In The Nick of Time

Those who are beginning to study the debate between Calvinism and Arminianism tend to entertain two related but mistaken assumptions. The first is that the debate involves only two primary positions. The second is that the more extremely one implements either position, the more distant one must be from the other position. The first of these assumptions is simply untrue. The second is true, but only to a point.

Like visible light, positions in the debate between Calvinism and Arminianism form a continuous spectrum. Every Christian who has an opinion on the issues can be located somewhere along that spectrum. The issues that define the positions, however, are not necessarily those that one might expect.

Participants in this debate will be found arguing about divine sovereignty versus human freedom, about the ordo salutis, about the extent of human depravity, about the role of prevenient grace, and about whether election is unconditional, conditional, or corporate. To be sure, all of these questions are important, but they eventually lead to one critical problem. That problem is the definition of divine foreknowledge.

Divine foreknowledge is the hinge upon which all the other debates turn. One’s definition of foreknowledge will determine whether one ends on the Arminian or Calvinistic side of the debate—and everyone who expresses an opinion is on one side or the other.

Arminians see God’s foreknowledge as His foresight. God looks ahead through the corridors of time and sees what free people will choose. For Arminians, divine foreknowledge is essentially reactive.

For their part, Calvinists see God’s foreknowledge as causative. God’s foreknowledge does not passively observe the future, but rather shapes it. God’s foreknowledge makes things happen. According to Calvinists, foreknowledge is not so much God’s foresight as it is His forethought.

Once upon a time, a kingdom was attacked by brigands while the King was absent. The brigands captured much of the King’s territory, at least temporarily. Some of the King’s subjects even made peace with the brigands. One band of hardy yeomen, however, determined to defend the kingdom at all costs.

Perceiving (as they thought) that they could not repel all brigands everywhere, they gathered in the heart of the kingdom. If they could not defend the entire kingdom, they would at least protect its heart. They staked out their territory in the heart of the kingdom, and there they erected a fortress from which to hurl stones and shoot arrows at the King’s adversaries.

Their fortress, however, was small and rather rude, while the subjects who had capitulated often dwelt in cities that were passing fair. Many who hated the brigands thought that they could live safely in these cities while occasionally protesting against the invasion. Others hesitated in between, not liking the cities and wanting to fight the brigands, but liking the look of the fortress even less. That is when a few within the fortress shouted, “If you will not come within our walls, then you are the enemy!” And they threw stones at them.

For many years the situation remained thus. Some who lived in the fortress would speak with some who dwelt in the land, but this, too, was hazardous. To be seen speaking to one who was not of the fortress was to risk a stone to the noggin. Those who lived in the fortress could not always tell the difference between a defender of the heart of the kingdom, a capitulator from the cities, and a person of the land who dwelt in neither place.

As the defenders began to erect the second story of the fortress, a few of them created private chambers of their own. Such insisted that their chamber was the entire kingdom, and its builder was the King’s anointed. These builders provoked conflicts with the builders of other rooms and chambers. Not infrequently, they would assassinate their rivals within the fortress. Because the bodies were buried carefully in a deep dungeon, no one thought that they would ever be found.

One of the hottest controversies in apologetics has to do with the possibility of common ground between Christians and unsaved people. The question is whether Christians, in order to persuade unbelievers, must find some kind of neutral territory that both can occupy as objective, fair-minded persons. Classical and evidential apologists believe that such common ground exists and is important. Presuppositionalists reject the notion of common ground and insist upon the antithesis between revealed truth and all human attempts to discover truth while denying revelation.

Much of the debate focuses upon Acts 17, in which Paul presents the gospel at Athens. When he spoke to the philosophers at the Areopagus, Paul was standing at the epicenter of intellectual life in his civilization. Consequently, Paul’s presentation is sometimes treated as a model or test case for apologetic systems.

