Dr. Calvin Beisner Comments: elephant room | discernment | association | TD Jakes | James MacDonald

The following is from Here I Blog:

I asked Facebook friend, author and scholar, Dr. E. Calvin Beisner7, who has published two books on the Trinity, his thoughts on Jakes’ comments in the above interview. Beisner replied:

Far, far, far too little evidence there to justify reclassifying Jakes as Trinitarian granted all he’s said before and his continuing to consider United Pentecostals his Christian brothers. Nothing quoted there falls outside what any reasonably sly and sophisticated United Pentecostal could say. Let Jakes clearly and explicitly affirm such clear Trinitarian statements as the Nicene Creed, the Symbol of Chalcedon, the Athanasian Creed, or even just Warfield’s summary–There is but one God; the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit each is God; the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit each is a distinct Person–and then let him also repudiate the anti-Trinitarian statements of United Pentecostalism and other modalist sects, and it’ll be time to declare him converted to the true God. My impression is that Jakes is simply out to gain the trust of larger groups than the Oneness and Pentecostal crowd in which he’s been at home.

I beg to differ with Dr. Beisner on one point.  With the downplaying of "essential doctrine" in Pentecostal circles, it has now become generally accepted that the trinity and oneness issue is considered a matter of adiaphora.  The Society for Pentecostal Studies has removed all trinitarian doctrinal statements so that oneness pentecostals could participate since they could not in good conscience sign such a doctrinal statement in order to join the society.  See:  Wikipedia:  Society for Pentecostal Studies.

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Click here to read the transcript of the Elephant Room interview with T. D. Jakes: The Elephant Room II