Scripture and sex

We live in a culture that deems sexuality/gender issues as of the absolute first importance and as a result the church is having to wrestle with these issues in ways that our forebears never had to. Of these issues probably the two key ones are abortion and the issue of homosexuality. With regard to the latter, I heartily commend the recent post by Dr. Mohler on the recent brouhaha about the election of a second openly gay bishop in the Episcopal Church USA: (http://www.albertmohler.com/2009/12/07/newsnote-when-gracious-restraint-fails-the-real-anglican-tragedy/). As Dr. Mohler concludes: "When truth is at stake, denominational etiquette is no basis for courageous leadership." Read the whole thing. It is also important to affirm in this debate that Holy Scripture is more than sufficient for what we need to say. While sociology, culture studies, and history can help enormously in untangling these issues, Scripture has to be our final authority. And I firmly believe that it is not ambiguous.

Hebrews 13:3 all over again

I have been following the persecution by the Chinese state of the Beijing Shouwang Church ever since I discovered that I know a brother from this congregation. Please pray for them. For the facts of the case, read this report: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/11/15/ap/asia/main5654121.shtml. It was very telling that there are concerns that President Obama might be completely silent on this matter of religious freedom when he visits with Chinese leaders. Not good.

Reviewing Chris Hedges and citing Cotton Mather

I picked up a copy of the National Post this past Saturday. I used to get it regularly a few years ago, but had stopped that regular subscription out of frustration with certain things, in particular the book review section. A friend encouraged me to pick it up again. I did so on Saturday and loved what I found. Among other things I read with interest were the insightful columns reflecting on the awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize to President Obama, Conrad Black's response to critics of his becoming a Roman Catholic (my friend John Clubine was mentioned by name and a particular book on Cromwell, dear to me, referred to), and a number of fascinating book reviews.

One of the latter that caught my attention was Jessica Warner's review of Chris Hedges' Empire of Illusion: The End of Literacy and Triumph of Spectacle (Knopf, 2009), of which I have read the first few chapters and skimmed other parts of it ["Rage against the obscene", National Post (Saturday, October 10, 2009), WP14]. She is critical of Hedges' style, namely, his jeremiad against popular American culture, and suggests that this is not "really the best way to pull us back from the brink." She then comments:

"Most people, I suspect, prefer their finger-wagging decently cloaked in wit and irony. There is a reason Voltaire and Swift continue to be read--and why Cotton Mather is not."

Poor Cotton Mather! But another reason could be that Mather's jeremiad prose is laced with theological perspectives at odds with many today, whereas Voltaire definitely and to some degree Swift would be very much at home in certain aspects of this post-Enlightenment world that is grounded in the modernity project.

A good review, though, of Hedges' book.

The Spirit of the Crucified One, true Christian community and being like Isaac

All who desire to walk in Christ will suffer persecution and know the cross. How true this is! Yet, how rarely discussed. What do we really know about dying with Christ? We who are Baptists should know more about this than we really do. After all, baptism is a dying with Christ, is it not? And is not baptism the doorway into the Church, the community of suffering?

But our churches have become adept at hiding: hiding behind liturgy, behind tradition, behind doctrine! Afraid to really build into each other's lives in case we encounter suffering, we continue to meet weekly, but so much of it is merely show and sham. Inwardly there is pain, but people are afraid to ask and probe. And if something is said, how easily do the words stay only in the realm of the theoretic.

Personally, I am fed up with all such subterfuge! I did not become a follower of Christ and join his people to make-believe at Church. Either this Way is real or it is not!

I once thought that if we could get the doctrine right and the polity right, then true church would follow. How silly could I have been! Of course, doctrine is vital and polity is essential. But there is something more needed: the Spirit of the Crucified One and a people ready to let him take them up like the mountain like Isaac was taken by Abraham.

This is why I love the stories from the Church of Christian friends who knew the joy of suffering together for Christ. Such stories are balm to my spirit when it is in turmoil and rent with pain.

Caring for the Anglicans: the past and the present

Why should Baptists care about the vile mess of US Episcopalianism? Because our forebears came out of that denomination and our arguments for Baptist polity were shaped in fighting Episcopalians (like the Quakers and Methodists and Congregationalists). And as Baptists we have a tradition: a tradition that involves in part arguments within and without. And some of the arguments in the 17th c were with the Anglicans outside of our forebears’ communities.

