ecclesiology – Page 3

The Miserable State of the Clergy Seen in the Words of Tim Keller

“I’d rather be in a democracy than a state in which the government is officially Christian. Instead of trying to take power, I think what Christians ought to be doing is trying to renew their churches.”

-Tim Keller, Wall Street Journal

02 September 2022

“Will no one rid me of this meddlesome priest?”
Henry II of England
Referring to Thomas Becket, the Archbishop of Canterbury, in 1170

1.) Understand what Keller has said here. He has said that he would rather be under a government that is non Christian than under a government that is officially Christian. Tim would rather have his magistrates be Christ haters than have magistrates who are in submission to Christ.

2.) Tim talks about how Christians shouldn’t “try to take power.” The question is “take power from whom?” Presumably, in Tim’s world Christians shouldn’t try to take power from non Christians and should be happy to be ruled by Christ-haters. Has Rev. Keller ever considered that all power is derived from God, hence, godly men must pursue power in order to honor God using power for righteous and godly ends — something that the Christ-hater can not do if he is consistent with his Christ hating worldview?

3.) You know Tim, it is possible to both try and renew our Churches and in godly ways seek to take power. The right honorable Dr. Rev. Tim Keller posits a false dichotomy when he suggest that Christians have a binary choice wherein they can either take power or they can renew their churches but they can’t do both. Has Tim ever considered that one piece of evidence that Churches are being renewed is that they seek to exercise godly dominion over the state apparatus?

Jon Harris On Transgenderism … McAtee Corrects Harris

Jon Harris is one of the guys in a white hat. Typically his material is quite good. However, Jon remains a Baptist and here his Baptist hackles were apparently raised by something Carl Trueman wrote. Jon tries to correct Trueman but fails miserably as I intend to demonstrate.

Jon Harris opined,

“People who think they’re trans don’t think they’re trans because they chose to be trans. On the contrary, they believe it was not their choice. They think its who they actually are independent of any choice they made. They believe gender is a social construct. So they root their identity in social interactions. (i.e. how they “experience” the world). This is why it is so important for them to receive social affirmation. People must experience them as their trans identity if gender is a social construct. Carl Trueman hinging this all on “radical individualism” is causing Christians to make basic mistakes. Mistakes like thinking Baptist theology leads to transgenderism because it supposedly bases Christian identity on choice. Mistakes like mocking people who think they’re trans by saying “if I chose to be a cat would I be?” It’s not about choice. It’s about experience. We need to clearly say, “You do not experience life as a trans person.” Often I hear Christians giving up the entire argument by saying things like, “That may be your experience, but what is true?” What is true is that they experience the world according to the way they were designed. Let’s stop reinforcing delusion.”

1.) Of course people who are trans don’t admit that they chose to be trans and so don’t think they chose to be trans. Just as sodomites don’t admit that they chose to be sodomite and so don’t think they chose to be sodomite. Very few people admit to choosing a lifestyle that is an abomination (Deuteronomy 22:5, Leviticus 18:22). So that people who think they’re trans refuse to say they consciously chose to be trans doesn’t mean that they didn’t consciously choose to be trans. Of course they chose to be Trans. Unless one is going to buy into the idea that they were genetically coded to be trans there is no other choice except that for whatever reason based possibly on whatever trauma in their lives they chose to be Trans.

2.) Of course they wouldn’t say that it was their choice. Now, I grant that it is possible that they didn’t even fully realize that they were making a choice when they made the choice and I grant that something horrific may well have entered into their life that moved them to make that choice, but for whatever reason, consciously made or silently acquiesced to, at some point it was decided that being trans was preferable to living in harmony with the way God made them.

3.) Of course they think being trans is who they actually are independent of any choice they made. What else would they say? If they admit that they made a choice then the whole “this is just the way I am” argument goes right out the door. That “this is just the way I am argument” is key because without it their perversion can’t gain traction. Without that argument then the abnormality of it all has to be admitted.

4.) Jon offers that Trans people root their identity in the way they experience the world suggesting that this “way they experience the world” is different from making a choice to be Trans. However, Jon, at this point has given us a false dichotomy when he wants to make a significant distinction Trans people being the way they are because they chose to be that way and Trans people being the way they are because that is the way they experience the world. At this point we have to ask … “Did not the Trans person choose to experience the world in the way in which they experience the world?” Jon’s false dichotomy gives his argument no traction.

5.) I have my issues with Carl Trueman but in this case Trueman is correct when he observes that all of this grows out of a radical atomistic individualism that has swamped the West. On this score Trueman has not made any mistakes.

