Seems like the question to ask is why did the Congregationalists make the original changes to Westminster?
And I’m sure there’s another FB group of Romans calling Anglicans divisive and authority haters.
That movement as far as I can tell was started by Presbyterians. The war for independence was largely encouraged by Presbyterians. It seems to me that Presbyterians don’t bark as loud as Baptists but are the ones who do the ground work of keeping the civil government in check. My years are not as many as yours, so I may be missing something. But when the Presbys hold a session and decide enough is enough, it’s game time.
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That thought terrifies me. May God keep us from building ministries based on our own personalities and even biases rather than on Christ’s work and devotion to his bride.
John Owen was one of the architects of Savoy. When two Quaker women were wandering Oxford topless as a testimony of the Holy Spirit against the dead formalism of the religious establishment in Oxford, Owen had them whipped and ejected from the town. I think it’s fair to say Owen wouldn’t support the universal authority of individual conscience in today’s Reformed churches. He went toe to toe with the Quakers repeatedly in his writings, and one their big problems he was addressing was the autonomy of the believer’s relationship with the Holy Spirit - not identical to but very related to this conscience discussion.
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Wilson names Warhorn’s statement here.
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Pastor Wilson also writes in there that “It is a sin to go into slavery willingly.”
We don’t live in a slave society, but this is hardly true in a slave society. There are all sorts of reasons one might become a slave. This text came to mind immediately: “5 But if the slave plainly says, ‘I love my master, my wife, and my children; I will not go out free,’ 6 then his master shall bring him to God, and he shall bring him to the door or the doorpost. And his master shall bore his ear through with an awl, and he shall be his slave forever.”
Scripture also repeatedly talks about willingly selling daughters into slavery. What is striking about this statement is that it doesn’t seem to jive with what else I’ve read of him on slavery. Perhaps he slipped.
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I’d be very happy if Presbyterians would become more Presbyterian.
A couple days ago I attended the stated meeting of our local presbytery. For those unfamiliar with the polity, it is a meeting for all the local teaching elders (TEs), aka ministers of Word and Sacrament, and up to two ruling elders (REs) from each local church. At this meeting, multiple pastors rose up to complain that the presbytery meetings were not times of rich fellowship and encouragement that the TEs desired and needed but were instead filled with business. The fault was laid at the current set of bylaws, which were said to be too bureaucratically constraining. How exactly this was so was never made clear to me aside from one example in that the bylaws specified that presbytery meetings were to be held on Saturdays, which meant the TEs didn’t have the freedom to schedule them at a more convenient time, such as Wednesday mornings.
I am very proud to say that my pastor took the floor to declare that the problem was not the bylaws but rather the lack of faithfulness of the TEs, for which they all (including himself) should repent. And as an example of lack of faithfulness, he pointed out that in prior meetings, many TEs left during the lunch break rather than stay for the afternoon session. And despite this direct rebuke, attendance of the afternoon session of the current meeting was noticeably smaller, and only one third of the men who started the meeting stayed until the end of the meeting.
I came to the realization that a large number of the TEs viewed the presbytery meeting as interfering with the work of the church rather than being the work of the church. For example, it was in the afternoon session that candidates for ministry were examined and pastoral calls were assessed. One might think this sort of oversight was an essential feature of Presbyterianism, but for a large number of TEs, it was just a bother. They’d rather hang out with fellow pastors over a beer.
Additionally, I perceived that the reason that presbytery meetings were so grinding was that the presbytery was deeply divided on substantial issues that kept arising over and over again because they were never directly faced and dealt with. Instead, the majority of TEs seemed to wish to maintain a superficial harmony by patching over differences with half-baked compromises and bureaucratic maneuvering. One example was a call that a TE received from a non-profit organization that, upon questioning from the floor, turned out to have been founded by the TE and had no independent board (at least not yet). So the question was raised, how could it be proper for a man to essentially call himself? When the website of the non-profit was checked, it turned out to have no mention of the Bible, Jesus, or the Christian faith. So the question was raised, how could this be an appropriate call for a minister of Word and Sacrament? The website also mentioned LGBTQ+, so the TE receiving the call was asked to clarify his views with respect to the recent Revoice controversy. This last question was ruled out of order, and it was pointed out that the Administrative Committee had already looked into everything and given their blessing to the call. But no one from the Administrative Committee attended the afternoon session, so their reasoning remained unexplained. The wrangling continued for more than an hour, not as debate over the substantive issues, but rather as attempts to find some precedent or compromise that would justify approving the call. By the time 4:30 pm rolled around, everyone was exhausted, so this matter, along with several others, was kicked back to the Administrative Committee.
