-A CALL TO SPIRITUAL REFORMATION- BY DA CARSON

"What a man is alone on his knees before God, that he is, and no more". –M’Cheyne

Sometimes in Scripture an aspect of the Christian life is seen as so central, that the biblical authors saw explicit command as unnecessary. An example of this would be the importance of the local church. There are very few places where a New Testament author says explicitly, “Join a church and attend that church every week. This is important.” What we do see is the overwhelming assumption of the New Testament authors that every Christian will be involved in a local expression of the body of Christ. Prayer is much the same way. There are several explicit commands to pray, but more than that, we see Christ, Paul, and others in the Bible simply assuming that Christians WILL pray—a much stronger argument than a few proof-texts. Prayer is important, thus a good book on prayer is a helpful book for a Christian to read.

There are few authors who have been as spiritually useful in preaching, writing, speaking, and teaching as D. A. Carson. He is as consistently careful in his writing as he is prolific (authoring or editing over 45 books). Time and time again, in a sea of sloppy, novel and unbiblical ‘Christian’ books, I find myself commending not only single volumes by Carson, but Carson himself. Trust this man! He has clearly articulated the Gospel over and over again. The Bible is his sole authority. And his teaching is accompanied by a life that has borne much fruit (the type of teacher Christ tells His disciples to trust).

His book, A Call to Spiritual Reformation, contains no pithy acronyms or cute illustration-centered chapter titles. It doesn’t furnish me with a long list of killer quotes, or clever new ideas. The power of this book lies in its simply systematizing what the New Testament epistles teach us about prayer. Carson has single-handedly changed the way I pray—that is, how I think about prayer and what I pray for. By pointing to the Apostle Paul, he has helped me to make three crucial category shifts:

1. Individual to corporate

I bet 90% of my prayers before reading this book were egocentric. These prayers weren’t categorically bad—Paul prayed for himself, as did Jesus. But the model we’re given in the New Testament epistles for prayer is radically other-centered. Therefore, Carson says, “If in our prayers we are to develop a mental framework analogous to Paul’s, we must look for signs of grace in the lives of other Christians, and give God thanks for them.” Paul was constantly praising the Lord for and interceding for his brothers and sisters through prayer. This is one big reason why we have a member directory at Sojourn. The design is that we would work through that directory page-by-page, praying for our brothers and sisters in Christ. Carson’s book taught me how to pray biblical prayers for these brothers and sisters.

2. Material/physical to spiritual

Most believers have experienced some sort of prayer meeting when the majority of the time is taken up by requests for so and so’s grandmother’s surgery next week, etc. Not a bad request. Bad if that is the steady diet of a prayer meeting. When Paul encounters churches facing intense physical challenges: persecution, famine, etc., he doesn’t pray for what we might—deliverance from these enemies and good health—material and physical concerns. Rather, he prays that they would, “have growing faith” and “increasing love”, be “holy and blameless before the Lord at Christ’s coming”, and “filled with the knowledge of God’s will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding”, “bear fruit in every good work”, and “grow in the knowledge of God”. Paul’s words echo the teachings of Jesus: “And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell.” (Matthew 10:28) As followers of Jesus, we adopt his teaching that the most important and vital battles are happening not in the physical world, but in the spiritual. This book taught me how to pray in light of that fact.

3. Temporal and temporary (the here and now) to Future and final

It’s natural to be affixed on what’s right in front of you without much of a future perspective. We think about our present situation to the detriment of the future. The phenomenon of credit card debt alone furnishes us with proof of this tendency in sinful men and women. But Christianity doesn’t offer us our full hope here and now. We’re waiting for something. Paul says that he longs to “strike the tent” and go home—he’s merely camping in the wilderness of this world (Philippians). Our faith is built on the truth that we are hoping and waiting towards a future event. Carson says, “Can biblical spirituality long survive where Christians are not oriented to the world to come? And, in this context, can we expect to pray aright unless we are oriented to the world to come?” And we shouldn’t forget that the Bible ends on just this note: “Come Lord Jesus!” A Call To Spiritual Reformation has reminded me of these truths and given me a model of prayer that aims towards the future and final.

