On 11/28/2019, the Thanksgiving sermon was preached by Pastor Joe Rosales.

The pastor opened the message with the debate regarding the very first Thanksgiving. Traditionally we celebrate the Pilgrims’ Thanksgiving, but there was an earlier Thanksgiving held in El Paso, TX by Catholics led by Spanish explorer Juan de Oñate, in which “a mass was said by the Franciscan missionaries traveling with the expedition” (https://texasalmanac.com/topics/history/timeline/first-thanksgiving). But as Protestants we unapologetically celebrate Thanksgiving with the Puritans, whether they were first or not!

George Washington gave the first national Thanksgiving Proclamation on 3 October 1789:

Whereas it is the duty of all Nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey his will, to be grateful for his benefits, and humbly to implore his protection and favor—and whereas both Houses of Congress have by their joint Committee requested me “to recommend to the People of the United States a day of public thanksgiving and prayer to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many signal favors of Almighty God especially by affording them an opportunity peaceably to establish a form of government for their safety and happiness.” (https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/05-04-02-0091)

Abraham Lincoln established it as a national holiday during the Civil War:

I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens. And I recommend to them that while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to His tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquillity and Union. (http://www.abrahamlincolnonline.org/lincoln/speeches/thanks.htm)

The Thanksgiving holiday, however, comes only once a year. It’s occasional. But Christians should always be thankful. The Heidelberg Catechism and Hercules Collins’ Orthodox Catechism distill the Christian life in three words: Guilt, Grace, Gratitude. Christians are called to be a eucharistic—a thanksgiving—people, as James White notes, to “pray without ceasing, in everything give thanks (εὐχαριστεῖτε); for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you” (1 Thessalonians‬ ‭5:17-18‬ ‭NKJV‬‬). We need to take back the true meaning of eucharist from the Antichrist Church of Rome.

The pastor also noted that cheerful brethren generally make everything better and more enjoyable, for “all the days of the afflicted are evil, but he who is of a merry heart has a continual feast” (‭‭Proverbs‬ ‭15:15‬ ‭NKJV‬‬).

Ultimately, God is good. Period. (Etymologically, good in the “Sense of ‘kind, benevolent’ is from late Old English in reference to persons or God.”) And we must be thankful for that, because we were not good, “but God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans‬ ‭5:8‬ ‭NKJV). ‬‬Gordon Clark puts it plainly:

God is neither responsible nor sinful, even though he is the only ultimate cause of everything. He is not sinful because in the first place whatever God does is just and right. It is just and right simply in virtue of the fact that he does it. Justice or righteousness is not a standard external to God to which God is obligated to submit. Righteousness is what God does. Since God caused Judas to betray Christ, this causal act is righteous and not sinful. By definition God cannot sin. At this point it must me particularly pointed out that God’s causing a man to sin is not sin. There is no law, superior to God, which forbids him to decree sinful acts. Sin presupposes a law, for sin is lawlessness. Sin is any want of conformity unto or transgression of the law of God. But God is “Ex-lex.” (Religion, Reason, and Revelation, in The Works of Gordon Haddon Clark: Christian Philosophy, Vol. 4, pp. 268-69, http://www.trinitylectures.org/christian-philosophy-the-works-of-gordon-haddon-clark-volume-paperback-p-145.html).

The pastor closed with a prayer from William Jay, “For a Day of Thanksgiving—Evening.”

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Edward Snowden. Permanent Record. Read by Holter Graham. New York: Macmillan Audio, 2019. Audible edition. https://www.audible.com/pd?asin=1250622689&source_code=ASSORAP0511160006

In his autobiography, NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden lays out stimulating discussions on education; identity and privacy; the Internet; whistleblowing; government power, contracting, surveillance, and abuse; cloud storage; and encryption.

Alter ego

Snowden makes an interesting case for using alternate identities and anonymity online, which can make people more willing to learn, admit when they’re wrong, and change their view; whereas using real identities tends to defensiveness and obstinacy in order to preserve reputation. He blames government and business for the Internet’s shift towards the latter. Anonymity, however, is a double-edged sword that just as easily emboldens people to be vicious and wicked (needless to say, much online behavior reflects this) and to shirk responsibility/accountability.

Growing Up…Online

Snowden’s upbringing sheds light on a number of issues. In some ways the young Snowden reminds me of my younger self, an obsessive, all-or-nothing kind of guy, diving headlong into whatever captured my attention, rarely coming up for air. Growing up, especially through puberty, Snowden spent most of his time playing video games and going online, learning as much as he could on messaging boards, without hardly any moderation or supervision. He advocates this kind of activity as a way of self-discovery, of growing up and finding identity; and sees hacking as a way of becoming equal with adults, since technical skill and acumen matter more than age. Somewhat similar to Snowden, however, several mass shooters spent lots of time in the Internet’s sewers, messaging boards like 8chan:

https://www.dailydot.com/unclick/8chan/

The truth is that the Internet, video games, and media in general are often too much for young impressionable minds to handle, especially without close parental supervision. They’re highly addictive, even for adults, and much of the content is inappropriate for youth. They foster impatience, heighten irritability, fuel tempers, destroy self-control, the list goes on and on:

https://www.frictionlessfamilies.com/technology-in-the-family

https://www.drkardaras.com/research.html

Parents need to wake up and stop overexposing their kids to technology and media.

Snowden’s life is also a sad but all too common object lesson of the devastating impact of divorce on children. It affected Snowden deeply when his parents were no longer together. He rightly describes it as both becoming a parent—maturing too quickly by being overexposed to adult problems—and as losing a parent, at the same time. Divorce is a vicious cycle that harms the children the most, including, but not limited to, the separated parents outdoing each other by buying the nicer gifts for their kids, and using the kids to spy on the other parent’s love life; kids having to choose which parent to stay with, and having to “be the parent” with their own parents when they become unstable; and, one of the worst consequences, kids constantly blaming themselves for the divorce. Even though his parents eventually “reconciled” by agreeing to flourish separately, the damage is done and requires supernatural intervention to truly overcome.

Cyber Religion

It’s interesting how Snowden uses overtly religious language to describe the early Internet, what he calls the most successful anarchy he’s ever experienced, which is consistent with his general distrust of authority, and thinking people are better off raising themselves in an online world that’s free of government corruption and corporate greed. He claims that the nascent Internet was more forgiving of online transgressions, and gave people the freedom to start over. The Internet was his idol, and the online communities he frequented his church, an attempt to find community and a sense of belonging. It reminds me of the documentary Ringers: Lord of the Fans, which shows real people forming cults that practically worship Tolkien’s fictional characters. One woman claimed The Lord of the Rings saved her life. Ian McKellen, the actor who played Gandalf, made the stupefying assertion that The Lord of the Rings is true and the Bible is false. John Calvin rightly said the human heart is a perpetual idol factory. It’s sad to see even conscientious individuals, who want justice to triumph corruption, idolize the most ridiculous things, exchanging “the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator” (Romans‬ ‭1:25‬); rather than worship Christ Jesus, the real God-Man, “the way, the truth, and the life” (‭‭John‬ ‭14:6‬)‬‬, the only One who can truly forgive all our sins and give us, not just a fresh start, but a perfect record of righteousness based on Christ’s perfect life and finished work on the Cross. No works required, just faith: “Truly, truly, I say to you, he who hears My word, and believes Him who sent Me, has eternal life, and does not come into judgment, but has passed out of death into life” (John‬ ‭5:24‬).

“Homo contractus”

Snowden levels sharp criticisms against the Intelligence Community’s (IC) government contracting, a way of “hacking” the federal head count limits placed on each agency. The black budget he leaked implies that the IC employs just as many contractors as government employees. Due partly to rapid advances in technology, the government turned to the private sector to hire contractors, sidestepping the established vetting and hiring process. Employees often start working for the government to get clearance levels and then jump ship to the highest bidding contractor the first chance they get. IC directors and Congresspeople land cushy jobs with the contracting companies they hired for the government, a blatant conflict of interest. What passes off as “innovation” is more like governmentally assisted corruption. This in part made it possible for Snowden to gain access to all the NSA’s secret documents as a contracted sysadmin fairly quickly.

The Cloud of centralized servers

I appreciated Snowden’s criticism of “cloud” storage, which is regressive technology that stores our data in untold racks of servers consolidated in large data centers, euphemistically pitched as “the cloud.” Consenting to these cloud services means that companies do whatever they want with our data: read it, scan it, sell it, delete it. We don’t really know where our data is and what cloud companies are doing with it. And who knows what parts of the cyber world our data has traveled.

Overall, this is an important book that deals with many pertinent issues affecting us today, though I would’ve liked for Snowden to add VPNs to the discussion, but he didn’t mention them; or to treat some of the controversial fallout resulting from his leaks, such as Operation Socialist:

https://darknetdiaries.com/episode/48/

He gives an excellent discussion of the need for encryption to permeate our online activity and for users to take advantage of anonymous browsers like Tor and messaging apps like Signal, which will reform the Internet back to the “purer” form that Snowden reminisces about:

http://reformedlibertarian.com/articles/politics/simple-online-privacy-measures-everyone-should-be-taking-but-arent/

Disclaimer: The book has some salty language, which was a little unexpected because it starts relatively clean.

Editor’s Note:  This post first appeared on Biblical Trinitarian http://www.biblicaltrinitarian.com/2018/11/is-critical-race-theory-anti-christian.html and is presented here without alteration.  With Critical Race Theory growing in popularity among putatively conservative Evangelicals, author Hiram R. Diaz III offers a much-needed refutation of this anti-christian idea.

Matthew Mullins, professor at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary, has a series of articles titled “Is Critical Race Theory [hereafter, CRT] ‘UnChristian,’” in which he seeks to demonstrate that CRT is not incompatible with the Christian faith. The articles form an apologetic defense of the recent utilization of CRT by professing evangelical leaders (e.g. Al Mohler, Thabiti Anyabwile, Russell Moore, and others) who are presently attempting to make “social justice” issues a primary concern for all Christians. This has been the cause of conflict between themselves and other evangelical leaders, as well as their congregants and other like-minded believers, who see such an emphasis on “social justice” issues as contradictory to the central role of the church in preaching and teaching the Scriptures (summarily expressed by the Law and the Gospel), and not engaging in social activism.

The upsurge in evangelical proponents of CRT has led a wide variety of non-CRT evangelical pastors, leaders, thinkers, and personalities to draft “The Statement on Social Justice & the Gospel,” wherein they explain their stance as regards the various “social justice” issues that have been raised by evangelical CRT proponents.[1] Their opposition to CRT is not only due to CRT proponent’s marginalization of the preaching of the Word of God, and their simultaneous privileging of “social justice” issues, but also due to the fact that CRT is derived from the presuppositions and concerns of postmodernist philosophers and social theorists. Opponents of CRT have rightly noted that the philosophical origins of CRT, from which CRT concerns and goals take root, are diametrically opposed to the main beliefs forming the foundation of the Christian worldview. In response, CRT proponents have sought to defend their synthesis of CRT categories, concepts, beliefs, and goals with the Christian faith.

However, the proponents of CRT have not given a biblical defense of the underlying philosophical beliefs which undergird it. This is either due to their unfamiliarity with those beliefs, their desire to avoid having to deal with the contradiction that arises between CRT’s philosophical foundations and the Christian worldview, or their inability to see how the Christian faith and CRT are diametrically opposed at the presuppositional level. This article, therefore, will follow Mullins’ definition of CRT, its core beliefs, and its proponents’ goals. It will then identify the philosophical origins of CRT and explain why it is not only un-Christian but foundationally anti-Christian and, therefore, to be denounced by the people of God.

§ II. Defining Critical Race Theory, 

Its Core Beliefs, and Its Proponents’ Goals

Mullins begins his series by defining CRT. Mullins –

CRT is a complex system of beliefs that emerged in the United States in the 1970s and 1980s to call attention to and redress the subtler forms of racism that replaced the overt racism made largely unacceptable by the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and 1960s.[2]

These beliefs are identified in later articles to be the following –

1. “Race is social construct”[3] – This “means that race is a social reality rather than a biological reality. It does not mean that they think that everyone’s skin is the same color. It means that the characteristics we associate with those colors are imposed rather than inherent. Race is something we have invented to organize our world, rather than a product of our DNA. And for CRT, folks with lighter skin have organized the world based on values assigned to colors that privilege themselves and oppress people with darker skin.”[4] 

2. “Racism is Structural”[5] – Mullins explains that for CRT proponents “racism is thus not only treating someone badly because their skin color is different from yours. Racism is a huge, complicated, historical system. It is the very way our world has been organized over time to empower folks who came to understand themselves as white and to subjugate those who fall outside that category.”[6]

3. “Colorblindness is a Problem, not a Solution”[7] – For CRT proponents, “the idea of treating people the same ‘regardless’ of their histories is why racism persists.”[8] CRT proponents argue that “if racism has evolved over time into an integral part of the structure of our society, and if that structure holds some people back and gives others a leg up, then to treat all those people the same is to maintain a status quo that disenfranchises some and privileges others.”[9] 

4. “Interest Convergence, not Pure Progress”[10] – Mullins relays that “Interest convergence is the idea that dominant groups only acquiesce to minority interests when those interests converge with their own.”[11] In other words, CRT proponents believe that at times changes in society affecting racial groups are wrongly identified as “progress” when in reality they have only come about because they changes that are “in the best interest of the dominant culture, not because [they are] truly just, fair, or best for minorities.”[12] 

5. “Whiteness is Normative”[13] – For CRT proponents, “whiteness has come to seem normal over time, making everything else non-normal, or other. To put it another way, whiteness and everything associated with being white has become the standard for how a person should be...CRT criticizes the idea that we can be neutral, objective, or colorblind when it comes to race. If we are trying to be neutral, then we are inevitably reinforcing the status quo, or the norm, and the norm is to live and behave like white people.”[14]

6. “Intersectionality”[15] – As Mullins states, “intersectionality is the study of how different identity categories overlap.”[16] Consequently, “proponents of CRT who study intersectionality typically believe that people living at the intersection of multiple oppressed identity categories face unique forms of discrimination that require equally unique forms of defense.”[17]

These core beliefs undergird the CRT proponent’s activities. CRT proponents see themselves are actively being committed to “expanding history,”[18] which is to say “telling a more complete story of United States history than many of us learned in school.”[19] They also “critique colorblindness,”[20] by “focus[ing] on revealing how stories, laws, customs, and decisions that seem to be neutral, or colorblind, are actually built on assumptions about race.”[21] Additionally, CRT proponents seek to “make the legal system fairer,”[22] “advocate for voting rights,”[23] and “change speech norms.”[24]

§ III. A Necessary Clarification

Having defined CRT, its core beliefs, and its proponents’ goals, we must make a necessary point of clarification. The proponents of CRT represent their stated goals as being in line with the second greatest commandment to love one’s neighbor as oneself, and because of this do not think their views should be called unChristian, let alone anti-Christian. This sidesteps the underlying issue – the fact that the philosophical underpinnings of CRT, from which perceived social ills spring and are identifiable as social ills, are anti-Christian. The disagreement between proponents of CRT and opponents of CRT is not one over whether or not Christians should love their neighbors as themselves. Rather, the disagreement is over the compatibility of CRT, as a post-structuralist-influenced/postmodern philosophical tool for social “change,” and the Christian worldview. The short answer is that they are not at all compatible, although they may share a superficial concern for rectifying some of the social ills we and our neighbors may experience. We will demonstrate this is the case below.

§ IV. The Origins of CRT

When we speak of the origins of CRT, we may be referring to the historical beginnings of the actual discipline or the philosophical foundations upon which CRT has been built. It is all too often the case that proponents of CRT will point to the historical beginnings of CRT when discussing its origins, presumably seeking to distance it from the halls of academia. Mullins does just this in his article explaining the “origins” of CRT, writing –

Critical Race Theory was not born out of a university department. It did not emerge from a political party, think tank, or policy center. It was a natural reaction to the aftermath of the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s. While overt forms of racism such as discriminatory hiring practices and voter intimidation had been made illegal thanks to civil rights activists, new forms of racism emerged that required new forms of resistance and new forms of legal defense.[25]

By denying that it originated in a university department, and by stating that it was “anatural reaction to the aftermath of the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s,” Mullins suggests that CRT is not tied to any particular philosophical worldview. It was a “natural [moral?] reaction” to historical circumstances, claims Mullins, but CRT scholars do not agree. For instance, Richard Delgado and Jean Stefancic state that –

As a scholarly movement, Critical Race Theory (CRT) began in the early 1970s with the early writing of Derrick Bell, an African-American civil rights lawyer and the first black to teach at Harvard Law School. Writing about interest convergence as a means of understanding Western racial historyl and the conflict of interest in civil rights litigation (the lawyer or litigation fund wants a breakthrough; the client or her group, better schools), Bell was one of a small but growing group of scholars and minority activists who realized that the gains of the heady civil rights era had stalled and, indeed, were being rolled back.[26]

Delgado and Stefancic are even more specific in their introductory work on the subject, writing –

The [CRT] movement is a collection of activists and scholars interested in studying and transforming the relationship among race, racism, and power. The movement considers many of the same issues that conventional civil rights and ethnic studies discourses take up, but places them in a broader perspective that includes economics, history, context, group- and self-interest, and even feelings and the unconscious. Unlike traditional civil rights, which embraces step-by-step progress, critical race theory questions the very foundations of the liberal order, including, equality theory, legal reasoning, Enlightenment rationalism, and neutral practices of constitutional law.[27]

Rather than placing the origin of CRT in a “natural reaction” or in some non-academic context, CRT scholars openly recognize that CRT was indeed birthed within the very context of academia.

Critical Legal Studies & Its Discontents: 

Truth and Consciousness as the Possessor and Revealer of Truth

Thus, the origin of CRT lies directly in the work of legal scholars emerging from Critical Legal Studies (hereafter, CLS), a “wing of legal theory,” according to Raymond Wacks, that “generally spurns many of the enterprises that have long been assumed to be at the heart of jurisprudence.”[28] CLS embraces an anti-Enlightenment worldview which rejects many of the core assumptions of the Christian faith, as derived from the Scriptures. For instance, Wacks explains that “the primary purpose of critical legal theory...is to contest the universal rational foundation of law which, it maintains, clothes the law and legal system with a spurious legitimacy.”[29] Rather than viewing Law as originating in the mind of God,

...CLS detects in the law a form of ‘hegemonic consciousness’, a term borrowed from the writings of the Italian Marxist, Antonio Gramsci, who observed that social order is maintained by a system of beliefs which are accepted as ‘common sense’ and part of the natural order – even by those who are actually subordinated to it. In other words, these ideas are treated as eternal and necessary whereas they really reflect only the transitory, arbitrary interests of the dominant elite.[30]

Universal and absolute rules, consequently, were viewed as local and relative strictures imposed by those with power on their subordinates. As Duncan Kennedy explains –

Legal behavior and legal thought, with their prestige and claims to universality and rationality, have an important effect, the Gramscian-type argument would go, in maintaining the hegemony of ruling class people over this influential professional, technical, intellectual sector which administers the legal system. The legal system maintains the social structure of the capitalist state. It requires legal workers and has got to have some way of keeping their loyalty.[31]

Law is a human construct that serves human ends, in other words, and nothing more.

CLS, following Freudian psychoanalysis, also psychologized “legal thought,” identifying it as “a form of ‘denial’...[which] affords a way of coping with contradictions that are too painful for us to hold in our conscious mind...[by denying] the contradiction between the promise, on the one hand of, say, equality and freedom, and the reality of oppression and hierarchy, on the other.”[32] The underlying assumption of Freud’s concept of denial is, we must note, the belief that what is truly taking place in the unconscious mind of man is only perceivable by analysis of his patterns of speech and behavior. What is explicitly identified as the true content of a man’s mind, by the man himself, is to be understood as a socially approved of means of communicating socially disapproved of desires for animalistic “needs” (e.g. violence, sex, power).

CRT: The Fruit of Philosophy,

Not a “Natural Reaction” to Moral Evils

In contradiction to Mullins' claims regarding the origin of CRT, then, it is plain to see the anti-Enlightenment – and by implication anti-Christian[33] – philosophical roots of CRT without much effort.

§ IV. Why CRT is Anti-Christian

1. Reality, Language, and Law – The Christian Worldview

At this point, it should be evident to the reader that the worldview espoused by CLS, and which forms the foundation of CRT and social justice advocacy, is essentially opposed to the Christian faith. Metaphysically, i.e. as regards the fundamental nature of reality, the Scriptures show us that our creaturely reality was brought forth,[34] is now being sustained,[35] will be destroyed, and will be recreated by the Word of God.[36] As the psalmist declares –

By the Word of the Lord the heavens were made,and by the breath of his mouth all their hosts.[37]

Moreover, what God has decreed to come about will not fail to materialize,[38] for God “works all things according to the counsel of his will.”[39] All of creation obeys the Word of God, the command of God that these things should exist and do what he desires them to do. And if the entirety of creation and its existence is under the Law-Word of God, then so are the actions of all men. 

