Reflections on order

Respondeo

Category: Reformed Theology

Review of “Grace Worth Fighting For”

A review of “Grace Worth Fighting For” by Daniel R. Hyde. Find the book here.

On the 400th anniversary of Dort, Rev. Daniel Hyde wants to remind us again of the importance of Dort to the whole church.  So what makes Rev. Hyde’s book special among all the literature on Dort?  Rev.  Hyde wants to demonstrate the catholicity of Dort. He desires to prove Dort’s continuity with the 1500 years of Christian doctrine before it.  This catholicity not only affirms the historic doctrine of the church of Christ but also seeks a consensus on the various ways in which the Reformed had interpreted that tradition up to this point.  The men of Dort wanted to be guided by scripture and so were careful not to condemn theological systems that sought to affirm the primacy of the grace of God in his electing purpose.  Rev. Hyde has written this book so his contemporaries can recover the catholic vision exemplified in the Canons.

Rev. Hyde wants to do this in an accessible way so that the regular pastor and layman can have better access to the theology of the Synod.  He succeeds. The book is easy to read and well laid out.  He explains the significant points of the Canons well along with historical awareness.  Somebody who wants to begin studies in the Canons of Dort would have a hard time finding a better resource for understanding the theology that produced the language of the Canons.

Hyde frames his work within recent scholarship recovering the depth and breadth of Reformed theology in the 16th and 17th century.  Particularly, Muller’s work on the Reformed Scholastics.  Muller has rehabilitated the theology of the Reformed Scholastics, demonstrating their continuity with the first reformers; Luther, Calvin, Bucer, and others.  He has also reminded us once again of the diversity of thought among the reformed.  It is wonderful to see these insights integrated into an accessible explanation of the Canons. They flesh out the picture of what was going on at Dort for us.

The recent scholarship of Michael Lynch on the British Delegation to Dort also brings a unique perspective to the book.  There is sometimes a tendency to devalue or ignore the contributions of the British Delegation.  Though some of their views were in the minority, they had an important voice in shaping the canons and in providing a moderating voice between different factions. Notably, The wisdom and erudition of the British delegate John Davenant played a role. There was also politics involved.  James I was an essential ally against the Netherland’s primary enemy at the time: Spain. 

Rev. Hyde is at his best when he brings out the importance of the catholicity of this synod. He argues that the way the Remonstrants framed the doctrine of predestination completely undermined the historic doctrines concerning Christ and his works.  As Turretin likes to note, it was the Remonstrants who were the innovators, meaning that it was the Remonstrants were departing from and undermining the historic doctrines of the church.  Hyde draws parallels between the work of the Synod of Dort and the Councils of Orange and Carthage, along with numerous references to the Church Fathers and Medievals. This historical background is part of the catholicity of the synod.  It desired to preserve what had always been taught by the church of Christ.

There was another aspect to this catholicity.  The synod’s catholicy was revealed in their attempts to affirm the theologies of the various reformed traditions so long as they attempted to grapple with the truth of an election based on God’s good pleasure.  Even though there were deep tensions in the synod, the synod ended with a document that could be affirmed by the diverse group of delegates. Hyde’s attitude channels the final fraternal Spirit of the Synod, even if the process may not have been so “catholic.”  We can see this in his generosity to the Lutherans in his discussion on the Perseverance of the Saints. 

In this desire to emphasize catholicity perhaps he does miss a couple of things.  One is the role of the civil government in pushing these men to a consensus.  It is a real question whether the synod would have held together without the push from James I and Prince Maurice. What is the significance of the interference of the civil government to the catholicity of the synod?  Another discussion that is missed is the reception of the Canons in the countries from which the delegates came.  Hyde does mention that the Dutch and the French received it as a standard, meaning that they bound their ministers to this standard.  I was left wondering about the reception in Germany, Switzerland, and England and how that affects the enduring catholicity of the document.  These are not major critiques, but some interaction with these realities would have added an important perspective.

The book left me wanting more (something that a good book does). I was curious to learn more about the particular theologies of the German delegates.  How did the French church and the Swiss church interact with the Canons?  What were the particular differences between the delegates on the perseverance of the saints?  What about church order?  Were their conversations on that?  What other peripheral issues were discussed?  Of course, a popular treatment will not deal with all these questions, but I hope that this work will prompt others to dig into this synod that is unique in the history of the reformed churches.

