Scott Clark has posted a form letter, here, for repentant FVers to sign off on. As has been my wont in times past, I would like to repost that letter here, with some editorial comments sprinkled throughout. I have put my comments in brackets and in bold, so that you can tell where it is exactly that I am speaking. The bold also helps to signify the blackness of my federal vision heart. Some of this is tongue in cheek, but some of it is as serious as it gets.
“To all whom this these presents do come [eh?],
I hereby declare that I really and heartily believe in form and substance what the Reformed churches confess, that God declares sinners righteous sola gratia, sola fide, only on the ground of the imputation of the whole and perfect obedience of Christ. [Amen. Preach it. This might not be so bad.]
I also confess that being caught up in the fever of the moment, I was attracted to the anti-revivalist rhetoric of the Federal Vision movement and my enthusiasm for their anti-revivalism and anti-subjectivism lead me to embrace doctrines and practices I now recognize to have been mistaken. [Oh, here it comes. Okay. I further confess that I was seduced by the trinkets and other shiny objects they gave me.]
I confess now that I embraced the movement without fully understanding the implications of their theology and practice. [In fact, I confess that I do not fully understand much of anything. I am slow of wit, and dim-witted of bulb. Ah, the bitter, bitter wormwoods!]
I hereby repent of failing to distinguish the law and the gospel as Reformed folk have done for four-hundred years, [But I do distinguish them. Not for four hundred years, certainly, but for quite some time now. Year after year of distinguishing them.]
of denying the covenant of works, [Did I do that? When did I do that? I am not saying this has to be wrong, but I have always tried to affirm this, preferring to call it the covenant of creation . . . Okay. If you say so. Okay.]
of confusing it with the covenant of grace, [But . . . but . . . but . . .]
of teaching viz. the ordo salutis, a temporary, conditional election alongside the eternal unconditional election [But didn’t Calvin teach this in his Institutes, referring to a general election, and . . . no, no, not the thumbscrews! Sorry for teaching a temporary, general election. Sorry.]
and of sometimes conflating the two, [Whatever you say. Sorry.]
of teaching temporary possession of baptismal benefits such as union with Christ, adoption, and justification that are said to be conditioned upon my faithfulness and thereby implicitly denying the doctrine of the perseverance of the saints. [Okay. I just want to get this straight so’s I don’t mess up again. I don’t want to deny perseverance of the saints, no way. So when did I say that anything was conditioned on my faithfulness? That would be really bad if I had done it. Can you cite a place where I did?]
I hereby repent of denying the visible/invisible distinction, [But I don’t deny it! I qualify it! Whatsa matter witchoo? Michael Horton made the same point . . . John Murray . . . Banner of Truth Collected Works . . . look, I’m sorry. I love you guys. I am trying to see your point. I think I kinda do. I think the Stockholm thing might be starting to kick in. About time.]
of denying that there are two ways of being in the one covenant of grace, [But I affirm there are two ways of being in the one covenant of grace. Are you sure you got the right guy? Yeah, that’s my picture. But I never signed that statement. That’s not my signature. Is my lawyer here yet? What do you mean ‘you are interogating him in the next room’?]
of attempting to revise the definition of faith in the act of justification to include Spirit-wrought sanctity. [I see it all now, and I do repudiate my former errors with enthusiasm. I now agree with you that saving faith must be unholy and rebellious. I don’t know why I didn’t see this before. Irony? What makes you say that?]
I repent of trying to smuggle into the doctrine of justification the doctrine of condign merit whereby God reckons me righteous partly on the basis of Spirit-wrought sanctity, [I don’t remember thinking this thought anywhere in my natural born head. I hotly deny it. Now what do we do?]
and of trying to smuggle into the doctrine of justification the doctrine of congruent merit whereby God is said to approve graciously of my best efforts to cooperate with grace toward justification.[I hotly deny this one too. Not that anybody listens.]
I repent of equivocating about justification as present and future in the same sense. [How can you equivocate about something in the same sense? Isn’t equivocation using different senses? Not trying to be difficult here. Just trying to understand.]
I admit that all believers are fully justified now and shall be vindicated as such at the judgment. [I actually agree with this! Without the iron boot!]
I repent of trying to enlarge faith in the act of justification to be more than simply “receiving and resting” on Christ and his finished work, of trying to include fruit and sanctity in the act of justification in either faith or the ground of justification rather than simply allowing them to be fruit and evidence of justification. [But if repentance and faith are the fruit of regeneration, which is not justification, that coming later, and regeneration is a type of sanctification (something wrought in me), then aren’t we all saying that faith is the fruit of a change of heart in me? Leastways, all of us who hold to the traditional ordo salutis? You do hold to the ordo salutis, don’t you? Since regneration is first, and justification later, we all agree that something is wrought in me before anything is imputed to me. Right?]
I repent of confusing baptism and the Lord’s Supper as signs and seals of initiation and renewal and thereby trying to commune infants and others before their catechizing and credible profession of faith. [In all seriousness, if you really want to keep your kids away from Christ until they have passed one of your blinkered ordination exams, then why don’t you just say so? You don’t want your kids to tolerate condign merit or congruent merit for a second, but you demand cognitive merit from them. Now kids, when you score 100 percent on this comprehensive exam covering the tota gratia portion of the syllabus, then you will have earned the right to participate in God’s free grace. Don’t ever make the mistake of thinking that God’s free grace is just lying around for anybody. Gotta ace the test. Gotta clear the bar. Gotta convince the session. Grace is only for those who understand, as we understand, which is to say, perfectly.]
I repent of troubling the churches before bothering to learn the rudiments of Reformed theology, [Hey, now you are getting a little personal.]
before learning the basic distinctions of the Reformed confession, [This appears to be as good a time as any for me to re-extend my invitation to a debate. Since I don’t know the rudiments of Reformed theology, and don’t know the basic distinctions of the Reformed confession, it will be the work of mere moments for you to pull my shirt over my head and roll my socks down. The crowd will go wild, and orthodoxy will rest comfortably that night, for the first time in years.]
of wasting the time of the church courts and assemblies, [I like that! Let’s make this guy buy the rope before we lynch him. That way we won’t be wasting our hard-earned money.]
in forcing them to teach me in committee reports what I should have learned in seminary had I paid attention. [Didn’t go to seminary. All I got is these committee reports.]
Most heartily of all I repent of being confusing about the one thing about which a minister should never ever be confusing, about which our confessions are completely and utterly unambiguous, about which the entire Protestant Reformation agreed: how sinners are right before God. [And that should be obvious by this portion of the letter of confession, shouldn’t it? According to what this letter asks us to affirm, sinners are right before God by means of their theological prowess. Sinners are right before God by intellectual achievement. Sinners are right because they aced the exam and had the teacher put the gold star of grace on the top of their paper. We have to use the word grace lest any should boast, but we still do.]
Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa. [Isn’t this a Latin thingy that papists say? This isn’t a trick, is it?]”