On the first post, we dealt with two myths. First, the myth that the Reformers did not care about the outward unity of the Church, and second, the myth that the Reformers wanted each individual Christian to read the Bible on his own and interpret the Bible on his own.  On this final post, I will offer two additional myths. We cannot detail all the various myths surrounding Reformational theology, but we will be content with these four.

The third myth is that the Reformers invented the idea of predestination. The Reformers certainly taught the idea of predestination, but they certainly did not invent the idea of predestination. Augustine many centuries earlier in response to the heretic, Pelagius, had a very developed theology of predestination. Augustine wrote:

“For not only has God given us our ability and helps it, but He even works [brings about] willing and acting in us; not that we do not will or that we do not act, but that without His help we neither will anything good nor do it.”

But beyond that, it was Moses and Paul who first said that God will show mercy on whom He will have mercy. John Calvin’s greatest work is undoubtedly the Institutes of Christian Religion. Evangelicals may get the impression that the only thing Calvin talked about was predestination, when in fact Calvin did not tackle the subject of predestination until the tail end of Book #3 of the Institutes. This means that you have to read more than 900 pages to get to Calvin’s position on predestination, and when you get there, you will find that Calvin talks about predestination in terms of how this truth will comfort us. For Calvin, predestination was a doctrine of comfort, not some ethereal and academic topic. The Reformers believed in predestination because Moses, Jesus, John, Paul believed it exalted the grace of God, so the Reformers taught it with full biblical conviction.

The final myth is that when the Reformers broke from Rome, they broke free from liturgical worship. “True Protestant worship is spontaneous and unconstrained by liturgical forms. Who needs a bulletin? Let’s just follow the Spirit.” This is the general belief of most evangelicals in America– that breaking from Rome is breaking from liturgy. Of course, everyone has a liturgy; some are thought through, others are not. And because of this supposed idea of how a Reformed Church should be, many Protestants have ended up with spontaneous and entertainment-driven worship. But here is the irony of all of this: before the Reformation, the people would gather to be entertained by the Roman Church. Now they were not entertained by skits and praise bands as many do today, rather they were entertained by seeing the priest do his magic. In those days, the priest would take the bread and wine and magically it would be turned into the substance of Christ’s body. But when the magic was done the people themselves did not take the bread and wine; only the priest took the bread and wine. The people just sat there and listened to the priest talk in a language that they did not know. It was a sort of passive entertainment. Do you know how the Reformers reacted to this magical trickery and this passive entertainment offered to the people? The Reformers said: “Enough of this!” “The Reformers rediscovered the biblical truth that the whole congregation is a priesthood called to offer up spiritual sacrifice before God.”

The Reformers insisted that the people together with the minister do the work of worship; that people instead of sitting down passively and watching the trained musicians or the priest do his trick were now going to become themselves living sacrifices unto God. So, instead of only the trained musicians in the choir singing, the Reformers began to take the laity, the common people, and trained them to sing. Luther, of course, was a much better trained musician than most of the Reformers, so he began to compose beautiful music. He began to train the congregation to sing robustly, not like monks, but like warriors. And Calvin, who was not musically gifted, hired a musician to put the psalms into music ^b. So, you see what is happening is that the  passive nature of the people in worship, where only the professionals sing–that is in fact still prevalent in our own day– has much more in common with Roman Catholicism than it does with Protestantism. The Reformers wanted the congregation involved in the liturgy: in the singing, confessing, and every other part of worship. Therefore, the Reformers did not abandon the liturgy, they corrected the liturgy of Rome. Instead of only priests and trained singers involved in the church, while the people remain silenced, the Reformers involved the entire congregation in sacred worship.

Many of you who have probably visited a Roman Catholic Church may say, “The modern Roman Catholic church is not like the Catholic Church of the 16^th century.” The modern day Catholic church has services in English and the people sing and the people take the bread and wine every Sunday. Do you know why this is the case? Because many years after the Protestant Reformation, the Roman Catholics realized that the Reformers were taking over the world and that they were losing the game and so they concluded: “We need to imitate the Protestants.”

It is not uncommon to have someone visit the congregation I pastor in Pensacola and say that our liturgy looks Catholic. But this means that they have bought into a myth. It is not that our liturgy looks Catholic, it is rather that anything that the Catholic Church does that appears in any way similar to what we do at our Church was learned from the Protestant Reformers, not the other way around. Do you think the modern day Protestant understands the Reformation? I would like to think they do. But every time you hear these myths stated remember what really happened. Remember and remind non-Reformed people that the Reformers loved the unity of the Church, they believed strongly that the people should read their Bibles in the context of the church, that the Reformers believed in predestination because the Bible taught predestination, and that the Reformers, not Rome, restored worship to the people.