Hence, when Paul declares that “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,”[40] he implicitly reinforces what he’s already stated explicitly to his hearers inRom 2:12-16: The same moral Law of God addresses all men. The Scriptures teach us that the work of the Law is written on the hearts of all humans,[41] irrespective of their national, ethnic, cultural, linguistic, or gender differences. The Law of God, therefore, does not see color, ethnicity, gender, socio-economic status, or even age – the Law of God sees guilt or innocence.

God’s rule by Law is evident, therefore, in the governance of the created order, but it is even more so evident in the universal knowledge of God as Creator, Law-Giver, and Judge. According to the apostle Paul, all men know God has created them to obey his Law, but they reject his law. According to the apostle Paul, all men know the difference between good and bad (i.e. righteous and unrighteous) behavior. All men will be judged on the basis of God’s revealed truth, be it merely general revelation or general and special revelation. Psalm 19 aptly articulates the triadic reign of God’s Law over the creation in general (vv.1–6), over all men in general (vv.7–10), and over particular men (vv.11-14). God teaches us that there is a inextricable link between reality, language, and law that reflects the life of our Creator, Redeemer, and Judge.

2. Power is God’s Possession to Distribute as He Sees Fit

The human establishment and exercise of civil laws by words is not a human contrivance, let alone a human practice which originated only a few hundred years ago (i.e. since the Enlightenment period). Man, as the image of God,[42] a prioriunderstands that there is an inextricable link between reality, language, and law. He further understands that law is a legitimate, divinely ordained means of exercising divinely bestowed power. This is hinted at in Gen 2:18-20, in which Adam reflects God’s act of naming creation in Gen 1 by naming various animals brought to him by God. Adam’s exercise of language assumes the inextricable link between reality, language, and law, and it assumes as legitimate the expression of power via legal language.

Adam received power from God, as all men do. For according to the Scriptures, “power belongs to God.”[43] As the prophet Samuel’s mother declares,

The Lord kills and brings to life; he brings down to Sheol and raises up. The Lord makes poor and makes rich; he brings low and he exalts. He raises up the poor from the dust; he lifts the needy from the ash heap to make them sit with princes and inherit a seat of honor. For the pillars of the earth are the Lord's, and on them he has set the world.[44]

And as the prophet Daniel tells us  Nebuchadnezzar likewise proclaimed –

“Blessed be the name of God forever and ever, to whom belong wisdom and might. He changes times and seasons; he removes kings and sets up kings...”[45]

And as the Lord Jesus Christ also declares to Pontius Pilate –

“You would have no authority over me at all unless it had been given you from above...”[46]

Rather than identifying political structures of power as illegitimate mechanisms of oppression, the Scriptures identify them as divinely ordained institutions for the well-being of human society. In contradiction to CRT, Scripture teaches us that power does not originate with men individually or collectively. Power is the sole possession of God; he distributes it, on loan as it were, to whomever he wishes, as he sees fit. 

The apostle Paul relays these truths unambiguously in his epistle to the Romans, writing –

...there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God. Therefore whoever resists the authorities resists what God has appointed, and those who resist will incur judgment. For rulers are not a terror to good conduct, but to bad. Would you have no fear of the one who is in authority? Then do what is good, and you will receive his approval, for he is God's servant for your good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain. For he is the servant of God, an avenger who carries out God's wrath on the wrongdoer. Therefore one must be in subjection, not only to avoid God's wrath but also for the sake of conscience. For the same reason you also pay taxes, for the authorities are ministers of God, attending to this very thing. Pay to all what is owed to them: taxes to whom taxes are owed, revenue to whom revenue is owed, respect to whom respect is owed, honor to whom honor is owed.[47]

While we recognize that there are historical events that lead to the formation of governing bodies, we also must recognize that it is God who has appointed these authorities to judge the actions of men and women impartially.

3. Impartiality is Not Impossible, if Properly Understood

From the above, we see that the Christian faith does not sever reality, language, and law from one another. We also see that God has given men the ability to rule by laws expressed in language. It is this judgment by the law of God that can properly be called impartial, seeing as its goal is to glorify God, not to attend to the needs, demands, and desires of any human individual or group. As it is written –

“You shall do no injustice in court. You shall not be partial to the poor or defer to the great, but in righteousness shall you judge your neighbor.”[48]

One can only show true impartiality by judging all men by the Law of God. CRT, and social justice advocacy, assume a concept of law that is purely socio-historical, non-divine in origin, and, therefore, identifies all laws as partial by virtue of their being expressed by different individuals and groups. Yet the Scriptures are clear – impartial judgment is judgment according to the Word of God.

4. Biblical Epistemology is Thoroughly Anti-Relativistic

We have already noted that CLS and CRT assume a form of ethical/moral relativism. What the reader should note here, however, is that ethical/moral propositions (e.g. “Income inequality is immoral”) constitute knowledge claims. Ethical/moral items of knowledge are viewed as relative to historically ensconced persons and groups, which implies that truth itself is relative. This is necessarily implied by their doctrine. However, we may further substantiate this assertion by reminding the reader that CRT, following CLS and the post-structuralist/postmodernist philosophers who influenced that school of jurisprudence, axiomatically denies all forms of essentialism. Consequently, CRT reduces categories of being and thought to heuristic tools to be used in the service of achieving whatever ends are in view by CRT proponents. The denial of all forms of essentialism renders all “knowledge” relative to historically ensconced persons and groups. Such a relativized understanding of knowledge, and therefore truth itself, stands in stark contradiction to the teaching of Scripture. 

God’s Word teaches us that what it proclaims to be the case is actually the case. Scripture is replete with examples of this, but here we will offer two that are sufficient, seeing as they are universal in scope.

The sum of your word is truth, and every one of your righteous rules endures forever.[49]

Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth.[50]

Given that the Scriptures are the Word of God communicated by various men throughout history, it follows that the truth is not relative to particular individuals or groups. CRT’s assumption that truths are relative to specific persons or groups is not only self-referentially absurd, therefore, but diametrically opposed to the teaching of Scripture regarding the nature of knowledge, truth, and, by implication, man.

5. Biblical Anthropology Militates Against CRT

We again must underscore CRT’s commitment to anti-Enlightenment concepts derived from the Christian worldview. As regards anthropology, what is renounced by CRT is the concept of subjectivity divorced from any particularities of history, ethnicity, language, gender, et al. Whereas the Scriptures teach us that every individual who ever has existed, is now existing, and will later exist is made in the image of God,[51] CRT undermines this by renouncing any concept of “abstract” subjectivity. The contradiction that obtains here is plain to see. Scripture teaches that all persons have an essential nature that makes them human; CRT denies all forms of essentialism, including anthropological essentialism.

6. The Incarnation and CRT are Mutually Exclusive

Christians affirm that the Eternal Son of God, Second Person of the Trinity, became “became flesh and dwelt among us.”[52] He was “made like [us] in every respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people.”[53] This means that “when the fullness of time was come, [Christ took] upon him man's nature, with all the essential properties and common infirmities thereof, yet without sin.”[54] Thus, we affirm “that two whole, perfect, and distinct natures were inseparably joined together in one person, without conversion, composition, or confusion; which person is very God and very man, yet one Christ, the only mediator between God and man.”[55] God the Son truly became truly human, sharing every aspect of our human nature in its uncorrupted and sinless state. Hence, Scripture declares him to be “the last”[56] and “second Adam.”[57]

Christ, in other words, is truly God and truly man. The two natures are united in one divine person, implying that the knowledge of the incarnate Son did not differ in kind from the knowledge he possessed prior to his incarnation, nor does it differ now. Knowledge is not dependent upon history, nor is it dependent upon one’s socio-historical conditions; knowledge is God's possession. Neither Christ’s gender, nor his skin color, nor his language, nor his height, nor his hair length, nor his weight, nor his eye color made him possess knowledge he otherwise would not have possessed had he been born, for instance, a wealthy, white Scandinavian aristocrat. The knowledge Christ has as the God-Man is identical in substance to the knowledge he possessed prior to his incarnation. This is a necessary implication of the doctrine of the hypostatic union of the human and divine natures in the Second Person of the Trinity.

Given the doctrine of the hypostatic union, therefore, we must affirm that whatever divinely revealed knowledge we possess is substantially identical to that knowledge as it exists in the mind of God. The true propositions we possess are identical in substance to those which God possesses, and cannot be otherwise, since the Son of God as one divine person with two distinct natures knew, and knows, such propositions as both God and man. This is a reality that contradicts CRT’s relativistic epistemology in which persons and groups of persons have access to truths that are unknowable by other persons and groups of persons differing with respect to historical placement, skin color, language, weight, height, gender, socio-political status, and so on.

CRT and the doctrine of the incarnation cannot be held together simultaneously without contradiction, for CRT implies that there are “truths” that are inseparable from the human particularities mentioned above, but the incarnation shows us that there are no truths that are inseparable from the human particularities of an individual person or group's existence, seeing as the Lord Jesus Christ’s possession of universal and absolute truths was not dependent upon those human particularities mentioned above. Either CRT is correct, therefore, and Christ could not have known universal and absolute truths, or Christ did know universal and absolute truths, and CRT is false. These options are mutually exclusive.

§ V. Conclusion/s

Contemporary Christian proponents of CRT and social justice advocacy are either not being upfront about the academic and philosophical origins of CRT and social justice, or they are ignorant of their origins. If they are not being honest about this matter, Christians have every right to question the veracity of their claim that CRT is not unChristian. Likewise, if the proponents of CRT and social justice are ignorant as to the origins of CRT and social justice, Christians have every right to question the veracity of the claim that CRT is not unChristian. We are under obligation to test all things by the Word of God, accepting what is explicitly and/or implicitly taught therein; we are also obligated to reject what has no basis in the Scriptures.

What we do not have the liberty to do is accept the claims of CRT and social justice advocacy proponents as true without first scrutinizing them in the pure light of God’s holy Word. As is usually the case in church history, proponents of false teaching often claim to be taking the moral high ground by promulgating their false teaching. One need look no further than the so-called “Emerging church” movement just over a decade ago to see this tactic in action.[58] It is necessary for us, therefore, to know whether or not a new teaching or framework for understanding some Scriptural reality (in this case, i.e. that of racism, sins of partiality and violence) is fundamentally, essentially, at odds with the Christian faith. When we do, we will be able to properly differentiate legitimate moral concerns and commands from illegitimate moral concerns and commands.[59]

Having established that CRT is foundationally anti-Christian and, therefore, incompatible with Christianity, indeed contradictory to its main beliefs regarding the Son of God’s person and work, we may better understand why it is that CRT and social justice advocacy mistakenly identify acts of mercy as acts of justice. CRT and social justice advocacy rest upon a worldview that is contrary to the Scriptures at nearly every turn, thus their fruits are equally corrupt. The central issue in this matter, then, is not whether or not the church is to uphold justice, nor whether or not the church is to despise all forms of partiality and embrace persons of all socio-economic and ethnic backgrounds, nor whether or not the Scriptures command us to love our neighbors by showing them mercy and kindness. The central issue is this – Are the Scriptures sufficient, or not?

1 See, “The Statement on Social Justice & The Gospel,” https://statementonsocialjustice.com.

2 “Is Critical Race Theory ‘UnChristian’ Part 1,” Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary,

http://kingdomdiversity.sebts.edu/index.php/2018/10/12/is-critical-race-theory-unchristian-part-1/, accessed October 18, 2018.

3 “Is Critical Race Theory ‘UnChristian’ Part 3,” Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary, http://kingdomdiversity.sebts.edu/index.php/2018/10/03/is-critical-race-theory-unchristian-part-3/,accessed October 18, 2018.

4 ibid.

5 ibid.

6 ibid.

7 “Is Critical Race Theory ‘UnChristian’ Part 4,” Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary,
http://kingdomdiversity.sebts.edu/index.php/2018/10/01/is-critical-race-theory-unchristian-part-4/, accessed October 18, 2018.

8 ibid.

9 ibid.

10 ibid.

11 ibid.

12 ibid.

13 ibid.

14 ibid.

15 “Is Critical Race Theory ‘UnChristian’ Part 5,” Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary, 
http://kingdomdiversity.sebts.edu/index.php/2017/10/26/is-critical-race-theory-unchristian-part-5/, accessed October 18, 2018.

16 ibid.

17 ibid.

18 ibid.

19 ibid.

20 ibid.

21 ibid.

22 ibid.

23 ibid.

24 ibid.

25 “Is Critical Race Theory ‘UnChristian’ Part 5,” Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary, 
http://kingdomdiversity.sebts.edu/index.php/2018/10/14/is-critical-race-theory-unchristian-part-2/. accessed October 18, 2018. (emphasis added)

26 “Critical Race Theory: Past, Present, and Future,” in Current Legal Problems 1998: Legal Theory at the End of the Millenium ed. Michael Freeman (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), 467. (emphasis added)

27 Critical Race Theory: An Introduction (New York & London: New York University Press, 2001), 2-3. (emphasis added)

28 Philosophy of Law: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006), 92.

29 ibid. (emphasis added)

30 ibid., 95.

31 “Antonio Gramsci and the Legal System,” in ALSA Forum Vol. VI. No. 1 (1982), 36.

32 Wacks, Philosophy of Law, 95.

33 While Christianity does not embrace the Enlightenment ideals of human ethical, epistemological, and social autonomy, it does agree with the Enlightenment’s concepts of rational universality, ontological essentialism, and epistemological foundationalism.

34 cf. Gen 1:1, Ps 33:6, John 1:1-3, 2nd Pet 3:5, Heb 1:1-2 & 11:3.

35 cf. Heb 1:3.

36 cf. 2nd Pet 3:5-7.

37 Ps 33:6.

38 cf. Ps 33:9.

39 Eph 1:11.

40 cf. Rom 3:23.

41 cf. Rom 1:18-19 & 32; 2:14-15.

42 cf. Gen 1:26-27 & 9:6; Luke 20:23-25; 1st Cor 11:7; James 3:9.

43 Ps 62:11

44 1st Sam 2:6-8. (emphasis added)

45 Dan 2:20-21. (emphasis added)

46 John 19:11a. (emphasis added)

47 Rom 13:1b-7. (emphasis added)

48 Lev 19:15.

49 Ps 119:160. (emphasis added)

50 John 17:17. (emphasis added)

51 cf. Gen 1:26-27.

52 John 1:14a.

53 Heb 2:17.

54 1689 London Baptist Confession of Faith, Ch. 8, Art. 2. (emphasis added)

55 ibid. (emphasis added)

56 1st Cor 15:45.

57 1st Cor 15:47.

58 See Diaz, Hiram R. “Heretics that are Holier Than You,” Christian Apologetics and Research Ministry Official Blog, 

https://web.archive.org/web/20121103061646/http://blog.carm.org/2011/06/heretics-that-are-holier-than-you/.

59 There are several contemporary authors who have provided very useful resources in this regard. See Beisner, Calvin E. Social Justice vs. Biblical Justice: How Good Intentions Undermine Justice and the Gospel (Good Trees Press: 2018), 46pp; Clark, R. Scott. “Resources on the Social Gospel and Social Justice,” The Heidelblog, https://heidelblog.net/2018/04/resources-on-the-social-gospel-social-justice/; Harrison, Darrell B. “The Fault in Their (Social) Gospel,” Just Thinking...For Myself,
 https://justthinking.me/2018/08/31/the-fault-in-their-social-gospel/, and “The Misleading Language of the Social Justice Movement,” https://justthinking.me/2018/05/13/the-misleading-language-of-the-social-justice-movement/; Buice, Josh. “The Broken Road of the Social Gopel,” Delivered by Grace, 
http://www.deliveredbygrace.com/the-broken-road-of-the-social-gospel/; Sey, Samuel. “Social Justice is a Threat to Human Rights and the Gospel,” Statement on Social Justice and the Gospel, https://statementonsocialjustice.com/articles/social-justice-threat-human-rights/; Hall, Amy K. “If We Lose the Meaning of ‘Justice,’ We Lose the Gospel,” Stand to Reason, https://www.str.org/blog/if-we-lose-meaning-justice-we-lose-gospel.

Today's post represents the third in a series of posts about my time as a student at Knox Theological Seminary (KTS) in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. I originally wrote about KTS and the controversy concerning Warren Gage in a 2008 book published by the Trinity Foundation titled Imagining a Vain Thing: The Decline and Fall of Knox Seminary.

In the ten years that have elapsed since I wrote the book under the guidance of the late Dr. John W. Robbins, my conviction that what I wrote was correct remains unchanged. I stand by the book, all of it.

That said, ten years is time enough for further reflection, and it seemed good to me to write a series of posts to share with readers some of the big-picture lessons that can be taken from the disaster that overtook KTS in the fall of 2007.

A Danger of Unsound Eschatology

There is no other head of the Church but the Lord Jesus Christ; nor can the Pope of Rome, in any sense, be head thereof; but is that Antichrist, that man of sin, and son of perdition, that exalts himself, in the Church, against Christ and all that is called God.

- Westminster Confession of Faith, 25.6

One of the myths advanced by Dr. Gage during my time at KTS was the idea that the Reformation had little to say about eschatology. In the Introduction to the John-Revelation Project (JRP) Gage makes the following claim, "It is instructive that Martin Luther questioned the canonicity of Revelation, lamenting that a "Revelation" should reveal, and John Calvin, who commented on every other book of the Bible, glaringly omitted commentary on the Apocalypse. The children of the Reformers have fared little better. And it is time to ask why?"

This is statement is propaganda in at least three ways. In the first place, although Luther did question the canonicity of Revelation, in the end he did accept it. Second, Revelation is not the only book John Calvin omitted from his commentary on the Bible. There were a number of books on which Calvin did not comment such as Judges, Ruth, and 1&2 Samuel. Third, there have been numerous commentaries written on Revelation by Protestants. For example, Isaac Newton (yes, that Isaac Newton), John Gill, E.B. Elliott to name just a few. In fact, it probably would shock most early 21st century Protestants just how much has been written by earlier generations of Protestants on Revelation in general and the identification of the papacy as the Antichrist in particular.

For example, the statement above is the original wording of the Westminster Confession of Faith (WCF) when it was published in 1648, but was excised in a 1903 revision of the WCF by the PCUSA - the PCUSA was and is the mainline Presbyterian denomination is the United States - and today it is a rare thing indeed for a Presbyterian church to use a version of the Confession with this language.

In the 1903 revision, the PCUSA replaced the historic language of the Confession with the following, "The Lord Jesus Christ is the only head of the Church, and the claim of nay man to be the vicar of Christ and the head of the Church, is unscriptural, without warrant in fact, and is a usurpation dishonoring the Lord Jesus Christ.

Many years ago when I first began to get serious about studying Reformed theology, I purchased a version of the WCF published by the PCA, a more theologically conservative organization than the PCUSA. The language of 25.6 in their version runs thus, "There is no other head of the Church but the Lord Jesus Christ. Nor can the Pope of Rome, in any sense, be head thereof."

The most obvious difference between the original version and its newer counterparts is the identification of the Pope or Rome as "Antichrist, that man of sin, and son of perdition."

Today it's considered bad manners and theologically incorrect to call the Pope of Rome Antichrist. But our Protestant forebears were no so ashamed. Consider the following quotes:

• This teaching shows very forcefully that the pope is the very Antichrist. He exalts himself above Christ and opposes Him, because he will not allow Christians to be saved without his power, which nevertheless is nothing and is neither ordained nor commanded by God...Just as we cannot worship the devil himself as Lord and God, so we cannot put up with his apostle, the pope, or Antichrist, in his regime as head or lord (Martin Luther, What Luther Says, 34).
• Daniel (Dan. 9:27] and Paul [II Thess. 2:4] foretold that Antichrist would sit in the Temple of God. With us, it is the Roman pontiff we make the leader and standard bearer of that wicked and abominable kingdom (John Calvin, Institutes, 4.2.12).
• Yea, we doubt not to prove the kingdom of the Pope to be the kingdom and power of Antichrist (John Knox).
• This chapter [Revelation 15] is a preparation to the pouring out of the seven vials...and of the destruction of antichrist; and it is said to be a sign "in heaven", where John was called up, and where he had his visions; and it was "another", a different one from that in (Revelation 12:1) which represented the downfall of Paganism, but this the downfall of Popery; and it is a very "great" one, it is expressive of great things, as the fall of Babylon the great, or the judgment of the great whore... (John Gill, Commentary on Revelation)
• [S]o the antichrist here mentioned is some usurper of God's authority in the Christian church, who claims divine honours; and to whom can this better apply than to the bishops of Rome, to whom the most blasphemous titles have been given, ad Dominus Deus noster papa - Our Lord God the pope; Deus alter in terra - Another God on earth; Idem est dominium Dei et papae - The dominion of God and the pope is the same?
• It is the bounden duty of every Christian to pray against Antichrist, and as to what Antichrist is no same man ought to raise a question. If it be not the popery in the Church of Rome there is nothing in the world that can be called by that name (Charles Spurgeon).