6.) Whether Harris likes it or not Baptist Baptism “theology” and transgenderism “ideology” do indeed have a point of contact and that point of contact is the denial that God does designate a person’s identity. Baptists deny God designating a baby’s identity as “covenant member” requiring the individual to choose for themselves and Tranny’s deny God designating a person’s gender as male or female, allowing the individual to decide for themselves. For both the Baptist and Transgender identity at a pivotal point is a social construct. For Baptist being in the covenant or not in the covenant is a social construct to be determined by the sovereign individual. As such they will not give Baptism to a child until that child determines their own social construct by choosing Jesus. For the Tranny being male or female is a social construct to be determined by the sovereign individual, and there are parents that are so buying into this that they are refusing to tell their child what gender they are so that the child can choose the social construct themselves.

Maybe we should refer to such parents as “Gender Baptists?”

Naturally enough, Jon doesn’t like this linkage because it hits too close to his Baptist home.

7.) I must agree with Jon about not using the “If I think I’m a cat does that make me a cat” argument with the Trans person because it is clearly the case that we are at a point that their replying with “yes” is not going to make very many people blink.

8.) And I agree that we must quit reinforcing delusion. However, Jon’s apologetic that we must tell the Trans person that they have to stop experiencing the world as Trans requires them to make a choice to do so, and at that point we see, once again, that Jon is involved in a false dichotomy.

But he has to reach for this false dichotomy because otherwise he may have to give up his Baptist radical atomistic individualism.

The War Heats Up; Road Runner McAtee Correct Wile E. Coyote R. Scott Clark Part V

R. Scott Clark (RSC) writes,

“They (The Kinists) not only ignore the plain teaching of Colossians 3 and Galatians 3.”

Bret responds,

Galatians 3:26f & The Indiscriminate Nature of the Gospel AND the Foolishness of Social Egalitarianism

Galatians 3:28 & Egalitarianism

RSC writes,

“They (Kinists) also ignore the plain teaching of Acts 10:15, where our Lord told Peter in a vision, “What God has made clean, do not call common” (ESV).”

Bret responds,

Except Kinists don’t call other races “common.”

This statement also implies that the 9th commandment challenged R. Scott Clark doesn’t realize that Kinists come in all hues. I have black friends who are kinist, yellow friends who are kinist, brown friends who are kinists, and on and on. So, once again, Scott is dissimulating about what Kinists believe.

RSC writes,

The next thing we read in Luke’s narrative is that Cornelius, a Roman centurion, wants to speak with Peter. Ordinarily, this would not be a good thing. A Roman centurion had a lot of authority and could have made Peter’s life not only uncomfortable but uncomfortably short. Peter explained to him, “God has shown me that I should not call any person common or unclean. So, when I was sent for, I came without objection. I ask then why you sent for me” (Acts 10:28b–29; ESV). The point of the vision was really about how Christians are to relate to one another across ethnic barriers. Kinism defies and denies the unequivocal teaching of God’s Word about the history of redemption and our new creation in Christ (2 Cor 5:17).

Bret responds,

That whole paragraph is SKUBALA. It is just not true.

RSC writes citing the CRC,

At Synod, in 2019, the Christian Reformed Church considered overture 7 (pp. 485–505) regarding Kinism. It adopted the following declarations regarding Kinism:

A. Declare that this is a grievous deviation from sound doctrine, a heresy: the Kinist teaching that interracial marriage is sinful, and the theological reasoning supporting this teaching.

Bret responds,

1.) At least as it pertains to me, which is the person the CRC was pointing at in all this, I have never ever said that “interracial marriage is sinful,” though I have said repeatedly that it is “normatively unwise.” I have also said repeatedly that once a inter-racial marriage is contracted that the local church should do all it can to support such a marriage if such a marriage exists in their congregation while at the same time reminding the congregation that the children of the congregation should not marry along inter-racial lines. To encourage such marriages would be to adopt Marxist principles for God’s covenant seed.

RSC citing the CRC,

B. Declare that this is a grievous deviation from sound doctrine, a heresy: the Kinist teaching that God has ordained separation in a religio-ethnostate, and the theological reasoning supporting this teaching.

Bret Responds,

See

http://www.thedailygenevan.com/blog/2022/11/17/naturalvsnonnatural?fbclid=IwAR0ly5u8bXFPlA-SWWztH1PbARSnLwaAwW-rflGjL3v5152ct66dz8c6eRg

RSC writes citing the CRC,

C. Declare that any office bearer who teaches or promotes Kinist theology is worthy of special discipline in accordance with Church Order Article 83.

Bret responds,

Now, the CRC may someday do this in the future but they did not do so with me.

RSC citing the CRC

D. Instruct the executive director to create, through the appropriate agencies, opportunities for education, instruction, and discussion so that church leaders and lay members can recognize and refute the heresy of Kinism in various social contexts where they may encounter it.

