors, Augustine, Turretin, Calvin, Tolkien, Chesterton, Nock, Tozer, Dabney, Bavinck, Wodehouse, Rushdoony, Bahnsen, Schaeffer, C. Van Til, H. Van Til, G. H. Clark, C. Dawson, H. Berman, R. Nash, C. G. Singer, R. Kipling, G. North, J. Edwards, S. Foote, F. Hayek, O. Guiness, J. Witte, M. Rothbard, Clyde Wilson, Mencken, Lasch, Postman, Gatto, T. Boston, Thomas Brooks, Terry Brooks, C. Hodge, J. Calhoun, Llyod-Jones, T. Sowell, A. McClaren, M. Muggeridge, C. F. H. Henry, F. Swarz, M. Henry, G. Marten, P. Schaff, T. S. Elliott, K. Van Hoozer, K. Gentry, etc. My passion is to write in such a way that the Lord Christ might be pleased. It is my hope that people will be challenged to reconsider what are considered the givens of the current culture. Your biggest help to me dear reader will be to often remind me that God is Sovereign and that all that is, is because it pleases him.

Baxter Begins Orientation At Transylvania Reformed Global Missions

Entry II

Baxter walked into the training center at the Headquarters of Transylvania Reformed Global Missions for orientation week.

At a circular shaped table were cute little name tags with each member of the teams name placed where they were to sit. The name tags had been computer generated and on the left side of the name was a picture of the globe and on the right side of the name was a Cross. Baxter thought that was cute.

Baxter picked up his name tag and casually moved his seating assignment so that he was sitting at the location closest to the exit which also had the felicitous advantage of having a wall at his back. In doing so he placed the name tag of ‘Shanicka,’ that had been at the seat he had adopted over to where his name tag had previously been. Baxter didn’t figure anybody would notice the switch.

Eventually the rest of the team began to arrive along with the TRGM staff.

The leader of the orientation week was a Rev. Lynne VanderVries-Masters. Baxter figured she was about 7 months pregnant.

“Welcome to the TRGM orientation week,” Lynne said. “We have a special welcome prepared for you today.”

With this Lynne introduced a William Lincoln who proceeded to begin a rap song.

“J-Man he did come to save
heal the sick and roll the grave
The J-Man he broke all the rules
Now you join his troop of fools

J-Man, J-Man, we need you
J-Man, J-Man, to help us woo
J-Man, J-Man, to find the lost
J-Man, J-Man, to bear all cost”

This cadence continued for some time but Baxter, having gone into ‘incredulity mode,’ missed most of the rest of the ‘lyrics.’ Later, he figured he’d catch the rest of the lyrics on ‘TransylvaniaTube.’

Baxter’s incredulity mode was shattered by a resounding ovation at the completion of Mr. Lincoln’s rap song. Baxter wondered why his Father hadn’t warned him about this kind of thing.

Rev. Lynne stepped forward and said with a smile straight out of a Crest commercial, “We wanted all of you to see that there are many ways to do evangelism and that we should take our audience into account when we speak of the J-Man.” After pausing to giggle appropriately Rev. VanderVries-Masters continued, “It is so important that we get past ‘traditional’ evangelism approaches, if only because we are no longer dealing with ‘traditional’ people. We hope that this rap song will stretch your evangelism comfort zone.”

Baxter wanted to ask how ‘evangelism’ was being defined but he figured that they would eventually get to that so he decided to hold his questions.

After this Rev. Lynne decided that they would have a ‘testimony time’ so the group could get to know each other.

There was about 25 people in the group and in the course of the next two hours Baxter heard recounted just about every sin and dysfunction he could imagine. There was Pete, the former Seminary student, who had quit Seminary because he lost God and who was going on the mission trip with hope of finding God again. There was Alice, the Christian who had become a coke addict but who had repented and was going on mission trip in hope of ‘trying to make up a little bit for my mistakes.’ There was Shanicka, who used to hate white people, but who had come to realize that most white people didn’t realize how racist they were. This had given her the ability to forgive them. There was Henry the former Cabbie from Kansas City who had more sordid stories then Baxter could remember. Baxter wondered if this was what the forced confessions in the re-education camps in Communist countries looked like. He had read about those re-education camps and all these testimonies bore a faint resemblance to what he had read.