One could multiply such quotes as the sand of the sea, but the sample above should serve to convince the reader that the conviction that the office of the papacy was the Antichrist of the Apostle John was widespread from the dawn of the Reformation until the end of the 19th century.

Today, such convictions is almost never heard. And if it is spoken, it's done so in a hushed whisper so as not to attract any attention.

One reason for the decline in understanding of the office of the papacy as Antichrist is the success the Jesuit eschatological schemes of preterism and futurism have had in supplanting the source eschatology of the Reformation.

Preterism is the view that the Bible teaches Antichrist came and went in the past and that there is today no Antichrist on earth. It was developed during the Counter-Reformation by Jesuit Luis de Alcazar.

Futurism, on the other hand, holds that Antichrist is yet to come. This program was developed by Jesuit Francisco Ribera and is the majority report among America's Dispensationalists.

But the historical stance of the Reformation on Antichrist is Historicism. Historicism holds, among other things, that Antichrist has been with us in the past, currently is at work, will be destroyed in the future.

Unsound Eschatology can be just as dangerous as any other unsound doctrine. To the degree Protestants have allowed the Jesuits to do their thinking for them, to the extent Protestants have absorbed the end times theories of the Babylonian Harlot, to that degree they have rendered themselves ineffective soldiers of Christ and set themselves up to be duped by hucksters such as Warren Gage.

(To be continued...)

As a continuation of last week's post, I'd like to look a few more larger lessons that can be drawn from the events surrounding the decline and fall of Knox Theological Seminary (KTS).  As a student at the school in the fall of 2006, my stay there, however brief, allowed me to witness part of the drama firsthand. 

Last week, I outlined a couple lessons, the first of which was that God is faithful to his people, sometimes in unexpected ways.  As a personal testimony to this, I related how my stay at KTS allowed me to meet John Robbins and, with his guidance, to write the manuscript for what would become the book Imagining a Vain Thing:  The Decline and Fall of Knox Seminary. To that point in my life, it never once occurred to me that I would ever be an author.  The fact that this actually happened is something that still to this day strikes me with amazement.  I didn't go to seminary planning to write a book.  I had gone there to study for the ministry.  But God had a different plan.

A second lesson Christians can take from the problems at KTS is the danger Roman Catholic trained faculty pose to Protestant institutions of learning.  Dr. Warren Gage, the central figure in the decline and fall of KTS, nominally was a Presbyterian, but his cast of mind was distinctly Roman Catholic.  In part this can be attributed to the fact that he took his Ph.D from the University of Dallas, a Roman Catholic school.  But Dr. Gage is certainly not the only professor at a Protestant school to have received his professional training at a Roman Catholic or Jesuit university.  These Romanist trained teachers pose a genuine threat to the doctrinal soundness of the Protestant colleges and seminaries where they are employed. 

But as important as these lesson are, they are not the only ones that can be taken from the unfortunate events at KTS.  So let us move on to continue some additional points.

A Tale of Missed Opportunities 

I recently watched a series of YouTube videos on commercial air disasters.  The author of the videos used a flight simulator together with on screen text to describe the events leading up to the crashes.  One of the common threads running through  the accounts of the various disasters is that it wasn't just one problem that caused the crash.  Generally, it takes a series of mistakes to occur in a particular sequence for a disaster to take place.  If any one of the factors had been different in a particular scenario, the crash probably wouldn't have happened at all.

From my knowledge of the events at KTS, it seems to me that this same principle can be applied to crashing seminaries as well.  In the case of KTS, there were a number of opportunities - opportunities stretching from the time Gage was under consideration for a teaching position at the school right up until the time when he and his faction formally gained control of the school - for Biblically sound professors, board members and donors to have acted to put a stop to Gage's nonsense.   But, as far as I am aware, no serious attempt to do this was undertaken until the problem had grown so large as to be too little too late.  And even when a serious attempt to remove Gage was undertaken, those pushing for his removal flinched, all but ensuring their defeat.

For example, as part of my research into KTS while writing the book, I found that Dr. D. James Kennedy - Dr. Kennedy was the founder of KTS and was still the Chancellor of the school when I attended there in 2006 - did not want to hire Gage.  Some at school wanted to bring in Gage to develop what become known as the Christianity & Culture (C&C) program  at the school.  As it was described to me at the time I applied to KTS, the C&C program was a Christian great books program where influential books would be read in light of the teachings of Scripture.  For example, in the one class I had in this series we read Plato's Republic.        

Dr. Kennedy was skeptical of the whole idea behind C&C, fearing, rightly as it turned out, that the program would turn into a sort of Trojan Horse, where instead of the culture being judged by the Bible, the Bible would be judged by the culture.  But for all his objections, both to the C&C program in general and to the hiring of Dr. Gage in particular, those in favor of both prevailed upon Dr. Kennedy and the decision to move forward was made.  Had Dr. Kennedy stuck to his guns, perhaps KTS would still be a sound seminary. 

Dr. Gage began teaching at KTS in the fall of 2002 and had already been at the school for four years when I arrived in 2006.  I was astounded at how unbiblical his teaching was, but, at least on the surface, it seemed that everyone thought he was great.  It wasn't until I began my research on the book  that  I learned that Dr. Gage had had his hand slapped a few times over the years for his distinctively unreformed doctrine, but no serious effort had been made to remove him from his teaching position.  Had Gage's unorthodox ideas received the scrutiny they deserved, perhaps he could have been removed from the school before he caused serious, lasting damage.  But this was not done, and his leaven was allowed to go on leavening the whole KTS lump for years until it was too late. 

Even up until the fall of 2007, KTS still had the opportunity to right its listing ship.  Prompted by a student complaint, Dr. R. Fowler White conducted an investigation into Gage's classroom teaching, an investigation which concluded that Gage was guilty of 1) teaching contrary to the Westminster Confession that individual passages of Scripture had more than one meaning, and 2) disparaging logic and systematic theology.  These charges were spot on, and when the evidence for them were presented to the Executive Committee of the seminary's Board of Directors, the decision was made to terminate Gage's employment.  Had the Executive Committee's decision stuck, KTS may have survived intact.  As it turned out, the full Board of Directors of KTS shied away from taking this decisive step, instead electing to suspend Gage with full pay for the remainder of the fall 2007 semester. 

As it turned out, the Board's failure to take decisive action against Gage was the last chance KTS had to recover its reputation for doctrinal soundness.  Taking full advantage of his reprieve, Gage appealed his suspension to the Session of CRPC.  Not only did Gage succeed in having his suspension reversed, but he also was able to oust those on the Board and Faculty of the school who had opposed him.  Had the Board of KTS stood its ground and fired Gage when it had the chance, in this author's opinion the school's subsequent history very likely would have been much different.  This was a tragic missed opportunity.

The story of the decline and fall of KTS is a cautionary tale of what can happen when individuals fail to take advantage of the opportunities God provides to take a stand for the truth.  Scripture enjoins us to, "mark them which cause divisions and offenses contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned, and avoid them," but this is easy to ignore.  In our sinfulness we fear men, we fear the loss of our jobs and reputations more than we fear God. This author is certainly aware of his own failings in this regard, so it is not my intention to point a finger at others while exempting myself.  That said, KTS's fall from being among the most doctrinally sound reformed seminaries is - as is the case with many airliner disasters - the tale of multiple missed opportunities  that, when taken together, ended up spelling disaster.

In a Dispute, the More Consistent Party Will Prevail, the Less Consistent Will Lose

"The logical and psychological principle that explains this whole tragic farce is this: When two parties accept the same premises, the more consistent party will prevail in the long run, and the less consistent party will not.  That is why the Bible is replete with warnings about the 'world,' 'the wisdom of the world,' and 'human tradition.' There can be no compromise of sola scriptura." 

The words quoted above are from a private email to me from John Robbins during the writing of my book on KTS.  The specific context of these remarks from John came in response to some disturbing discoveries I had made about the theological position of Gage's opponents.  As it turned out, the very people who rightfully criticized Gages for his fanciful typology and wanted to see him suspended from KTS actually agreed with Gage on an important point about typology.  This agreement prevented them from launching the vigorous attack on Gage's typology that the circumstances required.      

The point of agreement among Gage and his critics was this:  it is possible to discern type / anti-type relationships in Scripture by means other than explicit statement. 

In his 2006 book Lamb of God, Dr. Robert L. Reymond discussed typology and approvingly quoted Geerhardus Vos' comments in his Biblical Theology where he wrote, "the mere fact that no writer in the N.T. refers to a trait as typical, affords no proof of its lacking typical significance" (22).  In a footnote on the same page, Reymond wrote, "Bishop Herbert Marsh's dictum in his Lectures on the Criticism and Interpretation of the Bible (London, 1838), 373, that the interpreter should regard as Old Testament types only what the New Testament expressly declares to be so seems to me to be extreme and without scriptural warrant."

Herbert Marsh was a 19th Church of England Bishop for whom Marsh's dictum is named.  In his book Lectures on the Criticism and Interpretation of the Bible, Marsh wrote,

Whatever persons or things, therefore, recorded in the Old Testament, were expressly declared by Christ, or by his Apostles, to have been designed as pre-figurations of person or things relating to the New Testament, such persons or things, so recorded in the former, are types of the persons or things, with which they are compared in the latter. But if we assert, that a person, or thing, was designed to pre-figure another person or thing, where no such pre-figuration has been declared by divine authority, we make an assertion, for which we neither have, nor can have, the slightest foundation. And even when comparisons are instituted in the New Testament between antecedent and subsequent persons or things, we must be careful to distinguish the examples, where a comparison is instituted merely for the sake of illustration, from the examples, where such a connexion is declared, as exists in the relation of a type to its antitype (372-373).

This is Marsh's dictum:  The Bible must explicitly state types and anti-types.  Dr. Reymond tells us this is without scriptural warrant.  And yet, Marsh's dictum, does not leave us in uncertainty as to whether a type / anti-type relationship exists, which, as we shall see below, is a major advantage over Vos' approach. 

Reymond continues his quotation from Vos, adding, "Of course it is inevitable that into this kind of interpretation of O.T. figures an element of uncertainty must enter.  But after all this is an element that enters into all [extra-biblical] exegesis" (brackets in Reymond's text).  By quoting Vos as he does, Reymond admits that engaging in typology apart from the explicit statements of Scripture leads to uncertainty, yet he advocates Vos' typology anyway, while at the same time rejecting Herbert Marsh.  Such a position does not seem consistent with a Reformed approach to the interpretation of Scripture. What is worse, this approach to typology made it very difficult for Gage's critics to take him on, seeing that both sides agreed that typology was some mysterious thing that could be understood only by rejecting logic and embracing uncertainty.     

Although Dr. Reymond - while I was a student at KTS and throughout the time of the 2007 controversy over Warren Gage, Dr. Reymond held the title Professor of Systematic Theology, Emeritus at KTS - was not, as far as I am aware, himself directly involved in the Gage controversy on either side, his rejection of Marsh and support of Vos' speculative typology was echoed by Gage's leading critics.  As Dr. E. Calvin Beisner wrote in a blog post, "Anyone who thinks the former Knox board's decision to suspend Dr. Gage was because he was teaching Redemptive-Historical hermeneutics or Typology clearly does not know the facts.  His chief theological critics at Knox - (now former) board members R. C. Sproul, Rick Phillips, and Cortez Cooper, and faculty members Robert Reymond, Fowleer White, and I - all affirm and use RH and T and admire it in Vos and many others."

Perhaps no other statement from the Gage controversy better sums up the reason for the failure of Gage's opponents.  Gage believed that type / anti-type relationships could be discerned by use of literary patterns, intuition and imagination.  Gage's opponents believed that types and ant-types could be determined by some form of uncertain speculation.  Both sides agreed that Marsh was wrong.      

In the end, Gage's critics agreed with him that types could be determined in some touchy-feely, irrational fashion.  Their main complaint seemed to be, not that Gage used his "poetic imagination," his intuition and literary patterns to find types and anti-types in the Scriptures - Gage's method was in direct contradiction of the Westminster Confession of Faith 1.6 which posits only the explicit statements and necessary inferences of Scripture are binding on Christians; Gage also violated the single meaning clause in Westminster Confession of Faith 1.9 -   but that he simply went too far for their taste.  Doing so make Gage's critics appear weak and uncertain.  As a result, not only did they lose the argument, but they deserved to lose it. 

On the flip side of things, I must grudgingly admit that, as obviously heretical as Gage's teaching was, he had the courage of his convictions and never wavered from them.  Gages was a heretic, but he was a consistent and bold heretic.  His critics were inconsistent and weak.    

The more consistent side will prevail in the long run and the less consistent will lose.  That is one of the big lessons of controversy at KTS.  So what does this mean for us?  Let us make sure that we fight the Lord's battles in the Lord's way.  There's no reason to give an inch to false teachers.  In any theological controversy, we must pray to God that he would grant us the knowledge and the wisdom not merely to oppose false teaching, but to do so thoroughly, boldly and with logical consistency.   Doing so doesn't mean we will win every battle.  But we will win the war.   

(To be continued...)                  

Last week, with our article, The Gospel According to Piper, we caused a stir here at the Semper Reformanda Radio in our assessment of Piper on final justification and final salvation. On September 25, 2017, Piper wrote an article Does God Really Save Us by Faith Alone?, answering in the negative: No, God does not save us by faith alone. Our article was in response to Piper's.

Piper's expressions affirm that while justification is by faith alone, "final salvation" is not. In his September 25 article, he expressed this in multiple ways. We provide here two examples of this:

In justification, faith receives a finished work of Christ performed outside of us and counted as ours — imputed to us. ... In final salvation at the last judgment, faith is confirmed by the sanctifying fruit it has borne, and we are saved through that fruit and that faith.

These works of faith [(1 Thessalonians 1:3; 2 Thessalonians 1:11)], and this obedience of faith [(Romans 1:5; 16:26)], these fruits of the Spirit that come by faith, are necessary for our final salvation. No holiness, no heaven (Hebrews 12:14). So, we should not speak of getting to heaven by faith alone in the same way we are justified by faith alone.

By such words, Piper expresses justification in terms of "faith alone" and final salvation by works that flow from faith, attempting to preserve sola fide without compromising the Scriptural emphasis on works "which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them" (Ephesians 2:10).

Our article, The Gospel According to Piper, was the work of two writers, but what may be the most controversial contribution to the article came from my hand: by "final salvation" Piper actually means "final justification," and therefore Piper was actually expressing—under a Reformed flag—the Roman Catholic view of initial justification by grace and final justification by works. In support of our position I offered the following citation from Piper which summarized one of the main points in his book, The Future of Justification:

Present justification is based on the substitutionary work of Christ alone, enjoyed in union with him through faith alone. Future justification is the open confirmation and declaration that in Christ Jesus we are perfectly blameless before God. This final judgment accords with our works. That is, the fruit of the Holy Spirit in our lives will be brought forward as the evidence and confirmation of true faith and union with Christ. Without that validating transformation, there will be no future salvation. (Piper, John, and N.T. Wright. “The Justification Debate: A Primer.” Christianity Today June 2009: 35-37)

It seemed sufficient to us that if a) in final salvation at the last judgment "faith is confirmed by the sanctifying fruit it has borne," and b) in future justification at the last judgment the fruit of the Holy Spirit in our lives is brought forward as a "confirmation of true faith," then c) we may say that Piper equates final salvation with future justification, and his description of justification and final salvation is really a description of initial justification by faith alone and final justification by faith and works.

Several of our readers considered this representation uncharitable and unfair for three main reasons:

1. in other places Piper denies such a Roman Catholic formulation,
2. by "final salvation," Piper probably meant "final glorification" rather than "final justification," and
3. we should interpret Piper through the lens of forty years of his faithful preaching

Today I will address each of these three criticisms. The first objection is justifiable and compels me to apologize to Piper for overlooking his explicit denials of the Roman Catholic view of justification. I should have found them and included them in my contributions to the original article. I was wrong to omit them. The second objection requires that I provide compelling evidence that Piper means "final justification" by "final salvation."

After addressing these two objections, I will spend considerable time on the third to explain why I remain concerned about Piper's formulations on justification based on a survey of his shifting and contradictory expressions of the doctrine of justification over time. Piper's teaching on justification has been changing for years, and is still changing now. Therefore, it is laudable but nigh impossible to defer to an ostensible continuity and clarity in Piper's teachings.

Objection 1: Piper rejects the Roman Catholic view of justification

Because Piper's statement on justification in Christianity Today grounded present justification on "the substitutionary work of Christ alone," but said that future justification "accords with our works," making mention of Christ's righteousness only in reference to present justification, it appeared to us that Piper was summarizing his own position on justification in terms of an initial justification by grace through faith, and a future justification that is based on works. The Roman Catholic Tridentine formulation on justification is that the righteousness received in justification is "preserved and also increased before God through good works," and that those works are not "merely the fruits and signs of Justification obtained" (Council of Trent, Canons on Justification, Canon 24). If according to Piper's own formulation our initial justification is grounded on Christ's righteousness imputed to us by faith, and our final justification "accords with our works," we could not see how his expression of justification was substantially different from Rome's similar expressions of initial, ongoing, and final justification.

Here two clarifying data pertain. First, the Christianity Today article we cited was intended as a summary of Piper's The Future of Justification, which itself was a critique of N. T. Wright's views of justification. In The Future of Justification, Piper expresses concern that Wright's expressions explicitly affirm a future justification based on works. Piper finds this "startling":

Wright makes startling statements to the effect that our future justification will be on the basis of works. (Piper, The Future of Justification (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 2007) 22)

Here Piper finds "startling" Wright's final justification based on works, and what startled Piper so much is that Wright's position appears to conform to that of Roman Catholicism in which the justified are finally “judged righteous (and receive eternal life) because they are truly righteous" (Piper, The Future of Justification, 183). As startling as Wright's statements are to Piper, Piper's are to us, for Piper's own formulation is just as unsettling:

Future justification is the open confirmation and declaration that in Christ Jesus we are perfectly blameless before God. This final judgment accords with our works.  (Christianity Today June 2009: 35-37)

Why did Piper recoil at Wright's formulation, but when summarizing his own views, express a future justification that "accords with our works"? Part of the answer is how Piper differentiates between "based on works" and "according to works." He writes,

I take [Paul's] phrase 'according to' (kata;) in a sense different from 'based on.' I think the best way to bring together the various threads of Paul’s teaching on justification by faith apart from works (Rom. 3:28; 4:4–6; 11:6; Eph. 2:8) is to treat the necessity of obedience not as any part of the basis of our justification, but strictly as the evidence and confirmation of our faith in Christ whose blood and righteousness is the sole basis of our justification (Piper, The Future of Justification, 110).

Whatever one may think of Piper's various formulations on justification, in fairness to him the critic must at least acknowledge Piper's attempt at differentiating between "based on" and "according to" when formulating an expression in which final justification is according to works. This writer failed to do so.

We will return to Piper's varied, diverse and problematic formulations on justification below, but for now, I will simply acknowledge that my critics were correct to point out that Piper elsewhere objects strenuously to the Roman Catholic view of justification. It was my duty to consider those statements in my examination of Piper.

Objection 2: by "final salvation" Piper means "final glorification" rather than "final justification"

Some of my critics have said it is wrong to make "final salvation" mean "final justification" in Piper. It seems to them, rather, that Piper is talking about "final glorification" instead. For example, the following citation from Piper is taken to refer to "glorification":

So, we should not speak of getting to heaven by faith alone in the same way we are justified by faith alone. Love, the fruit of faith, is the necessary confirmation that we have faith and are alive. We won’t enter heaven until we have it. There is a holiness without which we will not see the Lord (Hebrews 12:14). (Piper, John, Faith Alone: How (Not) to Use a Reformed Slogan, September 13, 2017)

One problem with claiming that Piper is speaking here of glorification is that Piper repeatedly states that final glorification is our inheritance after attaining heaven or getting to heaven. Piper is in this passage speaking not of glorification but of getting into heaven prior to glorification, and the way to get into heaven is to be saved from the wrath of God on the Last Day by the fruits of faith. In fact, that was his whole point in Does God Really Save Us by Faith Alone?: "In final salvation at the last judgment ... we are saved through that fruit and that faith." There is a critical step between judgment and glorification and that step is "attaining heaven."

Note well that Piper elsewhere speaks of glorification as a result of attaining heaven only after final salvation is secured at the Last Judgment: "Jesus transforms us so that we really begin to love like he does so that we move toward perfection that we finally obtain in heaven" (Piper, What Jesus Demands from the World (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 2006) 160). When we obtain heaven, "we are going to receive a great inheritance, including our own glorification" (Piper, Children, Heirs and Fellow Sufferers, 2002). To Piper, the holiness without which no one will see the Lord is not "glorification" but "love, the fruit of faith." To attain heaven one must first be acquitted in judgment, and to be acquitted in judgment—justified—one must have works.