I have high praise for this book.  It challenges both pastor and laymen to stand firm against those who militate against the doctrines of grace.  It should incite in all Christians a doxology to the “depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God!”  This is the God who saves.  At the same time, it should give the pastor and laymen humility as the church seeks to find the best way to express the mysteries of God’s grace.

Is a King a Good Thing?

The question arises from reading Deuteronomy 17 and 1 Samuel 8.  In Deuteronomy 17, God assumes that Israel will eventually want a king like the nations around them. He gives instructions for how that king is to live before him and before Israel.

In 1 Samuel 8, when Israel comes to that moment where she does look for a king like the nations around here, Samuel refuses.  He sees the folly of Israel’s request.  God tells Samuel otherwise but encourages him to warn Israel about the prerogatives of a king.

Samuel presumes that the king will not follow the rules of Deuteronomy 17. Deuteronomy warns against multiplying horses (Deuteronomy 17: 16).  The king Samuel speaks of has many horses and his depredations are connected with his stables (1 Samuel 8: 11-12).  The king in Deuteronomy does not pile up silver and gold (Deuteronomy 17: 17).  Samuel’s king  freely taxes the people (1 Samuel 8: 13-17).

The key difference between what happens in Deuteronomy 17 and 1 Samuel 8 is not that Israel wants a king like the nations around them. This is a common comment from the commentators.  The fact is both Deuteronomy 17 and 1 Samuel 8 assume that the king is like the nations around Israel.

No, the key difference is that Israel, when she comes before Samuel is rejecting God as king.  She is coming with the wrong heart.  She is not seeking a king after God’s own heart.  If she was she would seek the king of Deuteronomy 17.  This is demonstrated in that after Samuel’s warning, Israel gladly accepts the type of king that Samuel describes.  If she had been reading Deuteronomy, she would have asked God to apply the warnings of Deuteronomy 17 to the king.  Now God does provide a king for Israel and he does warn the king to follow in his ways, but this is out of grace, despite the fact his people rejected him.

Actually, if Israel had been careful to circumscribe their king with the laws that Deuteronomy provides, much of the bad power of the king would have been undermined.  The king would have been constrained by the law of God from seeking great riches and honor. God told the king not to collect gold, or horses, or wives. If the kings of Israel had listened, they would not have moved in the direction of tyranny.

But why was it so important to have a king?  Did God intend to give Israel a king all along?   The king is important because the people of God needed somebody who could give true justice.   In the end, judges failed, regular avenues of justice failed, and the people of God needed a person with great wisdom to discern the hardest cases.  It is interesting that in Deuteronomy 17 the rules for a king follow the section concerning hard cases.  Because of man’s sinful nature, there is no such thing as perfect justice and we crave that justice.  The king would fill that role but in order for the king to fulfill that role well he had to be a man after God’s own heart.

In the end the only king that did not fall prey to the temptations mentioned in Deuteronomy 17 was and is the Lord Jesus Christ.

We can conclude that a king is a good thing.  The rules of Deuteronomy 17 assume that. 1 Samuel 8 demonstrates that the impatience of the people warped God’s gift of a king to Israel.  Israel did not have the patience to put boundaries in place so that the king would not become a tyrant. The role of Jesus Christ assumes that. A king without the boundaries God gave is an evil thing.  Israel never asks for the boundaries of Deuteronomy 17 in 1 Samuel 8.  Israel rejects the Lord as king because she rejects his teaching for a king.

n.b.  I don’t pretend to have the final word on this controverted subject.

Jesus fulfills the law: He Creates a Spiritual People

The 3rd part of “Jesus fulfills the law.”

Christ fulfilled the law.  Now when Christ or Paul talk about the law they are referring to the entirety of the law, both the rules and the institutions which they are connected to. We’ve already shown how Jesus fulfilled other portions of the law here and here. I’m referring, more particularly, to the many rules that God gives in the Old Testament.

Christ obeyed those perfectly.  From the Ten Commandments to the laws concerning the clean and unclean.  When we come to Christ in faith, we receive everything that he did for us from the beginning of his life to the end of his life, so that we may have perfection in all that we do.  That is why our good works are pleasing to God.  We have his full righteousness, the whole Christ; so that he counts or sin-filled works as good.  God even gives a reward out of the mere grace of God. Knowing this, we cannot but respond with such a joy.  Our efforts feel so tiny, almost useless, but Christ is our righteousness.

