Yesterday Dr. David Field gave the final Calvin lecture in NSA’s commemoration of the 500th anniversary of the birth of that great reformer. And what a lecture it was — the video will be available on line sometime, and I will let you know when and where. In the meantime, the lecture jabbed some thoughts of my own that had been lounging on the couch, and told them to go get a job already.
The title of the lecture was “Calvin’s Catholicity and Birth of English Nonconformity,” with particular emphasis placed on the courageous stand taken by John Howe. The only foretaste of the lecture I will give here is that the definition of sectarianism has nothing to do with the size of the sectarian body, but rather with the size of that body when compared to the size of Christ’s body. The latitudianarians receive as Christ’s those who are manifestly not Christ’s and the sectarians reject those who manifestly are.
In the meantime, here is a related comment that I would add. A minor issue is a minor issue unless it is treated by the one who holds it as a major issue — then the minor issue becomes a major issue, and it may be treated as such by those for whom the minor issue is not a major issue in itself. To major on minors is a major issue, even though the minor issue being majored on is not in itself major.
Say that someone holds a peculiar eschatological position, and the Church can certainly accomodate it. Nothing new here, right? But suppose he says that holding this position is the sine qua non of salvation — he has made his minor a major, and that is a major issue.
And this is where I must point out a distinction of major importance. I have been saying that regeneration is a sine qua non of salvation. A man won’t see the kingdom of God unless he is born again. But this is not the same thing as saying that a man cannot see the kingdom unless he agrees to Wilson’s particular formulations of what it means to be born again. There are born again people who would argue with me, long into the night, about my belief that regeneration precedes repentance and faith, for example. They deny it, and they deny it hotly. But what matters is that this person is one in whom regeneration actually did precede his repentance and faith (as I believe), which is not the same thing as saying that it is necessary for him to believe that. It has to happen to him. He doesn’t have to know what happened to him.
There are Lutherans who don’t agree with me on what it means to be born again, but that’s all right because they are born again. At the end of the day, I don’t care what they say about it. And there are Reformed evangelicals who would say exactly the same thing about it that I would — the only problem being that they are not in fact born again themselves.
Now when I say that I don’t care “what they say,” that sentiment has to be placed in context. I would care very much what they say about it at a presbytery exam for ordination. But when it comes to receiving them to the Lord’s Table, I don’t care at all. It is the Lord’s Table, not mine, and my job is to receive the same people the Lord receives, to the best of my ability.
A minister is like a licensed electrician. He has to wire the room so that the lights work. But a child can flip on the lights. I want high standards for the theological electricians because this is the house of the Lord, and we don’t want it to burn down. I want low standards (work with me here) for the people who live in the house. I want every three-year-hold with curious fingers, and a rudimentary knowledge of cause and effect, to be able to reach that light switch.