Tag: Separation

John Piper, Rick Warren & the Watchbloggers: The Persistent Problem of Secondary Separation

~ Bob Hayton ~ 42 Comments

I wish I had more time to comment on this. As it is, I’m away from home and don’t have much online time this week….

I fired up my twitter feed when I got to our destination, only to see a lot of ire being directed toward John Piper for his invitation of Rick Warren to speak at the Desiring God National Conference this fall. The watchbloggers, most notably CrossTalk blog (formerly Slice of Laodicea), are all upset over this and seem to have totally written John Piper off. I won’t repeat many of the charges, I’d feel dirty doing so. Just search the term #apj in Twitter to see some of this for yourself, or scour the comments at some of Justin Taylor’s recent blog posts.

Piper had explained his rationale for inviting Warren in audio/video posted here or in the comments. This comment under that post provides a transcript of Piper’s words on the subject and is helpful.

Last night, DG had hosted another ask Pastor John live online Q & A event, and so of course Piper had to deal with the controversy. The DG Blog has a 12 minute video-clip up from last night’s event, that should satisfy anyone’s curiosity. In that clip, which I recommend you watch, I found a few segments very insightful and pertinent to the issue of secondary and excessive separation. Let me provide some excerpts here and then offer some thoughts. I apologize in advance, if I don’t get the transcript exactly right.

…I’m real eager that this glorious thing God is doing in the “young, restless, reformed” — whatever this thing is called that God’s doing, awakening people’s love for the supremacy of God in all things. I’m real eager that that not become a brittle, narrow, ugly, excessively separatist movement, and so I’m not devoting my life to finding a lot of enemies to attack. I’ve got some, but I like to do it simply by hammering on truth….

Separatism or, who you do things with, is an important Biblical question. And so, I don’t put Rick Warren in the group that I’m going to hold at an arm’s distance. …I’m not going to draw the circle there.

And suppose you disagree with me on that. Now you’re faced with the question, ok, I’m with John Piper theologically. I’m not with Rick Warren on a bunch of things. John Piper has just chosen to hang out with Rick Warren. What do I do with John Piper? That’s called secondary separation issues. And there you are, I hope we can disagree about who we hang out with. Okay. Because a lot of traditional fundamentalists have said, no, if you hang out with somebody that I believe I should separate from, then I’m going to separate from you. And I want to say, look let’s, can we disagree about whether he would come to your conference and you still be willing to eat with me, talk with me?

So I would encourage you to think through that issue of secondary separation. The way I have chosen to live my life for the sake of reformed theology and the supremacy of God and the inerrancy of the Bible and the importance of solid Reformation gospel truths, the 5 solas, and so on, is to give all my energy to putting them in a positive, aggressively spreadable form, not to spend my time shooting at the people who don’t like them….

I think Piper does a good job explaining secondary separation. It is always a problem, because people always will disagree with others on their particular approach to ministry. So, should we just separate from anyone not exactly like us? No.

I find it interesting that many who aren’t fundamentalists exactly (they aren’t card-carrying Independent fundamental Baptists), still think secondary separation should apply here. I think it’s the natural human reaction when we face disagreements. It is certainly easier to just write people off, then allow for important differences.

Yet, Rom. 14-15 should apply here. We can accept others even thought they differ from us. Personally, I’m encouraged that Piper is reaching out to Warren. He may perhaps influence Warren, and Warren does have some positive things to share with us, too.

I have serious reservations about Warren and his methodology. But his book revolutionized my grandfather’s life. I can’t argue with that. When we take small differences and make them so important we will die over them, we are making mountains out of molehills. And in the process, the important, fundamental truths–that list Piper shared that Warren upholds– are rendered meaningless. As I have pointed out before, we “minimize the gospel through [such] excessive separation.” I think the unity we have in the big things should enable us to get along enough to respect others who differ with us in relatively minor matters.

What’s your thoughts on Piper and Warren. Do you agree with my thoughts here? If not, why should we think of Piper as “selling out” for this invitation of Warren to speak? Please join the conversation in the comments below.

Churches Working Together: No Place for “Local Church”-Onlyism

~ Bob Hayton

I am leaving for a trip, but wanted to leave you all with some good reading material.

Jeff Straub, professor of history at Central Baptist Theological Seminary here in Minneapolis has a couple posts stressing the importance of “churches working together”. Rather than seeing each church as an island completely independent and in need of nothing (which many local church only advocates do), his picture is closer to the biblical picture of churches working together.

I encourage you to check out his two posts. For those wondering, “local church” onlyism is the idea that there is little if any sense of the “universal church” idea in Scripture. Instead everything said of the church in Scripture is true of one local church ideally. In my opinion, this leads to the conclusion that cooperation between churches and unity and all that is just optional.