Finally it was Baxter’s turn to ‘give his testimony.’

Baxter cleared his throat and said with some embarrassment over his inability to compete with the other inmates,

“Folks, I was baptized as a infant. I grew up in a Christian home. My parents were and are outstanding. They have taught me to continue to trust my Elder Brother Jesus my whole life. They have taught me that I am a sinner and need Jesus. They have trained me in the ways of the covenant. Every week we feast on Christ and my Father reminds us that Christ is for us and forgives our sins. That’s about the extent of my Christian testimony.”

Everyone just stared at Baxter.

Finally, after a pregnant pause, Rev. Lynne said, ‘thats nice Baxter. We are happy for you.’

Baxter thought the tone in her voice sounded like something besides happiness.

With the testimonies completed they were excused for a break.

“When we come back,” Rev. Lynne said, “we will learn about how Reformed people do evangelism.”

Baxter went out to his car and fished around in his glove box where he found his flask. He had never had such a desire for a shot. He figured he’d take two pulls. One to get over what he had just witnessed and one to prepare him for whatever came next.

Grace & Nature — A small Taxonomy

Those of you following Iron Ink you will have noticed that I am providing a running condensation and commentary on Kuyper’s, “Lectures on Calvinism.” We have been dealing with Kuyper’s case of how the issue of God’s relation to man becomes foundational for the kind of culture that a people build. There have been some interesting comments on that.

I woke up this morning with something going through my head that might be helpful in terms of providing a kind of taxonomy for Kuyper’s analysis.

Paganism — The upper realm of Grace overtakes the lower realm of Nature so that grace and nature are indistinguishable. Animism.

Modernism — The lower realm of Nature overtakes the upper realm of Grace so that nature and grace are indistinguishable. Materialism.

Islam (Neo-orthodoxy) — The Upper realm of Grace and the Lower realm of Nature are completely isolated and divorced from one another. Hyper-transcendence leads to immanentism.

Romanism — The Church serves as the talisman and conduit between the Upper realm of Grace and the lower realm of nature. The Church mediates salvation.

Escondidoism — The Upper realm of Grace can only be found in the Church. The lower realm of Nature is isolated from the Upper realm Grace in what is called the common realm.

Calvinism – The Upper realm of Grace transforms the lower realm of nature without the lower realm being turned into or confused with the Upper realm. Grace and nature remain distinct though never divorced.

Cultural Analysis & Russert’s Death

At the risk of sounding like a cold hearted bastard, I have to ask the question; What gives with the whole Tim Russert dying thing?

Given the media exposure that this is getting you would have thought Princess Diana had died again.

Now, whenever death visits any family I am saddened, and I am saddened for the Russert’s loss but I’m still not sure why this death has to be reported on in the way it is. The problem is not that I am put off by a death being reported. The problem is that great numbers of people die yearly that are more influential public persons then Russert was and yet, comparatively speaking, very little is said about their deaths because they are not part of the Hollywood-Media elite family.

I conclude a few things,

First, the media assumes that America loves the same people they love. If I had access to television and print media I suppose that with the death of each of the lambs in the flock I serve I would broadcast it everywhere. This is what the media is doing. They loved Tim Russert and having the control of the levers of the media they are making America share their grief.

Second, one must understand that you can tell a great deal about a people when you look at who they grieve. America’s Hollywood and Media personality culture is evidenced in the way that we are all being held captive to the elites grief, and inasmuch as average Americans are truly grieving it reveals how America is a culture which has taken the Hollywood and Media elite as their representatives. Since I don’t particularly esteem the Hollywood and Media personality culture I am not particularly prone to grieving one of their own as if he was one of my own.