Piper thus speaks of personal holiness as a "validating transformation" that will serve as evidence of true faith at the last judgment so that we can attain heaven, and he speaks of final glorification as the inheritance we receive upon attaining heaven after surviving that final judgment. Piper is speaking of, and has been speaking of, a final acquittal in judgment as a prerequisite to attaining heaven, which itself is a prerequisite to final glorification.

Yes, by "final salvation," Piper means "final justification," and "final justification" to Piper means "final salvation from future judgment."

As evidence, simply read Piper's own words. He speaks again and again of faith and works being necessary to be acquitted in the final judgment:

Final salvation from future judgment is conditional. It will not happen apart from our persevering faith. ... "salvation" refers to our future deliverance from the wrath of God at the judgment and entrance into eternal life. (Piper, John, Desiring God: Meditations of a Christian Hedonist (Piper, John, Desiring God, Multnomah Publishers, 1996) 42) (emphasis added)

[Jesus] says that on the day of judgment he really will reject people because they are "workers of lawlessness." "Then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness’” (Matt. 7:23). He says people will “go away into eternal punishment” because they really failed to love their fellow believers: “As you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me” (Matt. 25:45-46). There is no doubt that Jesus saw some measure of real, lived-out obedience to the will of God as necessary for final salvation. (John Piper, What Jesus Demands from the World, 160). (emphasis added)

It is not accidental that the title of this book has a double meaning. The Future of Justification draws attention not only to where the doctrine itself may be going, but also to the critical importance of God’s future act of judgment when our justification will be confirmed. How will our obedience function in that Day? (Piper, The Future of Justification, 183-4). (emphasis added)

Present justification is based on the substitutionary work of Christ alone, enjoyed in union with him through faith alone. Future justification is the open confirmation and declaration that in Christ Jesus we are perfectly blameless before God. This final judgment accords with our works. That is, the fruit of the Holy Spirit in our lives will be brought forward as the evidence and confirmation of true faith and union with Christ. Without that validating transformation, there will be no future salvation. (Christianity Today, June 2009: 35-37) (emphasis added)

In final salvation at the last judgment, faith is confirmed by the sanctifying fruit it has borne, and we are saved through that fruit and that faith. (Piper, Does God Really Save us by Faith Alone? (Desiring God, September 25, 2017) (emphasis added)

The fact is that in his own words, Piper sees "future justification" and "final salvation" as the same thing, and future justification is by faith and works.

The reader is invited to consider, as well, the fact that the summary on Piper provided from Christianity Today—in which future justification and future salvation are equated—was reviewed and confirmed by Piper himself as an accurate summary of what he was trying to say. Trevin Wax, who compiled the summary confirms this: "Please note that both John Piper and N.T. Wright looked over my work and made some slight revisions regarding their respective summaries" (Wax, Trevin, Piper vs. Wright on Justification: A Layman's Guide, June 26, 2009).

Piper's statements on final justification—final salvation from the wrath of God at the last judgment—were in response to Wright's teaching on final justification in a debate on the meaning of justification. To propose that Piper really was talking about "final glorification"—something not even mentioned in the entirety of Piper's The Future of Justification—is an unhelpful diversion that obscures the actual point Piper was making about "Wright’s view of justification  ... in the present and at the end" (Piper, The Future of Justification, 103). How are we justified at the very end? By faith and by works, according to Piper.

Objection 3: we should evaluate Piper based on decades of faithful gospel preaching

Several critics considered our criticism of Piper uncharitable because we were taking Piper's unclear teachings on justification and using them to interpret his clear teaching on justification. Instead we should consider the fact that Piper has taught clearly for decades on justification and salvation. This objection, however, assumes that Piper has taught consistently and clearly on justification until now. The fact is, Piper has wavered between several different and contradictory positions on justification, which makes it exceedingly difficult to determine which teachings of Piper are the "clear" ones, and which are the "unclear ones."

In order to understand just how unclear Piper has been over the span of his career, we provide below a survey of his thinking on justification from 1985 through 2017.

Piper through the Years

Piper received his Master of Divinity at Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, California (1968-1971) where he studied under Daniel Fuller and discovered the teachings of Jonathan Edwards. Piper was called to become the pastor of Bethlehem Baptist Church in Minneapolis, Minnesota in 1980 in which capacity he served until 2013.

It is worth noting that in his formative years, Piper was greatly influenced by Daniel Fuller who came under the displeasure of O. Palmer Robertson because of his problematic formulations on justification:

In substitution for the biblically clear distinction between the legally imputed righteousness of justification and the vitally infused righteousness of sanctification, [Daniel] Fuller opts for the flexible meanings that may be introduced into the phrase, the “obedience of faith.” Unwittingly it seems, Fuller plays on an ambiguity inherent in the phrase. When he speaks of “salvation” by the “obedience of faith,” does he mean

(1) faith as attaching to Christ altogether? (2) the obedient actions arising from faith? (3) faith considered in itself as an act of obedience?

Because of the ambiguity inherent in the phrase, Fuller may slide between its various meanings … meaning sometimes the obedience which is faith and meaning at other times the obedient actions done in faith. In other words, man is saved by doing, by keeping the revelatory law of Moses, which is the law of faith. … Fuller … leaves himself open to being understood as commending works of faith (the “obedience of faith”) as the way of justification.” (O. Palmer Robertson, Presbuterion, 1981, vol. 8, issue 1, Daniel Fuller's Gospel and Law: Contrast or Continuum?, A Review Article, 84-91)

Robertson's point is borne out by Fuller's work, The Unity of the Bible: Unfolding God's Plan for Humanity (Zondervan, 1992). Fuller built his view of justification around Jonathan Edwards' rejection of Calvin. While Edwards insisted on justification by faith alone, he struggled to grasp how a sinner could be initially justified by faith alone when the verdict on his final justification was still pending, awaiting the outcome of his perseverance. Edwards (and Fuller following) concluded that we are not actually saved by faith alone, but rather are "saved by perseverance." Thus, in the initial verdict of justification, God "has respect to" the eventual perseverance of the sinner:

"But [contrary to Calvin] we are really saved by perseverance… For, though a sinner is justified in his first act of faith; yet even then, in that act of justification, God has respect to perseverance as being virtually [implied] in the first act." (Fuller, Daniel, The Unity of the Bible (Zondervan, 1992) 296-298 (citing Edwards))

This is problematic. Our view on justification is that the righteousness God contemplates in His verdict of justification is Christ's righteousness alone, imputed to us by faith alone. The Westminster Confession insists that God justifies believers "not for any thing wrought in them, or done by them, ... nor by imputing faith itself, the act of believing, or any other evangelical obedience to them, as their righteousness," not even their perseverance (Westminster Confession of Faith, 11.1). Edward's problematic formulation has God contemplating the sinner's perseverance in His verdict of justification, focusing on the "thing wrought in them."

W. Robert Godfrey correctly recognized that Fuller had indeed proposed a different view of justification, and therefore a different gospel:

The clearest implication of Fuller’s work has to do with the instrumental cause of justification. What is implicit in his book is made explicit in his interactions with Robertson’s work where he states that faith and works are the instrumental cause of justification. (Godfrey, W. Robert, O. Palmer Robertson, Presbuterion, 1983, 9.1, Back to Basics, 80-81).

Godfrey's concern, too, had been borne out in Fuller's book. Let the reader keep in mind that Piper's view on justification blossomed in the same sun and soil as Fuller's. As Piper himself later acknowledged, "the plants of my pondering have grown" in Fuller's garden. As we shall see, starting with Fuller's ambiguous meaning of "obedience of faith," Piper has wavered throughout his ministry between multiple positions, and is still even now trying to find his voice on justification. Piper's apple did not fall far from Fuller's tree, and Robertson and Godfrey could write the same  today of Piper as they did of Fuller.

1985: Bethlehem Baptist Church Staff: What We Believe About the Five Points of Calvinism

We provide the following statement to show where Piper was early in his teaching ministry. This is five years after accepting the call to pastor Bethlehem Baptist. Piper is entrenched in the justification construct Robertson and Godfrey found so disconcerting in Fuller. Piper, puzzled over how God can provide an initial verdict of justification before the sinner has even shown that he will persevere, attempts in this statement to reconcile the difficulty:

God justifies us on the first genuine act of saving faith, but in doing so he has a view to all subsequent acts of faith contained, as it were, like a seed in that first act. ... God does not wait to the end of our lives in order to declare us righteous.  ... Nevertheless, we must also own up to the fact that our final salvation is made contingent upon the subsequent obedience which comes from faith. ...[W]e are justified on the basis of our first act of faith because God sees in it (like he can see the tree in an acorn) the embryo of a life of faith. (emphasis added)

That difficulty will continue to arise in Piper as he wrestles with the righteousness God contemplates in the initial and final justification of the believer.

1995: The Sinner is Justified by Faith in His Future Moral Improvement

It is now 1995 and Piper is still advancing Fuller's constructs on justification. While Piper does not completely agree with Fuller on everything, he nonetheless formulated his own view of justification based on the latent ambiguity in Fuller's "obedience of faith," the very construct Robertson found so reprehensible:

Daniel Fuller’s vision of the Christian life as an “obedience of faith” is the garden in which the plants of my pondering have grown. Almost three decades of dialogue on the issues in this book have left a deep imprint. … His major work, The Unity of the Bible, is the explanatory background to most of what I write. (Piper, Future Grace (1995) 7)

For Piper, “[f]aith is primarily future oriented” (Piper, Future Grace, 13), which necessarily causes the sinner to focus primarily on his future transformation rather than on the past work Christ has already accomplished for him. We see Fuller's influence as Piper explains his meaning: "future grace" is the Holy Spirit's moral transformation in the believer, and the believer is justified by faith in that moral transformation:

“…the heart-strengthening power that comes from the Holy Spirit (Ephesians 3:16) is virtually the same as what I mean by future grace.” (Piper, Future Grace (Multnomah, 1995) 69).

“And this faith in future grace is the faith through which we are justified.” (Piper, Future Grace, 191).

Thus, to Piper, both God and the sinner have the sinner's future moral improvement in mind in justification. God contemplates the sinner's future improvement—the sinner believing, and God foreseeing—that the sinner will improve over time. Take Piper's own words from Future Grace, and we have exactly what Robertson feared in Fuller: the sinner is justified by God's knowledge of, and the sinners confidence in, his future moral improvement, "for the faith through which we are justified" is faith in "the heart-strengthening power that comes from the Holy Spirit."

1999: Does James Contradict Paul?

In his 1999 sermon on James and Paul, Piper struggled to reconcile the two apostles, and could only resolve the tension by having Paul speak of the initial moment of justification at the beginning of the Christian life, and having James speak of maintaining an ongoing and final right standing with God through faith and works:

So when Paul renounces "justification by works" he renounces the view that anything we do along with faith is credited to us as righteousness. Only faith obtains the verdict, not guilty, when we become Christians. Works of any kind are not acceptable in the moment of initial justification. ... For James, "justification by works" (which he accepts) means "maintaining a right standing with God by faith along with the necessary evidence of faith, namely, the works of love. (Piper, John, Does James Contradict Paul?, August 8, 1999)

Piper repeats the construct multiple times, insisting that Paul is speaking only about justification by faith alone in initial justification: "That's how we get started in the Christian life - justified by faith alone."  James, on the other hand, is talking about how "one maintain[s] an ongoing and final right standing with God." (Piper, John, Does James Contradict Paul?, sermon audio, 28:26-34:26).

At the end of the sermon, Piper finally commends an entirely new construct to his listeners to resolve the difficulty: "justification by dependence alone on Christ alone." Piper defined "dependence" as faith at the beginning of the Christian walk, and defined "dependence" as faith and works during the middle and end of the Christian walk. Here, in an attempt to clarify, he simply muddied the water in order to preserve a Reformational sola, but in reality imported works into final justification (Piper, John, Does James Contradict Paul? ,sermon audio, 35:30-35:50).

Like his mentor Fuller, Piper thus repeatedly "leaves himself open to being understood as commending works of faith (the “obedience of faith”) as the way of justification." In fact, this 1999 sermon was simply a recapitulation of Fuller's 19th chapter of The Unity of the Bible, Unfolding God's Plan for Humanity, "Abraham's Persevering Faith" (281-304). It is important to establish this in Piper's timeline to show that in 1999, Piper was still advocating a view on justification that the reformed community found reprehensible.

2002: Counted Righteous in Christ

Something apparently had happened between 1999 and 2002. During that time, Piper wrote Counted Righteous in Christ to defend "the historic Protestant view of the relationship between faith and obedience so that the two are not conflated in the instrumentality of justification." A laudable concern, indeed, since his own mentor had conflated them, and he had as well. Gone from his writing was the ambiguous language of justification by "dependence alone on Christ alone." Absent, too, was the talk about how justification at the "beginning of the Christian life is by faith alone" but "maintaining a right standing with God" is "by faith along with ... works of love."

Had Piper finally become Protestant? Perhaps even Reformed? While reformed teachers were cheering his new work, Piper's mentor, Daniel Fuller, was deeply disappointed that he had wandered so far from the fold. "[I]s not such talk dangerous?" Fuller asked. In Fuller's eyes, Piper had stumbled into the Galatian heresy (Fuller, Daniel, Reformation & Revival Journal (vol 12, no. 4, Fall 2003, "Another Reply to Counted Righteous in Christ" 115-120).

The plants of Piper's pondering had apparently left Fuller's garden at last. Let the reader note that until he published Counted Righteous in Christ, Piper's formulations on justification did not elicit Fuller's disapproval. From his seminary years until the turn of the millennium, Piper still agreed with Fuller's erroneous construct on justification, and that status quo remained until Piper finally decided to defend "the historic Protestant view" instead of what Fuller had taught him. But the plant of Piper's pondering would soon return to its roots.

2006: What Jesus Demands from the World

Piper's 2006 work was written to instruct Christians on the need to obey Jesus' commands (Piper, John, What Jesus Demands from the World (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books (2006) 17). We agree that Christians are to obey Jesus. One rather disconcerting observation, however, is found in Demand #21, in which Piper explains that Jesus will send some believers to hell "because they really failed to love their fellow believers." We cited this same example above to show that Piper means "final justification" when he speaks of "final salvation." We return to it now to demonstrate that Piper's wavering on justification is due partly to Fuller's tutelage, and partly to his own confusion.

To arrive at his conclusion that Jesus will send some believers to hell, Piper combines Matthew 7:23 "depart from me, ye that work iniquity” and Matthew 25:41-46, "Depart from me, ye cursed ... Inasmuch as ye did it not...". Piper thus shows that Jesus will send some people "'away into eternal punishment' because they really failed to love their fellow believers" (Piper, Demands, 160). The two passages say nothing of the sort.

Piper's confusion is found in his assumption that the rejected persons in each passage—"Depart from me" (Matthew 7:23, 25:41)—are "fellowbelievers" with the children of God. Yet both passages actually portray them as unbelievers. In Matthew 7:23, those who are sent away from Him are "false prophets," "ravening wolves" dressed "in sheep’s clothing" (Matthew 7:15). In Mathew 25:41, those who are sent away from Him are goats, rather than sheep. As Christ explained in John 10:26, "ye believe not, because ye are not of my sheep." Only sheep believe. The people Jesus sends away to damnation are unbelieving wolves and goats. To arrive at his conclusion that Jesus will send some believers to hell, therefore, Piper had first to read "believers" into "wolves" and "goats," something completely foreign to the text.

Compounding his confusion, Piper then attempted to justify his reading of Matthew 7 and Matthew 25 by appealing to Matthew 12. In doing so, Piper interpreted Jesus' reference to faith as a reference to works, and on that basis concluded that Christians will be justified by works at the last day. Piper explained his rendering of Matthew 7 and 25, in this footnote:

Though it may cause confusion, it is possible to use the word “justify” to describe how the fruit of good behavior works in the day of judgment. The fruits can “justify” us in the sense of proving that we are believers and belong to Jesus and have a right standing with God in him. That is how I understand Matthew 12:37, “By your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned." (Piper, Demands, 161n (emphasis added))

Here Piper has read "works" into "words," completely foreign to the text. As we showed in our previous article, Jesus' reference to people being justified or condemned by their "words" on the last day was a reference to being justified by faith or condemned for unbelief, not judged by their "works." He was referring to the words of faith expressed by the Gentiles of Galilee ("Is not this the son of David?" (Matthew 12:23)) in contrast with the unbelieving words of the Pharisees ("This fellow doth not cast out devils, but by Beelzebub the prince of the devils" (Matthew 12:24)).

To illustrate His point that people will either be justified or condemned by their words, Jesus gave two examples of people being justified by their words on the Last Day: the Ninevites who believed the preaching of Jonah (Matthew 12:41, Jonah 3:5), and the Queen of Sheba who believed the teaching of Solomon (Matthew 12:42, 1 Kings 10:9). Both would rise in judgment with this generation, and condemn it. The Ninevites and the Queen of Sheba had spoken words of faith upon the hearing of God's word, and this present generation had spoken words of unbelief, "for out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh" (Matthew 12:34). Jesus thus taught that we would be acquitted on the Last Day by the same righteousness we received when we first believed—just like the Ninevites and the Queen of Sheba. Words here referred to "faith" or "unbelief." They do not refer to "works." To arrive at his conclusion that "the fruit of good behavior" justifies us "in the day of judgment" Piper erroneously substituted "the fruit of good behavior" for "words" and concluded that believers must be in some sense justified by their works of love on the Last Day.

Our concern with Piper's 2006 position is twofold. First, in his analysis of the role of works in justification on the Last Day, he distorted three separate passages from Jesus to get to his point. Second, it shows that the "plant of his pondering" never really left Fuller's "garden." He was still right where he was in 1999 when he explained repeatedly that initial justification is by faith alone, but it is our duty to maintain our right standing with God through works.

Piper's position in 2006 was not dissimilar to that of N. T. Wright, Professor of New Testament and Early Christianity at the University of St Andrews and proponent of the controversial New Perspective on Paul. The year after What Jesus Demands from the World, the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA) rejected Wright's formulations on the same grounds that Robertson and Godfrey had rejected Fuller's:

It would appear that Wright is inconsistent when it comes to his means for receiving present and future justification. In the present, Wright argues that the badge of justification is faith alone and that no works are involved in this (Wright, What Saint Paul Really Said, 132). However, in reference to “final” justification, Wright argues that it is “on the basis of the whole life led.” But this is a contradiction: how can one be assured of “final justification,” if the final verdict is based on the whole life led (i.e. faith plus faithfulness/works)? Is there such a case as a person receiving present justification and not final justification?These inconsistencies seem to shift the means for receiving justification to works, since the only difference between one who receives present justification from one who receives final justification is that the latter works. (34th PCA General Assembly, Report of ad interim Study Committee on Federal Vision, New Perspective and Auburn Avenue Theology (2007) 2228n)

We would ask Piper the same questions because of his own inconsistencies. Is there such a case as a person receiving present justification and not maintaining right standing with God through good works? Piper assures us that that could never happen: "None who is located by faith in God’s invincible favor will fail to have all that is necessary to demonstrate this in life" (Piper, Demands, 210). If so, then in what way does Jesus "really" send some of our "fellow believers" to hell on the Last Day?

2007: The Future of Justification

In his critique of N. T. Wright, Piper ironically criticized him for his ambiguous use of "the obedience of faith," the very thing for which Robertson had critiqued Fuller. Piper wrote,

Adding to the ambiguity of how our works function in justification is Wright’s apparent conflation of “faith,” on the one hand, and “faithfulness” (or faithful obedience), on the other hand. ... The issue is whether justification by faith really means justification by works of any kind, whether provided by God or man. That is the issue, and Wright again leaves us with the impression that human transformation and Spirit wrought acts of obedience are included in the term “faith” when he speaks of present justification being by faith alone. (Piper, The Future of Justification, 130-131).

We remind the reader that only eight years earlier, in his attempt to harmonize James and Paul, Piper was advocating for "justification by dependence alone," as noted above, explaining that our initial right standing with God is by faith alone, but our ongoing and final right standing with God is maintained by both faith and works. Both were collapsed into the single construct, "dependence alone." Like Wright, Piper was including "Spirit wrought acts of obedience" in the term "dependence," holding to justification by "dependence alone" (meaning faith alone) at the beginning of the Christian life, and justification by "dependence alone" (meaning faith and works of love) throughout the life of the believer. Piper too, had been "adding to the ambiguity of how our works function in justification" less than a decade earlier.

