Edwards, Feeding the Flock

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This week in one of our church’s Wednesday night classes we covered J. I. Packer’s chapter on Jonathan Edwards in his book, A Quest for Godliness. It is a great chapter, but one line especially stood out to me concerning pastoral ministry. It was this description of Edwards from Packer:

“All his life he fed his soul on the Bible, and all his life he fed his flock on the Bible” (310).

May this be said of us in the end. If we just feed the flock other things will flow from that.

ETS Doctrinal Statement

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By now many of you will have read about Dr. Francis Beckwith’s return the Roman Catholic Church. The story has gained particular attention because Beckwith was currently serving as President of the Evangelical Theological Society. Beckwith said he planned to remain a member of ETS since he could still affirm the Society’s doctrinal statement. More recently Beckwith has decided to resign from the Society.

This has raised awareness about the amazing brevity of the ETS doctrinal statement. In 2001 I delivered a paper at the annual meeting of the ETS arguing that the doctrinal statement was inadequate, using as one example interviews with some prominent Catholic scholars who said they could sign the statement. A slightly adjusted version of the paper was later published in The Southern Baptist Journal of Theology 8.3 (Winter 2004): 74-81. Two blogs (Ref 21 & Justin Taylor) have recently pointed to this paper posted on my Union page.

The ETS Executive Committee has made a public statement on the situation which seems aimed in part to express why they think the Roman Catholic position cannot square with the ETS doctrinal statement. I appreciate the men on this committee and some are personal friends. However, their statement does not show any disagreement between Catholic theology and the ETS doctrinal statement. They stress that Catholics accept other sources of authority on par with Scripture. That is of course true, but the ETS doctrinal statement does not speak to that issue. It simply says that the Bible alone is the Word of God written. It does not say there are no other infallible sources of authority. It is surely true that the intention of the drafters of the ETS doctrinal statement meant to exclude the Catholic position, but they have failed to do so if you simply take the words as they stand. My purpose in bothering to point this out is the hope that ETS will be pushed to acknowledge the inadequacy of our current doctrinal statement so that the statement might be enhanced.
My paper makes a suggestion for one easy way to fix the doctrinal statement.

Potomac Captive

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Potomac Captive: The Adventures of Henry Fleete, by Jan Fleet Umhau
(Dietz Press, 1998), pb., 160 pp.

This book tells the story of the historical character Henry Fleete in early 17th century Virginia. Mrs. Umhau, a direct descendant of Fleete, has taken what historical facts are known and from them woven a believable account of his life.

Fleete by accident ends up on a ship headed to Virginia from England as a teenager, begins getting established, is taken captive by Indians, narrowly escapes death, eventually becomes accepted in the Indian community, and returns to colonial life as a leading trader in the area respected by Indians and Europeans alike. The story was adventurous which kept my boys interested. It was not a great book like others we have read, but it was a fun read and a good introduction to life in 17th century Virginia.

Bible Material for Children

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My notes from the breakout session by this title are now available here. This is actually my “notes” edition, with a bit more information (some probably only clear to me!) than the actual handout from the session. The bulk of the document is a list of good books, some with description. Each book listed has been discussed somewhere on this blog as well. The document also contains some passages which speak to the importance of teaching the Scriptures to our children.

Thomas Long on Plagiarizing Sermons

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Thomas Long, Professor of Preaching at Emory’s Candler School of Theology, has written an excellent article entitled, “Stolen Goods: Tempted to Plagiarize”. I encourage you to read it. It is well balanced and considers the common rationales given for preaching the sermons of others. He argues the point I have sought to make in the past that the key issue is integrity. Long writes:

Perhaps as much or more than any other form of communication, preaching depends upon a cord of trust binding together the speaker and the listener, the preacher and hearer. A good sermon consists not primarily in flawless logic, soaring poetry or airtight arguments, but in passionately held truth proclaimed with conviction. To compromise the truth in ways that hearers would consider deceptive makes them reluctant to extend this necessary trust and damages the witness. For evidence, we can point to the hard disillusionment and sense of betrayal experienced by many in congregations where pastors have been caught plagiarizing sermons.