Here are the links to Dr. Straub’s posts. He makes the case that churches working together produce longer lasting fruit than churches doing it solo.

The comments are worth the read too. Let me know here what you think, too.

Doctrinal Disagreements (on Secondary Matters): Just a Teaching Issue

~ Bob Hayton ~ 13 Comments

I just finished listening to the audio from the recent Standpoint Conference held at Southeast Valley Baptist Church in Gilbert, Arizona this past month. The conference was geared toward “young fundamentalists” and centered on Biblical fellowship (koinonia). Several of the messages were very good, and I plan to share some of my thoughts and commentary in the coming weeks.

The speaker for the last session was Mike Durning (a fellow ShaperIron member). His topic was: “How can Calvinists and not-so-Calvinists have Koinonia?” The message is worth listening to, as he hits on some important issues, particularly with relation to how bitter the Calvinism debate can get.

Toward the end of his message, however, he really hit the nail home. After mentioning that in the Bible church he pastors, at one time both a 5 point Calvinist and a very Arminian-leaning fellow were on the elder board together, he moved on to spell out some thoughts I find very important. I’m sharing my attempt at transcribing this section of the audio. I’ll give you the excerpt and encourage you to get the audio (it’s free) and listen to the whole thing.

Our church has been home to charismatics before. We politely insist that they not speak or pray in their imagined heavenly language. If they despair at someone for going to a doctor or, you know, they try to say that all sickness is of the devil, then we instruct them and if necessary we’d ask them to leave. But why close the door to helping someone grow in their understanding of Scripture?

We even had a charismatic on our board of deacons before, which is saying something because I preach against charismaticism a whole lot more then I would ever touch the issue of Calvinism or non-Calvinism. What’s wrong with them being with us, though? They worship with us, they hear the Word, why cut them off?

Our church has been home to historic a-mil guys, pre-trib pre-mil guys and everything in between. Our church has been home to dispensationalists and covenant theologians. Our church is home to both cessationists and some soft-cessationists, a few non-cessationists.

Do we have a taught position? Sure. And some of these things I teach far more firmly then I teach the issue of Calvinism or non-Calvinism. But those who truly know Christ and show up are welcome. And they’re our brothers and sisters.

Listen guys, once we know we’re dealing with believers, everything except rebellion is just a teaching issue. Did you catch that? If we know they’re believers, everything except rebellion is just a teaching issue. That’s the mindset.

You don’t have to march in lock-step with me to worship at my side. You don’t have to cow-tow to my view point to sit in my pew. You don’t have to agree with all things that I believe in order to work with me.

Is there a standard? Sure. Is unity based on a core of doctrine and practice? Sure. But to insist on 100% conformity to my viewpoint in order to fellowship, is arrogance — not separatism.

So, what do you think? I for one, think he is absolutely correct (when it comes to secondary matters). Let me know if you agree or disagree.

How Should Fundamentalists View Conservative Evangelicals? Kevin Bauder Weighs In

~ Bob Hayton ~ 6 Comments

In the eyes of many fundamentalists (and by that term I’m referring to the card-carrying, independent Fundamental Baptist variety), if you aren’t either a fundamentalist or an out-and-out liberal, then you must be a new evangelical.   “Neo” is a derogatory term, mind you, not the name of “the one” who will save mankind, ala The Matrix….

Fundamentalists for the most part like solid lines of demarcation between their group and the others.   Those others, whether they be conservative evangelicals in general, or Southern Baptists, or Calvinists, their main problem is that they aren’t “one of us”. And this means they can’t be trusted. Furthermore, their problems run deeper than what Bible version they carry.   They must be linked in some way, with Rome or liberalism or any other bad thing we can think of.

Problem is, they are independent thinkers, they don’t toe the fundamentalist party line when it comes to “worldly” amusements or cultural taboos. They actually respect Billy Graham to some level, and they don’t think any measure of Calvinism is satanic.

Perhaps the biggest problem, at least it appears so to us who are on the outside looking in, is that these “others” are influential. Leaders like John MacArthur and John Piper, use the Bible carefully and are “building a following” (at least that’s what Fundamentalists might think). Young unsuspecting Christians are led away into all kinds of error and wickedness when they follow these “others”.

I’m not far from the truth. And now that I’ve painted that not too rosy picture, let me encourage you to go read Kevin Bauder’s thoughts on conservative evangelicals. He is incensed at the party-spirit of fundamentalists which view these “others” as enemies or opponents. Rather, they are to be esteemed for their “defense of the gospel”. And this esteem and even a level of partnership is possible without an all out embracing of their every peculiar position on questions of worldliness and matters of secondary doctrine.