2009: Piper, meet Doug Wilson. Doug Wilson, meet John Piper

Back in 2003, Douglas Wilson, pastor of Christ Church in Moscow, Idaho, suddenly began "to suspect that what he has believed for many years may actually be a truncated form of the truth, particularly when the subject concerns the gospel and salvation" (Wilson, Douglas, “The Objectivity of the Covenant,” Credenda/Agenda, volume 15, issue 1, p. 4, 2003). Wilson had recently bought into the controversial Federal Vision theology and appeared to be expressing the gospel in terms of justification by faithfulness alone, instead of by faith alone, the very construct for which Piper had criticized Wright in The Future of Justification. The Federal Vision would eventually be judged erroneous at the 34th PCA General Assembly (2007) mentioned above. The PCA report on Federal Vision expressed concern that its adherents were creating confusion about the gospel by combining justification and sanctification together:

[T]he way Federal Vision proponents collapse the distinct benefits of this mediation (i.e. justification, adoption, sanctification) into “union with Christ” creates significant confusion. Similarly, Federal Vision’s appeal to “the biblical usage” of justification as a way to collapse forensic and transformative categories also confuses doctrines that our Standards rightly distinguish (i.e., justification and sanctification). (2225-2225)

In 2009, John Piper invited Douglas Wilson to speak at the annual Desiring God Conference because he was deeply "persuaded that Doug Wilson gets the gospel right" (John Piper, Why So Many Presbyterian Speakers This Year). Wilson's gospel is "very complicated," Piper conceded, but it is not "another gospel," and he just "gets a bad wrap from a lot of PCA guys who aren't careful about the way they think" (John Piper on Doug Wilson). [Disclosure: this writer is a member in a PCA church]. In the same discussion, Piper insisted that, for all of his criticism of him, "I don't think N. T. Wright preaches a false gospel, either. I think N. T. Wright preaches a very confusing gospel."

What is so remarkable and ironic about Piper's embrace of Wilson is that Wilson was drifting away from "the [ostensibly truncated] historic Protestant view of the relationship between faith and obedience" by conflating faith and obedience in the instrumentality of justification, at precisely the time that Piper felt compelled to distance himself from Fuller's gospel and write Counted Righteous in Christ to defend "the historic Protestant view of the relationship between faith and obedience so that the two are not conflated in the instrumentality of justification." And yet, in 2009, Piper returned to his Fullerian roots and concluded that Wilson had actually gotten the gospel right, even though he was expressing it in the same terms as Fuller and Wright—men from whom Piper had ostensibly been distancing himself since 2002.

2012: Still fine-tuning his understanding of justification

In 2012 Piper revised Future Grace, acknowledging exactly what we have been highlighting in this timeline: the inconsistent, wavering announcement of justification by [something] alone, and Future Grace's imperative of forward looking faith. Because of the latent ambiguities in his constructs on justification in the 1995 edition, and (we believe) because of the uncertain trumpet he had sounded over the years, Piper felt compelled to clarify his teaching once more:

In the never-ending question of how Christians, who are counted righteous in Christ by faith alone, should nevertheless pursue righteousness, this book is my answer. It is my fullest attempt to explain why the faith that justifies also sanctifies, without mingling or confusing those two glorious works of God.

Since publishing the first edition of Future Grace in 1995, I have walked through extended controversies surrounding the nature, ground, and instrument of justification. These controversies have sharpened my own grasp of what the Bible teaches. Some of that sharpening is captured in Counted Righteous in Christ (Crossway, 2002), The Future of Justification (Crossway, 2007), and Finally Alive (Christian Focus, 2007). Some people have felt tensions between the first edition of Future Grace and the message of those books. I hope that this revised edition will remove those tensions. (Piper, John, Future Grace, Preface to the 2012 edition (Multnomah, 2012)).

We are not convinced, however, that Future Grace can actually be corrected to fix the problem of "mingling or confusing" justification and sanctification. Just as Piper's 1999 sermon on James and Paul showed that he was still at that time in Fuller's garden, Future Grace, written four years prior, was based entirely on chapter 18 of The Unity of the Bible in which Fuller attempted to work out the implications of "faith’s futuristic orientation" and Edward's view that the sinner's perseverance is contemplated by God in His verdict of justification. We do not believe that Piper can truly extract himself from Fuller's garden while consuming the fruit that grows there. For all of his protestations, shifting positions and subsequent clarifications, Piper appears only briefly to have departed from his Fullerian roots circa 2001, and has long since returned to them.

2013: Bethlehem Baptist Church updates What we believe about the five points of Calvinism

In 2013, Piper updated his church's 1985 position on Calvinism. Correcting some of the tensions that had existed in previous expressions of justification, just as he did the previous year with Future Grace. He deleted "God justifies us [with] a view to all subsequent acts of faith," and simply stated,

God justifies us completely through the first genuine act of saving faith, but this is the sort of faith that perseveres and bears fruit in the “obedience of faith.”

Also, instead of God justifying us because He can see in our first act of faith "a life of faith with its inevitable obedience," the focus was shifted now to Christ's righteousness: "The first time we believe in Jesus we are united to Christ. In union with him, his righteousness is counted as ours, at that moment." Nevertheless, the statement on obedience being required for final salvation remained: "Obedience, evidencing inner renewal from God, is necessary for final salvation."

2017: Does God Really Save us by Faith Alone?

In 2017, Piper showed that although he was trying to resolve the tensions present in his previous formulations on justification, the ambiguous construct Robertson criticized in Fuller was still present in his thinking: "In final salvation at the last judgment, faith is confirmed by the sanctifying fruit it has borne, and we are saved through that fruit and that faith." As Piper expressed back in 1995, "Final salvation" is salvation "from future judgment," and in 2009, "Future justification is ... This final judgment." He is still advancing a double justification doctrine—and initial justification by faith alone, and a final justification by faith plus works.

Conclusion

In The Future of Justification, Piper recalled that Richard Gaffin had spoken at the Pastors Conference in Monroe, Louisiana in 2005 (the namesake of the Monroe Doctrine and by some reckoning the origins of the Federal Vision). At the Pastors Conference, Gaffin had expressed what Piper believed, upon further study, to be "the true biblical understanding of the function of works in the final judgment" (Piper, The Future of Justification,115-16).

In the 1970s, throughout the Westminster Theological Seminary justification controversy surrounding the teachings of Norman Shepherd, Gaffin was Shepherd's ardent defender. At the heart of the controversy was Shepherd's view of the role of works in the justification of the believer, and Gaffin had sided with Shepherd. Shepherd's views were eventually  determined to be out of accord with the Westminster Confession and he was dismissed from the seminary in 1982. We provide here three of Shepherd's theses that were so offensive to the reformed community:

Thesis 21: The exclusive ground of the justification of the believer in the state of justification is the righteousness of Jesus Christ, but his obedience, which is simply the perseverance of the saints in the way of truth and righteousness, is necessary to his continuing in a state of justification (Heb. 3:6, 14).

Thesis 22: The righteousness of Jesus Christ ever remains the exclusive ground of the believer’s justification, but the personal godliness of the believer is also necessary for his justification in the judgment of the last day (Matt. 7:21-23; 25:31-46; Heb. 12:14).

Thesis 23: Because faith which is not obedient faith is dead faith, and because repentance is necessary for the pardon of sin included in justification, and because abiding in Christ by keeping his commandments (John 15:5; 10; 1John 3:13; 24) are all necessary for continuing in the state of justification, good works, works done from true faith, according to the law of God, and for his glory, being the new obedience wrought by the Holy Spirit in the life of the believer united to Christ, though not the ground of his justification, are nevertheless necessary for salvation from eternal condemnation and therefore for justification (Rom. 6:16, 22; Gal. 6:7-9). (from Thirty-four Theses on Justification in Relation to Faith, Repentance, and Good Works, November 18, 1978.)

After an extensive review of Piper's teachings on justification, we cannot see how Piper's current views differ in any substantive way from Shepherd's offensive theses on justification. Thus, we stand by our original assessment of Piper's views on "final salvation" and "final justification."

We extend two closing comments for the consideration of our readers on this controversial issue. First, one of our critics agreed that even in a charitable reading of Piper, his language could still be understood to be problematic. We appreciate that even some who disagreed with us understood that it was possible that we were reading Piper charitably.

Second, some critics have suggested that we have engaged in controversy for the sake of controversy. Although, from our perspective, we are zealous to maintain the purity of the church, we nevertheless understand that we should as zealously strive to maintain its peace. We are happy for the reminder to pursue both, and concede that we are not immune to the temptation to pursue controversy for its own sake.

That said, we offer to our critics a matter for reflection: those who seek the peace of the church are just as susceptible to the opposite temptation to avoid controversy for the sake of avoiding controversy. As we examine the history of the justification controversy—it now spans two generations of theologians—we have seen the damage that is propagated when error is tolerated in order to maintain the peace of the church.

To that end, we remind our readers that this controversy did not start with Piper's 2017 article. It is by no means a new controversy. It started in 1970s when the faculty of Westminster failed to respond timely to Shepherd's errors and allowed them too long to fester within its walls. The controversy has long since metastasized and we are now dealing with the second generation of the fruit it has borne.

The history of this long standing controversy may be explored profitably starting with O. Palmer Robertson's essay, "The Current Justification Controversy." And while Piper has on occasion expressed his disagreement with the Roman Catholic view of justification, after examining his decades of attempts to express the doctrine, we are not entirely sure that Piper really understands the essence of the Roman Catholic view, much less the implications of the justification controversy itself.

To all of our readers—to those who disagree, and to those who do not—enjoy October 31, 2017 tomorrow, the 500th anniversary of the birth of the  Protestant Reformation.

Soli Deo Gloria.

To start, I didn’t sympathize with Piper's irrational emotive appeal for writing this book:

[T]here is another way to commend the vision. A person also wants to know, Is the vision beautiful and satisfying and fulfilling?... Commending Biblical truth involves more than saying, "Do it because the Bible says so." That sort of commendation may result in a kind of obedience that is so begrudging and so empty of delight and hearty affirmation that the Lord is not pleased with it at all.... Not only must there be thorough exegesis, there must also be a portrayal of the vision that satisfies the heart as well as the head.... This little book is meant to fit mainly into the second category. (15-16, emphasis his)

Believers keep God's laws precisely because “the Bible says so.” Jesus said, "If you love Me, keep My commandments" (John 14:21). Period. Not because we find them "satisfying": "Do we then nullify the Law through faith? May it never be! On the contrary, we establish the Law" (Romans 3:31). "For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments. And His commandments are not burdensome" (1 John 5:3). A true believer desires to obey, and grows in obedience to, his heavenly Father out of gratitude, because he's been forgiven by Christ and sealed by the Holy Spirit. The Law of God is only burdensome and "empty of delight and hearty affirmation" to unregenerate sinners because it condemns them and because they hate God. We don't need to somehow be emotionally convinced in addition to "thorough exegesis." The Bible simply says, "Come now, let us reason together, says the Lord" (Isaiah 1:18).

The Bible also contrasts the mouth (what one professes) and the heart (the true, inner self—not mere emotions) rather than the “head” and the “heart.” That’s why Jesus said to the scribes and Pharisees, "Well did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: 'This people honors Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me'" (Mark 7:6). The psychological distinction between head ("intellect") and heart ("emotions") is unbiblical, which leads Piper to overemphasize emotions and create a false dichotomy between obedience and desire. Unfortunately, this is one of Piper’s most fundamental convictions that drives his entire ministry, from his preaching, to his teaching, to his writing. Much of what John Robbins said in his review of Colson's Loving God applies to Piper's book as well:

...In your [Colson's] book and tapes you attack creeds and philosophies and emphasize the Person and cross of Christ. You contrast a “magnificent philosophy” with a “living truth,” and “academic theory" with a “living Person.” But the Bible makes no such contrast. Indeed, it teaches the opposite: As a man thinks in his heart, so is he. Christ said, “My words are spirit and they are life.” The words are the Spirit. The Gospel, the truth, the words are powerful. There is no contrast in the Bible between words or teaching or doctrine or philosophy and Christ. There is a contrast between profession of belief and actual belief, but not between Christ and his words. The contrast is a figment of modern psychology. We know Christ only insofar as we know about him. One cannot know Christ, or any other person, except by knowing propositions about him. Knowledge is always knowledge of a proposition. Saving faith is always assent to one or more Biblical propositions. Therefore, please do not disparage knowledge or teaching or doctrine, for by doing so, you are disparaging Christ. As Calvin put it, we owe to Scripture the same reverence that we owe to God. (See http://www.trinityfoundation.org/journal.php?id=187)

Piper also confused me when he, apparently referring to liberal theologians Emil Brunner and Paul Jewett, states that "our best Christian thinkers claim not to know what masculinity and femininity are" (20). Those men are a far cry from being “our best Christian thinkers,” especially if they can’t define something as basic and fundamental as manhood and womanhood. Anyone who studies the Bible can know exactly what true masculinity and femininity are.

The book's subtitle, "Manhood and Womanhood Defined According to the Bible," is misleading as well. Piper defines manhood and womanhood as the following:

At the heart of mature masculinity is a sense of benevolent responsibility to lead, provide for and protect women in ways appropriate to a man's differing relationships.

At the heart of mature femininity is a freeing disposition to affirm, receive and nurture strength and leadership from worthy men in ways appropriate to a woman's differing relationships. (22)

These definitions are “an attempt to get at the heart, or at least an indispensable aspect, of manhood and womanhood” (21). But a more appropriate subtitle would be, "Manhood and Womanhood defined in relation to each other." Although Piper is a complementarian (20-21), his definitions of manhood and womanhood tend to overlook the fundamentals: God's order and creation roles. And why does a woman, according to Piper's definition, seem to have more than one head? 1 Corinthians 11:3-13 reads:

I [Paul] want you to know that the head of every man is Christ, the head of woman is man, and the head of Christ is God.... For a man indeed ought not to cover his head, since he is the image and glory of God; but woman is the glory of man. For man is not from woman, but woman from man. Nor was man created for the woman, but woman for the man. For this reason the woman ought to have a symbol of authority on her head, because of the angels. Nevertheless, neither is man independent of woman, nor woman independent of man, in the Lord. For as woman came from man, even so man also comes through woman; but all things are from God.

Piper doesn't mention that man was made for God and woman for man. And although spiritually "there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus" (Galatians 3:28), Christ explains why there is a prescribed natural order:

The sons of this age marry and are given in marriage, but those who are considered worthy to attain to that age and to the resurrection from the dead neither marry nor are given in marriage, for they cannot die anymore, because they are equal to angels and are sons of God, being sons of the resurrection. (Luke 20:34-36)

So in this life, God institutes an order for us to follow until the resurrection because we are still in the flesh and marry and have kids...and die. Women should "have a symbol of authority on their heads because of the angels," that is, a woman's "hair is given to her for a covering" (Ephesians 5:16), and the man also covers her because even though women are spiritually equal to men and to the angels in heaven, they are still in the flesh, so they must "submit to [their] own husbands, as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands" (Ephesians 5:22ff.). This order won't be necessary for believers after the resurrection because they will no longer marry and die, and because there will only be one marriage in heaven: Christ, the Husband, and the church, the bride (Revelation 19:7-9). This also shows why God has historically destroyed societies that embrace homosexuality: it violates God's natural order and unravels the moral fabric of society. The most fundamental institution of society is the one that God Himself established first and foremost—marriage.

Piper also argues that "It is not primarily the responsibility of women to build procedural and relational guidelines to protect themselves from the advances of ill-behaved men. Primarily it is the responsibility of mature manhood to establish a pattern of behaviors and attitudes" (45, emphasis his). Nonsense. It is primarily the responsibility of both! Not just the man's. A woman's head is her husband or her father, or God if neither are available; she does not need to rely or depend on any other man to "establish" boundaries. Women must protect themselves and establish biblical boundaries with other men, especially if she’s alone. Piper later claims that "the natural expression of...womanhood will be hindered by the immaturity of the man in her presence" (55). This is also absurd, for true womanhood is affirmed by God and her husband or father, and is only hindered by other immature men if the woman is insecure. But even a mature married woman, according to Piper, "will affirm and receive and nurture the strength and leadership of men in some form in all her relationships with men" (59). This too is false and even dangerous, for the only men a woman needs to "affirm and receive and nurture" is her father and husband! Not every "worthy" man she comes across!

The book had some helpful points, but overall it confuses rather than clarifies biblical manhood and womanhood. For better material see Gary Smalley's If Only He Knew, Pastor Tom Nelson's teachings on marriage and the Song of Solomon (http://dbcmedia.org/), and Pastor G. Craige Lewis' teachings on creation roles (http://www.exministries.com/sermons/atcp-archive/) instead.

Updated 11/30/2020

What makes a true Clarkian? How much and what do you have to agree with Clark on? Which of Clark’s protégés carries the truest banner of his legacy? These questions have stirred much controversy and division amongst those who follow the teachings of Reformed philosopher-theologian Gordon Haddon Clark.

But such questions are distractions. What’s far more important than identifying “true” Clarkians is to understand what Clark himself taught, know how to evaluate secondary sources, and develop the maturity to disagree biblically, whether it’s with Clark, Clarkians, or other Christians, without unnecessary denouncements. It's foolish to judge who is or isn't a "true" Clarkian; it only damages Clark's legacy and breeds unnecessary infighting, and the history of some of Clark's followers sadly attests to this even now. All of us who value Clark—especially the coming generation of pastors, preachers, teachers—would do well to get along. There's already too much internal strife as it is, and while Clark’s influence is slowly growing, we’re still a small piece of the Reformed pie.

This isn’t the worst-case scenario we’ve witnessed, but Jason Petersen, a student at Whitefield Theological Seminary, recently denounced Luke Miner, a Scripturalism.com contributor (Jason is also a contributor), as a self-deceived Clarkian. Jason recounts in his blog:

While I have no doubt that Luke believes he is a Clarkian, he is not a Clarkian. Clark never defined knowledge as justified-true belief, yet Luke attempted to articulate (in a different thread) that notion in the Clarkian Apologetics [Facebook] Group (or at the very least, that “true belief” is not enough and that a qualifier is needed. Clark would never agree with this).  Clark instead defined knowledge as true belief, or more specifically, possession of the truth by a mind. This, and my conversation with Luke, is exactly why I proclaimed that he is not a Clarkian. Perhaps he respects Clark and agrees with him on many aspects (such as Clark’s rejection of metaphysics), but he should not call himself a Clarkian.[1]

According to Jason, a "true" Clarkian must at least agree with Clark's epistemology and maintain key terms as Clark defined them, that is, according to Jason's interpretation. Jason is making amends with Luke and others involved, though Luke "and Cjay will remain out of the [Clarkian Apologetics Facebook] group."[2]

We don’t care for petty conflicts, but this illustrates a growing tendency in some. If these little foxes are left unchecked, they will ruin their vineyard. The biblical and productive approach is to simply correct misunderstandings or misrepresentations of Clark, without pronouncements as to who the "real" Clarkian is. Especially because the accuser could be wrong. Those who denounce fellow Clarkians this way resemble Diotrephes,

who likes to put himself first, [and] does not acknowledge our authority. So if I come, I will bring up what he is doing, talking wicked nonsense against us. And not content with that, he refuses to welcome the brothers, and also stops those who want to and puts them out of the church.  (3 John 9-10)

Does Jason "like to put himself first"? Judge for yourselves:

Imagine being a professor and then having a student try to take over the class. Anyone who knows me is aware that I have little tolerance for such antics. It is also worthy to note that the Clarkian Apologetics Group is a direct product of the Gordon Clark Foundation, which, by the way, endorses this [Jason's] website.[3]

Isn’t this the carnal sectarianism that Paul warned against in 1 Corinthians 1:10-17, 3:1-4? For when one says, "I am of Clark and you are not," are you not carnal? Is Christ divided? It is a sad but common practice in our day for immature believers to seek online platforms and tout spiritual influence and authority when they’re neither ready nor qualified nor called by God to do so. “Therefore let anyone who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall” (1 Cor. 10:12).

A Justified True Clarkian

In any case, is Jason's claim true, that Clark rejected justified true belief (JTB) and "instead defined knowledge as true belief, or more specifically, possession of the truth by a mind"? Not according to Clark himself:

A systematic philosophy must take care of epistemology. Knowledge must be accounted for. It may be that the a priori forms cannot be listed; it may be that botany or some other subject remains obscure; but knowledge of some sort must be provided.[4] ..................................................

What account shall be given of everyday “knowledge” that common sense thinks it silly to doubt? Don’t I know when I am hungry? Can’t I use road maps to drive to Boston to Los Angeles? Indeed, how can I know what the Bible says without reading its pages with my own eyes? It was one secular philosopher criticizing another, who said that knowledge is a fact and that any theory that did not account for it should be abandoned. But all such criticisms miss the point. The status of common opinion is not fixed until a theory has been accepted. One may admit that a number of propositions commonly believed are true; but no one can deny that many such are false. The problem is to elaborate a method by which the two classes can be distinguished. Plato, too, granted a place to opinion as distinct from knowledge; he even admitted that in some circumstances opinion was as useful as knowledge with a capital K. But to dispose of the whole matter by an appeal to road maps that we can see with our own eyes is to ignore everything said above about Aristotle.[5]

Clark then proceeds by arguing that there is no account of this common sense “knowledge,” and is thus not knowledge but opinion. For an opinion to be knowledge it must be both true and accounted for. Clark's unpublished paper on Plato’s theory of knowledge from the Gordon H. Clark Foundation runs along the same lines:

The term “knowledge” is very ambiguous, and, until all its meanings have been revealed, false judgment cannot really be explained. Socrates’ discussion has pointed out some of its meaning. Plato’s analysis of false judgment is included in the Sophist when the Forms have been introduced.

