Damnation by Faith

As far as I can tell the Roman Catholic Church now teaches that the most likely way to go to hell is to believe Roman Catholic doctrine. Allow me to support this from a series of quotes from the Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC).

The CCC teaches that Protestants who disbelieve the doctrine of the Roman Catholic Church are likely saved:

CCC-818: However, one cannot charge with the sin of the separation those who at present are born into these communities [that resulted from such separation] and in them are brought up in the faith of Christ … . All who have been justified by faith in Baptism are incorporated into Christ. (Brackets in original.)

CCC-819: Christ’s Spirit uses these Churches and ecclesial communities as means of salvation, whose power derives from the fullness of grace and truth that Christ has entrusted to the Catholic Church.

However, believing Roman Catholics who have committed mortal sins or have not participated in the sacraments (particularly penance and confirmation) necessarily go to hell.

CCC-1129: The Church affirms that for believers the sacraments of the New Covenant are necessary for salvation. (Emphasis in original.)

CCC-1856: Mortal sin, by attacking the vital principle within us—that is, charity—necessitates a new initiative of God’s mercy and a conversion of heart which is normally accomplished within the setting of the sacrament of reconciliation.

CCC-1446: Christ instituted the sacrament of Penance for all sinful members of his Church: above all for those who, since Baptism, have fallen into grave sin, and have thus lost their baptismal grace and wounded ecclesial communion. It is to them that the sacrament of Penance offers a new possibility to convert and to recover the grace of justification. The Fathers of the Church present this sacrament as “the second plank [of salvation] after the shipwreck which is the loss of grace.” (Brackets in original.)

Thus if a saved Protestant accepted Catholic doctrine, he would lose his salvation by believing Roman doctrine. He would stop being saved because he believed the doctrine of Rome and yet had not been confirmed or received penance. Thus disbelief and ignorance saves but faith and knowledge of the truth damns.

This is also the case for non-Christian religions and atheists:

CCC-847: This affirmation is not aimed at those who, through no fault of their own, do not know the Gospel of Christ or his Church, but who nevertheless seek God with a sincere heart, and, moved by grace, try in their actions to do his will as they know it through the dictates of their conscience—those too may achieve eternal salvation.

CCC-2125: The imputability of [atheism’s] offense can be significantly diminished in virtue of the intentions and the circumstances.

CCC-1735: Imputability and responsibility for an action can be diminished or even nullified by ignorance, inadvertence, duress, fear, habit, inordinate attachments, and other psychological or social factors.

Thus the non-Catholic with the greatest likelihood of salvation is a tyrannized, ignorant, distracted, frightened person with inordinate attachments separated from the gospel. To attempt to remove duress, fear, bad habits, inordinate attachments, and provide the gospel increases responsibility and therefore the likelihood of damnation.

Or to put it another way an atheist with a bad case of inadvertence is possibly saved, but by drawing his attention to the gospel he is damned if he remains an atheist or ever returns to being an atheist.

While we can imagine different responses by apologists, the catechism is clear that believing Catholic doctrine makes salvation dependent on participating in the sacraments and that salvation can be lost on a daily if not moment by moment basis. It is also clear that a category of Protestant, Jews, Muslims, pagans, and possibly atheists are saved while explicitly rejecting or in ignorance of Roman doctrine. Catholics are saved and potentially damned by believing Catholic doctrine and non-Catholics are saved by believing some true things and by their disbelief or ignorance of the Roman system.

The moment that a saved non-Catholic believes Catholic doctrine he or she loses their salvation and is forced to gain salvation back by entering into the sacramental system. Within this system, there is no confirmation of salvation, and each mortal sin—lust, dishonoring parents, lying, theft, murder, and adultery—requires the sacrament of reconciliation prior to death and last rites. Yet a saved Protestant, who remains ignorant of church history and papal doctrine, resides secure in his ignorance and disbelief according to the catechism. We can say the same for saved non-Christians.

We arrive then at something new in church history—damnation by faith as dogma.*

It won’t take a sophisticated Catholic apologist much time to close the loophole I’ve noted. The reflex action is to declare such things a mystery as was recently done in a discussion by Rome of Jews who reject Christ. I anticipate a mystery of divine mercy in comparison to mean spirited Protestants.

Even so, we need to inform our congregations and our young people that Roman Catholicism requires faith plus works for the salvation of Catholics and ignorance for the salvation of everyone else. According to Roman Catholic dogma the best way for a Protestant to lose his salvation is believe the gospel as taught by the Pope.

Further, we need to talk to our Catholic neighbors about this multitude of mysteries; the covering of mystery grows very thin when it explains so much. And the enigma melts before passages like Romans 10:9-14:

If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved. For the Scripture says, “Everyone who believes in him will not be put to shame.” For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; for the same Lord is Lord of all, bestowing his riches on all who call on him. For “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.” How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching?

* Pascal mentions a similar problem in his Provincial Letters, but limits the issue to Catholics with Jesuit confessors.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church - Key Points

Among Roman Catholics, Vatican II, and thus the Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC), is interpreted across a spectrum from essential rejection to continuity with the past to rupture.

Essential rejection is the position of extremely traditional Catholics who remain in communion with the Pope but who continue to give or take the Mass in the wafer alone and who gravitate toward the Latin Mass. Their interpretation of CCC has the greatest continuity with pre-Vatican II statements and tends to minimize the discontinuity.

Continuity with the past is the mainstream interpretation of serious Catholics. “Serious” does not include politicos who claim Augustine supported abortion or who have purchased multiple annulments. Pope Benedict XVI, now emeritus, appears to me to be a very conservative proponent of the continuity view, and he is the mind behind the current universal Catechism. This view is represented by Catholic voices like the magazine First Things.