CARL F. HENRY'S FIFTEEN THESES: A Christian View of Revelation

This list and the extensive (and I do mean extensive!) writing behind this list (Henry's magnum opus: God, Revelation and Authority) would have been such a help to me in college at Carson-Newman. Phrases such as, “Inerrancy is heresy” and “Conservatives are Bible-olaters” were fairly common in my Religion classes. But it wasn’t my professors pointing to the so-called inconsistencies in the text, or variants between manuscripts that fooled me. The trap set for me was much more unassuming and inconspicuous at the time (and infinitely more damaging!). The attack I fell prey to was waged against the very nature of Scripture.

Dr. Don Olive distinguished between two schools of thought in one of my philosophy classes: 1) The Bible as revelation and, 2) The Bible as ‘the record of revelation’. The ‘special revelation of God’, said Dr. Olive, was Jesus Christ and Jesus Christ alone! The Bible was merely the record of this revelation. This presentation sounded very pious to my immature Christian ears and I bought it! I even mentioned it to Christian friends who I recognized were not making this ‘helpful distinction’ (Lord have mercy on me for saying false things!!).

This argument, or an argument of the more Barthian flare (Scripture as a window into the revelation of God, but not revelation itself) is much more devastating than a simple attack on the 'discontinuity' of the order of events in the life of Christ between Mark and Luke, or something similar. The previous argument cuts to the core of what Scripture is. Dr. Henry’s theses have become such a wonderful framework for helping me along in a true and God-honoring doctrine of Scripture. Here they are.

1. Revelation is a divinely initiated activity, God’s free communication by which he alone turns his personal privacy into a deliberate disclosure of his reality.

2. Divine revelation is given for human benefit, offering us privileged communion with our Creator in the kingdom of God.

3. Divine revelation does not completely erase God’s transcendent mystery, inasmuch as God the Revealer transcends his own revelation.

4. The very fact of disclosure by the one living God assures the comprehensive unity of divine revelation.

5. Not only the occurrence of divine revelation, but also its very nature, content, and variety are exclusively God’s determination.

6. God’s revelation is uniquely personal both in content and form.

7. God reveals himself not only universally in the history of the cosmos and of the nations, but also redemptively within this external history in unique saving acts.

8. The climax of God’s special revelation is Jesus of Nazareth, the personal incarnation of God in the flesh; in Jesus Christ the source and content of revelation converge and coincide.

9. The mediating agent in all divine revelation is the Eternal Logos—preexistent, incarnate, and now glorified.

10. God’s revelation is rational communication conveyed in intelligible ideas and meaningful words, that is, in conceptual-verbal form.

11. The Bible is the reservoir and conduit of divine truth.

12. The Holy Spirit superintends the communication of divine revelation, first, by inspiring the prophetic-apostolic writings, and second, by illuminating and interpreting the scripturally given Word of God.

13. As bestower of spiritual life the Holy Spirit enables individuals to appropriate god’s revelation savingly, and thereby attests the redemptive power of the revealed truth of God in the personal experience of reborn sinners.

14. The church approximates the kingdom of God in miniature; as such she is to mirror to each successive generation the power and joy of the appropriated realities of divine revelation.

15. The self-manifesting God will unveil his glory in a crowing revelation of power and judgment; in this disclosure at the consummation of the ages, God will vindicate righteousness and justice, finally subdue and subordinate evil, and bring into being a new heaven and earth.

***Notice how he has set up these theses doctrinally: Aspects connected with the Father (1-7) the Son (8,9) the Bible (10, 11), the Holy Spirit (12, 13) the church (14) the consummation (15).