How does he do this?  As we have already mentioned, he sends out his Spirit among us, to guide us and direct us so that as we read in Romans 8:, the righteous requirement of the law may be fulfilled in us, so that we too may be holy, righteous and blameless, so that we may really do good things before God.

So how do we learn from all those rules of the Old Testament through Christ?  How do we order our lives after those laws?  We first need to understand, how Christ changed our relationship to the law.  Christ freed us from the law.  Paul teaches us in Galatians 4 that the people of the Old Testament were under a tutor.  That tutor had absolute authority over the Jews.  The law taught them and as their tutor demanded obedience.

In Christ, we are freed.  We are no longer under the law.  Yet we still use the law.  For example, Paul uses the law that you should not muzzle your ox to encourage his hearers to provide for their leaders in 1 Corinthians 9:9. You might say that the law is now a mentor. The Spirit teaches us how to apply it to our lives.  In Christ, we’ve grown up and now we look with affection to our old tutor, the law, in order to find advice on ordering our lives.

Of course the centerpiece of the law, written by the very finger of God, the Ten Commandments, continue to have an important part in our lives.  This is the law of love, the law of Christ, that Christ gives to guide our lives.  Christ’s call to live by the fruits of the Spirit cannot be followed without the guidance of the Ten Commandments.  This is what we might call the substance of the law.  But we do so under Christ and guided by the Spirit.  We do not do so under the law.

But other laws of the Old Testament can guide us in how we live our lives as well. We can the example of the Old Testament to bring order to the church and to our individual lives. We’ve already noted how Paul uses the law about muzzling oxen.  For example, the practice of daily sacrifices teaches us the practice of daily devotion. No Christian will deny that daily devotions are a good way to order our lives.

The church, as a whole. may decide to have two services on Sunday based on the practice of morning and evening sacrifices.  We can also think of the practice of fasting in the Old Testament.  A local church may decide to call a day of fasting in order to meet certain problems in the world around them or within the church itself.  These are Spirit-led, free choices that the Spirit calls us to do for the sake of destroying the sin that remains in us and for expanding the kingdom of God.

We can learn from the law, as long as we do bind one another’s consciences to the practices that the Spirit has led our church too.  We do not argue from the law in order to control one another but in order to encourage and edify one another.  As individuals and as communities we learn from the law, but we do so in freedom from the law.

We are not law-led, we are Spirit led. And the Spirit leads us through the word of Christ. The perennial temptation of the church is to go back to the slavery of the law instead of the freedom of the Spirit.  That betrays a desire for slavery.  Instead look to your wisdom, Christ.  He gives you the Holy Spirit.  As John teaches us in 1 John 2:20, through that Holy Spirit, you know all things.

Christ fulfills the law: Christ changes spiritual geography

n.b. I recently preached a sermon on Belgic Confession 25.  This Article deals with how Christ fulfilled the law. This doctrine is not well understood today and so I thought it was fitting to publish the sermon. I’ve divided it up into blog-sized sections for easier reading:

 

The basic institution in the Old Testament was the tabernacle or temple.  This was the center of Israelite culture and religion.  It was even their political center. David ruled from Jerusalem. This was the city where the ark was and later where the temple would be set up.  The tabernacle was the place where God could dwell with his people.  God set up the system of the law around the tabernacle in order to protect the people from his presence.  God is a holy God. Out of his grace and love for mankind, God desired to dwell with his people.  But his people needed to be protected from him, his power, and ultimately his holiness.  So God gave his people the law so that they would protect themselves from his holiness.

The people of Israel were able to approach God through various washings, through sacrifices, and through keeping themselves clean when approaching the temple, or the tabernacle, of God.  God even instituted levels of holiness in Israelite society.  There was a division of labor.  Everybody in society wasn’t able to keep the law equally rigorously so God gave Israelites a High Priest. He was required to keep the greatest level of Holiness; then Priests, then Levites and finally the rest of the people. The Holiest men were able to come the closest to God for the sake of the rest of the people.  These are the ceremonies and symbols of the law, which the Belgic Confession is speaking of.   These ceremonies allowed men to approach the God of heaven and earth.  The coming of Christ brought an end to all of these.

Why?  There is a host of aspects of Christ’s work that we could look at in order to see how he fulfilled every element of the temple, the sacrificial offerings and the various offices that God set up in and around the temple.  I want to focus on two aspects.  Christ’s fulfillment of the tabernacle itself and his fulfillment of the sacrificial system.