Third, the Hollywood and Media elite are overwhelmingly comprised of people who have no use for Christian notions of God and religion. As such, when a sudden death like this hits them they have no way to handle it. They are a people without God and without hope. When a death of a comparatively young colleague comes suddenly, like Russert’s has, they are brought face to face with their own mortality and like children scared of the night they have to yell out. Given the fact they have all the microphones, when the Hollywood and Media elite ‘yell out’ everyone is forced to listen.

I am honestly saddened for the Russert’s in their time of loss. It is sad whenever somebody this young and productive is summoned. I sorrow more for a culture whose grief is wrapped up in a Hollywood and Media elite culture.

Dear Pastor — Ask The Pastor

This response to my recent post analyzing the problems of alternate schooling comes from a young man who is alternately insightful and muddled in his thinking. I thought I would turn it into a post in order to continue to tease out different understandings that contend for the privilege of being called ‘Reformed.’

Bret,

Having strong (W2K, viral, I know!) views on education myself, I can’t help but wonder if at the base of your frustrations are a couple of things: 1) the over-realization of the purpose and function of education, and 2) the necessarily low view or under-realization of the institution of the family.

Steve, allow me to deal with these in reverse order. My conviction is that schooling should not be shipped out and should be done in the family setting. I believe that when we ship our children out to strangers we have a necessarily low view of the institution of the family. I believe therefore this would include you as, as I recall, you farm out your children to be educated by strangers. My conviction on the family is that it should be the primary building block for the Church, the realm that should make modern schools obsolete, and the first Republic. I don’t know how anybody could have a higher view of the family than myself.

As to your suggestion that I have an over-realization of the purpose and function of education I would only reply by saying that I’m sure that would seem to be the case to somebody who suffers from an under-realization of the purpose and function of education. This disagreement stems from our different eschatologies. You are forever going to be accusing me of a over-realized eschatology and I am going to forever be rightly discerning your problem of a under-realized eschatology. This push-me, pull-you on eschatology between us is going to affect every issue and every discipline.

While there is most assuredly an intellectual aspect to it (that is unashamedly undermined in both cult and culture as both take their cues from a modernism that has rendered an epistemological choice between reason and experience), the end result to these presuppositions seems to be an equally aberrant intellectualization of Christian belief. Is the answer to the de-intellectualization of the Christian religion even as it becomes exchanged for the experientialism of revivalism really to indulge the notion that Christian belief is to be farmed out to the classroom instead of the home and church?

Well, I should emphasize for readers that we have a couple points of agreement here.

1.) We agree that our educational models are suffering intellectually.

2.) We agree that there is a danger to the Christian faith both from an unbliblical experientialism and a unbiblical rationalism.

Moving on, I hope in my first paragraph above I have squelched any idea that ‘Christian belief should be farmed out to the classroom instead of the home and church.’ My conviction is that the classroom, and home, and church while decidedly distinct are interdependent and all share the responsibility to be shapers of faith. Education, being a distinctly religious undertaking, Christian parents should be slow to farm out their children to classrooms governed by people who are not epistemologically self conscious regarding their Christianity.

You seemingly fault me for heading in a direction that you fear will result in a aberrant intellectualization of the Christian faith. We should say that Christianity is eminently, though not exclusively, rational and as such the intellectual aspect of Christianity should be pursued with vigor. Indeed, I would contend, that this is supported by the teaching of Jesus when he said that eternal life is to know the only true God and the Christ that He sent. The only way to know God is through the intellect. This is a truism that is accepted by all save the mystics. Now, to qualify, I understand that there exists such a thing as arid rationalism that is to be hated but the pursuit of rationality need not end in arid rationalism.

In my experience with the Dutch Reformed community (the CRC) that places such a high premium on Xian education there seems to be this notion that what the home should be doing—nurturing faith—can be co-opted by the school. I find that completely, well, sub-Christian. The project of education is primarily intellectual, not affective. It is the role of the home to be primarily affective. My wife and I nurture Christian belief in our kids, not Mr. or Mrs. VanVanderVandeMeer.