The rupture view is held by the likes of the theologian and priest Hans Küng. In this view, Vatican II is seen as breaking with the past in significant ways; the proponents tend to expect further modernizing and aggressively push for change. Googling an English language interview of Küng airing his complaints and issuing veiled threats against Ratzinger will provide readers with the basic position.

When you’re witnessing to many traditional Catholics, the Catechism’s inclusivism towards non-Catholics will be minimized. However, those in the rupture camp may allow if not speak in terms of universalism. Establishing where sophisticated Catholics are on the spectrum can be helpful to focus your apologetic efforts.

Below, I’ve arranged comments and quotes from the Catechism that I hope will help you use God’s word to witness to your Roman Catholic neighbors. Please note that the citations are often not in the order they appear in the CCC. Also, I scattered in some of the wholesome doctrine found in the CCC.

On the Bible

The CCC contains about 5,000 scriptural citations. Less than 100 citations come from the Apocrypha.

All Roman Catholics are encouraged to read the Bible:

CCC-133: The Church “forcefully and specifically exhorts all the Christian faithful… . to learn ‘the surpassing knowledge of Jesus Christ,’ by frequent reading of the divine Scriptures. ‘Ignorance of the Scriptures is ignorance of Christ.’” (Ellipsis in original)

However, interpretation of Scripture must submit to the Pope/Church, and interpretation is only for the Pope. Reading is allowed; interpretation essentially forbidden:

CCC-100: The task of interpreting the Word of God authentically has been entrusted solely to the Magisterium of the Church, that is, to the Pope and to the bishops in communion with him.

CCC-119: “For, of course, all that has been said about the manner of interpreting Scripture is ultimately subject to the judgment of the Church which exercises the divinely conferred commission and ministry of watching over and interpreting the Word of God.”

The four Gospels are given a special position and in my interaction with conservative and serious lay Catholics are considered more appropriate and perhaps safer for devotional reading:

CCC-127: The fourfold Gospel holds a unique place in the Church, as is evident both in the veneration which the liturgy accords it and in the surpassing attraction it has exercised on the saints of all time.

On the Pope and the Magisterium of the Church

The Pope and the bishops are all considered apostles, but the Pope reigns supreme:

CCC-862: “Just as the office which the Lord confided to Peter alone, as first of the apostles, destined to be transmitted to his successors, is a permanent one, so also endures the office, which the apostles received, of shepherding the Church, a charge destined to be exercised without interruption by the sacred order of bishops.”

CCC-882: The Pope, Bishop of Rome and Peter’s successor, “is the perpetual and visible source and foundation of the unity both of the bishops and of the whole company of the faithful.” “For the Roman Pontiff, by reason of his office as Vicar of Christ, and as pastor of the entire Church has full, supreme, and universal power over the whole Church, a power which he can always exercise unhindered.”

CCC-883: “The college or body of bishops has no authority unless united with the the Roman Pontiff… .” As such, this college has “supreme and full authority over the universal Church; but this power cannot be exercised without the agreement of the Roman Pontiff.”

Oddly enough the Pope and his cohorts agree that they do not meet the biblical qualifications found in 1 Corinthians 9:1 and Acts 1:22 to be an apostle:

CCC-860: In the office of the apostles there is one aspect that cannot be transmitted: to be the chosen witnesses of the Lord’s Resurrection and so the foundation stones of the Church.

The CCC teaches that the Pope and the magisterium of the church are infallible:

CCC-889: In order to preserve the Church in the purity of the faith handed down on by the apostles, Christ who is the Truth willed to confer on her a share in his own infallibility. By a “supernatural sense of faith” the People of God, under the guidance of the Church’s living Magisterium, “unfailingly adheres to this faith.”

CCC-891: “The Roman Pontiff, head of the college of bishops, enjoys this infallibility in virtue of his office… .The infallibility promised to the Church is also present in the body of bishops when, together with Peter’s successor, they exercise the supreme Magisterium,’ above all in an Ecumenical Council.”

The official position of the Roman Catholic Church is the magisterium. Practically speaking the teaching is the consensus of the cardinals with the pope as the head today. Because the magisterium participates in the divine knowledge, absolute contradictions between the Scripture, tradition, and magisterium are perceived as impossible. Any contradiction with past or present statements is by definition only apparent. Thus, all past statements are interpreted as if the modern consensus was the intended outcome, and the contemporary consensus is amendable or can develop into a new and future consensus.

Reading back current practice as the historical tradition of the church or the correct interpretation of Scripture is the habit of mind of Catholics. This behavior helps us to understand why Pope Francis speaks of Catholics breeding like rabbits and clever Vatican handlers and apologists will explain it away.

There is no predictable criterion for deciding what statements by a pope are infallible. The self-conscious dignity of Rome requires that “Catholics shouldn’t breed like rabbits” will be ignored. Yet bizarre and self-contradictory actions abound: John XXII (1249-1334) rejected papal infallibility and the next pope decided John was fallible but he wasn’t. The Jesuits were suppressed under one pope (Clement XIV, 1773), brought back under another (Pius VII, 1814), and now the current pope is a Jesuit.

C. S. Lewis describes the issue of attempting to join with the ever evolving Rome with stark clarity:

The real reason why I cannot be in communion with you is not my disagreement with this or that Roman doctrine, but that to accept your Church means, not to accept a given body of doctrine, but to accept in advance any doctrine your Church hereafter produces. It is like being asked to agree not only to what a man has said but also to what he is going to say. “Christian Reunion”, in Christian Reunion and Other Essays, edited by Walter Hooper (London: Collins, 1990), 17-18.