The “pieces of knowledge” stored in the mind are no more than true beliefs. Our attitude toward a false belief is the same as it is toward a true one. Our confidence in belief is not based on reason. Socrates contrasts a jury’s second-hand belief when convinced of the facts to the direct knowledge of the eye-witness who has seen the fact. Even if the jury finds the right verdict, they are still judging without knowledge, only belief. If true belief and knowledge were the same, a juryman could never have a correct belief without knowledge. Therefore, knowledge cannot be defined as true belief.

True belief lacked something which was necessary in order to call it knowledge. So Theaetetus suggests that knowledge is true belief accompanied by an account or explanation. Plato considers the various possible meanings of “account” and finally rejects the suggestion. The account is not enough to raise correct opinion to the level of knowledge.[6]

In Lord God of Truth Clark again concurs with Plato:

Accordingly the knowledge possible for human beings consists of the axioms of and the deductions from Scripture. We can indeed entertain opinions about Columbus, and by accident or good luck they may be true; but we could not know it. Our dear pagan Plato, at the end of his Meno (98b) declared, "That there is a difference between right opinion and knowledge (ōrtheme) is not at all a conjecture with me, but something I would particularly assert that I knew."[7]

While Clark doesn't necessarily use the term justified true belief—likely because it didn’t gain traction til the late 1970’s,[8] and he died in 1985—he clearly affirms the concept. He agrees with Plato on the distinction between belief/opinion and knowledge, as do many of his pupils. So according to his standard of "true" Clarkianism, Jason would also have to denounce Clark himself, as well as Clarkians who are more knowledgeable such as Sean Gerety, Robert Reymond, John Robbins, Gary Crampton, and even his mentor Kenneth Talbot. While Jason claims that "Clark never defined knowledge as justified-true belief,” Sean Gerety

find[s] it strange how many who claim to hold to the biblical epistemology of Gordon Clark fail to understand even the first principles of his theory. For Clark knowledge requires an account. That is, for a proposition to rise to the level of knowledge it has to be justified.[9]

Gerety explains that "knowledge, which is true belief with an account of its truth, or, simply, justified true belief (belief being the operative word), is the gift of God."[10]  In The Justification of Knowledge—the title itself is a dead giveaway—Robert Reymond argues that

Clark is a brilliant Reformed philosopher–theologian. I deeply appreciate the reflection of the Reformed view of Scripture in his assumption, on dogmatic grounds, of the self–authenticating Word of God as his axiom for knowing God or anything else as it ought to be known. I concur with him that unless one begins with God he will not arrive at a knowledge of God, nor will he be able to justify any knowledge claim.[11]

Reymond moreover "would agree that, without innate self–evident truths and without a revelational pou sto as a given, the justification of knowledge is impossible,"[12] and thus concludes:

The Church cannot expect to know the fullest blessing of God upon its evangelistic endeavors until it sets aside all accommodations to the autonomy of unbelieving man and insists, in conjunction with the proclamation of the Reformed gospel, that the authority of the word of the self–attesting Christ of Scripture is the only ground sufficiently ultimate to justify human truth claims, and that until His word is acknowledged as authoritative and placed at the basis of a given human knowledge system, that system remains unjustified and no truth assertion within it can be shown to have any meaning at all.[13]

John Robbins also makes important distinctions regarding knowledge:

There are three sorts of cognitive states: knowledge, opinion, and ignorance. Ignorance is simply the lack of ideas. Complete ignorance is the state of mind that empiricists say we are born with: We are all born with blank minds, tabula rasa, to use John Locke's phrase. (Incidentally, a tabula rasa mind - a blank mind - is an impossibility. A consciousness conscious of nothing is a contradiction in terms. Empiricism rests on a contradiction.) At the other extreme from ignorance is knowledge. Knowledge is not simply possessing thoughts or ideas, as some think. Knowledge is possessing true ideas and knowing them to be true. Knowledge is, by definition, knowledge of the truth. We do not say that a person "knows" that 2 plus 2 is 5. We may say he thinks it, but he does not know it. It would be better to say that he opines it.

Now, most of what we colloquially call knowledge is actually opinion: We "know" that we are in Pennsylvania; we "know" that Clinton - either Bill or Hillary - is President of the United States, and so forth. Opinions can be true or false; we just don't know which. History, except for revealed history, is opinion. Science is opinion. Archaeology is opinion. John Calvin said, "I call that knowledge, not what is innate in man, nor what is by diligence acquired, but what is revealed to us in the Law and the Prophets." Knowledge is true opinion with an account of its truth.[14]

In order to possess the truth, you have to know that your belief is true. That is Justified True Belief, and that is why Gary Crampton, a professor at Whitefield Theological Seminary, argues that

An important part of the Scripturalist worldview is the epistemological distinction between knowledge and opinion. Throughout the history of Western thought, philosophers such as Parmenides, Plato, and Aristotle, have correctly differentiated between these two. Augustine and Gordon Clark are just two examples of Christian philosophers who have done the same. There is a difference between that which we “know” and that about which we may have opinions.

In the Scripturalist worldview, knowledge is not only possessing ideas or thoughts; it is possessing true ideas or thoughts. Knowledge is knowledge of the truth. It is justified true belief. Only the Word of God (that which, as the Westminster Confession [1:6] says, “is either expressly set down in Scripture, or by good and necessary consequence may be deduced from Scripture”) gives us such knowledge.

Opinions, on the other hand, may be true or false. Natural science is opinion; archaeology is opinion; history (with the exception of Biblical history) is opinion. In these disciplines we are not dealing with “facts.” In them there is no justified true belief. To “opine” something is not to “know” it. Justified truth is found only in the Word of God.[15]

Crampton also highlights what Jason misconstrues: that Clark's definition of knowledge as a mind's possession of truth is JTB, because possessing the truth requires not just a true belief/opinion, as Jason claims, but also an account of its truth from Scripture. Otherwise it's just an opinion that happens to be true.

Jason claims that Clark defined knowledge as only true belief because he equates “true belief” with “possession of truth by a mind”—which Clark never did. Jason fails to cite where Clark rejected JTB or defined knowledge as true belief; the only source he gives is one of Clark’s obscure encyclopedic articles on knowledge[16] whom hardly anyone knows about, much less read, and the article itself makes no such claim. And from this foundation built on sand he denounces those who disagree, but not without sinking himself. Clark and many of his most prominent followers clearly affirm JTB, so is he ready to denounce Sean Gerety, Robert Reymond, John Robbins, Gary Crampton, and Clark himself as self-deceived Clarkians?

Notitia, Assensus, and…Faith?

There's yet another issue, more theological than philosophical. Throughout many of his writings, Clark emphasizes faith as an important doctrine, biblically clarifies what it means, and refutes deficient views. That’s why he wrote two treatises on it, Fa­­ith and Saving Faith and The Johannine Logos. In Faith and Saving Faith, Clark writes: "Faith and belief have been emphasized. Even apart from these introductory inducements the nature of saving faith is an important division of theology."[17] Clark’s treatment of faith is one of his major theological contributions. To disagree with his view of faith is significant, so much so that, if we follow Jason’s logic, it surely would not make you a “true” Clarkian.

Clark’s definition of faith is simple and biblical. In What Is Saving Faith? he explains that “Faith, by definition, is assent to understood propositions. Not all cases of assent, even assent to Biblical propositions, are saving faith, but all saving faith is assent to one or more Biblical propositions.”[18]

Clark consistently defines faith as understanding (notitia) with assent (assensus) throughout his writings, both published and unpublished. Note the complete absence of “trust” (fiducia). Some groundlessly accuse John Robbins of dishonestly altering Clark’s books—including Jason himself, who unfortunately parrots the views of his mentors from Whitefield Seminary, the president of which is Dr. Kenneth G. Talbot, and they have poisoned the well in Facebook groups to dissuade people from trusting Robbins and The Trinity Foundation,[19] which is by far the best and most reliable source of Gordon Clark’s thought and work. But in one of his unpublished papers on faith from the Gordon H. Clark Foundation—“a ministry of Whitefield College & Theological Seminary”—Clark cites Augustine’s definition of faith:

Augustine was probably the first to define faith. In his treatise Concerning the Predestination of the Saints he said, “Thinking is prior to believing… To believe is nothing other than to think with assent. For not all who think believe… but all who believe think; and they think believing and believe thinking.”[20]

And then agrees with him: “A person may know or understand a proposition and yet not believe it. To believe is to think with assent. Assent is an act of will: it is the voluntary acceptance of the proposition as true.”[21]

Even so, both Drs. Kenneth G. Talbot and W. Gary Crampton diverge from Clark's view of faith. Not only that, but in their book Calvinism, Hyper-Calvinism and Arminianism they claim that the “historical” view of faith which Clark believed and taught cannot justify:

First, not all faith is justifying faith. The Bible speaks of several kinds of faith, only one of which is genuine, justifying faith. Historical faith is one kind of non-justifying faith. All that is involved here is an historical assent to the truth claims of the gospel. As taught in James 2:19, even the demons have this kind of faith: “You believe that there is one God. You do well. Even the demons believe — and tremble!”[22]

But how is it that demons “assenting to the truth claims of the gospel” invalidates saving faith as believing—understanding and agreeing with—the gospel? Whether demons believe the gospel or not (they don’t) is irrelevant, because Christ died only for fallen man, not demons. Or is it because Talbot and Crampton debase it as a “non-justifying,” “historical” faith? The verse only says that the demons believe in one God, not that they believe the gospel. Clark repeatedly refuted this misapplication of James 2:19:

[The] argument here is that since the devils assent and true believers also assent, something other than assent is needed for saving faith [e.g. trust or fiducia]. This is a logical blunder. The text says the devils believe in monotheism. Why cannot the difference between the devils and Christians be the different propositions believed, rather than a psychological element in belief? [This] assumes a different psychology is needed. It is better to say a different object of belief is needed….[23]

It is illogical to conclude that belief is not assent just because belief in monotheism does not save. The clearer inference is that if belief in monotheism does not save, then one ought to believe something else in addition. Not assent, but monotheism is inadequate.[24]

And if Talbot’s and Crampton’s “historical” faith and “gospel-assenting” demons weren’t bad enough, they stray further still:

In justifying faith the believer appropriates and rests on Christ alone as Mediator in all his offices, based upon the divine testimony of God’s Word. Therefore, orthodox Christianity teaches that justifying faith involves three elements: knowledge (notitia), assent (assensus), and trust (fiducia). It is not enough to know the truth about Jesus Christ; nor is it sufficient merely to assent to the truth claims of the gospel (as in historical faith), as essential as these are. Saving faith is that which also whole-heartedly acquiesces to the Christ revealed in Scripture. Biblical conversion entails a whole-souled commitment. Justifying faith is a faith that makes a fiducial (i.e., a trusting) response to the gospel promises.[25]

But does not “whole-heartedly acquiesce” mean to “whole-heartedly” accept as true? How is this any different from assent? Merriam-Webster defines acquiesce as “to accept, comply, or submit tacitly or passively.” This is why Clark stressed that adding fiducia to faith is a tautology: “The crux of the difficulty with the popular analysis of faith into notitia (understanding), assensus (assent), and fiducia (trust), is that fiducia comes from the same root as fides (faith). Hence this popular analysis reduces to the obviously absurd definition that faith consists of understanding, assent, and faith. Something better than this tautology must be found.”[26]

Clark is one of very few theologians who tirelessly refuted the “necessity” of fiducia, the extra psychological element that many Protestants add to faith, as confused, meaningless, and redundant. Yet Crampton wrote an article called “Justification by Faith Alone” where he makes the same arguments listed above and heartily approves Jonathan Edwards’ discussion of trust (fiducia):

And clearly for Edwards, saving faith is one that involves trust (fiducia). Saving faith, he wrote, “is the whole soul’s active agreeing, according, and symphonizing with this truth [of the gospel].” It is an “adhering to the truth, and acquiescing in it.” It is an “embracing the promises of God, and fiducial relying on them, through Christ for salvation.” “There is a difference,” preached Edwards, in a sermon on Matthew 16:17, “between having a rational judgment that honey is sweet, and having a sense [taste] of its sweetness.” The same is true regarding saving faith: There is “a true sense of the divine and superlative excellency of God and Jesus Christ, and of the work of redemption, and the ways and works of God.” There is “a true sense of the divine excellency of the things of God’s Word [which] does more directly and immediately convince us of their truth.” When one has this “sense,” he acquiesces to the “light of the glorious gospel of Christ.”[27]

Clark also chided theologians who use analogies involving physical actions to represent “trust,” because faith is a purely internal, mental act of understanding and assenting to propositions. If it were a physical or external act, it would be a work. Here are more examples from Clark’s articles on faith, reason, and knowledge posted on the Gordon H. Clark Foundation:

The element of trust [fiducia], which Protestants emphasize, defies all explanation and remains in utter confusion. Illustrations, such as actually depositing money in a bank rather than merely believing that the bank is sound, depend on a physical action, in addition to the mental act of believing. Such additional external action is inappropriate to represent the thoroughly inner mental act of faith. Knowledge is an integral part of faith, and not its antithesis.[28]

………………………………………………………..

In describing the nature of faith, fundamentalists, evangelicals and even modernists in a certain way stress the element of trust. A preacher may draw a parallel between trusting in Christ and trusting in a chair. Belief that the chair is solid and comfortable, mere intellectual assent to such a proposition, will not rest your weary bones. You must, the preacher insists, actually sit in the chair. Similarly, so goes the argument, you can believe all that the Bible says about Christ and it will do you no good. Such illustrations as these are constantly used, in spite of the fact that the Bible says, “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved.”[29]

………………………………………………………..

Is there such a thing as “mere belief,” or “mere intellectual assent?” Indeed, is there such a distinguishable phenomenon as a “mere” act of will? Intellectual assent is itself an act of will; and conversely, no volitional action could possibly take place without belief. If you will to eat ice cream, you must believe at least that there is some ice cream to be eaten. Intellect and will are not two separate “faculties”; rather they so interpenetrate in a single mental state that it is difficult and perhaps impossible not only to separate them in time but even in definition.[30]

Keep in mind that Clark’s published writings are weightier than his unpublished papers; there could be many reasons as to why he didn’t publish them. Nevertheless, Clark’s published material from The Trinity Foundation and unpublished papers from The Gordon H. Clark Foundation reveal the same mind at work—the exact same view of faith as understanding with assent and rejection of tautological trust. Talbot and Crampton have almost completely disregarded their mentor here. So if Jason will denounce Clarkians who affirm JTB and who attribute it to Clark, what’s to stop him from denouncing Drs. Talbot and Crampton who disregard Clark on such a vital issue as faith, and go as far as degrading Clark’s view to a “historical” faith that cannot justify?

Can the Blind Lead the Blind?

Our point is not to denounce Talbot, Crampton, and Jason as pseudo-Clarkians; our point is that Jason’s Diotrephesian demeaner betrays him. Not only did he denounce someone who didn’t accord with his own misrepresentations of Clark—exposing his own ignorance in the process—he has shown himself to be an unreliable source who’s not nearly as familiar with Clark as he claims to be. Jason evidently hasn't read much of Clark because he seems unfamiliar with a basic catalog of his publications. In his response to Luke Miner, for example, he claims that “there is a nature of man, and Clark wrote about this at length in many books, but perhaps most in depth, in his book, “What do Presbyterians Believe?” If one makes ontological statements, one cannot dismiss the term, ‘ontology.’ ”[31]

Jason refers to a 13-page chapter as "perhaps [Clark's] most in depth" discussion on man, even though Clark also wrote a 130-page treatise called The Biblical Doctrine of Man.[32] He rarely quotes Clark directly and misleadingly presents his own views as Clark’s. It’s hard to find primary source treatment of Clark’s works on his website or Facebook posts other than excuses as to why he can’t furnish citations. Jason has much to learn from men like John Robbins, whom he would do well to read rather than malign: “One of the characteristics of a competent historian [and teacher, scholar, etc.] is his practice of citing primary sources for his statements. If he makes an assertion about a person's views, for example, he quotes the words of that person. He does not merely quote or cite someone else, especially an opponent or critic of that person.”[33]

Instead of self-aggrandizing our platforms to lord it over others, and making false, unjustified (pun intended) assertions without substantiating references to push self-promoting agendas and those of schismatic seminary faculties—we need humility to sharpen and be sharpened by our peers.

There’s more to this than a petty Facebook scuffle. It’s about the damage being done to Clark and his followers by self-proclaimed experts who misrepresent and promote factious agendas that slander, defame, and undermine the valuable, edifying work of other Clarkians and their ministries. We can and should seek to be of one mind as Christians, especially if we share similar Reformed convictions and appreciation for one of the greatest Christian philosophers and theologians of all time. But it will not happen until Jason and those like him take heed and repent.

Imperious Presbyterians [and Christians from any denomination] seriously err in their emphasis by behaving as if authority is the essence of ecclesiastical office, rather than service.

Sadly, there is a Scriptural example pertaining to the distorted outlook of the Imperious Presbyterians. It is Diotrephes, who loved “to have the preeminence” (3 John 9) and abused his position to thwart the Apostle John. It is a tragic case when men in our day, professing to be Presbyterian pastors, exhibit more of the spirit of Diotrephes than of the Spirit of Christ and Paul.[34]

Semper Reformanda,

Carlos Montijo and Tim Shaughnessy

Postscript

1/10/2016 - Last night, Jason posted the following on the Clarkian Apologetics Facebook group:

Jason L. Petersen 10 hrs · Pensacola, FL

Thank you all for your support in this group. We are very, very, appreciative of your participation and understanding concerning the rules that we have laid out. At some parts of this post, I will be repeating what has been told to me by the Foundation, and at other parts, I will be speaking for myself.

Unfortunately, the Gordon Clark Foundation has concluded that the format we have chosen for this group will not work either. At first, we allowed for a discussion group that also would allow the admins to post content that we think is informative and edifying for the group. Unfortunately, there were some who just wanted to pick a fight.

After having issues with people who wanted to pick a fight on social media, we decided to change the format so that some discussion would be had. We laid out a very specific and strict set of rules. Unfortunately, some did not wish to adhere to the rules, and instead of respecting the intentions and rules of the group, they sought to teach everyone that the information we provided was not trustworthy. This was set to be a sort of classroom-like setting, but the tools given to us on Facebook is not enough to support such a format.

Now, I personally have made some mistakes in this group. First, I blocked two people that I still maintain respect for when it was not necessary. Second, I publicly stated that John Robbins edited Dr. Clark's work on faith without having the resources immediately at the ready. I personally apologize and repent for both of these things.

I'd also like to say that I am not one that is officially a part of the Gordon Clark foundation. I am endorsed by the foundation, but I simply help out. With all of the feuds that has started with some individuals from the Gordon Clark Discussion Group, it has been determined that a format such as this is not appropriate for the foundation.

At this time, we plan to start a new group. There will be no members (except for admins) allowed in this group. The group will be open to the public. The public may choose to read the content that we post or ignore it. The goal of the Gordon Clark Foundation is to get Clark's writings, published and unpublished out into the open. One issue that surfaces when one is trying to achieve this goal is that there may be some who may add a thought (be it in an apparent agreement or disagreement) that is not exactly what Dr. Clark believed. The main goal of the foundation in starting a group like this was to get the content from the Foundation out there. Ricky W. Roldan and I were the main participants, but the actual members of the Foundation did not participate very much because they did not like the way the format was working out. There are a few very qualified individuals that have expressed a willingness to help out in producing content for the Foundation, but some have held back because they do not want to risk getting involved in a time-wasting social media debate.

Therefore, we will start a new group where people can either choose to read Dr. Clark's articles and our own musings, or ignore us entirely.

As for this group, I will either take it over myself from the Foundation, or I will remove it from Facebook. I am not entirely sure of what I wish to do with it yet (I would appreciate some feedback on it).

Although there have been a lot of people who have speculated that our intention is to censor the ideas of others, and that we are "not teachable," and other bad things, many of you have been very supportive and expressed a desire for the type of format that we have now. I am very sorry that it did not work out. The choice we faced was either to let the group spin out of control and undermine the intentions that we had when we started the group, or to remove people (as we did) for violating the rules, and then allow them to speculate about and misconstrue our intent for removing them. For us, this is truly a no-win situation. The only thing to do is to create a new group and go from there.

I thank you all again. You have been a great encouragement. I will post more information in this group when I have it. Blessings.

Jason’s prompt response appears to be a step in the right direction; we look forward to working things out with him.

4/1/2017 - Jason has reached out to us and made amends, and we're discussing these matters with him in a spirit of brotherly love and hope to interview him on Semper Reformanda Radio soon. He no longer believes that John Robbins altered Gordon Clark’s books and appears to lean towards knowledge as Justified True Belief as well (see http://answersforhope.org/39-distinguish-knowledge-opinion/).