Actually, I should have said, the Administrative Commission. Over the objections of several older TEs (including my pastor and a seminary professor) and several knowledgeable and experienced REs (including myself), a coalition of younger TEs managed to push through a wholesale replacement of the bylaws with a substantially truncated set that created an Administrative Commission largely appointed by the Moderator, and as a commission rather than a committee, it will have the power to make decisions rather than merely recommendations. Although the new bylaws state that this power is “not intended to be used for controversial matters”, would you trust that? It will now be easier for the young Turks to avoid inconvenient questions and opposition from the old guard minority, and if the presbytery meeting time is switched to Wednesday mornings, the REs will be sidelined. But with decision-making taken away from the presbytery as a whole, the middle mass of TEs will be rewarded for their support with more time for fellowship in the pub.
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Got a little queasy reading this, remembering my days in the PCA.
Indeed.
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Man, so much in that post by Pastor Wilson.
The excommunication scenario stands out. Denouncing the Mass and her transubstantiation, translating the Scriptures into vulgar tongue, getting married, preaching salvation by faith alone…all reasons our forefathers were excommunicated. Resisting a circumstance of worship over which the elders have authority?
So, Wilson has moved some. His message has moved from leave your churches to force them to excommunicate you.
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Douglas Wilson ceased being interesting when he started epitomizing the stance of regardless freedom, freedom exercised with little or no regard for others. From the linked article:
Regardless freedom, of course, is exemplified by (what I must hope is) the rare belief that being required to wear a face covering in public spaces is a grievous assault on one’s liberty. It assumes that my liberty of action must not be constrained by any consideration beyond the realization of my own desires and my own self-interest narrowly conceived.
Not only does this miss the purpose of freedom, which should not be an end in itself but used as a means to glorify God, it also short-circuits any meaningful debate about the moral and political dimensions of the present crisis. If you believe Wilson, it’s all a power grab and there’s nothing to be learned other than yet another confirmation of how wicked our enemies are.
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I’ve often thought over the past year and half that a lot of Moscow is doing is a power grab… the pot calling the kettle black. They’re staking their claim in the reformed world and working to peel people out of their churches. They may not be trying to do this but it has been the fruit of their work. I’m still dealing with it in my own church.
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Their regular nod to Warhorn confuses me. They seem to respect the Evangel crew, or at the very least desire to appear to respect them. Why show that deference (or the appearance of it), if you believe their position is fundamentally at odds with your own?
Doug said ‘this is a good statement’ about a statement that argues the exact opposite of what he was saying in his post. I don’t get it.
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“I would rather die than accept masks as a condition for coming into the presence of God (2 Cor. 3:18).”
Wilson makes masks a top-tier gospel issue, up there with the solas of the Reformation. Death rather than approaching God incidentally masked.
Yet, he encourages near infants to approach Christ’s presence in the Lord’s Table with nothing more than a pat of the tummy as a profession of faith.
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I’m glad I didn’t finish reading this thing. It just gets worse and worse as you go.
I know that he read it because I sent it to him and Toby. They both appreciated it.
You men keep misrepresenting Doug’s argument. Doug said he would rather die than have masks as condition” of coming into worship. He’s saying he would rather die than to make masks mandatory for worshiping the Lord. It’s not masks per say he’s opposed to but the mandating of them in worship he’s opposed to.
‘Round and round the cobbler’s bench, the monkey chased the weasel.’
Doug’s argument’s isn’t being misrepresented here @JosephSpurgeon.
‘Not only would I rather die, but if I were a member of a church that for some reason required this of me, I would rather be excommunicated than comply with it. I would seek permission to leave peaceably, and if that were denied, I would be excommunicated.’
‘For some reason required this of me’? That’s pretty vague. Any reason at all? Here at the church I serve, the congregation, at the request of the elders, complied with Parliament’s mandate’s that was in force for much of the last year, that all indoor events had to be masked (explicitly including places of worship). Doug says that a congregant who disagreed with the government mandate should either refuse to comply with the elders’ request or leave the church over it. Full stop. I’m opposed to the government mandating masks in worship as well, and I voiced that opinion repeatedly to the elders and to the congregation, yet we still thought it wise in light of the situation to submit for the duration of the restrictions (which have now been lifted). Discussion of sphere sovereignty/authority aside, our decision as elders was a theological decision, that there were various scriptural reasons it wouldn’t be in the best interest of the flock to go against Parliament’s dictates in this case (regardless of my own views on the legitimacy of their authority to issue these mandates).