JONATHAN EDWARDS ON PERSONAL ASSURANCE OF SALVATION

"The real Christian, enjoying assurance of salvation, has holy boldness but he also has less of self-confidence and more modesty...He is less apt than others to be shaken in faith, but more apt than others to be moved with solemn warnings, and with God's frowns, and with the calamities of others. He has the firmest comfort, but the softest heart. Richer than others, he is the poorest of all in spirit: the tallest and strongest saint, but the least and tenderest child among them." (taken from Religous Affections)

WHEN IS IT SAFE TO DIVERGE FROM ONE'S ELDERS?

The relationship between elders and individual members of a congregation seems a bit tricky to me. In the kindness of the Lord, I have the opportunity to reflect on this relationship with Rob Plummer and Mike Cosper (two of our elders at Sojourn) on a somewhat regular basis (especially since the elders of our church have put foward a new proposed constitution). We have agreed on some things and disagreed on others. These are my thoughts so far:

On the one hand, we are commanded to "obey our leaders and submit to them" and to "imitate their faith" (Heb. 13:17, 7). On the other hand, we can see a consistent emphasis in the NT epistles on congregational responsibility/authority. Here’s the support I see in Scripture—(and anybody reading this blog is very likely more able than I am in interpretation, so correct me by all means!)

The churches in Revelation (not just the elders) are held responsible for corporate sins and not just individual ones (also in 1 Timothy). Paul holds the members (he doesn't mention the elders) of the church at Galatia responsible for ensuring biblical teaching and resisting those who are heretical—even if it’s the Apostle Paul! 1 Corinthians makes clear, as does Matthew 18 that the congregation has a responsibility in church discipline and 2 Corinthians 2 shows that the gathering has some responsibility in reconciliation. In 2 Corinthians 10-13, Paul lays out a grid for judging leaders, stressing that some should be kicked out! Dave, the Carson article Sojourn gave us to read for leadership training describes the Systematic deductions that I draw from these texts:
"In 1 Corinthians and again in Matthew 18, the Lord Jesus insists that when things come down to the crunch, you tell the conflict to the church. You tell it to the church—for not only is there wisdom in the whole church, but there is a final sanction in the whole church. In fact, in the New Testament, there is a running tension between the authority that rests with the church and the authority bound up with the elders." (Don Carson)

So it is absolutely crucial that I am obeying and submitting to my leaders, but it's equally crucial that I realize there are situations when by doing that, I could displease the Lord. Some examples would be Martin Luther disobeying his leaders, or J. Gresham Machen, John Murray and others in the PCUSA disobeying and disassociating with their denomination due to its Gospel aberrations. From what I can tell, these men would have been sinning had they obeyed their leaders.

It's also one reason (I think) that, by the Lord's grace, we have denominations. The First Century church's concerns weren't with the ordinances--not out of neglect or irresponsibility--they just hadn't gotten there yet! By the Lord's grace, we have had two thousand years to study Scripture further and develop more personal, biblically-based convictions (that as individuals we believe we are held accountable by the Lord to act upon), such as views of pre-conversion baptism, the way local churches should be governed, etc.

So, I guess I think that the normal pattern of doctrinal belief is to trust one's elders, but I would add two exceptions to this regular rule. When there is:
1. Divergence on the fundamentals of the Gospel or any other seemingly clear teaching of Scripture (like God knowing the future, or eschatology-just kidding)

2. Divergence on doctrine that affects the practice of a local church (and implicitly gives a definition for "church" that you think is unbiblical). So, I think it would be displeasing to the Lord for me to stay at a Presbyterian church in Louisville if I became thoughtfully convinced that the Bible teaches believers baptism, even if that Presbyterian church was orthodox on the essentials of the faith and my elders thought I should stay.

The importance of these exceptions is hightened when we realize Scripture makes clear that as church members we are responsible in some way for what we are letting our elders teach us and (if it's not too strong to say), we are somehow endorsing their teaching by remaining in the pew.