 

Nor can we stand back and gloat about the Episcopalian loss of gospel witness: it should make us WEEP! Think of the worthies in that Body: Cranmer, Hooper, Ridley, Latimer, Richard Greenham (that fount of Puritan pastoral theology), Perkins, holy Sibbes, Gurnall, the Wesleys, Romaine, the Venns, Newton (the mentor of one of my favourite Baptists, John Ryland Jr.), Whitefield, the holy John Fletcher, Grimshaw (my hero who was such a help to my Baptist forebear John Fawcett), Samuel Walker, George Thomson, William Cowper, Octavius Winslow (he became an Anglican after years as a Baptist! This is an historical mystery that needs unravelling), Simeon, Ryle. What we owe the Anglicans!

 

God have mercy on the denomination now! And God keep us from travelling the same path: much of their episcopal leadership has degraded the Lord Jesus and he has degraded them!

Ministering in Québec

I have returned from a long week (nine days in total) away from home with ministry and teaching as far afield as Florida, Southern in Kentucky (classes ended this past week), and Sherbrooke in Québec. Not surprisingly, I was tired when I flew into Montréal last Friday. But oh what refreshment time among the French Baptist brethren proved. I never spend time with my French brothers (this time, especially with Stéphane Gagné and François Deschamps—two very dear brothers and good friends) without coming away refreshed, humbled, challenged, and thankful for the wonder-working grace of God among these brothers and sisters. The Lord is doing a great work in la belle province—unnoticed by much of the Anglophone Evangelical world (this should not surprise, for that world has largely forgotten—Calvin excepted—the great French Evangelical heritage). And this English-speaking Christian wants to go on record that I am deeply in the debt of these French-speaking Christian heirs of Calvin. Some of the happiest hours as a Christian I have spent among these believers. One of them, Jacques Alexanian, a key figure among the pioneers of the present work in Québec, I consider and honour as a father in Christ. Others of them are among my closest friends. Yet others have touched me deeply by their zeal, their worship and love for Christ and his kingdom. May God continue to bless these churches for the glory of his Son, the Lord Jesus.

As Calvin did, pray for France!

During the French Reformation, around 10% of the population embraced Evangelical Protestantism—this entailed close to 50% of the upper and middle classes. These two million flooded into the church during a time of a great outpouring of the Spirit between the 1520s and the 1560s. Those stirring days will be remembered frequently this year when many celebrate the qunicentennial of the birth of John Calvin (born 1509). As an historian I am thrilled to read of those days and very thankful for the life and ministry of Calvin (though not without some reservations about certain aspects of his ministry).

But as a Christian, living in the early twenty-first century, what stares me in the face is the enormous spiritual need of France. I just got this statement sent to me today in an e-mail from a dear brother and sister, both of whom I taught in the 1980s at Central Baptist Seminary, Toronto, and who have served in France for nearly twenty years. They wrote:

“We have seen very few French people turn to the Lord and remain attached to Him over the past 19 years.”

Should this not be a matter for great prayer? Especially by those who honour Calvinistic theology? Calvin gave much of his life to see the gospel planted in France. If we honour his memory, should we not share something of his concern and desire?

Brothers and sisters, those of you love the doctrines of grace—yea, all who love the Lord Jesus and long for his appearing, pray for France and her people!

Dr. Randy Singbeil (1964-2009)

I just received word that a very dear brother, Pastor Randy Singbeil, of Alliston, Ontario, died last night quite suddenly from a previously undiagnosed brain tumor. Randy was a lover of the doctrines of grace, and a graduate from Knox Theological Seminary (D.Min.). I counted Randy among my good friends and esteemed him as a colleague in ministry. I first met Randy about twelve years ago when he was pastoring at Walsh, here in Ontario. What drew us together was a shared love for the same historical figures—men like the Puritans and Jonathan Edwards, Calvinistic Baptists like Andrew Fuller and Charles H. Spurgeon, and that remarkable Welsh preacher Martyn Lloyd-Jones—and a great desire to see revival and reformation here in our Baptist churches of Ontario.

