As critics are rummaging around, trying to find something that works, you have to expect the occasional novelties. The most recent one is that I am a theological liberal, akin to those who were resisted by Machen back in the day. This argument is made by Pastor Todd Bordow (OPC).
He does this while granting that that I do “not deny supernaturalism, as many liberals did.” This being the case, then how can he maintain that there are many similarities between me and the old liberalism? He gives three reasons.
His first objection is that liberals used traditional words like salvation and faith, but used them “stripped of their biblical meanings.”
“This abuse of language is common among FVers. DW states how the salvation Christ came to bring is not only the salvation of souls, but salvation of governments and cultures. How is a culture “saved?”
But here is where Pastor Bordow misses the key distinction. There is a vast difference between using a term with different definitions, which is equivocation and dishonesty, and using such a term with additional meanings, which is called having a larger vocabulary. The liberals did the former. We are doing the latter.
Pastor Bordow says, “In FV speak, it is not even clear what ‘salvation’ means.” But actually, salvation means everything that personal salvation has always meant among genuine believers. It means forgiveness of sin, freedom from condemnation, deliverance from Hell, and a promised resurrection from the dead. To object, as Pastor Bordow does, because we also speak of the salvation of institutions and nations is to miss the point logically, as well as to strip certain biblical passages of their traditional meaning. And does this latter point make Pastor Bordow a liberal. How on earth can you disciple nations? How can you baptize nations? Like the Great Commission says to do?
He says:
“That is why someone should not be overly impressed when men like DW offer a bone to the greater Church with a sermon or statement that affirms traditional theology. One needs to carefully read DW’s material elsewhere as to how those terms are explained and applied to people, and see if this matches the traditionally believed understanding of these concepts.”
It is not offering “a bone” to affirm the five solas, the five points of Calvinism, and so on, when they are affirmed as carrying the same meanings that historic Reformed theology has affirmed since the time of the Reformation. But, that said, are we allowed learn anything else? If so, then let us talk about it, carefully examining new light to make sure that we are not unwittingly giving up something we ought not to give up. No problem with that. But if not, then what is with that semper reformanda business?
His second argument for my liberalism is that I have returned to a principle of works righteousness, just like the liberals did.
“If one reads DW’s literature carefully, one notices a common theme; it is the theme of blessings for obedience and curses for disobedience. DW is unabashed in his love for this truth. What DW fails to understand, and it is truth most five-year-old believers understand, is that this is a principle for law, not gospel. DW sees Deuteronomy 28, the blessings for obeying all the law and curses for disobeying all the law, and he sees a principle enforced under the New Covenant. The liberals could not distinguish law and gospel so basic to theology, and neither can DW. His Credenda Agenda even speaks of Christian parents who send their children to public schools as ‘breaking covenant’ with God and being under a curse. Whether he defines the curses eternally or in this life, this is still a denial of the gospel, where Christ takes upon himself the curse of the law for us fully. To DW the curse of the law is still in effect for the Christian. Thus DW’s views are simply a subtle reworking of the old liberalism.”
Pastor Bordow is correct that I am “unabashed in [my] love for this truth.” He is quite wrong in saying that in my view “the curse of the law is still in effect for the Christian.” But before answering his doctrinal objection, please note the oddity — I am a liberal because I teach that Christian parents ought not to allow their children to be discipled by liberals. In Pastor Bordow’s book, it is apparently a mark of staunch conservative theology to allow liberal theology to be poured into the minds and hearts of the children of the covenant for five days a week, just so long as they get a catechetical dab of the old time religion on the Lord’s Day.
But what about the blessings/curses argument? Is this keeping Christians under condemnation, contra Paul’s glorious statement to the contrary (Rom. 8:1)? Of course not. With regard to an individual believer’s standing before God, with regard to justification, the only thing that God considers is the perfection of Jesus. God does not look at our lusts, our failings, our strivings, our virtues, our homeschooling, our private Christian schooling, our merits, our prayers, or our Westminster-confessing. The gospel is that in Christ God saves sinners.
That said, go and find out what this means — why does God scourge every son that He receives? What son is without discipline? Why does Paul give Ephesian believers a commandment (law) with a promise (grace)? And what is that promise exactly? Why are new covenant believers told not to harden their hearts the way their fathers did in the wilderness? Why are Christians promised that God will answer their prayers, if they pray in faith, believing?
The short form — the short theological harmonization of this — is that for all the elect, the curses of the covenant are simply forms of discipline, not punishment. They are corrective, not raw justice. God’s just wrath for all our sins fell upon Christ alone. These chastisements are therefore part of God’s gracious blessing, and are used by Him for our sanctification. For those members of the covenant who are not elect, the curses are just that, curses. It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. Our God is a consuming fire.
His third argument is that liberals downplay the importance of the “immortality of the soul,” and minimize the importance of presenting the gospel to individuals that they might believe and be saved. Apparently in line with this, I mock “heavenly-minded believers and true gospel concern for lost people.”
“Again, anyone familiar with DW’s writings knows how commonly DW mocks those concerned with the soul’s eternal salvation over against the reformation of culture and society, labeling them ‘Gnostics.'”
Actually, what I challenge is that kind of evangelism that tries to secretly woo private individuals away from their household gods without ever confronting the principalities and powers. But idolatry is all of a piece. Of course, we want every man to repent and believe, and to walk away from his private idolatry to find forgiveness in Christ — and I have never mocked those who are fruitful in doing this. Not only have I not mocked it, but have been engaged in that work myself for many years. But why should we stop there? Why are preachers of the gospel being told to limit our fire to the little idols? Why may we not preach against the big ones? Might it be that the big ones have ways of retaliating?
Now it should go without saying that when we confront the idolatry of Americans at large, we are not saying that it is fine with us if private individuals go to Hell. The gospel is good news for the nations, and this includes all the people in it. Peace on earth, good will toward men. If I desire — as I surely do desire — the kindness of God in Christ to overwhelm our nation with a gracious deluge, it would surely be an odd objection to say that I must somehow want the non-Christian next door to remain dry.
God is great, and we serve and worship a great Savior. Our sin and rebellion were crimson, but the greatness of God’s forgiveness comes to make us white as snow. Because Christ is the Logos of God, imagination rules the world. It remains for Christians to submit their imaginations to that Logos (so that we will not perpetuate our apostasy with our rebellious imagination), and to proclaim what God has actually done in Christ. He has remade the world, He has remade humanity. God has established a new heavens and a new earth. It remains for preachers of the gospel to submit their imaginations to the express Word of God found in Scripture alone. And when we have done so, the words of the psalmist will become true for us. I believed, and therefore I have spoken.
The Bible is God’s final and absolute word to us. Jesus Christ, and Jesus Christ alone, is the King of these United States. He is our Prophet as well, and we are to live by every gracious word that proceeds from His mouth. The just shall live by faith. He is our High Priest, and so now we have access to God the Father, by one Spirit, through the shed blood of the everlasting covenant, and only through that shed blood. In the resurrection of Jesus, we have our complete justification. If this is liberalism, I confess to being a little disoriented.