Why do we celebrate the Reformation? Because the Reformers believed that the ancient paths of Moses and Paul were good paths and that we should walk in them and find rest for our souls.<>поддержание а ucoz

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Reformation Sunday is coming! With the popularity of new movements, the Reformed faith has become a familiar furniture in the evangelical house. Still, Reformed theology can be very divisive. Our calling as Christians is to strive towards like-mindedness with the non-Reformed, but this does not mean that we ought to strive towards like-mindlessness. The call to unity is a call for us to dialogue with other Trinitarians with an open Bible and a humble spirit.^a To begin this conversation we need to clear away misunderstandings; to clear away the myths concerning the Reformation. It is my humble opinion that the greatest expression of Trinitarian orthodoxy in the world today is found in the Reformed faith. Explaining precisely what this great tradition desired to do will help us ground ourselves in the Reformation’s conviction that the Scriptures are our highest authority in life.

Critics have developed many myths about the 16^th century Reformation. Ironically, the critics would not have the privilege and liberty to express their criticisms if it had not been for the Reformation. They persist nevertheless. We will examine four of these myths; two now and the others in the days ahead.

The first myth is that the Reformers did not care about the outward unity of the Church.

In Jesus’ high-priestly prayer in John 17, He commands that we be one just as He and the Father are one. But the more astute may say, “But wait a minute: the Reformation did not unite the Church, it actually fractured it greatly.” In some sense it did. However, what one may fail to understand is that Christian unity cannot be rooted in corruption. A corrupt and immoral Church cannot continue to bless the nations. You see, the issue here is not just unity, the issue is uniting around the right things. The Reformers understood this. They understood that unless false doctrine and corruption were dealt with you would have a weak, paralyzed Church incapable of being the salt and light of the earth. The Reformers were so concerned about not dividing the Church that when Rome charged the Reformers with the sin of schism (the sin of division), Calvin called for a Church-wide council, so that both sides could be examined. He wanted another ecumenical council to debate these important issues; perhaps they could come to an agreement and not divide. In fact, Luther—the father of the Reformation—said to Philip Melanchthon before he died that his greatest fear would be that “many harsh and terrible sects will arise, God help us!” The Reformers feared the idea of a divided Church. They wanted to unify the Church but their vision never came to pass. Our hope is that the vision begun in the Reformation will continue in the decades and centuries to come. Still, the Reformation understood that unity is not based on the appointment of an arch-bishop or a pope. Installing an ecclesiastical figure does not bring unity unless purity and true doctrine are at its base. The Reformation was intended to be a reformation of the Church since the Reformers understood that without the Church there is no ordinary possibility of salvation.

The second myth is that the Reformers wanted each individual Christian to read the Bible on his own and interpret the Bible on his own. 

Some define this as the priesthood of all believers; that every man was his own priest and interpreter. But this is not what the Reformers meant by the priesthood of all believers. The Reformers did not want individual Christians taking their Bibles home and acting as if they were an authority in and of themselves, and that therefore they needed no one to guide them. On the contrary, the priesthood of the believers for the Reformers meant that all believers had common access to the heavenly throne of grace; that we could act as priests to one another. The Reformers did not mean that instead of having one pope, every Christian would be his own pope! Rather, they wanted the Bible put in the hands of the people so that it could be studied in the context of a community. The Reformers never intended for the people to try to understand the word of God apart from the guidance and teaching ministry of the Church. After all, the Reformers were biblical people and they knew Paul’s words that the Church needs pastors and teachers to equip the saints. This is why they wrote confessions and catechisms for adults and children.