Notes

[1] Jason Petersen, "A Conversation with Luke Miner," Answers for Hope, 30 Dec 2015, accessed 1 Jan 2016, http://answersforhope.org/a-conversation-with-luke-miner/

[2] Petersen, http://answersforhope.org/a-conversation-with-luke-miner/. Jason eventually kicked out Tim Shaughnessy from the Facebook group for questioning his unfounded claim that Robbins allegedly altered Clark’s books.

[3] Petersen, http://answersforhope.org/a-conversation-with-luke-miner/.

[4] Gordon H. Clark, An Introduction to Christian Philosophy, in The Works of Gordon Haddon Clark, Volume 4 (Unicoi, TN: The Trinity Foundation, 2004), p. 300-301. Bold emphasis ours. Quoted in Sean Gerety's comment on 26 April 2007, "Must Clarkians use some Emperical Analysis & Inductive Reasoning?", Puritan Board, http://www.puritanboard.com/showthread.php/20726-Must-Clarkians-use-some-Emperical-Analysis-amp-Inductive-Reasoning/page2

[5] Clark, An Introduction to Christian Philosophy, p. 322. Bold emphasis ours. Quoted in Sean Gerety, "Biblical Epistemology 101," God's Hammer, 27 Jan 2013, https://godshammer.wordpress.com/2009/01/24/ink-marks-on-a-page/

[6] Gordon H. Clark, "Plato's Theory of Knowledge," The Gordon H. Clark Foundation, accessed 1 Jan 2016, http://thegordonhclarkfoundation.com/platos-theory-of-knowledge-by-gordon-h-clark/

[7] Gordon H. Clark, Lord God of Truth (Hobbs, NM: The Trinity Foundation, 1994), p. 40. Bold emphasis ours. Thanks to CJay Engel for finding this quote. For "a reasonably complete proof that Gordon Clark did, indeed, consistently use the term “knowledge” distinctly from true belief (or true opinion)," see his and Luke Miner’s article, "Gordon Clark and Knowledge: On Justification," http://scripturalism.com/gordon-clark-and-knowledge-on-justification/

[8] See a Google Books Ngram Viewer analysis of "justified true belief" from 1500 to 1985 at https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=justified+true+belief&case_insensitive=on&year_start=0&year_end=1985&corpus=15&smoothing=3&share=&direct_url=t4%3B%2Cjustified%20true%20belief%3B%2Cc0%3B%2Cs0%3B%3Bjustified%20true%20belief%3B%2Cc0%3B%3BJustified%20True%20Belief%3B%2Cc0%3B%3BJustified%20true%20belief%3B%2Cc0

[9] Sean Gerety, "Biblical Epistemology 101," God's Hammer, 27 Jan 2013, accessed 3 Jan 2016, https://godshammer.wordpress.com/2013/01/27/biblical-epistemology-101/

[10] Sean Gerety, "Ink Marks on a Page," God's Hammer, 24 Jan 2009, accessed 3 Jan 2016, https://godshammer.wordpress.com/2009/01/24/ink-marks-on-a-page/

[11] Robert L. Reymond, The Justification of Knowledge: An Introductory Study in Christian Apologetic Methodology (San Jose, CA: Pacific Institute of Religious Studies, 1998), p. 68, http://www.sgbcsv.org/literature/JustificationOfKnowledge.pdf.

[12] Reymond, Justification of Knowledge, p. 70.

[13] Reymond, Justification of Knowledge, p. 100.

[14] John W. Robbins, "An Introduction to Gordon H. Clark," The Trinity Review (July/Aug 1993), http://www.trinityfoundation.org/journal.php?id=192. Emphasis ours.

[15] W. Gary Crampton, "Scripturalism: A Christian Worldview," The Trinity Review 299 (March/May 2011), http://trinityfoundation.org/journal.php?id=276. Bold emphasis ours. See also Crampton’s The Scripturalism of Gordon H. Clark (Jefferson, MD: The Trinity Foundation, 1999), p. 46:

An important part of Gordon Clark’s epistemology is his distinction between knowledge and opinion. There is a difference between that which we know and that which we opine. Knowledge is not only possessing ideas or thoughts; it is possessing true ideas or thoughts. Knowledge is knowledge of the truth; it is justified true belief. Only the Word of God (that which “is either expressly set down in Scripture, or by good and necessary consequence may be deduced from Scripture”) gives such knowledge.

[16] Gordon H. Clark, "Know, Knowledge," The Gordon H. Clark Foundation, accessed 6 Jan 2016, http://thegordonhclarkfoundation.com/know-knowledge-by-gordon-h-clark/

[17] Gordon H. Clark, "What Is Saving Faith?", The Trinity Review 206 (Jan/Feb 2004), http://www.trinityfoundation.org/journal.php?id=102

[18] Gordon H. Clark, What Is Saving Faith? (Unicoi, TN: The Trinity Foundation, 2004), p. 88, http://www.trinitylectures.org/what-is-saving-faith-p-60.html. Emphasis ours. This book combines Faith and Saving Faith and The Johannine Logos into one volume.

[19] On 26 September 2015, we messaged Dr. Kenneth Talbot privately to inquire about his attacks on John Robbins. He thanked us for expressing our concern but declined to comment. Here’s what Tim asked:

My friend Carlos and I have strongly considered attending your school in the future and I am grateful for your presence in the ministry of Christ. I count you as a brother in the Lord and have benefitted from you personally. That’s why I find this difficult now.

I want to approach this carefully and respectfully, but I feel that I need to say something. I have recently found myself discouraged and even troubled to some extent by the way you speak about John Robbins and the Trinity Foundation. I have heard you speak negatively of Robbins and the TF in the past and have ignored it. Recently on Jason Petersen’s wall you said the following:

View fullsize

This is not the first time I have heard you say something like this and I am disturbed by it. I don’t know anything really about Cheung but I find it surprising that you would say such things about Robbins.

I have benefited greatly from Dr. Robbins’ writings and the Trinity Foundation which has been committed to keeping and defending the legacy of Dr. Clark. I have used Dr. Robbins’ work in my own writings and have a high regard for the man. I don’t share in your assessment of Robbins or the TF and I wanted to know if this is the impression you give your students. I should also tell you that when I first heard of your school I asked Tom Juodaitis about it and he affirmed that it was the only school that was favorable to Clark and he had nothing negative to say about you or your school. I will not have time to reply back to you right now but I look forward to hearing from you.

You can also check out my writing and see if it reflects the type of attitude you have a problem with.

God Bless, Tim

Here’s what I (Carlos) asked:

Dr. Talbot you criticized Robbins publicly so we didn't think you'd have a problem giving details. Isn't the attitude you express against him the same attitude you're accusing Robbins of? Why would you defame a man who loved Clark and dedicated his life to promoting and preserving his legacy? Clark obviously held Robbins in high regard if he asked him to finish his book [The Incarnation] on his deathbed. It sounds like you're slandering him. I don't understand why you defame Robbins and the Trinity Foundation—who defend and promote Clark—while you also affiliate with people who criticize Clark and have no regard for him like Joel McDurmon [listen to “An interview of Joel McDurmon: Researcher and Writer for American Vision”] and Jeff Durban, who had Oliphint recklessly misrepresent Clark and falsely accuse him of heresy on his show (https://www.facebook.com/ApologiaRadio/posts/324063354406639).

These are some of the reasons Tim and I are no longer considering Whitefield Seminary, and no longer recommend it even though they're one of the few seminaries that incorporate Gordon Clark into their curriculum. For more information see Sean Gerety’s “Faith Is Understanding With Assent” and “Whitefield Follies,” as well as Luke Miner’s “Clark on Saving Faith in 1961.” There are still very strong misrepresentations–even slanders–of Clark today, particularly from Van Tilians. Here are a few examples from Scott Oliphint, Apologia Radio, and Reformed Forum:

• https://www.facebook.com/groups/CFDD1/permalink/791646060853020/

• https://www.facebook.com/ApologiaRadio/posts/324063354406639

• http://reformedforum.org/podcasts/ctc163/

• http://www.apologiaradio.com/?p=482

[20] Gordon H. Clark, "Faith," The Gordon H. Clark Foundation, accessed 3 Jan 2016, http://thegordonhclarkfoundation.com/faith-by-gordon-h-clark/

[21] Clark, "Faith," http://thegordonhclarkfoundation.com/faith-by-gordon-h-clark/

[22] Kenneth G. Talbot and W. Gary Crampton, Calvinism, Hyper-Calvinism and Arminianism: A Theological Primer, 3rd ed. (1990), p. 112. To request the free ebook version, see http://whitefieldmedia.us4.list-manage1.com/subscribe?u=2209ac66c06c8383a9ce36dfd&id=f5a1e983ce

[23] Clark, What Is Saving Faith?, p. 152.

[24] Clark, What Is Saving Faith?, p. 153.

[25] Talbot and Crampton, Calvinism, Hyper-Calvinism and Arminianism, p. 114. See also John Robbins’ “R. C. Sproul on Saving Faith,” http://trinityfoundation.org/journal.php?id=238. Talbot and Crampton’s view of faith is like Sproul’s.

[26] Gordon H. Clark, "Saving Faith", The Trinity Review (Dec 1979), http://www.trinityfoundation.org/journal.php?id=10

[27] W. Gary Crampton, “Justification by Faith Alone,” A Puritan’s Mind, accessed 31 Dec 2015, http://www.apuritansmind.com/justification/justification-by-faith-alone-by-w-gary-crampton-th-d/

[28] Clark, "Know, Knowledge," http://thegordonhclarkfoundation.com/know-knowledge-by-gordon-h-clark/

[29] Clark, "Faith and Reason," http://thegordonhclarkfoundation.com/faith-and-reason-by-gordon-h-clark/. Emphasis ours.

[30] Gordon H. Clark, "Faith and Reason," The Gordon H. Clark Foundation, accessed 6 Jan 2016, http://thegordonhclarkfoundation.com/faith-and-reason-by-gordon-h-clark/. Emphasis ours.

[31] Petersen, http://answersforhope.org/a-conversation-with-luke-miner/

[32] Gordon H. Clark, The Biblical Doctrine of Man, 2nd ed. (Jefferson, MD: The Trinity Foundation, 1992), http://www.trinitylectures.org/biblical-doctrine-of-man-the-p-50.html

[33] John W. Robbins, Can the Orthodox Presbyterian Church Be Saved? (Unicoi, TN: The Trinity Foundation, 2004), p. 13, http://www.trinityfoundation.org/journal.php?id=232

[34] Kevin Reed, “Imperious Presbyterianism,” The Trinity Review (June/Aug 2008), http://www.trinityfoundation.org/journal.php?id=254v

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Keller, Timothy. The Prodigal God: Recovering the Heart of the Christian Faith. New York: Dutton, 2008. Kindle edition. Although Keller is a Reformed pastor in good standing with the Presbyterian Church of America (PCA), he strays considerably from sound biblical doctrine and compromises the gospel in one of his better-known publications, The Prodigal God. More unfortunate is that few seem to realize this. This review will apply Scripture to correct the doctrinal errors in Keller’s The Prodigal God, for “all Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness” (2 Tm 3:16).[1]

It is not enough to simply recognize doctrinal errors; they must be corrected publicly. Any pastor who recognizes such errors, especially ones that pertain to the essentials of the faith, yet remains silent is derelict in his duty to uphold sound doctrine. This is why Paul tells Titus that an elder is to “give instruction in sound doctrine and also to rebuke those who contradict it” (Ti 1:9). It is important to examine popular and influential works like The Prodigal God in light of what the Bible mandates in places such as 1 Thessalonians 5:21 and Acts 17:9-11.

The purpose and target audience of The Prodigal God are clearly stated by Keller in the introduction:

THIS short book is meant to lay out the essentials of the Christian message, the gospel. It can, therefore, serve as an introduction to the Christian faith for those who are unfamiliar with its teachings or who may have been away from them for some time.

This volume is not just for seekers, however. Many lifelong Christian believers feel they understand the basics of the Christian faith quite well and don’t think they need a primer. Nevertheless, one of the signs that you many not grasp the unique radical nature of the gospel is that you are certain that you do.

This book, then, is written to both curious outsiders and established insiders of the faith both to those Jesus calls “younger brothers” and those he calls “elder brothers” in the famous Parable of the Prodigal Son.[2]

Keller states that his book “lays out the essentials of the Christian message,” which he correctly identifies as the gospel, and it is for this reason that we will examine what Keller teaches about the gospel. The reader should keep in mind that Keller wrote this book for “seekers” and “curious outsiders” as well as “established insiders of the faith.” That Keller is writing to non-Christians as well as mature Christians is troublesome, considering the book’s doctrinal errors. We can also wonder why there aren’t more Christians calling Keller to give an account of his many false teachings in this book.

Throughout The Prodigal God Keller identifies the “curious outsiders” as the younger brother and the “established insiders of the faith” as the elder brother in the Parable of the Prodigal Son. While Keller rightly identifies the elder brother in the parable as the Pharisees, he also calls them “established insiders of the faith,” which is confusing and misleading because the Pharisees adamantly rejected Christ. And while Scripture states that we are to “examine ourselves to see whether we are in the faith” (2 Cor 13:5), Keller nevertheless calls them “established insiders of the faith.” One has to ask: What is the criterion Keller uses to identify the Pharisees as “established insiders of the faith?” And what “faith” is he referring too? We will take a closer look at this too and show from Scripture that in order to make this portrayal, Keller has to ignore—and often blatantly contradict—what the Bible teaches concerning the Pharisees.

One of the most troubling statements made by Keller in the introduction is that “one of the signs that you may not grasp the unique radical nature of the gospel is that you are certain that you do.” Not only is this absurd, it is troubling in light of what Keller says regarding the believer’s assurance of salvation in later chapters of the book. This statement is for the “established insiders of the faith” who “think they don’t need a primer” on the Christian faith. If it is true, though, that one of the signs you may not grasp the gospel is that you are certain that you do, then you can never be certain of your salvation. If you are certain that you have grasped the gospel message, then that is one of the signs that you may not have grasped it at all! This is a serious problem because understanding the gospel is necessary for salvation. Why else did Paul write, “Yet we know that a person is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ”? (Gal 2:16). Is Paul’s confidence in having grasped the gospel to be taken as a sign that he has not grasped it at all? Why did John “write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God”? Answer: “That you may know that you have eternal life.” (1 Jn 5:13). The truth is that believers can be certain of their salvation because of what Christ has done on the cross. We will compare this statement further with what Keller describes as assurance later in this review.

The Elder Brother and the Pharisees

Keller’s portrayal of the elder brother is sure to leave his readers with an unbiblical understanding of the Pharisees. We will first look at what Keller says about the elder brother and then what he says concerning the Pharisees. We also need to consider why he portrays the Pharisees the way he does.

Keller and the elder brother

Keller correctly identifies who the elder brother in Jesus’ parable represents and to whom the parable is directed. He knows Jesus is using the elder brother as an illustration of the Pharisees and that he is directing his parable at them:

The second group of listeners was the “Pharisees and the teachers of the Law,” who were represented by the elder brother. (7)

So to whom is Jesus’s teaching in this parable directed? It is to the second group, the scribes, and Pharisees. (7)

It is because the real audience for this story is the Pharisees, the elder brothers. Jesus is pleading with his enemies to respond to his message. (27)

The elder brother gets no harsh condemnation but a loving plea to turn from his anger and self-righteousness. Jesus is pleading in love with his deadliest enemies. (74)

So while Keller correctly identifies the elder brother as representative of the Pharisees and even correctly calls them the “enemies” and the “deadliest enemies” of Christ, he also calls them “insiders of the faith”:

This book, then, is written to both curious outsiders and established insiders of the faith both to those Jesus calls “younger brothers” and those he calls “elder brothers” in the famous Parable of the Prodigal Son.” (Introduction)

The targets of this story are not “wayward sinners” but religious people who do everything the Bible requires. Jesus is pleading not so much with immoral outsiders as with moral insiders.” (8)

Keller identifies the Pharisees as both the “moral insiders” and “established insiders of the faith,” the same Pharisees who were the “deadliest enemies” of Jesus. While it may be true that many churches today have legalistic “elder brother Pharisees,” no legalistic Pharisee is “in the faith.” Keller applies the illustration of the elder brother to modern-day Christians, even though it’s impossible for a true Christian to be a legalistic Pharisee. Jesus is not directing his teaching to “insiders of the faith.” It appears that from Keller’s perspective it is possible to be an “established insider of the faith” and yet at the same time be an “enemy” of Jesus. Of course, a person can “profess” to be a Christian, attend a church every Sunday, and yet be a legalistic Pharisee, but Keller never makes this distinction.

Keller and Pharisees

So what does a Pharisee look like from Keller’s perspective? Keller identifies the Pharisees as the moral conformists who believe and obey the Bible and put the will of God and the community first. He blurs the line between a Christian believer and a Pharisee, which seems hard to do since they are polar opposites. In other words, Keller portrays the Pharisee as a picture of what Christians should be! He argues that the second group of listeners was the

Pharisees and the teachers of the law, who were represented by the elder brother… They studied and obeyed the Scriptures. They worshiped faithfully and prayed constantly. (7)

So to whom is Jesus’s teaching in this parable directed? It is the second group, the scribes, and Pharisees… The targets of this story are not “wayward sinners” but religious people who do everything the Bible requires. Jesus is pleading not so much with immoral outsiders as with moral insiders. (8)

Jesus’s teaching consistently attracted the irreligious while offending the Bible-believing religious people of his day. (15)

So from the quotes above, we have the Pharisees depicted as the Bible-believing religious people of Jesus day who studied and obeyed the Scriptures and did everything the Bible requires. Let’s compare this with how the Bible describes the Pharisees and ask some basic questions.

First, even though the Pharisees read and studied the scriptures, did they believe and obey them? Note that the “Scriptures” the Pharisees had at the time was the Old Testament.

Jesus said to the Pharisees, “For if you believed Moses, you would believe me; for he wrote of me. But if you do not believe his writings, how will you believe my words?” (Jn 5:46)

Jesus also said, “But you do not believe because you are not part of my flock. My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me” (Jn 10:26-27).

The Pharisees did not believe Jesus and therefore did not believe what Moses wrote. They did not believe the Scriptures and they were not the “Bible-believing religious people of [Jesus’] day.” John Robbins writes, “It is a complete fiction to say that Orthodox Jews believe the Old Testament. Those who assert that unrepentant Jews believe the Old Testament call Christ a liar.”[3] In passages like John 10:26-27 Jesus plainly says that they did not believe because “You are not part of my flock.”

Second, did the Pharisees obey Scripture as Keller asserts? It is clear from Jesus’ own words that they did not obey. Jesus said they were lawless hypocrites: "Even so you too outwardly appear righteous to men, but inwardly you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness" (Mt 23:26). Just as the reprobate cannot be the elect, a person cannot be both lawless and obedient at the same time. The Pharisees had an outward expression of obedience but they did not actually obey the Scriptures: “You leave the commandment of God and hold to the tradition of men… You have a fine way of rejecting the commandments of God in order to establish your own tradition” (Mk 7:8-9). Unfortunately, Keller does not point any of this out and contradicts what the Bible says by stating that they were “religious people who do everything the Bible requires.”

And while Keller says that “they worshiped faithfully,” the Bible says, “This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me; in vain do they worship me” (Mk 7:6-7). The Pharisees may have been devoted false worshipers but Keller makes it appear as if they were faithfully worshiping the one true God.

Keller also knows that he can’t press every single detail literally from the metaphor:

Let me be careful to avoid a misunderstanding here. This story is a great metaphor of sin and salvation, but we can’t press every single detail literally. Neither Jesus nor any author of the Bible ever implies that any human being is flawless, without sin or fault, except Jesus himself.” (74)

While Keller gives this disclaimer he nevertheless continually draws out details from the parable that contradict the Bible. He is correct in saying that no “human being is flawless, without sin or fault, except Jesus himself,” yet he neglects what the Bible actually teaches concerning the true condition of man’s depravity. This is only part of the truth; which he continually betrays in what he writes about the Pharisees. This “Reformed” pastor undermines the Biblical doctrine of total depravity, especially when he attempts to make a distinction between the Pharisee and the true believer by claiming that the Pharisees are “being good”:

They key difference between a Pharisee and a believer in Jesus is inner-heart motivation. Pharisees are being good but out of a fear-fueled need to control God. They don’t really trust him or love him. To them, God is an exacting boss, not a loving father. (85)

So while Keller virtually erases the line between a Christian and Pharisee and actually applies the elder brother image to true Christians, he does make a distinction between Pharisee and true believer. Normally this would be helpful but unfortunately, he once again ignores what the Bible says and creates false distinctions and contradictions.

It would appear by and large that many young, restless, and reformed readers are not even batting an eye when they read this book. Let’s compare again Keller’s teachings with the Bible. He says that the Pharisees are “being good” but Jesus said, “no one is good except God alone” (Lk 18:19).