It was a privilege to get to know Randy even more as he studied at a seminary with which I am very familiar, Knox Theological Seminary in Fort Lauderdale, where he graduated with a D.Min. I remember reading over portions of his well-executed thesis "Can These Dry Bones Live? Church Revitalization in the Cultural Mosaic of Canada (2004)". And when I came to Toronto Baptist Seminary as Principal in 2003, and was seeking for pastoral leaders who would support the work at Toronto Baptist Seminary, I turned to Randy, among a few others. By that time, he and his dear wife Crystal had moved to Toronto to pastor Long Branch Baptist Church. Randy, and Crystal as time allowed, was always present and supportive at our seminary functions and showed a great interest in what we were doing.

I last saw him, I believe, at the Sola Scriptura conference in London, Ontario, last November, though we had ongoing contact through e-mail since then. He and Crystal were there, and we talked about a possible trip to Geneva this summer to celebrate the quincentennial of John Calvin’s birth. Randy was his usual outgoing, warm self, that I always deeply appreciated.

One of our mutual heroes, the Baptist pastor Andrew Fuller often resorted to poetry and hymnody when overwhelmed with emotion. Shortly after getting the news about Randy I was led to think of this hymn by D.A. MacGregor, the nineteenth-century Canadian Baptist, who also died quite young. These are stanzas 5-6:

Life is death if severed From Thy throbbing heart. Death with life abundant At Thy touch would start. …

Jesus! all perfections Rise and end in Thee; Brightness of God’s glory Thou, eternally. Favour’d beyond measure They Thy face who see; May we, gracious Saviour, Share this ecstasy.

We trust and confidently believe that Randy is now seeing the face of his and our Saviour, and rejoicing perfectly in God’s mercy in Christ.

Please remember his wife Crystal and his and her families in prayer. The funeral will be Saturday in Alliston, Ontario.

PS See the tribute to Randy by my dear friend Heinz Dschankilic on the Sola Scriptura website: "Today We Grieve at the Loss of a Dear Friend."

Grace Irwin and Margaret Clarkson

I just read in the Vic Report (Winter 2009), 18 that Grace Irwin (1907-2008) has gone to be with the Lord. She died September 16, 2008. After graduating from Victoria College in 1929, she served for 38 years as "a charismatic teacher of classics at Toronto's Humberside Collegiate Institute." In addition to her teaching, she was also an amateur actress into her nineties and an authoress, penning excellent lives of John Newton and Lord Shaftesbury. I distinctly remember reading her fascinating autobiography a few years ago when my family and I vacationed at Port Elgin on Lake Huron.

She also pastored Emmanuel Evangelical Church in Toronto for many years, after retiring from teaching. The church had been founded by H.H. Kent, a student of T.T. Shields (did all the men in those days have the same letters for their Christian names?)--and while I would disagree with her taking on such a role--she leaves behind a tremendous legacy in the city of Toronto.

Her memorial service was taken in part by one of her nephews, the well-known Christian publisher John Irwin, who referred to an occasion when Grace addressed an audience in the University of Toronto’s magnificent Convocation Hall.

“Grace stood at the podium and announced that Erasmus had written long ago what she wished to say to those who now packed Convocation Hall. For several minutes she read, or rather recited from memory, with great expression, Erasmus's Latin preface to the New Testament.”

(HT: SUZANNE'S BOOKSHELF )

For a great picture of Grace Irwin, see http://www.mirror-guardian.com/article/56790.

Also recently deceased is the great hymnwriter, Margaret Clarkson (d. March 17, 2008), aged 93. I still remember hearing her lecture on hymnody at Central Baptist Seminary, where I taught first, in the 1980s.

Richard John Neuhaus

What a shock to read of Richard John Neuhaus' death. Like Dr. Russell Moore, I too will miss his lucid and pungent prose. And I too plead guilty to always turning to the back first when I read my monthly copy of First Things. There are four or five journals/magazines I have a subscription for—a couple of professional history journals—and then there is First Things. How often the journal has been an oasis for me. I thank God for Richard Neuhaus. And do read the quote from Neuhaus that Dr. Moore includes in his appreciation.