Bret responds,

I am looking forward to the day when someone trained by the CRC tries to refute Kinism, because it has not been done to date. R. Scott Clark certainly has not done so in is laughable and ridiculous two part series.

RSC citing the CRC writes,

According to article 74 of the Acts of Synod (pp. 818–20) for 2019, the Synod adopted those for declarations on this ground:

Ground: Kinist theology and practice is neither biblical nor Reformed. Rather, Kinism is a twisting of Reformed doctrine. The Bible makes clear that God’s ideal is a family of every tribe and nation being considered equal in every way. Kinist principles and praxis distort this truth.

Bret responds,

1.) As we have seen from the countless of quotes I have given in this series, Kinism in theology and practice is both biblical and Reformed. It is the Alienism (Marxism as applied to social orders) of R. Scott Clark and the CRC which is neither Biblical, nor Reformed, nor historical.

2.) “Equal in every way?”

Surely the CRC can’t be serious. This is pure hard egalitarianism. Surely all peoples are ontologically equal. Certainly no peoples are made of better dirt than other peoples, and so in that sense are equal. Certainly, all men are equal before God’s law. But to say that all peoples are equal in every way is just French Revolution lunacy. Superiorities and inferiorities run through all races, peoples, tribes, and nations and to suggest that all races, peoples, tribes, and nations are equal is the kind of denial of reality that is in the same league as saying girls can be boys and boys can be girls because they are equal in every way.

RSC citing the CRC,

Synod also adopted the following motion:

That synod, given the recent history of Kinist teaching in a particular church of the CRCNA, admonish councils and classes to promote confessional fidelity and mutually to pursue special discipline of an office bearer who is found to hold views contrary to our standards.

Bret responds,

1.) LOL … the CRC calls for special discipline of any office bearer who is found to be a kinist and yet when they could have tried to do that to me they passed. Is this their subtle admission that I was never an office bearer and so they had no jurisdiction over me?

2.) Is it an admission that they did not go after me because they knew they could not prove their case and exoneration would have been something that the Dutch Mafia who runs the CRC would have found mortifying?

RSC citing the CRC.,

Grounds:

a. The pastor who was teaching Kinist views was able to do so for several years without special discipline being successful.

Bret responds,

1.) I was never a Pastor in the CRC, though I did Pastor a CRC Church

2.) Special discipline was never successful because special discipline was never attempted. There were delegates at Synod 2019 who were asking why I was released instead of being disciplined. So far as I know they never got an answer to that question.

3.) And keep in mind that;

a.) When I was released from the CRC (though I was never in to be released) that the governing Church’s Pastor of the Church I served recommended and argued vehemently that I should be released with a “honorable release” as opposed to the “Dismissed” that released me.

b.) The Church that I Pastored unanimously voted to leave the CRC due to the CRC’s heretical stands, knowing full well who I am after ministering among them for a quarter of a century.

RSC writes citing the CRC

b. By admonishing councils and classes to encourage confessional fidelity and special discipline when applicable, it sends a strong message from the broadest body of our denomination that Kinist teaching will not be tolerated in our churches.

Bret responds,

The CRC has no worries about Kinism in their midst. They are safely Marxist. I was the proverbial “One in a Million.”

RSC citing the CRC,

Synod adopted another overture offered from the floor:

That synod acknowledge, with lament, the historic tolerance and indifference within our Reformed theological tradition to perpetual hateful racial prejudice and the theological error of Kinism as well as the need to act as a prophetic voice on these matters in the present and future.

Bret responds,

AH… here we see the slight glimmer of admission that Kinism, or something very much like it as been part of the Reformed theological tradition. Naturally, quite to the contrary of what is written above, the kinism I’ve read of in Church history (See Achord and Dow’s Anthology, “Who Is My Neighbor; An Anthology in Natural Relations”) has never resembled hateful racial prejudice.

Maybe there has been “hateful racial prejudice” in the Reformed tradition but if it existed it would be hard to top the “hateful racial prejudice” that is being exhibited towards Kinists who are not Marxists.

RSC writes,

Make of the last clause what you will, Synod was clearly embarrassed by the existence of Kinism within the CRC for a decade and wanted to send a clear message that the CRC repudiates Kinism.

Bret responds,

1.) And yet, the CRC had every opportunity to bring charges against me and so run me through their Kangaroo court system. If the CRC really had wanted to send a clear message of their embarrassment regarding Kinism THAT is what they would have done. But they didn’t. Instead they merely dismissed me upon my request. (A strange action considering that I had never been ordained by the CRC.)