Speaking from what I have seen after 13 years of affiliation with the CRC, I would agree that there existed a idea that the school and the catechism at Church should do what should have been going on in the home. I agree that such a notion is sub-Christian. But allow me to suggest that one reason this failed is that the schools and the Churches became co-opted by the larger culture. Consequently, the nurturing of Christian faith, was not be accomplished anywhere, though the nurturing of the faith of modernism was happening in the church and in the school.

I would take issue with you in your third sentence above. You seem to desire to separate the intellectual from the affective. This is not possible. If the education is successful in its project of the intellect it will also have been successful in the work of the affective. Similarly, if the home is successful in its affective work it will only be due to the fact that it has been successful, in doing intellectual work. Steve, you can not separate these two the way that you seem to be doing. Certainly the two are distinct but they are not un-related. Where ever you send your children to be educated you can be sure that they are learning the affective, and are being nurtured in some faith system.

This disagreement between us stems from our disagreement on the Lordship of Jesus and how that is exercised. You, of course, are wrong.

In the same way that theonomic thoughts ends up politicizing true religion, I strongly detect on your part this same assumption that results in an intellectualizing of Christian belief. Instead of seeing that Christianity in the business of making believers you seem to see it as a project of making students.

Look, Steve, you’ll have to take this problem up with Jesus. It was Jesus who called us to be disciples. Hard to be a disciple without being a student Steve. Further, it was Jesus who said that we were to teach them to observe all things that I have commanded you.’ If I am teaching people to observe all things and they are learning to observe all things doesn’t that make them ….students?

Steve, this culture, is designed to keep people ignorant and stupid. Dumb people are easier to control. Legion are the names of the books that have made this point. In light of this reality the accusation that you level against me of wanting to seeking to make students is, shall we say, ‘odd.’

Finally, nobody need to worry about any lack of affections or emotions on my part. They work just fine.

Your hunch that Xian schools are just glorified government schools is correct, at least around here. (I also see it as very much a carried over effort in the effort to maintain a particularly ethnic project, to keep the Dutch migratory culture sufficiently cohered; this against the fact that cultural assimilation has been finalized and renders the effort quite irrelevant. The only thing left to lean on to justify Xian education is that mistake which leads people to believe that Xians doing education is the same thing as Xian education.) But, unlike you, I only see that as a problem because I see no value in paying for a glorified public school education. And I am not compelled to to go on the wild goose-chase to find real Xian education since it doesn’t exist.

Well, we agree completely in this paragraph until your last sentence. I wouldn’t pay a thin dime for my children to attend Dutch ‘Christian’ schools. Indeed, I would pay good money in order for my children not to go to them. I even agree that you shouldn’t go on a wild goose chase, because I seriously doubt there is any real Christian education in your area. Where we disagree is when you utter complete tripe by saying that there is not such a thing as genuine Christian education. That is just a stupid statement.

But I understand your ‘theology’ forces you to that conclusion.

Thanks for the letter. I honestly believe you to be, in many regards, a sharp fellow. But like so many in your school you sharpness in one statement is immediately negated by your dullness in a succeeding statement.

Take care. I continue to pray for your Church that it might find a godly pastor.

Do Alternate School Settings Fix All That Is Broken?

Most people think because I am anti-government schooling that automatically makes me pro-homeschooling or pro private school. Nothing could be further from the truth.

My experience with most (not all) alternate schooling is that it is even more dangerous because it hires teachers trained in Colleges who use a curriculum that is humanistic. This
means that, unless the prospective teachers have done the extraordinarily hard work of reinterpreting their humanistic training through a Biblical grid, they remain government school teachers even though they are working for a ‘Christian school.’ This results in alternate schools, that are supposed to be teaching a uniquely Christian and World life view to give its imprimatur upon a teacher who is teaching out of a humanist world and life view. Hence, what I am seeing in most the alternate schooling settings that I am exposed to are teachers who, like their government school counterparts, are not epistemologically self-conscious about their Christian faith. The consequence of this is that though they affirm the Christian faith they are still thinking and teaching as those who share many of the premises of the culture they are part of and so they do not have the ability to think, and thus teach in a theo-centric fashion. Christian school administrators hire these people because they likewise don’t know what it means to think with a Christian World and life view.