Alexander Solzhenitsyn (1918-2008)

Another literary figure for whom I have a great admiration and who recently died was Alexander Solzhenitsyn (1918-2008). His literary masterpieces from my perspective were parts of The Red Wheel--August 1914, November 1916, Lenin in Zurich--and then One Day in the Life of Ivan Denosovich (a difficult read emotionally). I read many of his essays when a much younger Christian and deeply appreciated his critique of the godlessness and soul-lessness of Communism, especially when I had once professed myself a Marxist. For a recent obituary, see Alexander Solzhenitsyn: Dissident writer who exposed the moral infamy of Soviet Communism by Mark Le Fanu (The Independent, August 5, 2008). See also John Piper, “Thank You, Lord, for Solzhenitsyn.”

Pauline Baynes (1922-2008)

Art and religion have long gone hand in hand. One thinks of the base use of the arts to create idols for worship. But, on the other hand, one needs to remember Bezalel, who was inspired by the Holy Spirit "to desvise artistic designs" in gold, silver, and bronze for use in the Temple (Exodus 31). And the Spirit filled this man so that his artistic ability might be a blessing to the people of God. It is no less true today. One thinks of Rembrandt's work, for example. Or the twentieth-century artist Pauline Baynes, who has just died. Her marvellous drawings of figures to accompany the Narnia tales of C.S. Lewis will long be remembered by this writer/reader.

For a recent obituary, see Pauline Baynes: Illustrator who depicted Lewis's Narnia and Tolkien's Middle-earth by Brian Sibley (The Independent, August 6, 2008).

Being myopic

Here is a fabulous phrase from Cardinal Ivan Dias, the Vatican's Prefect of the Congregation for the Evangelisation of Peoples, who made a very recent splash in some British newspapers when he remarked that some Western churches live "myopically in the fleeting present". Whatever the Cardinal may have intended by the remark--it seems it was a dig at British Anglicanism--his remark can be read also as a pungent critique of North American Evangelicalism that more often than not is quite happy to forget the past and bask in "the fleeting present."

Canada Day: Rejoicing and Sorrowing

I am a Canadian. My parents brought me here from the United Kingdom when I was twelve in 1965. I found it difficult at first, but I have come to love this nation—her topography and human archaeology, her customs and culture—and I am proud to describe myself as a Canadian. I love my roots in England and Ireland, and my wife’s Scottish heritage—I have grown to love the United States—but I am first of all a Canadian when it comes to national identity. And Canada Day is therefore a special day (though I do wish it were still called Dominion Day—I love to think of this nation as a Dominion). A day to celebrate what is best about this nation and how good God has been to us. What a shock then to read of Henry Morgentaler being named to the Order of Canada on Canada Day. To do such on the day when we celebrate what is best about our nation is little better than an insult to those of us Canadians who believe that most of this nation’s abortions over the past thirty or more years have amounted to wholesale murder. Morgentaler’s advocacy of the right to abortion has not helped our fair land but stained it with the blood of countless innocents. He claims to speak for women—but who speaks for the voiceless within the womb? To honour such a man is transpose the categories of good and evil and say what is evil is good. I weep for this nation. O Lord Almighty be merciful to us for not only this sin, but all of the others with which we as Canadians have angered you. In wrath remember mercy!

On Wolves and Dogs

The New Testament authors are frank about false teachers. Just to give a sampling from the Apostle Paul: false teachers are “wolves” (Acts 20:29); men who “by smooth talk and flattery” deceive hearts (Romans 16:18; cp. 2 Cor 11:1-4; Titus 1:10); “false apostles, deceitful workmen” (2 Cor 11:13); “enemies of the cross of Christ” (Phil 3:18); “dogs” and “evildoers” (Phil3:2); men with seared consciences (1 Tim 4:1-2), who speak “irreverent babble” (1 Tim 6:20); “evil beasts,” “detestable” and unfit for any good work (Titus 1:16). This is but a sample. It is very strong language. Rightly are we careful in applying such texts to the present day. Moreover, I know that this list of errorists does not refer to the same type of problems.

But…we would be utterly naïve if we thought our generation above all others had managed to avoid this problem entirely, a problem that was clearly not rare even in the Apostolic era.

In this light, read this excellent post by Dr. Russell Moore: Serpent-Sensitive Worship.