John 1: 14 gives us a hint as to how Christ fulfills the tabernacle system.  We are told there that the word became flesh and dwelt among us.  The Word, God, came down and took on flesh.  He was in a human body.  Remember what we said the tabernacle was for?  It was a place for God to dwell with his people so that, we could approach him.   John gives us a further hint through the Greek word he uses for dwell.  The word literally means tabernacled.  God dwelt among us in the flesh.

But Jesus did more.  He fulfilled the sacrificial system.  The ancient Israelites and to repeat the commanded sacrifices again and again so that men could draw near to God.  Jesus, by his death, offered a sacrifice that covers all sin; all sin.  That means that all the laws of uncleanness no longer apply.  We don’t need repeated sacrifices, we don’t need repeated washings.  We all need one sacrifice: Christ’s, and we only need one washing: his baptism.  This is why God tore the veil of seperation on the night of Christ’s death.  Any man could approach God through Christ.  There was no need for the institutions of the temple.  As the Belgic Confession says, they are abolished.

Ultimately, what happens is that the spiritual geography of the Old Testament is changed.  We have a New Testament spiritual geography.  The tabernacle is no longer a building, but the flesh of Christ.  Because Christ has gone to sit at the right hand of his father, our tabernacle is in heaven.  There is more.  Christ unites us to himself so that we also change.  In Christ, we are a temple of the Holy Spirit.

That is why God destroyed the temple in Jerusalem.  After Christ died and sat down at the right hand of God, the temple was no longer necessary.  When the Jews, who had rejected Christ, continued to use the rituals and ceremonies of the Old Testament the temple became an abomination. According to Hebrews, Christ’s fulfillment of the Mosaic system means that we may freely and confidently draw near to the throne of Christ. Christ’s truly powerful sacrifice covers corrupt flesh with his blood.   Those who defended the temple were now defending a false way to God. In a sense, it was a false Christ, claiming to continue the work that Christ had already accomplished.   God’s dwelling was now in Christ and those who were, and are today, united to Him.

And yet the substance of these remain for us in Jesus Christ according to the Belgic Confession.  The book of Hebrews gives us a way to understand this.  We still have a sacrifice.  We still have a tabernacle.  Because of Christ’s work their nature changed.

But the Belgic Confession doesn’t stop there, the author adds these words, “We still use these testimonies taken from the law and the prophets.” They have two uses for us.  They confirm the gospel to us.  We can see a little bit of what that means in seeing how Christ fulfilled the tabernacle and the sacrificial system.  The second use is that they help us “order our life in all honesty, according to God’s will and to his glory.”

How does the tabernacle system help us to order our lives? Surely this must refer to the Ten Commandments or maybe some of the civil laws might be helpful for the ordering of the church? Paul’s words to Timothy would suggest differently.  He tells us that all scripture is inspired and is profitable for teaching, for rebuking, for correcting, and for training in righteousness.

How does the tabernacle system train us in righteousness?  There is a lot to say, but I will mention a couple things.  The tabernacle system teaches us about how holy God is and how sinful we are.  Most importantly it teaches us that we may only approach God through the means he provides, namely Christ and his Spirit.

Further, it teaches us that we are to approach God with humility and with the desire to seek righteousness in Him.  It teaches us that this is something that is lifelong.  It teaches us about God’s desire for purity when we approach him.   We can also argue from the law that in Christ we are sacrifices before God.  That is what Paul suggests in Romans 12: 1.  He tells us to present our bodies as a living sacrifice to God.  We do so with the same purity and humility that God called his people to in the Old Testament.

A Typology of Hyper-Calvinism

It is my belief that Hyper-Calvinism is more common than many Calvinists and Reformed folks are willing to admit.  However, I should admit that I define Hyper-Calvinism more broadly that most Calvinists.   Hyper-Calvinism is anything that distorts the positive claims of the Canons of Dordt.  Basically, Hyper-Calvinism distorts the sovereignty of God.  I want to identify a number of ways that Reformed people have twisted Calvinism. They twist it into something that would be unrecognizable to those who defended this system. Here is a Typology of Hyper-Calvinism.