I do pray Bauder represents a changing of the guard and that the fundamentalists of today will share their deep-seated faith in and practice of the Bible with their evangelical brethren, come out from their holy huddles and not be afraid of being impacted by some of the clear thinking, Bible-prizing conservative evangelical leaders God had graced the church with today.

Let me offer a few excerpts and then encourage you to go read Bauder’s essay which says all of this in a more scholarly way.

Conservative evangelicals have oriented themselves by fixed points of doctrine. They have scoured apostasy from the world’s largest seminary. They have debunked Open Theism. They have articulated and defended a Complementarian position against evangelical feminism. They have rebutted the opponents of inerrancy. They have exposed and refuted the New Perspective on Paul. They have challenged the Emergent Church and laid bare its bankruptcy.

In other words, because many Fundamentalists appear to have lost their doctrinal sobriety, the initiative for defending the gospel has shifted from Fundamentalism to conservative evangelicalism. Conservative evangelicals have majored on the centrality of the gospel and the exaltation of God. Rather than centering themselves upon theological novelties and idiosyncrasies, they have given themselves to a defense of the Faith.

Nevertheless, some Fundamentalists have managed to convince themselves that conservative evangelicals are the enemy….

To be sure, significant differences continue to exist between Fundamentalists and conservative evangelicals. Those differences, however, are less serious than the ones that exist between the various camps within Fundamentalism. For example, many Fundamentalist churches and institutions have capitulated to the error of King James Onlyism. Many Fundamentalists are willing to tolerate and even idolize arrogant and egotistical leaders. Many Fundamentalists are willing to live with doctrinal shallowness and trivial worship in their pulpits and in their hymnals. Many Fundamentalists continue to believe that manipulative Revivalism will produce vibrant Christians. Who could deny that these matters are serious?

…

We Fundamentalists may not wish to identify with everything that conservative evangelicals say and do. To name these men as neo-evangelicals, nonetheless, is entirely unwarranted. To treat them like enemies or even opponents is to demonize the very people who are the foremost defenders of the gospel today….

D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones on Unity across Eschatological Positions

~ Bob Hayton ~ 6 Comments

We’ve been discussing whether eschatological positions should hinder our unity in a local church, or beyond. Mark Dever recently challenged pastors to not let this hinder unity, even calling doctrinal statements that detail a specific millennial position, sinful.

In light of all this, I was struck when I read the following words from Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones in a book I finished this weekend. Speaking on the phrase “let all things be done with charity” (1 Cor. 16:14), he addresses the question at hand directly.

In standing fast in the faith, if we are not animated by the spirit of love, we may not always differentiate as we should between faith in its essence and certain peculiar interpretations and expositions of our own. Here is a theme which might very easily occupy our minds on many occasions. There is nothing so tragic, I sometimes think, in certain circles as the way in which men fail to differentiate between that which is of the essence of the faith and certain other matters about which there can be no certainty. You cannot, I am told, be a member of the World Fundamentalist Association unless you believe in the “pre-millennial” return of our Lord and if you happen to be a “post-millenarian” you cannot be a Christian! If you are an “a-millenarian” you are just unspeakable. There you have an illustration of the importance of differentiating between the essence of the faith and the interpretation of a particular matter about which there has always been a difference of opinion. There is the same difference of opinion as to when the rapture of the saints is to take place. Men separate from each other about matters of that nature, where there is no certainty, and where there can be no certainty, though the return of the Lord is certain. Who can decide who is right, whether those who hold the pre-millennial, or those who hold the post-millennial view? I could mention great names on both sides, equally expert theologians. Surely these are matters where there can be a legitimate difference of opinion. Let us bear in mind the adage: “In essentials, unity; in non-essentials, liberty; in all things, charity.” “Stand fast in the faith.” Yes, but in a spirit of love.

[from The Christian in an Age of Terror: Selected Sermons of Dr Martyn Lloyd-Jones 1941-1950 (previously unpublished sermons, edited by Michael Eaton) — Kregel, pg. 264 ]

I think we see Lloyd-Jones agreeing with Dever here. As for me, I think we should leave the question open for membership, but we can define what our church will teach. But as we teach we should be careful with how we deal with opposing views.

I think this does shape how we approach Scripture (or how we approach Scripture shapes this issue). So it is emphatically important. But we should be careful to elevate our preferences and doctrinal conclusions on a matter that is not crystal clear, over and above the points of doctrine which are universally held and powerfully clear. When you elevate every position to the place of major doctrine, you minimize what Scripture presents as truly central.