Apologists in the classical and evidentialist traditions believe that Paul made effective use of common ground in Athens. He approached the philosophers on the basis of their shared belief in a deity, found a common category in the “unknown God,” fit the true and living God into that category, and then proceeded to the details of the gospel. These apologists make much of Paul’s success: even at a center of hardened unbelief (the Areopagus), some believed and others continued to express interest. Paul’s citation of the pagan authors Epimenides and Aratus is seen as a further indication that he was appealing to common ground.

Every year in January pulpits across America come alive with political preaching. Some churches emphasize the importance (as they see it) of social justice in the tradition of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Other churches decry the injustice (as they see it) of legalized abortion. At opposite ends of the political spectrum, both sorts of churches seem to agree that they have a right—and perhaps a duty—to address certain kinds of political issues.

Political involvement on the part of churches is not the same thing as political involvement on the part of individual Christians. Granted, Christians have their primary citizenship in the Kingdom of God, and that citizenship relativizes all earthly loyalties. Nevertheless, Christians also remain citizens of the nations that they inhabit. They may, and sometimes should, choose to become involved in the political process. They may campaign, vote, and even hold office without necessarily violating their commitment to Christ and His Kingdom. As they have opportunity to participate in shaping the politics of their nations, they may help to advance a relative and proximate degree of righteousness.

Churches, however, find themselves in a different situation. A church that is rightly ordered will rely upon the explicit teachings of the New Testament in order to define its mission and ministry. While this insistence upon the New Testament may sound suspiciously Dispensationalist to some, it is not. Covenant Theologians find the church in the Old Testament, but they also recognize that the present form and order of the church commences with the death and resurrection of Jesus.

A search of the New Testament yields no indication at all that churches ought to be involved in the political process. On the contrary, the New Testament sees churches as spiritual entities whose ministries focus upon spiritual concerns. Consequently, political preaching and campaigning constitute a distraction from the most important affairs of the church, a renunciation of the church’s commission, and a betrayal of its privileged position in Christ Jesus. Political preaching per se has no place at all in the church of Jesus Christ.

Civility is in vogue again, at least for a few moments. The nation has been traumatized by another mass murder. A psychopath in Arizona cut down half-a-dozen innocent people, including a federal judge. A congressional lawmaker and others were left injured.

Everyone agrees that the murders were evil and even monstrous. It goes without saying that these acts violated the canons of civility—murders always do, whether they are one or many, whether the victims are federal officials or innocents in the womb.

The surprising thing is that someone has now speculated that uncivil political speech played a significant role in provoking the murders. The public—by which I mean the masses who are always eager for a facile explanation, particularly if it shifts the blame to someone else—has decided to treat this suggestion as a genuine insight. The result is that pundits and politicians are tripping over themselves to eschew rudeness. Civility is nouveau chic.

Certainly incivility can provoke violence. Rudeness provokes reactions, and those reactions sometimes escalate into physical altercation. If you are rude enough often enough to the wrong people, one of them is likely to take a poke at your nose.

That is a different matter than suggesting that incivility incites violence. Is an unhinged person more likely to commit murder simply because a politician or pundit was not nice to a public figure? Little or no evidence supports this thesis.

In fact, American politics draws from a robust tradition of incivility. Thomas Paine accused George Washington of being either an apostate or an imposter, treacherous in private friendship and hypocritical in public life. Thomas Jefferson hired pamphleteer James T. Callendar to hound John Adams for presidential corruption. The Federalists later used Callendar to pillory Jefferson, propagating the charge that he was the father of Sally Hemings’s biracial children. Decades later, cartoonist Thomas Nast (inventor of the modern Santa Claus) depicted Abraham Lincoln as a hairy ape or baboon. Harper’s Weekly famously listed epithets that were hurled at Lincoln: “Filthy Story-Teller, Despot, Liar, Thief, Braggart, Buffoon, Usurper, Monster, Ignoramus Abe, Old Scoundrel, Perjurer, Robber, Swindler, Tyrant, Field-Butcher, Land-Pirate.”