He also makes the key point that what people need is not a good performance but the Word of God applied to their specific situation by one who knows and loves them.

The preacher comes from the pews to stand in the pulpit. Only preachers who deliver their own sermons stand with one foot in the life of the people and one foot in the biblical text. No Internet preacher stands in this same place. No borrowed sermon, however fine, can answer the question that cries out from every congregation, “Is there a word today, a word for us, from the Lord?”

This is a great article. May it be of much help to the church.

Book, By Faith Alone

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By Faith Alone: Answering the Challenges to the Doctrine of Justification
Ed. Gary Johnson & Guy Waters
(Crossway, 2006), pb, 219 pp.

I obtained this book because I wanted to read more particularly about Federal Vision (or Auburn) Theology. The book is presented as a response to both Federal Vision and the New Perspective on Paul. As the introduction states:

In what follows, we want to trace the background and development of two seemingly disparate movements that have surfaced within the evangelical and Reformed church- the New Perspective(s) on Paul and the Federal Vision. (21)

I am fairly familiar with the New Perspective but was not as clear on the claims and concerns of Federal Vision, though I continued to see it arise in both academic and pastoral situations. There is a chapter devoted specifically to Federal Vision and one interacting with N. T. Wright and the New Perspective. The other chapters take up doctrinal issues at stake such as imputation, the active obedience of Christ, and the covenant of works.

Although Al Mohler wrote the afterword this is clearly a book arising out of a Presbyterian setting. This is not a slur, by the way! Justification is the key unifying doctrine of the church (as argued here before), but some of the issues raised here are simply not the issues faced in my churches at the moment and I am not in full agreement with all the nuances. Therefore, this is not a book I am going to read straight through. It served me well in introducing some topics and will be a useful reference for the future.

“Reinvigorating Baptist Practice of the Ordinances”

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My article on the ordinances, “Reinvigorating Baptist Practice of the Ordinances”, which I have previously mentioned, is now available online here. I discuss briefly some reasons I think these Christ-ordained institutions have fallen on hard times in Baptist churches and then argue for some specific ways to move forward. Among other things I argue for “immediate” baptism and weekly communion. I would be interested in any thoughts on the article.

John Angell James on Parental Duty

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The conference went well last week and it was pleasure to meet the people who came to my session on Bible material for children. I will post my complete handout on my Union page soon (it is too long to post in it’s entirety here). In the meantime I will post portions from it in a series of posts.
Here is a great quote from John Angell James on the responsibility of parents to teach their children the Scriptures. It comes from his book, The Christian Father’s Present to His Children.

“It is a situation of tremendous responsibility to be a parent….  With every babe that God entrusts to your care, he in effect sends the solemn injunction- “Take this child, and bring it up for me;” and at the final audit, will inquire in what manner you have obeyed the command. It will not then be sufficient to plead the strength of your affection, nor the ceaseless efforts to which it gave rise; for if these efforts were not directed at the right end…  you will receive the rebuke of Him that sitteth upon the throne.”

Above Reproach

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I am sitting in a restaurant right now working on material for our upcoming conference. Other people here are talking openly about local scandals concerning pastors abusing their wives and their own stories of finding pastors in compromising situations and locations. These are not national stories, just their own local incidences. Eventually one woman said, “It is scary that these are pastors. Supposed to be men of God and up there preaching. I don’t trust them any more. I don’t trust anybody.” A man then said, “Yeah, I used to go to church all the time but I have not been at all in the last 8 months.” He went on to talk about his string of very young girlfriends.

Brothers, this is our setting. Our behavior directly affects the way people see God. We must bear this in mind and live accordingly. And, interestingly, in spite of the secularists, people still do expect pastors to be particularly connected to God. People are looking to us to show them the character of God. That is humbling and scary, but it is also a great opportunity. Let us then cry out to God for grace that we might praise and not slander Him with our lives (Titus 2:8, 10).