One might argue that Keller doesn’t exactly call them good in the quote, but rather he just says they are “being good.” This is still baffling! When were they ever “being good?” Was it when they “were persecuting Jesus” (Jn 5:16)? Or how about when they “were seeking all the more to kill him” (Jn 5:18)? Were they being good when Christ called them lawless hypocrites (Mt 23:26)? Or when he told them they were doing the desires of their father the Devil (Jn 8:48)? Were they being good when they were going to stone him (Jn 10:33)? Or was it when they cried, “Crucify him!” (Lk 23:21)?

Keller argues that the “key difference” is “inner-heart motivation.” It’s not repentance, it’s not faith in Christ, it’s not that one has Satan as their father and the other is the child of God, it’s not that one is in the kingdom of darkness and one in the kingdom of light, and it’s not even their unconverted human depravity. No, it’s just their “heart motivation.” Keller says that the “inner-heart motivation” is the problem but then identifies this inner-heart motivation as a “fear-fueled need to control God.” Yet the Bible clearly says that “there is no fear of God before their eyes” (Rom 3:18). Jesus said, “Out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks,” and the inner heart-motivation of the Pharisees was revealed when “they kept shouting, “Crucify, crucify him!” (Lk 23:21). The true difference between a Christian and a Pharisee is repentance and faith in the redemptive work of Jesus that bears fruit in keeping with repentance (Lk 3:8).

Keller also says “they don’t really trust him or love him,” and he is correct but he fails to mention the true disposition of the unconverted sinner, which is that they’re all “haters of God” (Rom 1:30). Perhaps this would be too offensive to his curious outsiders. He writes, “to them God is an exacting boss, not a loving father,” suggesting that the problem rests in their perception of God rather than identifying man’s actual relationship with God as the real problem. To them, God is not a loving father because they have a different father, as previously mentioned.

Such a trivial distinction doesn’t matter though because the Bible makes it clear that “no one does good, not even one,” (Rom 3:12) as long as we remain unconverted. Only after we are made alive in Christ can we do any good works “which God prepared beforehand, that we should just walk in them” (Eph 2:10). The Bible thunderously denounces all merit placed in man outside of faith in Christ: “Whatever does not proceed from faith is sin" (Rom 14:23), for “all our righteous deeds are like a polluted garment” (Is 64:6).

So from the Bible we can see that the Pharisees were not the Bible-believing religious people of Jesus day. They did not obey the Scriptures, they did not do everything the Bible required, and they did not put the will of God first. Keller abuses the text and wrongly portrays the Pharisees as what Christians should look like, while at the same time misapplying the illustration of the elder brother to this same group of “Christians,” or, as he puts it, “insiders of the faith.” Why does Keller distort the Biblical view of the Pharisees so much and equate them with conservative Christians? Keller claims that “if our churches aren’t appealing to the younger brothers, they must be more full of elder brothers than we’d like to think” (14). He seems to think that because our churches have “conservative, buttoned-down, moralistic people” (14) in them, that is why “the licentious and liberated or broken and marginal avoid church” (14). Dr. E.S. Williams writes:

Keller uses the image of the elder brother to caricature conservative Christians as judgmental, hostile bigots. In Keller’s mind, the reason that conservative churches are so unpleasant is because they are filled with elder brothers (conservative Christians), who speak out against liberal, immoral values on sex and politics. Keller is profoundly hostile towards conservative Christians, whom he regards as the major cause of most problems in the world. So we have the remarkable paradox of a leading Presbyterian theologian who is vehemently opposed to the Reformed Christian faith. Even more amazing is the fact that he is the leader of The Gospel Coalition.[4]

Keller’s motive for writing such things is irrelevant if he is unfaithful to Scripture. It is egregious that Keller makes the Pharisees look like Christians, applies the elder brother image to Christians, and then makes a false distinction between the Christian and Pharisee. In so doing he contradicts the Bible repeatedly. This, however, is not the only problem with the book.

Redefining Sin

The title of Chapter 3 is “Redefining Sin.” Keller here distorts the biblical view of sin and attaches his own view to the parable of the prodigal son while at the same time appealing to the authority of Jesus. It is not uncommon for liberals, heretics, and false teachers to use orthodox language only to redefine the language in their teachings. Both Mormons and Jehovah’s Witnesses use the name of Jesus only to redefine the biblical doctrine of Christ. It is also very common for false teachers to make appeals of authority to Jesus in an attempt to pass off their unbiblical teachings. Many false prosperity preachers likewise appeal to Jesus’ own words in John 10:10, “I came that they may have life and have it abundantly,” to preach their false health, wealth, prosperity gospel. In this chapter Keller once again injects his own views into the biblical text, contradicts the Bible, and makes a false appeal to Jesus as the one who is teaching what Keller is teaching:

Why doesn’t the elder brother go in? He himself gives the reason: “Because I’ve never disobeyed you.” The elder brother is not losing the father’s love in spite of his goodness, but because of it. It is not his sins that create the barrier between him and his father, it’s the pride he has in his moral record: it’s not his wrongdoing but his righteousness that is keeping him from sharing in the feast of the fathers.” (33)

Keller says that it is because of the elder son’s “goodness” that he is losing the father’s love and that creates a barrier between them, rather than his sins. Keep in mind that the elder brother represents the Pharisaical moral insiders of the faith and the father is a representation of Jesus. Can we lose God’s love because of our goodness? What else but sin could create a barrier between us and God? Can goodness and righteousness separate us from God?

Keller contradicts what Jesus said to the rich young ruler in Luke 18:19. While Keller affirms that the elder brother is good and righteous, Jesus, on the other hand, tells the rich young ruler, “Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone.” Once again Scripture says, “None is righteous, no, not one” (Rom 3:10). What definition of righteous and good is Keller using if not a Biblical one? Apart from Christ, we have no righteousness or goodness. Keller identifies pride as the real problem but this pride is nothing less than sinful and is, therefore, wrong. Therefore, it would be the elder son’s wrongdoing, not his “goodness” that keeps him from sharing in the feast.

But Keller claims the opposite. He says that “the elder brother is not losing the father’s love in spite of his goodness, but because of it.” Yet when the rich young ruler boasted of his own goodness by saying, “All these [commandments] I have kept from my youth” (Lk 18:21), Jesus did not tell him that he was losing the father’s love because of his goodness. Instead, Jesus pointed him back to the first commandment by showing him that he loved his money more than God when he told him to “sell all that you have and distribute to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven” (Lk 18:22). Jesus’ response to the young man was consistent with what he said in response to the question about the greatest commandment to “love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment” (Mt 22:36). By loving his money more than God he was violating the first and greatest commandment. The young man left very sad because he was very rich (Lk 18:23). Notice that Jesus didn’t affirm the rich young ruler’s goodness in Luke 18, nor did he affirm the Pharisees’ goodness through the parable of the prodigal son. Jesus tells the Pharisees in Luke 16:15, “You are those who justify yourselves before men, but God knows your hearts. For what is exalted among men is an abomination in the sight of God.” So Jesus in no way intended to affirm the “goodness” of the Pharisees in the parable because they are “an abomination in the sight of God.”

And Jesus certainly did not intend to teach that it was “not his sins that create the barrier between him and his father.” Keller is a terrible expositor. Of course, it is our sin that creates a barrier between us and God! This is why Jesus pointed the rich young ruler back to the law to show him his sin. This is why Galatians 3:24 says the law was our schoolmaster, and why Paul says in Romans 7:7, “Yet if it had not been for the law, I would not have known sin.” Jesus showed the rich young ruler it was his sin that was the problem, not his goodness. So while Keller says it was not his sin that created a barrier, Isaiah 59:2 reads, “It's your sins that have cut you off [created a barrier] from God. Because of your sins, he has turned away and will not listen anymore.” Clearly then, the real problem is the elder brother’s sin, not his “goodness” and “righteousness.”

Keller unravels his false teaching further:

Each one [of the sons], in other words, rebelled—but one did so by being very bad and the other by being extremely good.

Do you realize, then, what Jesus is teaching? Neither son loved the father for himself. They both were using the father for their own self-centered ends rather than loving, enjoying, and serving him for his own sake. This means that you can rebel against God and be alienated from him either by breaking his rules or by keeping all of them diligently.” (36)

How can a person rebel against God by being extremely good? If a person is rebelling against God at all then they clearly are not being good in any sense. It is impossible to rebel against God by being extremely good because the qualities of rebellion and goodness are contradictory. That is, unless you equivocate on the terms good and evil, in which case you should consider Isaiah 5:20: “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil.”

In the second part of the quote, Keller attributes his false teaching onto Jesus. He says that Jesus is teaching that “you can rebel against God and be alienated from him either by breaking his rules or by keeping all of them diligently”; yet this is not what Jesus told the rich young ruler, and it’s not at all what Jesus is teaching in the parable. He did not tell the young ruler that he was “alienated” from God for keeping all of the laws since his youth, but instead showed the man that he was in trouble for not keeping the law. Perhaps it’s true that both sons in the parable were using the father but the conclusion Keller draws is false. While Keller says that we can be alienated and can rebel against God by “keeping all of the rules diligently,” the Psalmist writes, “You have commanded your precepts to be kept diligently” (Ps119:4)! Keller contradicts the Bible yet again, for God commands us to keep his moral laws diligently! The real problem is that we fail to keep them, and this is sin.

Here is another of Keller’s false appeals to Jesus:

With this parable, Jesus gives us a much deeper concept of “sin” than any of us would have if he didn’t supply it. Most people think of sin as failing to keep God’s rules of conduct, but, while not less than that, Jesus’s definition of sin goes beyond it.” (34)

Here, then, is Jesus’s radical redefinition of what is wrong with us. Nearly everyone defines sin as breaking a list of rules. Jesus, though, shows us that a man who has violated virtually nothing on the list of moral misbehaviors can be every bit as spiritually lost as the most profligate, immoral person. Why? Because sin is not just breaking the rules, it is putting yourself in the placed of God as Savior, Lord, and Judge just as each son sought to displace the authority of the father in his own life.” (42)

It’s hard to imagine that one of the founders of the Gospel Coalition could be such a terrible expositor. Keller wants us to believe that Jesus told the parable to provide us with a much deeper concept of sin, even though Jesus himself said, “This is why I speak to them in parables, because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand” (Mt 13:13). Jesus spoke in parables to confuse his hearers and to keep them from understanding, and the prodigal son parable was meant to mock the Pharisees’ self-righteousness and total ignorance of God (Lk 15:1-3). How is it that Keller thinks that only in this parable do we have access to this deeper understanding of sin when Jesus magnified the law and gave a deeper understanding of sin in Matthew 5 when he discussed anger and lust?

Keller wants his readers to believe that Jesus is redefining sin, but Jesus was always consistent and in perfect harmony with Scripture. Jesus is not redefining anything at all in this parable. Keller wants us to believe that “sin is not just breaking the rules [commandments], it is putting yourself in the place of God.” But putting yourself in the place of God is breaking the very first rule! “You shall have no other gods before me” (Ex 20:3). This is exactly what Satan did when he said, “I will make myself like the Most High” (Is 14:14). Sin, whether in thought or deed, is a violation of God’s holy standard. This is why the Westminster Confession (which Keller is also fond of contradicting) reads in Chapter VI.6, “Every sin—both original and actual—is a transgression of the righteous lawof God and contrary to it.” What Keller writes is nothing short of confusion, yet he intends this book to be an introduction to the Christian faith for outsiders and a primer for “established insiders.” No, thank you. Paul tells Titus to “teach what accords with sound doctrine” (Ti 2:1), but Keller’s teaching does not accord with sound doctrine.

Keller’s Gospel

While Keller intends The Prodigal God to be a sort of primer which “is meant to lay out the essentials of the Christian message, the gospel,” it is Keller himself who distorts the biblical doctrine of atonement and compromises the gospel.

Keller writes that “one of the signs that you many not grasp the unique radical nature of the gospel is that you are certain that you do,” but he later writes, “The inevitable sign that you know you are a sinner saved by sheer, costly grace is a sensitive social conscience and a life poured out in deeds of service to the poor.” (112)

Keller suggests that you really can’t know if you're saved by believing in what Jesus has done, but that you can have assurance of your salvation based on what you have done. This is Romanism at its heart: “The Romanists held that a man is to believe in the mercy of God and the merits of Christ, but that this belief brought with it no assurance of justification; though possibly, if the man lived a very holy life, God might before he died reveal his grace to him, and give him assurance.”[5] The Protestant view of assurance is rooted in the knowledge of the historical redemptive work of Jesus on the cross.

It is also wrong to say that the “inevitable sign” that you are saved is a “sensitive social conscience and a life poured out in deeds of service to the poor” simply because many who are not saved do this. What about repentance and faith in Christ alone for the forgiveness of sins?

Keller contradicts himself still further and betrays the gospel of justification by faith alone when he writes, “As long as you are trying to earn your salvation by controlling God through goodness, you will never be sure you have been good enough for him. You simply aren’t sure God loves and delights in you” (61). This is a lie. By making the problem of a works-based salvation one of assurance, Keller compromises the gospel and allows his readers to keep the idea that the only thing lacking is assurance of salvation, not salvation itself when they attempt to earn salvation. The problem for those who are trying to earn their salvation is not a lack of assurance but a forfeiture of the gospel. If a person is trying to earn their salvation, then they are not saved because they are not trusting in the finished work of Christ. Keller blurs the true distinction between the true gospel of justification by faith alone and a false gospel which includes works. Paul writes, “For by works of the law no human being will be justified in his sight, since through the law comes knowledge of sin” (Rom 3:20). In fact, it is the one who does not work but believes that is justified. “And to the one who does not work but believes in him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness” (Rom 4:5).

Keller also seems to think that if we are not attracting people to our churches then it must mean that we are not preaching the same message as Jesus.

The kind of outsiders Jesus attracted are not attracted to the contemporary churches, even our most avant-garde ones.

If the preaching of our ministers and the practice of our parishioners do not have the same effect on the people that Jesus had, then we must not be declaring the same message that Jesus did. (14)

Paul warns Timothy to “follow the pattern of the sound words that you have heard from me,” (2 Tm 1:13), and he commands Titus to “teach what accords with sound doctrine” (Ti 2:1), but never does he attribute the lack of success in ministry to a compromising of the message of Jesus. In fact, we see just the opposite. Those who compromise sound biblical doctrine often have the biggest ministries, which is why Paul warns, “For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions” (2 Tm 4:3). Paul does not say that if you are not filling your churches then you must not be preaching the same message as Jesus. This kind of thinking leads to tampering with the message of Jesus, which is exactly what Keller has done in this book. Keller reduces the gospel to a message of feigned humility:

Jesus says: “The humble are in and the proud are out” (see Luke 18:14). The people who confess they aren’t particularly good or open-minded are moving toward God because the prerequisite for receiving the grace of God is to know that you need it. The people, who think they are just fine, thank you, are moving away from God. “The Lord… cares for the humble, but he keeps his distance from the proud” (Psalm 138:6 – New Living Translation).

When a newspaper posed the question, “What’s Wrong with the World?” the Catholic thinker G.K. Chesterton reputedly wrote a brief letter in response: “Dear Sirs: I am. Sincerely Yours, G. K. Chesterton.” That is the attitude of someone who grasped the message of Jesus. (45)

Keller once again attributes his false teaching to Jesus by misquoting him from the text in Luke 18:14. The verse actually reads, “I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.” The reader should note that Jesus never says, “The humble are in and the proud are out.” Keller misleads his readers on two accounts here. First by misquoting Jesus and second by the conclusion he makes from the text he misquotes. The verse says that “this man [the tax collector] went down to his house justified,” but why was he justified? It was not simply because he was humble, as Keller claims. It is true that the man showed humility but that was only part of the whole message, and Keller substitutes the part for the whole in order reduce the gospel to an issue of humility. Jesus was speaking the parable to “some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous” (Lk 18:9), but it was the tax collector who said, “God, be merciful to me, a sinner!” (Lk 18:13). Furthermore, the Greek word for “be merciful” is hilasthēti, which literally means “be propitious.” The tax collector cried out and asked God to be propitious—to turn away His wrath from him. This is not just a depiction of humility but rather a depiction of saving faith. We see that the Pharisees trusted in their works and good deeds but it was the tax collector who was justified by rightly understanding his depravity and expressing saving faith.

Keller’s false gospel manifests itself by giving as an example someone who did not believe in the gospel of justification by faith alone. Keller, a Reformed pastor, affirms G. K. Chesterton, a Roman Catholic, as “someone who grasped the message of Jesus” on the basis of nothing more than a feigned expression of humility. The message of Jesus was, “Repent and believe in the gospel” (Mk 1:15), but as a Roman Catholic Chesterton did not believe the true gospel of justification by faith alone. He was hostile to the Protestant faith, became an apostate, and affirmed the false gospel of justification by faith and works. He was nothing less than an Antichrist who opposed the gospel of Jesus Christ. Jesus said, “Whoever is not with me is against me” (Mt 12:30), and those who oppose the true gospel set themselves against Christ himself. It is remarkable that Keller affirms a Roman Catholic who affirmed a false gospel as someone who grasped the message of Jesus. This is the necessary consequence of Keller's false gospel that the “humble are in.”

Keller also has a history of ecumenism and fondness for Roman Catholicism. Timothy Kauffman has made mention of this on his blog:

Tim Keller (PCA Minister): “The best things that have been written [on meditation] almost are by Catholics during the counter-reformation—Ignatius Loyola, Francis de Sales, John of the Cross, St. Teresa of Avila—great stuff!”[6]

These people whom Keller endorsed to his own church led the Counter-Reformation and wanted nothing more than to rid the world of justification by faith alone. They vehemently opposed Luther and Calvin and despised the true gospel. Keller has been known to frequently use and even endorse those who preach a false gospel. He quotes N.T. Wright liberally in The Reason for God, yet Wright teaches a works-based salvation. Paul wrote, “Now I beseech you, brethren, mark them which cause divisions and offenses contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned; and avoid them” (Rom 16:17 KJV). Yet we have the leader and co-founder of the Gospel Coalition endorsing and affirming those who preach a false gospel. Shame on Keller.

Unfortunately, that isn’t all. Keller distorts the gospel further by substituting the biblical doctrine of atonement for heresy.

He came and experienced the exile that we deserved. He was expelled from the presence of the father, He was thrust into darkness, the uttermost despair of spiritual alienation – in our place. He took upon himself the full curse of human rebellion, cosmic homelessness, so that we could be welcomed into our true home. (101)

This is heresy. “The full curse of human rebellion” is not “cosmic homelessness”; it is God’s wrath. Keller only talks about exile, alienation, and homelessness in his book as the sole punishment that befalls wicked sinners. He never mentions the wrath of God that abides on sinners and instead eliminates it by claiming that the full curse is “cosmic homelessness.”

This distorts the gospel by denying the doctrine of propitiation. The word propitiation refers to the satisfying of God’s wrath against the sinner through the substitutionary atonement of Jesus on the cross. If we exclude propitiation by excluding God’s wrath, then we forfeit the gospel, and that is exactly what Keller has done in this book. Jesus did not redeem us from the curse of the law and become a curse for us (Gal 3:13) by merely being forsaken or becoming spiritually “homeless”; He suffered and bore the full wrath of God.

Paul tells us that we were by nature “children of wrath” (Eph 2:3). If propitiation is removed from the gospel, then the wrath of God still abides on the sinner’s head and we have no gospel at all. If Jesus only saved us from exile, then He did not ultimately satisfy or propitiate the wrath of God on behalf of his people. Paul tells us that it was Jesus “whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith…. It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus” (Rom 3:25, 26). Without propitiation, there can be no justification. Jesus, therefore, did not just experience exile or homelessness as Keller teaches, for “it was the will of the Lord to crush him” (Is 53:10) as well.

Keller distorts the gospel in The Prodigal God along with various other doctrines and must be held accountable for what he teaches. I, therefore, do not recommend this book or its author.

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[1] Scripture references are ESV unless otherwise noted. All emphases in Scripture quotations are mine.

[2] Brackets and emphases are mine.

[3] John W. Robbins, “The White Horse Inn: Nonsense on Tap,” The Trinity Review 271 (September/October, 2007), http://www.trinityfoundation.org/journal.php?id=245.

[4] E.S. Williams, “The Prodigal God,” review of The Prodigal God, by Timothy Keller, The New Calvinists, accessed March 10, 2014, Keller’s books, http://www.newcalvinist.com/tim-kellers-false-gospel/the-prodigal-god/.

[5] Horatius Bonar, “Assurance of Salvation,” The Trinity Review (April, 1994), http://www.trinityfoundation.org/journal.php?id=185.

[6] Timothy Kauffman, "And the Diviners Have Seen a Lie," accessed June 1, 2014, http://www.whitehorseblog.com/2014/05/18/and-the-diviners-have-seen-a-lie/.

[7] See E.S. Williams, “Keller redefines the gospel,” The New Calvinists, http://www.newcalvinist.com/tim-kellers-false-gospel/keller-redefines-gospel/.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]