Another problem with non-government alternate schooling is that the curriculum that is used isn’t particularly ‘Christian.’ After 20 years of homeschooling I can tell you that a great deal of curriculum out there that is advertising itself as Christian isn’t. In many private schools the curriculum that is used is not much better then what might be found in government schools. As a result what happens in many educational venues is that you have people teaching who have not reinterpreted their academic discipline through a Christian grid teaching a curriculum that is not written from a Christian grid. This eventuates in students who are nice (because they are attending a place with a Christian ethos) but who are as captive to the presuppositions of the culture they are part of as their friends who go to government schools.

A third problem with non-government alternate schooling is that the parents, like the teachers mentioned earlier, don’t know what it means to think in a distinctly Christian fashion. This means that they don’t have the ability to hold the feet of rogue teachers and administrators to the fire. Sadly, my experience has been that many parents who home school don’t want to know themselves or don’t see the need for their children to know what it means to think as a Christian. This was brought home to me recently when a parent of one of the students I teach was queried by some of her evangelical friends about why she bothered to send her daughter to my Worldview class to read ‘those books that your daughter will never use.’ (We were reading Schlossberg’s “Idols For Destruction” at the time.) They thought the class didn’t have any practical value and they gave these parents a bit of a hard time. It was brought home again when a major metropolitan area near to me held Worldview conferences for 15-20 year olds for a week during the summers but could only garner 50 or so students every year. This community was well known for it’s Reformed presence but despite bringing in well known quality people to speak at these conferences there was not enough interest to keep the conferences going past a few summers.

A fourth problem with non-government alternate schooling is that for those who are trying to be epistemologically self-conscious about their teaching the support networks are limited. My personal experience over the years was that when I attended what was supposed to be support networks I left more frustrated by what I was hearing in relation to the education going on in homes then I was before I arrived. I quit attending these functions early on because I figured I didn’t need to go looking for frustration when I could find it everywhere around me.

A fifth problem is that there are very few Churches that are willing to stress the importance of decidedly Christian thinking. Parents who do not hear from the pulpit the importance and necessity of being able to think, in concrete terms, as a Christian aren’t likely to see its importance. Parishioners who are not taught in Sunday School or in mid-week settings what Christian History, or Christian Economics, or Christian theory of Law looks like aren’t going to see the issue as that important, and so aren’t going to desire it for their children.

A sixth problem is that most evangelicals really don’t believe in the absolute and exhaustive sovereignty of God. Without that foundational conviction, teaching Christian thinking is really not possible. All of Christian thinking begins and ends with the sovereign God, who because of His omnipotence, all facts find their meaning in Him. Similarly, the failure to see Christ as the risen epistemological Prophet-King, who, because of His work as High Priest, teaches us to think in Redeemed ways leads to a lackluster approach in educational efforts. For to many evangelicals Christ remains the Redeemer of souls but not minds.

Most of my (admittedly anecdotal) experience with the alternate schooling community in the broader evangelical world over the last 20 years has caused me to conclude that most of what is going on in alternate school settings is just another variant of government schooling. I have seen students and parents who don’t care, don’t know, and don’t want to know. I have met very few parents who provide alternate schooling for their children who realize how much work it takes for student and teacher alike to teach their children to become epistemologically self conscious so that they develop the ability to see the culture in which they are living. Even in families that pursue alternate schooling the assumption seems to be that it is not important to think Worldviewishly.

In closing I should add that most of the parents and students I have spoken of above who pursue alternate schooling are swell people. As long as one doesn’t talk about anything important they are delightful conversation partners. Many of them would give you the shirt off their backs to help you. Over the years I have been humbled many times by their kindnesses and support to me and my family. The challenge I have offered here does not speak to their overall niceness but rather to the urgency for them and their children to take every thought to make it captive to Christ.

So you see, the problem that we have in terms of seeing Reformation in our Churches and in our culture is not a problem that is only located in Government schools. The problem includes most of what happens in alternate school settings.