Further, the Catechism makes almost no attempt to expose the vast disagreement of past doctors of the church with the current magisterium. As an example Augustine in CCC-1372 is cited in support of the current practice of Rome in the Eucharist. However, Augustine rejected the doctrine of transubstantiation, as should be clear by his comparing the physical presence of Christ in the elements to cannibalism in On Christian Doctrine:

If the sentence is one of command, either forbidding a crime or vice, or enjoining an act of prudence or benevolence, it is not figurative. If, however, it seems to enjoin a crime or vice, or to forbid an act of prudence or benevolence, it is figurative. “Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man,” says Christ, “and drink His blood, ye have no life in you.” This seems to enjoin a crime or a vice; it is therefore a figure, enjoining that we should share in the sufferings of our Lord, and that we should retain a sweet and profitable memory of the fact that His flesh was wounded and crucified for us. (On Christian Doctrine, in Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church, vol. 2, ed. Philip Schaff. Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1997, pg. 562, 3.16.24)

On Mary

The Catechism explicitly notes the evolution of the Marian doctrine:

CCC-491: Through the centuries the Church has become ever more aware that Mary, “full of grace” through God, was redeemed from the moment of her conception.

CCC-499: The deepening of faith in the virginal motherhood led the Church to confess Mary’s real and perpetual virginity even in the act of giving birth to the Son of God made man.

Mary’s role in salvation parallels Jesus and is as necessary:

CCC-501: “The Son whom she brought forth is he whom God placed as the first-born among many brethren, that is, the faithful in whose generation and formulation she cooperates with a mother’s love.”

Jesus replaces the fallen Adam and Mary is the second Eve.

CCC-511: The Virgin Mary “cooperated through free faith and obedience in human salvation.” She uttered her yes “in the name of all human nature.” By her obedience she became the new Eve, mother of the living.

Mary is given divine titles and roles in salvation:

CCC-969: “Taken up to heaven she did not lay aside this saving office but by her manifold intercession continues to bring us the gifts of eternal salvation… .Therefore the Blessed Virgin is invoked in the Church under the titles of Advocate, Helper, Benefactress, and Mediatrix.” (Ellipsis original)

Mary is not given the title of Co-Redemptrix, but she is described as such:

CCC-964: There [at the foot of the cross] she stood, in keeping with the divine plan, enduring with her only begotten Son the intensity of his suffering, joining herself with his sacrifice in her mother’s heart, and lovingly consenting to the immolation of this victim… .

At least some of the language of the Catechism suggests, perhaps unintentionally, that Mary had a pre-existence prior to her conception:

CCC-721: In this sense the Church’s Tradition has often read the most beautiful texts on wisdom in relation to Mary. [Citation to Prov 8:1-9; Sir 24]. Mary is acclaimed and represented in the liturgy as the “Seat of Wisdom.”

Sirach 24:9 states speaking of wisdom, “From eternity, in the beginning, he created me, and for eternity I shall not cease to exist” (ESV).

On Baptism and Conversion

Baptists should be delighted with the following:

CCC-1214: This sacrament is called Baptism, after the central rite by which it is carried out: to baptize (Greek baptzein) means to “plunge” or “immerse”; the plunge into the waters symbolizes the catechumen’s burial into Christ’s death from which he rises up by resurrection with him, as “a new creature.”

However, the Catechism also teaches:

CCC-1257: “Baptism is necessary for salvation for those to whom the Gospel has been proclaimed and who have had the possibility of asking for this sacrament.”

CCC-1213—Through Baptism we are freed from sin and reborn as sons of God; we become members of Christ, are incorporated into the Church and made sharers in her mission: “Baptism is the sacrament of regeneration through water in the word.”

CCC-405—Baptism, by imparting the life of Christ’s grace, erases original sin and turns a man back toward God, but the consequences for nature, weakened and inclined to evil, persist in man and summon him to spiritual battle.

Also, the salvation granted can be given up:

CCC-1446—“Christ instituted the sacrament of Penance for all sinful members of his church: above all for those who, since Baptism, have fallen into grave sin, and have thus lost their baptismal grace…

CCC-1861—Mortal sin is a radical possibility of human freedom, as is love itself. It results in the loss of charity and the privation of sanctifying grace, that is, of the state grace. If it is not redeemed by repentance and God’s forgiveness, it causes exclusion from Christ’s kingdom and the eternal death of hell… .

It is the expectation of the CCC that all Roman Catholics often lose their salvation and thus must be reconverted: And this leads to the doctrine of the second conversion(s):

CCC-1428—This second conversion is an uninterrupted task for the whole Church… .

CCC-1429—St. Peter’s conversion after he had denied his master three times bears witness to this… . St. Ambrose says of the two conversions that, in the Church, “there are water and tears; the water of Baptism and the tears of repentance.”

Some Closing Hopes

I have shown above that Roman Catholics have an almost exhaustively accurate paragraph on baptism and that all Catholics are encouraged to read the Bible. I have also shown that an argument can be made that Rome is preparing to declare Mary had a pre-incarnate existence and is co-Redemptrix. Such is the wholesome and diabolical extremes of the Catechism.

Part of being a thoughtful Christian requires that we be able to use both extremes in a godly way. It’s not helpful to proclaim the Pope the Antichrist or to behave as if Vatican II was a tectonic shift towards the true gospel. Revelation’s whore of Babylon may be Rome, but she may also be lead by a Southern or Bob Jones grad.

Encourage your Catholic neighbor to read the whole Bible. Expose them to grace as taught by the Bible by studying the Bible with them and being gracious through the Spirit. But most importantly show them the Jesus Christ of the Bible.

The Jesus of the Bible knows nothing of his mother as Meditrix, Advocate, or Helper. Jesus taught eternal security not multiple conversions. Jesus rules his Church through the Word and the Spirit. And it is Jesus who paid the only real penalty for sins.

The hopeful request of all those who are saved is found in John 12:21, “Sir, we wish to see Jesus.” Show them Jesus.

Christ and the Church in the Catechism of the Catholic Church

It was a warm spring day in DC, and my Catholic friend explained with great earnestness that if I were to be ordained prior to converting to Catholicism, then I might be able to be a priest and keep my wife and kids. Dispensations can be obtained.

