Dr. R Scott Clark Speaks Out About Truth Telling

At the Heidblog, Dr. R. Scott Clark made valid remarks regarding the current climate in Evangelicalism in an article called Balanced But Biting. Dr. Clark was responding to an incident in which Mike Horton was criticized in Christianity Today Magazine for saying that Rick Warren has certain things wrong with his theology. For this reason most of my Calvinist friends are incredulous that John Piper is inviting Rick Warren to speak at the next Desiring God Conference. First of all, Rick Warren is not even a Calvinist. Second of all, Warren speaks anywhere to anybody as if everybody is a Christian. He even spoke at the initiation of the new Anglican province in the United States, the Anglican Church in North America. Unfortunately, the AC-NA is predominated by semi-pelagian and Anglo-Catholic theology which outright rejects the doctrine of justification by faith alone.

Personally, I like Mike Horton. I really do. But my complaint with Mike Horton is not that he makes "biting" remarks. On the contrary, I think Dr. Mike is too easy on his opponents. A few months back on the White Horse Inn program Dr. Horton interviewed David Virtue of VirtueOnline about the upcoming consecration of Robert Duncan as the new Anglo-Catholic archbishop of the new AC-NA province. Not once did Mike ask any tough questions of David Virtue about the theology of the predominance of Anglo-Catholicism in the AC-NA or how that tradition does not accept the doctrines of grace or the five solas of the Reformation. In fact even conservative Anglo-Catholicism is diametrically to Evangelicalism of any kind. This is one reason why in 1873 the Reformed Episcopal Church seceded from the Protestant Episcopal Church. On that same program Mike interviewed C. FitzSimons Allison, retired bishop of the South Carolina Diocese of the Episcopal Church. Dr. Horton did ask Rev. Allison about the doctrine of justification by faith alone and of course the bishop upheld that doctrine. However, it was a clever way of avoiding bringing up the issue with David Virtue.

Evangelicals are so tolerant these days that Anglican Evangelicals like the Sydney Anglicans are willing to enter into full communion with the new Anglican Church in North America while even acknowledging that there are significant theological differences with Anglo-Catholics. But my question is this. Why is the Federal Vision and the New Perspectives on Paul such a big issue for Presbyterians like Dr. Horton and then nothing at all is even mentioned on The White Horse Inn program about how the Tractarian movement in the past and today outright rejects the Gospel? The Sydney Anglicans, including Dr. Mark D. Thompson of Moore Theological College, said on his blog and at the Anglican Church League blog that conservative Anglo-Catholics are "orthodox."

Well, if being morally and theologically conservative makes a tradition "orthodox", then I suppose the Protestant Reformation in general and the English Reformation in particular were completely unnecessary. After all, if Anglo-Catholics are preaching the true Gospel, then it's merely a matter of theological preference. Those stupid English Reformers were burned at the stake for nothing.

Really, the problem today is not polemics, as Dr. Clark's article points out so clearly. The real problem is no one is willing to speak the truth at all. I was banned from commenting at VirtueOnline for daring to suggest that Anglo-Catholics are not "saved" because their theology is a theology of merits and achieving justification and salvation by one's own efforts. The Federal Vision controversy in the various presbyterian denominations, particularly the Presbyterian Church in America, is analogous to Anglo-Catholicism except Anglo-Catholicism is worse!

I think the real problem is that Evangelicals are afraid to speak out for fear of being labeled "fundamentalists." But there comes a time when one has to step across the line drawn in the sand and to say, "I'm a Christian. Here I stand. I can do nothing other than this." If Martin Luther was right, then the true churches will stand or fall based on whether or not they uphold the Gospel and justification by faith alone. Justificaton by faith alone is inherently a non-negotiable part of preaching the true Gospel of Jesus Christ.

I can say the same when it comes to the Gordon H. Clark controversy over the hypostatic union of the divine nature and the human nature in the Person of Jesus Christ. Anyone who denies that Jesus Christ is one person and is at the same time both fully divine and fully human, then than person is not a Christian. I recently had to rebuke some online friends of mine and distance myself from them because they literally attacked the incarnation of Jesus Christ and denied that the Son of God could assume human form without compromising or changing His deity. I am really no one special. But the Reformed churches need more laymen and ministers who are willing to be persecuted for the sake of truth. I am calling for the God's Hammer blog to stop promoting neo-Nestorianism and I do so because I am committed to the truth. I am willing to fight for the Gospel. Every Christian ought to care enough about the Gospel and the souls of their neighbors to do as the apostles did in the first century:

And when they could not find them, they dragged Jason and some of the brothers before the city authorities, shouting, "These men who have turned the world upside down have come here also, (Acts 17:6 ESV)

Glory be to the Father, and to the Son : and to the Holy Ghost;
Answer. As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be : world without end. Amen.

http://www.eskimo.com/~lhowell/bcp1662/

www.reasonablechristian.blogspot.com