  1. Missional Hyper-Calvinism or Traditional Hyper-Calvinism:  This is what most people think of when they think of Hyper-Calvinism.  This is the belief that God will save his elect with or without us. The result is that they question the use of mission work.  This attitude faced William Carey when he expressed the desire to go as a missionary to India.  The story is told that an old Calvinist confronted him. He told him that God would save the elect in India without his help.  Ultimately this undermines the call of the divines at Dordt to remember that God uses means (CoD III/IV.17).
  2.  Predestinarian Hyper-Calvinism:  This form of Hyper-Calvinism posits a strict parallel between God’s predestination of the elect and His predestination of the reprobate.  It ignores the Canons’ language of “choosing” the elect and “passing over” the reprobate, (CoD I.7, 15).  The language of the Canons teaches us that the decree of election and the decree of reprobation are accomplished in a different way.  Predestinarian Hyper-Calvinism denies this.  This is a particularly pernicious error because it undermines the character of our God.
  3. Ecclesial Hyper-Calvinism:  This form of Hyper-Calvinism holds that God makes a covenant only with the elect and denies or empties God’s covenant with the baptized. (The fact is, there are many explanations of what it means that God makes a covenant with the baptized.  I argue that a broad variety of answers still belong to Calvinism proper.  It is those who deny that God covenants with babies or empties the covenant of baptism by saying that God only covenants with elect babies that are guilty of this error. see my definition of covenant here.) It tends to diminish the importance of sacraments as marks of the people of God and treats them only as aids to devotion.    Further, It tends to deny that children of believers should be treated as Christians.  The Reformed Baptist position is a form of this error.  The emphasize God’s covenant with the elect to the point that they try to make the number of the baptized and the number of the elect the same. This form of Hyper-Calvinism doesn’t directly contradict the Canons of Dordt, but it does tend to undermine its assurances to those whose children die in infancy (CoD I.17) and its declaration that sacraments are means of grace (CoD III/IV.17).
  4. Hyper-Assurance Hyper-Calvinism: This form of Hyper-Calvinism demands full assurance of election before you can be certain of your election and before you can be certain you are actually a member of Christ’s body.  The Canons of Dordt clearly proclaims the gospel of full assurance (CoD V.9). The Spirit gives us this grace. It does not claim that you need that full assurance to be saved.  Instead, the Canons encourage us to use the means of grace to deal with this lack of assurance (CoD V.14).  In fact, this position directly contradicts the Canons, which claims that the elect vary in their assurance in their lifetimes (CoD V.11).
  5. Hyper-Grace or Antinomian Hyper-Calvinism: This form of Hyper Calvinism puts all the weight on God’s irresistible grace in converting the soul.  Man can sit back after salvation and the good works will come.  The responsibility of man to live out his salvation in fear and trembling is ignored or even denied.  This contradicts the call of the Canons to persevere (CoD V.13,14).
  6. Hyper-Depravity Hyper-Calvinism: This form of Hyper-Calvinism emphasizes the total depravity of man.  Man can do no good before God.  It tends to undermine or deny that the saved man can please God. Ultimately it denies the power of God in regenerating the will of man and the new life that he gives him.  (CoD V.16)
  7. Hyper-Glory or Hyper-Sovereignty Hyper-Calvinism: I use the term Hyper-Glory because this is the result of a false type of piety, which thinks that the glory of God is a zero-sum game.  God gets all the glory and nobody else gets any.  Rather, when God gets all the glory, he is generous that glory and shares it with his saints.  By the term Hyper-Sovereignty, I refer to a sort of fatalism or  Stoicism.  You might hear, “We should be happy with whatever God does.  We need to receive it as God’s will.”  There is a sense where we can’t really take joy in life.  They forget that God’s own son sweat blood, while he pleaded with God to “Let this cup pass.”  He didn’t receive the cross stoically or fatalistically.  The working out of God’s plan of salvation is more complicated than we are willing to admit. This is another form of Hyper-Calvinism that does not directly contradict the Canons of Dordt. However, it does contradict the tenor of that piece of work.

Some hold to one of these errors.  Many more hold to a combination of these errors.

Many will be quick to point out that many errors in Calvinism share space with the errors of Jacobus Arminius as well. We can think of neonomianism for example.  This is the idea that Christ came and justified us through faith and we need to add good works, alongside Christ’s work, in order to reach final justification.  This is an error. However, the point of this post is to demonstrate a certain category of errors.  Namely, how people misuse the truth of God’s absolute sovereignty, while claiming to defend it.

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