My heart and mind toyed with the thoughts: the great creaking beauty of the medieval liturgy, the pageantry and fancy dress, the history, architecture, the universities, libraries, philosophy, and Latin. The specter of the Mass rose before me. Worshiping bread and the wine, bowing and kissing statues of saints excused with the thinnest of theological distinctions, Pilipino adherents nailing themselves to crosses. No, this is not the Way.

And I said, “The problem is that one of us is a blasphemer. Either I blaspheme Christ by not worshiping him at every available Mass, or you commit an act of idolatry by worshiping bread and wine. There is no middle ground. In heaven if allowed or required I will kiss and pray to Mary; in heaven I will adore the body of Christ, but until heaven or when Christ returns I will trust the Bible and my conscience.”

My friend demurred yet agreed I was saved by Vatican II’s allowance of separated brethren, and the waters of the Tiber receded from my feet.

And thus we come to the Christ-church interconnection. Rome claims to have Christ and in some sense be Christ—and, in so doing, Rome replaces Jesus with herself. The two doctrines of nature and grace interdependence (cf. Part 2) and the Christ-church interconnection are reinforcing and basic to the rest of the system.1

In Roman Catholic theology the greatest break between nature and God is not sin, but rather a lack of divinity or perfection in nature. Nature is good but not divine. Sin is a disorder that can righted by the use of reason (cf. Thomas citation from Part 2). Yet for nature to be perfected there must be the divine addition of grace. With the addition of grace, man can now begin to gain merit with God because he is sharing in the divine life.

The person who brings perfection to nature is Jesus Christ through the incarnation. Jesus mediates the sharing of grace through a participation in His divinity. Christ’s divinity is shared by, and to a degree contained within, the Roman Church. The Church then turns and mediates Christ’s divine life to the world.

Christ in the Mass

To illustrate how Christ and the Roman Church are understood as interconnected and how Rome displaces the Son of God, we will begin with the doctrine of the eucharist and wend our way to the other aspects of shared divinity. We will note in passing how the Catechism can be considered biblical in the sense of defending itself and offering an explanation of the Bible.

The primary touchpoint for lay Catholics in experiencing and sharing in the divinity of Christ comes in the consumption of the wafer and, post-Vatican I, I in the wine.

Or as we read in CCC 1325, “The Eucharist is the efficacious sign and sublime cause of that communion in the divine life and that unity of the People of God by which the Church is kept in being.”

The divine life enters the Christian through the “a Paschal banquet, ‘in which Christ is consumed” (1323). And the Christ consumed is defined in 1374: “In the most blessed sacrament of the Eucharist ‘the body and blood, together with the soul and divinity, of our Lord Jesus Christ and, therefore, the whole Christ is truly, really and substantially contained.’”

The wafer is Jesus Christ. And to eat the wafer is to consume “the whole Christ.”

Thus in Catholic doctrine, Christ’s words in Matthew 26:26 are taken in a supposedly literal sense: “Take, eat; this is my body” (ESV). Yet, this immediately creates several exegetical and practical problems. First, Jesus served the first Lord’s Supper before he was crucified. So when Christ said, “Take, eat; this is my body,” His body had not yet been sacrificed. So did the Apostles eat the pre-sacrificed body?2

The other major issue is found in Hebrews 7:27, “He has no need, like those high priests, to offer sacrifices daily, first for his own sins and then for those of the people, since he did this once for all when he offered up himself.”

Both the timing of the Last Supper and the statement “he did this once for all” cause a bit of a quandary. How can a “once for all” sacrifice be repeated millions of times a day throughout the world at local Catholic churches? And what body did the Apostles eat?

The answer is found in CCC-1085:

His Paschal mystery is a real event that occurred in our history, but it is unique: all other historical events happen once, and they pass away, swallowed up in the past. The Paschal mystery of Christ, by contrast, cannot remain only in the past, because by his death he destroyed death, and all that Christ is—all that he did and suffered for all men—participates in the divine eternity, and so transcends all times and while being made present in them all. The event of the Cross and Resurrection abides and draws everything toward life.

We can add to this 1367:

The sacrifice of Christ and the sacrifice of the Eucharist are one single sacrifice: “The victim is one and the same: the same now offers through the ministry of the priests, who then offered himself on the cross; only the manner is different.”

And then the final component is found in 1545 and 1548:

The redemptive sacrifice of Christ is unique, accomplished once for all; yet it is made present in the Eucharist sacrifice of the Church. The same is true of the one priesthood of Christ; it is made present through the ministerial priesthood without diminishing the uniqueness of Christ’s priesthood. (1545)

In the ecclesial service of the ordained minister, it is Christ himself who is present to his Church as Head of his Body, Shepherd of his flock, high priest of the redemptive sacrifice, Teacher of Truth. This is what the Church means by saying that the priest, by virtue of the sacrament of Holy Orders, acts in persona Christi Capitis…(1548)

Thus the explanation as to how Christ’s one sacrifice can be re-sacrificed millions of times by millions of priests is that Christ’s priesthood is shared with the church and Christ’s body is atemporal. The Apostles ate Jesus’ sacrificed body at the Last Supper because it is “being made present in” all times. Jesus sacrificed body travels between times at the summons of Christ and his priests.

In the Catholic system Christ’s body on the cross becomes not only atemporal but non-spatial; it can be summoned into times both before and after the resurrection to reside in the bread and the cup. The priests are the embodiment of Christ and so they function as Christ in the re-sacrifice.

When the Son of God became a man in the incarnation He shared His divinity with nature in a way that is repeatable and can occur in other moments of time independently of the spatial location of His body. Christ then shares His physical divine attributes with the church in a permanent way. The church not only has the physical body of Christ in the mass, but it is the Body of Christ.