@adionne is right. It seems Doug has moved. He’s moved from ‘defy tyrants’ to ‘defy your elders.’ And for the life of me, I cannot see how this comports with Hebrews 13.17-18. Is there no possible legitimate reason that a church’s eldership might temporarily urge submission in this matter?
And if there might be a temporary and legitimate reason that it might not be cowardice or compromise for a church’s leaders to urge compliance, Doug’s rhetoric is pastoral malpractice…the sort that leads to the divisive issues many here have already raised.
The Reformers were not this incompetent even over matters as significant as the Solas and restoring biblical worship. Luther waited several years after he said it was a necessity to give the congregation services in the vernacular before implementing a German mass in his own congregation. It was the radical reformers who wanted change right now. Years of Latin services @JosephSpurgeon, years. But a couple months of wearing masks from otherwise faithful shepherds must require rebellion or excommunication.
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Thank you Aaron for your response but we are not in the time of the reformation attempting to come out of Latin mass and years of papist abuses. It would be one thing if we had all been wearing masks for years and trying to reform away from it. In my opinion, trying to compare what is happening now to then doesn’t work. We are under a secular humanist tyranny that is growing before our eyes and everyone wants to nitpick those that believe we ought to stop it. And I don’t meant to be rude but the Church in Britain has gone along for years with that nanny state and it doesn’t surprise me that the churches have gone along with implementing mask mandates. I personally don’t want to see America become Britain.
Here is the thing I can’t shake and its that I feel like I am being gaslighted by our media and civil government and that my compliance with mask mandates(and as a pastor my requiring them) is selling out my family and my congregation to further erosion of their liberty (which didn’t come cheap) in which the end result is far worse than masks. And so yes masks are not the same as Roman Catholic rule but I know this won’t get traction here but I believe that a secular humanist tyranny will prove to be far worse than a Roman Catholic one.
Therefore while I don’t want to divide over masks and hate the division over it, I don’t know how I would be able entrust my family to a church that required masks to the point of excommunication or goes along with everything as if nothing is really happening. I think the reason Doug is willing to make space for Evangel is that he believes we see what is happening and will fight it at some point even if we disagree on tactics. But there are churches (PCA and SBC) that implemented every CDC order without a thought to its ramifications and when people have had some scruples with it, they have not been willing to hear them out or to accommodate them.
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Dear brother you’ve just changed the subject. I was addressing your claim that some here are misrepresenting DW. You’ve just changed the subject to justifying why his tactic is necessary in this situation, and insulting my church context in the process.
Here’s the key question: is it a sin for a pastor to ask a congregation to wear masks?
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The misrepresentation is to make DW position to be only about masks as if masks in and of themselves are the thing when they are not. Every time someone says
the implication is that its masks in and of themselves which are the problem and not all the things I mentioned.
Notice here that you made a switcheroo. We aren’t talking about “asking”. A pastor can ask his congregation to do all kinds of things. We are talking about “requiring” to the point of excommunication whether formally or informally. And so yes, to require masks to the point of excommunication is in my judgement wrong. The Westminster Larger catechism says that the sins of superiors include any way dishonoring themselves, or lessening their authority, by an unjust, indiscreet, rigorous, or remiss behavior.
Any elder or pastor worth his salt will in the current situation work to honor the conscience of his people even if he believes them to be wrong rather than just to squash it through rigorous or remissful behavior. There are ways that a church could put up signs and inform their people about mask mandates and can speak openly and honestly about honoring lawful authority while resisting unlawful authority. Its why I appreciate our statement on Conscience and Covid Vaccine Mandates or the first statement on Covid.
Who do we know that is doing this? Not hypothetical PCA or SBC churches…who do you personally know who is kicking people out of the church for this? Who of our brothers is doing this? Excommunicating people over masks?
The irony is DW encourages individuals to break communion with their churches over masks. He is urging people to effectively do the very thing he is condemning.
No, I didn’t say anything about excommunication for failure to wear masks.
But I ask again, in light of Hebrews 13.17, is it a sin for a pastor to ask his congregation to wear masks? That is the question.
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I know several people who have been told that they could not come into their church even to slip into the back. I know one man who was removed from teaching sunday school over masks. To not be vague I can name names. Kosmosdale Baptist Church here in Louisville for example removed a man from good standing in membership because of masks. I know of people who have been told they had to put on a mask or leave. Its not a hypothetical. You can informally excommunicate people by telling them that they are not permitted to come to worship if they don’t have a mask.
Again you are making the switch. Asking is one thing. Requiring is another. In Doug Wilson’s scenario if you aren’t going to excommunicate him over a mask than he really isn’t speaking to you. The question is should pastors and elders require masks?
As a pastor, I say no, not in our current context.