2.) Is it interesting that the “Conservative” R. Scott Clark is making common cause in these two articles not only with his arch-enemy Doug Wilson but also with a denomination that he excoriates; the uber-Liberal CRC. It seems that “Conservative” Wilson, “Confessional” Clark, and the uber-liberal CRC have all in common the desire to libel, slander, and rid the planet of Historic Christianity, which is, in the end, all Kinism is.

This has been proven exhaustively by Achord & Dow’s book “Who is My Neighbor.” It is also nicely set forth in the article linked above titled “Natural and Non-Natural communities.”

RSC writes,

It is certainly a gross error, schismatic (as it separates what Christ has united), it is ugly and unbefitting of a Christian profession. Let no man cast asunder what Christ has joined together.

Bret responds,

Quite to the contrary it is the Alienism that condemns all the Church Fathers who were Kinist just by their virtue of being Christian. By abandoning the idea and truth of Kinism Clark and the rest of his ideological brood of vipers is abandoning the Christian faith. It is they who are vile and ugly beyond all recognition. It is they who are in gross error (and in Clark’s case not only on this count but also on the count of his heretical R2K). It is they who are the schismatics dividing the Church from its Christian past. It is they who are touting beliefs that are not befitting Christian men. It is they who have cast asunder what Christ joined together opting for some red stew because they were tired from hunting acceptance of the world.

And keep in mind this all started merely because R. Scott Clark wanted to smear my book, “Saved to be Warriors; Exposing the Errors of Radical Two Kingdom Theology.”

The Problem with our Cognoscenti

“He who is unaware of his ignorance, will only be misled by his knowledge.”

Richard Whately

I would have to say that herein we find the problem with to many in our clergy corps who are bright and educated but are still intellectual scofflaws. They have this vast pool of knowledge about any number of things from 16th century Elizabethan Puritanism, to Textual Criticism of the 18th Century Continentals, to the influence of Mercersburg theology on Philip Schaff as it influenced his Church history and yet the church languishes under their leadership. It is not that the subjects named above are bad. I want people around who know about those subjects. The problem is not with their areas of expertise. The problem is with their amazing ignorance, of which they are completely unfamiliar with, which puts all their grand learning in the service of the most idiotic and harmful of projects. For example how in the world could otherwise intelligent people come up with R2K, Federal Vision, or the New Perspective on Paul unless the quote by Whatley applies? We are a Church led by people who have not yet determined the difference between IQ and discernment, between the kind of mental acuity required for graduate and post-graduate work and the kind of mental acuity needed for the work of everyday living. We have a clergy corps who are long on theory but short on the ability to see the implications of where their theory is going to take us as a people.

And because of this, matters are going to get progressively worse in the Church.

The Sure and Certain Coming Victory

^{John 16:33 “}I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.”

II Cor. 2:14 — “But thanks be to God, who always leads us triumphantly as captives in Christ and through us spreads everywhere the fragrance of the knowledge of Him.”

The Victory of Christ and His people is inevitable. We will win because He has won. Get over it. There is no barrier that can forestall us. There is no Maginot line that can impede us. We will overcome all resistance. You will be assimilated to the Kingdom of God or you will die outside of it.

Rev. 22:15 But outside (The New Jerusalem) are dogs (sodomites) and sorcerers and sexually immoral and murderers and idolaters, and whoever loves and practices a lie.

The Kingdoms of this world shall become the Kingdoms of our Lord.

He was given dominion, glory, and kingship, that the people of every nation and language should serve Him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion that will not pass away, and His kingdom is one that will never be destroyed. Dan. 7:14

Every battle we may lose serves the purpose of the sure certainty of victory in the War. Every one of us you may kill, either by way of reputation or by way of literal death, guarantees the rise of 10 more of us to come after you with the Praise of God on our lips and a double edged sword in our hands.

You cannot stop us. No weapon formed against us shall prosper. You cannot forestall your final defeat, you cannot reverse this certain triumph. Even your very thoughts will be made captive to Christ.

Your children too will rise and bless the name of Jesus. They will curse your name for cutting off their breasts, for pumping them full of toxins, for attempting to create a hell on earth in which they then have to live. Your children will be the finest disciples of the Christ you hate because they lived long enough to see the world that your vile affections created and they will resolve never to go back to that way of living.

Your Commander in Chief has already been defeated and all we are engaged in now is the mopping up exercise of childish resistance as found in pockets of insanity.

Plead for mercy now. Kiss the Son, lest He be angry and you perish in the way. Sue for peace and receive generous terms of surrender. Why will you refuse such a sweet clemency?

Why will you die in your sin when you cannot win?

Why will you die in your sin when eternal life is on the other side of Christ’s command for all men everywhere to repent?