The Church as Christ

And so we read in the Catechism quoting from Augustine (354-430) in 796:

This is the whole Christ, head and body, one formed from many…whether the head or members speak, it is Christ who speaks. He speaks in his role as the head (ex persona capitais) and in his role as body (ex persona corporis). What does this mean? “The two will become one flesh. This is a great mystery, and I am applying it to Christ and the Church.” And the Lord himself says in the Gospel: “So they are no longer two, but one flesh.” They are, in fact, two different persons, yet they are one in the conjugal union,…as head he calls himself the bridegroom, as body, he calls himself “bride.”3 (Ellipses original.)

Thus in the Catholic system Christ is the Church not only as the representative sacrifice, but He is the church. And when the Church speaks as Christ, so Christ speaks. When the church acts as Christ so Christ acts:

CCC-889—“In order to preserve the Church in the purity of the faith handed on by the Apostles, Christ who is the Truth willed to confer to her a share of his own infallibility.”

Christ’s infallibility is the “Church’s living Magisterium” (Ibid). Christ can share His infallibility, His physical body, and His merits with the church because He is the church and the church is Christ. The church as a body is being perfected into Christ’s perfect body.

In Catholic doctrine, the Roman Catholic Church can’t be wrong in an issue where she has spoken in a “definitive manner” (892), because she is Christ. And we must notice that the church both being Christ and being the distributor of Christ’s physical body leads to the doctrines and practice that are so obviously contra-biblical and unreasonable.

Rome’s doctrine can be thought of as biblical only by accepting the teaching of nature and grace interdependence and the Christ-church interconnection. What appears in Protestant eyes as open idolatry is defended as Christ’s divinity parceled out within the structure and forms of Rome.

Thus we read in 1378:

Worship of the Eucharist. In the liturgy of the Mass we express our faith in the real presence of Christ under the species of bread and wine by, among other ways, genuflecting or bowing as a sign of adoration of the Lord. “The Catholic Church has always offered and still offers the sacrament of the Eucharist the cult of adoration, not only during the Mass, but also outside of it, reserving the consecrated hosts with the utmost care, exposing them to the solemn veneration of the faithful, and carrying them in procession.”

The Lord Jesus by becoming incarnate and then sharing His divine attributes with the church is now worshiped by worshiping the wine and the bread. The wine and the bread share in the deity of Christ and must be worshiped.

The Catholic Church claims to eat the soul of the Son of God, and they openly worship the bread and the wine as containing “the whole Christ…truly, really and substantially.” In this view, it is no more wrong to worship the bread and wine than to bow at Jesus’ feet in heaven, because they are essentially the same.

Divine attributes trickle down throughout the dogma of the church: we see the Christ-church interconnection particularly in the intercession and veneration of the saints and the Marian doctrine.

Christ, Mary and the Saints

We read in in 2131, “By becoming incarnate, the Son of God introduced a new ‘economy’ of images.” This new economy allows the church to venerate “icons—of Christ, but also of the Mother of God, the angels, and all the saints” (Ibid).

And 2132 goes on to add:

The Christian veneration of images is not contrary to the first commandment which proscribes idols. Indeed, “the honor rendered to an image passes to its prototype,” and “whoever venerates an image venerates the person portrayed in it.” The honor paid to sacred images is a “respectful veneration,” not the adoration due to God alone…

Jesus by becoming incarnate now allows the church to participate in an activity formally forbidden, because He shares His ability to be honored through the body with the holy icons. The incarnation allows the church to bring images within herself and to use them as devotional devices.

Further, the church has created a distinction between veneration and adoration. Veneration is simply honor and adoration is worship. A third distinction exists, which might best be called “super-veneration,” to Mary. We read in 971, “This very special devotion…differs essentially from the adoration which is given to the incarnate Word and equally to the Father and the Holy Spirit.”

Mary is given super-veneration because in 505, “The spousal character of the human vocation to God is fulfilled perfectly in Mary’s virginal motherhood.” Mary so perfectly represents the unity of the Church/Bride with Christ that, “Jesus, the only mediator, is the way of our prayer; Mary, his mother and ours, is wholly transparent to him: she ‘shows the way’, and is herself ‘the Sign’ of the way…” (2674). So Mary is prayed to because she exemplifies the spiritual and in a sense physical unity we are to have with Christ as the Church.

We read in 2673, “In prayer the Holy Spirit unites us to the person of the only Son, in his glorified humanity, through which and in which our filial prayer unites us in the Church with the Mother of Jesus.” And 2675 goes on to say that Christians, when praying to Mary, entrust “the supplications and praises of the children of God to the Mother of Jesus, because she now knows the humanity which, in her, the Son of God espoused.”

The Virgin Mary hears prayers because she is now united with her Son in a way that grants her attributes of divinity and her perfections make her more God like. All the saints are to a lesser degree included in this deification.

Jesus’ incarnation is seen as spreading divine attributes throughout the church in various ways. The Magisterium of the Church is a shared divine attribute. We read that the pope and the

bishops have by divine institution taken the place of the apostles as pastors of the Church, in such wise that whoever listens to them is listening to Christ and whoever despises them despises Christ and him who sent Christ. (862)

The bread and the cup have the complete “body and blood, together with the soul and divinity, of our Lord Jesus Christ.” Mary shares both human and divine attributes of Jesus, but not His full deity. These same attributes are shared with the lesser saints and the angels.

Practically speaking, the Roman Catholic doctrine of Christ-church interconnection removes the person of Jesus Christ and replaces Him with herself and the sacramental system. Rome takes her place in the temple of Christ proclaiming herself to be Christ (2 Thess. 2:4).

Our Lord Jesus warns us of this in Matthew 25, “For many will come in my name, saying, ‘I am the Christ,’ and they will lead many astray…Then if anyone says to you, ‘Look, here is the Christ!’ or ‘There he is!’ do not believe it” (Matt. 25:5, 23).

Notes

1 The framework of this analysis can be found in Allison, Roman Catholic Theology and Practice and Muller, Christ and the Decree. However, I am not aware of quoting either author in the above article. I of course take full responsibility for my conclusions and errors.