The Reformation did not mean biblical anarchism. In fact, Luther feared that some would disregard the Church once they had their own Bible. Luther feared lack of submission to those in positions of authority in the Church. To those who did not seek the guidance of the Church, Luther had this to say: “If we read the Bible in our own way, we will just go to hell in our own way.” Martin Luther believed as Paul did that God gave ministers and elders to equip the Church in all truth. So, this idea that the Reformers believed that it was every man for himself and that people could come to their own conclusions without the accountability of the Church is a great myth. Theology apart from the Church is anarchism. The Reformers rejected this idea.<>racer mobilраскрутка  а через социальн ые сети

1. Thanks to my friend, Rich Lusk, for elaborating on these  (back)

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Guest Post by Dustin Messer

“There is nothing in this universe on which human beings can have full and true information unless they take the Bible into account.” – Cornelius Van Til

Over on the Discarded Image blog, Brandon G. Withrow suggests that “theology has nothing to do with history.” Indeed, this statement acts as a methodic refrain throughout his piece. Knowing Professor Withrow’s intellectual prowess, it’s with fear and trembling I’m going to humbly suggest that he’s dead wrong. Theology, in my view, has everything to do with history, and vice versa. Lest you think I’m exaggerating, here are three things that theology and history share:

Firstly, theology and history share creation. In the piece, Dr. Withrow rightly states that historians are limited to “the story of this world.” The problem is that “the story of this world” is precisely that with which theology is concerned! History and theology are both concerned with the same substance: namely, creation. And they are telling the same story: namely, “the story of this world.” If the Bible only dealt with the spiritual, I’d be happy to grant Dr. Withrow’s point. However, the Bible mischievously puts its nose in families, mountains, lakes, kings, nations, and other historical, created things. In fact, when not speaking about God himself, the Bible speaks about nothing but creation! Keep in mind, this is the very same creation with which history is out to chronicle. These are the cards we’re dealt. If you want a religion that tells the story of a different world, perhaps try your hand at a mystical, Eastern table, but from Genesis to Revelation, the Bible is telling the true story of this world. When you speak about creation, you are mixing theology and history.

Secondly, theology and history share sin. The fruit of mixing theology and history, Dr. Withrow argues, is all rotten. Admittedly, the examples he cites (erroneously trying to identify if a certain event is God’s judgment on a people, etc.) don’t smell too good! However, when you separate the disciplines completely, you lose the ability to call past events “wrong” or “right.” For instance, nearly all historians will characterize the move from chattel slavery, to the Emancipation Proclamation, to the civil rights marches, as a positive progression. Even Dr. Withrow’s ideal atheistic historian will want to call the freeing of slaves “good.” But by what standard is it good? Perhaps you think “but the ideal historian will not take sides, he’ll just state the facts.”  Hopefully, anyone who has watched the History Channel when Pawn Stars isn’t on will recognize the naiveté of such a sentiment. Even in deciding which events to recall and which to leave out, the historian is constructing a narrative in which there are “good” and “bad” actors. In this instance, the atheist historian is assuming the moral presuppositions of Christianity. Ironic since Dr. Withrow wants the Christian to borrow the atheist’s presupposition! Of course, you could be a Christian borrowing from an atheist borrowing from a Christian, but at some point that gets exhausting! When you speak about sin, you are mixing theology and history.

Thirdly, theology and history share salvation. Two thousand years ago Jesus came, in history, to liberate the fallen creation from sin. His physical corpse was then, in time and space, risen from the dead. Now, if you were taking the assumption, as Dr. Withrow would have you, that there is no God, you must conclude that Jesus did not rise from the dead. With your bias in place, it would be impossible to account for such a miracle. No, for the resurrection to happen, a personal God would have to be tinkering around in history, and that cannot be. To be fair, I’m sure Dr. Withrow would still want the Christian to “theologically” hold to the resurrection, just not “historically.” The problem, of course, is that this theological claim, like nearly all theological claims, is, by its nature, a historical one (1 Cor 15). The “theological” Jesus claims to be “historical” and the “historical” Jesus claims to be “theological,” if you separate the “theological” Jesus from the “historical” Jesus you lose both. When you speak about redemption, you are mixing theology and history.

In conclusion, Dr. Withrow correctly diagnosis the ideological presupposition behind my reading of history. He does not, however, suggest a non-ideological, “more objective” reading, as he would have you believe. Instead, he wants historians to be “essentially atheists.” What our views have in common is this: both start with a bias confession about God’s existence. I answer in the affirmative, he in the negative. The difference in our reading is this: mine is congruent with my worldview, his is not. If you are an atheist, feel free to “plant your feet firmly in the air,” as Schaeffer would say. A Christian, however, does not have the luxury of planting his feet in Christian theism while studying theology, but atheism while studying history. To the contrary, Christians study art, philosophy, science, history and anything else they please with the sure knowledge that this world is created and actively governed by a covenantal, Triune, personal God.

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