Welcome to 2011, the four-hundredth birthday of the King James Version of the Holy Bible. Many in the English-speaking world will be joining the celebration. And no wonder—the King James Version has been read by more English speakers and has done more to shape the language than any other document.

People find reasons to like what they like and to hate what they hate—or, more frequently, who they like or hate. In the one case, flaws are easily forgotten and dismissed while virtues are magnified. In the other, the virtues are forgotten or dismissed while the flaws are magnified. In the one case, we canonize our heroes. In the other case, we demonize our enemies.

Human nature, however, is complex. We rarely do justice to people by canonizing or demonizing them. In fact, to do either is to dehumanize them and to blind ourselves to the real effects of both depravity and grace in their lives.

Scripture certainly depicts people in all their complexity. It shows us the flaws even of heroes like Abraham, David, and Peter. It also allows us to see grace at work in the life of a Manasseh or a Nebuchadnezzar. A Christian attitude toward people will surely adopt a similar perspective.

These observations have been occupying my thoughts lately. The process began with reflection upon one of my predecessors at Central Seminary, Richard V. Clearwaters. “Doc” (as he is still known here) is one of those figures who has been both canonized and demonized. He has been a hero to some and a villain to others.

My early acquaintance with Doc came mainly through historical study. The more interesting aspects of Doc’s life tend to be those in which people got hurt—and people who have been hurt often demonize whomever they think has hurt them. The historical record contains plenty of confirmation that Doc was a skillful ecclesiastical politician. He not only knew how to get things done, but also how to get people to do what he wanted them to do, whether they liked it or not.

What a remarkable woman. She was a bride already during her teen years. Exactly when the marriage had been covenanted is uncertain, but she was reckoned as a wife. Her husband was an older man, and he was still waiting (for what? maturity?) before taking her to him. Though husband and wife, they had never lived together, nor ever slept together. She was still a virgin bride.

Her husband was a son of kings. She could trace her own family line back to the greatest of the kings of her people. Centuries had passed, however, since any of that king’s lineage had worn the crown. A curse had been uttered over one of her husband’s ancestors, and every son of the lawful bloodline was barred from the throne.

She was of a different line. She and her husband shared that common ancestor—the great king—but for nearly a thousand years their fathers had built separate houses. Only her husband’s house could lawfully rule the kingdom. And the sons of that house were cursed.

So here she was, a daughter of a king, betrothed to the son of kings, but living in a backwater of a conquered nation. She exercised none of the prerogatives of royalty, nor did she expect that she ever would. Her husband—this son of kings—was a carpenter, a builder by trade.

Could anything have been further from her mind than an angelic visitation? Yet there he was, an ancient and dreadful presence, greeting her, saying that she was “highly favored” (filled to the bursting-point with God’s grace), and pronouncing her “blessed among women.” No wonder she paled and trembled.

Yet the appalling magnificence brought astounding news. She had found grace in the eyes of God, he said. She was about to conceive and give birth to a son who would be a most unusual person. He would be called the son of the Most High. He would be given the throne of the great king. He would rule over the nation, once chosen but now conquered. Furthermore, His kingdom would never end.

The entire “Now About Those Differences” series is available here.

The entire “Now About Those Differences” series is available here.

Sinister et Dexter

The best and most accurate body of manuscripts underlying the New Testament is the Textus Receptus. This then supports the King James Version for which I unashamedly stand and from which I exclusively study and preach.

—Evangelist Dwight Smith

The Masoretic Text of the Old Testament and the Received Text of the New Testament (Textus Receptus) are those texts of the original languages we accept and use; the King James Version of the Bible is the only English version we accept and use.

—Temple Baptist Church and Crown College, Knoxville, Tennessee

At first glance, the present essay will appear to be a digression from the conversation about fundamentalists and conservative evangelicals—and a lengthy digression at that. It is not. It is rather an attempt at recognizing that, when the principles of Christian fellowship and separation are applied consistently, they affect our relationship with professing fundamentalists as well as our relationship with other evangelicals. To illustrate this point, let me begin with a personal anecdote.