2 For a pre-Trent view see, Peter Lombard, trans. Giulio Silano, The Sentences: Book Four—On the Doctrine of Signs. The Master of the Sentences discovers three bodies.

3 I wanted to put in a positive word for my friend and teacher Augustine by agreeing within B. B. Warfield, “For the Reformation, inwardly considered, was just the ultimate triumph of Augustine’s doctrine of grace over Augustine’s doctrine of the church.” —Studies in Tertullian and Augustine (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 2003), 130.

The Bible vs Catechism of the Catholic Church on Nature Grace

My intent in this article is to show from the Catechism of the Catholic Church a radically different understanding of nature and grace than what is taught by the Bible and held by Protestants. The Catholic view of grace and nature, along its view of Christ-Church interconnectedness, leads to a different gospel than found in the Bible. Lord willing, next week we will consider the Christ-church issue.

Our three main sources are the Bible, Allison’s Roman Catholic Theology and Practice: An Evangelical Assessment, and the Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC).

We are entering into the Byzantine substructures of Roman Catholic theology. And while I am attempting to make sure each article in the series can stand alone, the reader will be greatly assisted by reading the first article in this series.

Allow me to define our terms as we begin: “Nature” in Christian vocabulary is God’s created order and includes everything that God created. And “Grace, in an all-encompassing sense, is the providential activity of God to sustain created nature in existence and to direct it to its divinely designed end, and his redemptive activity to rescue this created order from its fallenness due to sin” (Allison, Roman Catholic Theology and Practice, 46).

According to the Bible, grace is not a quality or a quantity placed within the heart of a man, but rather it is God freely bestowing His kindness (Luke 6:35, Eph. 2:8-9). Grace is a direct action of God founded on his love and kindness. The blessings of grace are measurable, but grace itself is an action bestowed freely according to God’s promises through his Spirit.

When we read of grace in the Scripture, there can be no suggestion of merit, because grace is God’s response to our demerit:

But the free gift is not like the trespass. For if many died through one man’s trespass, much more have the grace of God and the free gift by the grace of that one man Jesus Christ abounded for many. (Rom. 5:15)

The trespass of Adam earned condemnation. Adam changed human nature in such a way as to only produce sinful works (Isa. 64:6). We have merited war with God in Adam and by our works, but we cannot merit grace with our broken natures or with a regenerated spirit. Earned grace would be a wage and “wages are not counted as a gift” (Rom. 4:4). So Paul asks in frustration, “What do you have that you did not receive?” (1 Cor. 4:7)

Historic Critique

The historic critique of Roman doctrine was well aware of the problem of grace and nature. John Calvin (1509-1564) provides an example in his commentary on Romans 5:15:

Hence grace means the free goodness of God or gratuitous love, of which he has given us a proof in Christ, that he might relieve our misery: and gift is the fruit of this mercy, and hath come to us, even the reconciliation by which we have obtained life and salvation, righteousness, newness of life, and every other blessing. We hence see how absurdly the schoolmen have defined grace who have taught that it is nothing else but a quality infused into the hearts of men; for grace, properly speaking, is in God; and what is in us is the effect of grace.1

Grace according to the Bible and Protestant theology “is in God.” Grace is God’s love as expressed towards sinners. The gifts of grace are the effects of God’s love towards sinners and are freely bestowed without reference to the will of man (cf. Rom. 9:16, 1 Cor. 12:11, 2 Peter 1:21). God gives His grace without consulting us or being controlled by us. The blessing, whether it be regeneration or baptism, is evidence of God’s grace, but the blessing is not, properly speaking, God’s grace.

We can compare grace to a wedding band. I wear a wedding ring as evidence of my wife Kimberly’s love for me, but the band is not Kimberly’s love. Kimberly and my marriage, children, household are all the effects of our love, but these things are not our love. And the Bible describes grace as an affection and favor and not as a thing.

It is the argument of Protestant Christians that grace flows to us as a gift of the Holy Spirit. And that grace either is the Spirit or the active working of the Spirit, but grace itself is not a spiritual substance. No sinful man can give grace as a necessary benefit.2

The Rupture Between Nature & Grace

What I’ve sketched above is in general the teaching of Protestants with fraternal disagreements about the order of salvation, what happens in infant baptism, and different degrees of theological consistency. Yet imbedded in this description is a particular understanding of nature and grace. Most importantly there is a rupture between nature and grace that must be repaired by the Spirit.

Unlike Protestant thought, the Catholic system sees nature and grace as interdependent. Nature and grace function together for the purpose of elevating nature to experience the glory of God. Things can have grace inside of them as a spiritual substance.

Thus in the Catholic system the waters of baptism can communicate grace to the person being baptized—the person gets wet and gets grace. The wetness of the water and the giving of grace occur in the same action and through the same substance, because nature and grace are interdependent and in continuum.

Thus we read in the CCC 1238, “The baptismal water is consecrated by a prayer of epiclesis…” (The word epiclesis means the calling down.) The CCC goes on, “The church asks God that through his Son the power of the Holy Spirit may be sent upon the water, so that those who will be baptized in it may be ‘born of water and the Spirit.’” The “prayer of epiclesis” calls down the Spirit on the water and then this grace is stored in the water. The water can be pre-consecrated at the Easter vigil or immediately consecrated by the priest.

We read next in the catechism: “The essential rite of the sacrament follows: Baptism properly speaking. It signifies and actually brings about death to sin and entry into the life of the Most Holy Trinity through configuration to the Paschal mystery of Christ” (1239).

The water carries within it or is a channel of grace and necessarily does the work intended by the church. And it’s this way with the wafer, oil of chrism, and wine. The stuff carries within it different sorts of grace and the grace necessarily does the work assigned to it.

To come to this view the Roman Catholic Church created a radically different understanding of nature and grace than taught by the Bible. Protestants, in agreement with the Bible, teach that sin ruptured, destroyed, the ability of human beings to do good, and that salvation is not merely an issue of renovation and perfection of nature, but it is a radical re-creation of a fallen nature.

Nature in Roman Catholic thought is tainted by sin, but there is no absolute brokenness; all nature including the human soul “still possesses a capacity to receive, transmit, and cooperate with grace” (Allison, 47).

Thomas of Aquinas (1224-1275), the architect and popularizer of much of this theology, in his commentary on the book of Romans illustrates the issue:

But in the unbeliever along with his unbelief is the good of his nature. Therefore, when an unbeliever does something from the dictate of reason and does not refer it to an evil end, he does not sin. However, his deed is not meritorious, because it was not enlivened by grace.3

Thomas taught with modern Rome that an unbeliever can do things that are not a sin, because his entire nature has good within it. Sin is a disorder that can be overcome by human effort or be assisted by grace.

Grace perfects what is already good in the sinner, and grace combined with personal effort then leads to merit. The Catechism tells us that “ ‘merit’ refers in general to the recompense owed by a community or a society for the action of one of its members” (2006).

It’s not possible to “merit the initial grace of forgiveness and justification” (2010). But, when “[m]oved by the Holy Spirit and by charity, we can merit for ourselves and for others the graces needed for our sanctification, for the increase of grace and charity, and for the attainment of eternal life” (Ibid.).

Roman Catholic thought sees nature as not only good, but with both the ability and capacity to voluntarily and even mechanically cooperate with grace. Further, because there is a continuum between grace and nature, grace has attributes similar to nature. Grace becomes a spiritual substance.

When the priest prays over the baptismal waters, then the power of regeneration, justification, and so forth clings to the water. As long as the water is used in the proper way, it gives the grace of baptism to the recipient. And, in the same way that I can earn cash from an employer and then request that the salary be given to my son, so grace can be earned and directed to others. Or as we just read “we can merit for ourselves and for others the graces needed.”

The most grossly economic use of graces as merit is found in the Catholic doctrine of the “Church’s treasury.” It’s described this way in sections 1474-1479:

1475—“In the communion of the saints, ‘a perennial link of charity exists between the faithful who have already reached their heavenly home, those who are expiating their sins in purgatory and those who are still pilgrims on earth. Between them there is, too, an abundant exchange of all good things.”

1476—“We also call these spiritual goods of the communion of the saints the Church’s treasury….

1477&#82#8212;“This treasury includes as well the prayers and good works of the Blessed Virgin Mary…. In the treasury, too, are the prayers and good works of all the saints, all those who have followed in the footsteps of Christ the Lord… In this way they attained their own salvation and at the same time cooperated in saving their brothers in the unity of the Mystical Body.”

1478—An indulgence is obtained through the Church who, by virtue of the power of binding and loosing granted her by Christ Jesus, intervenes in favor of individuals and opens for them the treasury of the merits of Christ and the saints to obtain from the Father of mercies….

1479—Since the faithful departed now being purified [in purgatory] are also members of the same communion of saints, one way we can help them is to obtain indulgences for them, so that the temporal punishments due for their sins may be remitted.

Indulgences

Indulgences can be earned in a variety of ways and the indulgence can be used for both the living and the dead. One can pay for extra Masses to be said, go on a pilgrimage, do good works, or simply pay cash.

What should be clear is that thoughtful Protestants and Catholics view the universe in very different ways and view grace in radically different ways. In the papal system grace takes part in some of the attributes of nature, grace can be stored, earned, traded, and sold. Nature is a fit receptacle for grace, because the Fall did not damage nature.

In 1517, Martin Luther published the 95 Theses in response to the vulgarity and grossness of Johann Tetzel sale of indulgences. Tetzel’s preaching only violated a single aspect of the current Catechism. Purchasers of indulgences must now be “duly disposed” (1471). Tetzel, and the modern Roman Church, can sell grace because of their doctrine of grace and nature.

While the grossest abuses of the papal system have been muted since the Reformation, the fundamental doctrine on grace and nature has not changed. And this doctrine is antithetical to the gospel of grace.

The gospel of grace knows nothing of merit for salvation or blessing: “O LORD, you will ordain peace for us, for you have indeed done for us all our works” (Isa. 26:12).

And the cry of the preachers of the true gospel remains the same for all time:

Come, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters; and he who has no money, come, buy and eat! Come, buy wine and milk without money and without price. Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which does not satisfy? Listen diligently to me, and eat what is good, and delight yourselves in rich food. Incline your ear, and come to me; hear, that your soul may live… (Isa 55:1-3a)

Notes

1 Romans 5:15, Commentaries on the Epistle to the Romans, vol. 19, in Calvin’s Commentaries, Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 2003. 207-208.

2 My paedobaptist friends, including Calvin, allow a single exception to this rule in infant baptism, but they quickly right themselves in the rest of their theology of grace.

3 Romans 14:20-23, Commentary on the Letter of Saint Paul to the Romans, C. 14, L. 3, in Biblical Commentaries, vol. 37. Lander, WY: The Aquinas Institute for the Study of Sacred Doctrine, 2012, 390.

The Flexibility of Rome

A few years ago, I stopped by a friend’s church in Washington, D.C. to walk to lunch with him. He had just finished a gut-wrenching meeting where a recent church member explained he had converted to Roman Catholicism without informing the pastors of the church.

The church member’s main justification for the conversion was the intellectual dearth among Protestants and particularly Baptists. And he held this out as the force that drove him to cross the Tiber.

My friend valiantly attempted to share the gospel with the young man from God’s Word and to pull him back to the true faith. But the deed was done, and the excuse was that Baptists lack intellectual and academic validity. And this excuse was given to a pastor with a doctorate in church history from Cambridge.

The other day, I prepared a document for a Catholic neighbor who had returned to Rome because, he said, papal doctrine never changes. Included were citations from the Bible, Augustine, Peter Lombard, Thomas Aquinas, and The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church, all showing that Roman doctrine has changed and will change in the future.

At some point in our conversion, it became clear that her priest, whom she talked to about these things, was unaware of the role of Peter Lombard in the development of Roman dogma. And when I pointed this out, I was informed that unlike the scholarly and academic Protestant clergy, Catholic priests are much more about relationships and mystery.

I might add several more examples of Roman Catholicism’s flexibility: a Presbyterian who became a Roman Catholic because of the idea of consuming God in the Mass (utterly pagan though this idea is), feminists who feel affirmed by Mary devotion, communist priests in Latin America, and a nice director of the Newman Center in Iowa City who explained to me that papal bulls are like Paul’s epistles—one man’s opinion. On top of all that, my last two houses have had St. Joseph statues buried upside down in the front yard by the owner or the realtor.

Roman Catholicism is flexible! Her practice and doctrine is amorphous. She can be almost openly pagan while almost wholly scholastic. The local Catholic priest may be an ignorant redneck from Maine, a brilliant Nigerian trained in Rome, a feminist Charismatic, or still giving the Tridentine Mass of only the wafer in Latin. Your Catholic neighbor may be a Christeaster (one who attends church only on Christmas and Easter), a devotee to the rosary, mostly evangelical, a member of Opus Dei, or a faithful Vatican II Catholic.

Rome sits on her seven hills attempting to prove that all roads lead to her. She can be all things to all people, but using a rather different model than the Apostle Paul.

And this brings us to the problem of how to witness to our Roman Catholic neighbors, defend our congregations against her apologists, and inform ourselves and others about her doctrine and practice.

Three Resources

Allow me to suggest three resources: they are in order of importance—the Bible, Allison’s Roman Catholic Theology and Practice: An Evangelical Assessment, and the Catechism of the Catholic Church.

The Bible First

We must begin and end with the Bible alone, because if folks are saved out of Roman Catholicism, it is by the Spirit of God drawing them through the Word.

Further, the Bible is something that we share with Rome. Yes, they have poor translations and some uninspired books—the point is that Rome continues to claim and tell her followers that her doctrine is based on the Bible, tradition, and the magisterium of the church.

As Protestants we share in some of the traditions—Christmas, Easter, and so forth;we share most of their Bible; but we abhor and reject the magisterium. Rome’s claim to authority and the weight of her gospel rests on the magisterium. The magisterium is the absolute authority of Rome to define reality for Catholics.

If we approach our neighbors as experts on the magisterium of the Roman Church, we may inadvertently teach them what their system teaches they ought to believe rather than what they do believe. We really have very little idea what an individual Catholic believes or knows about doctrine. And the last thing we want to do is teach a bad Catholic how to be a “good” one without having them confront God’s Word.

Our calling is to press God’s Word on the false beliefs of Catholic neighbors, and those false beliefs may or may not be taught by Rome. Would that all Catholics held to some of the true doctrine taught by her—that abortion is sin, the truth of the Trinity, the incarnation and deity of Christ, the inspiration of Scripture, the imminent return of Christ, the virgin birth, and more.

The Catechism

Thus allow me to introduce you to the Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC). It’s the first universal catechism for Catholics since era of the Council of Trent (1545-1563). The main author—or at least the theological mind behind the catechism—is the man now known as Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI. He completed the work in 1992 as Cardinal Ratzinger.

The CCC was designed specifically to assist Catholic congregations in implementing Vatican II (1962-1965). And Pope John Paul II (1920-2005) helpfully added these words, in the Prologue:

The Catechism of the Catholic Church…is a statement of the Church’s faith and of catholic doctrine, attested to or illumined by Sacred Scripture, the Apostolic Tradition, and the Church’s Magisterium…. [It] is offered to every individual who asks us to give an account of the hope that is in us (cf. 1 Pt 3:15) and who wants to know what the Catholic Church believes.

So the catechism is what Catholics ought to believe and what ought to be taught at the local Catholic church. The CCC provides what the current magisterium of the church is claiming. It’s written so that non-Catholics can grasp what the pope teaches. But please remember that the differences between individual Catholic priests and parishioners’ beliefs and sophistication are as great as among Baptist pastors and church members.

The most tempting thing for an aspiring apologist to do with the catechism is to dig up horrifying quotes like this commentary on praying to Mary in CCC-2677:

By asking Mary to pray for us, we acknowledge ourselves to be poor sinners and we address ourselves to the “Mother of Mercy,” the All-Holy-One. We give ourselves over to her now, in the Today of our lives. And our trust broadens further, already at the present moment, to surrender “the hour of death” wholly to her care. May she be there as she was at her son’s death on the cross. May she welcome us as our mother at the hour of our passing to lead us to her son, Jesus, in paradise.

While the catechism is full of such statements, proof texting out of the catechism tends to make non-Catholics feel vindicated, but it doesn’t explain how the system works. We can list a dozen places where Mary is granted divine attributes, but we don’t know the theological justification as to why she’s allowed such powers.

Further, we must also notice that the catechism carefully refuses to grant Mary full divinity:

Mary’s function as mother of men in no way obscures or diminishes this unique mediation of Christ, but rather shows its power. But the Blessed Virgin’s salutary influence on men…[ellipses theirs] flows forth from the superabundance of the merits of Christ, rests on his mediation, depends entirely on it, and draws all its power from it.

…

No creature could ever be counted along with the Incarnate Word and Redeemer; but just as the priesthood of Christ is shared in various ways both by his ministers and the faithful, and as the one goodness of God is radiated in different ways among his creatures, so also the unique mediation of the Redeemer does not exclude but rather gives rise to a manifold cooperation which is but a share in this one source. (CCC-970)

Charging into a Facebook discussion about the Roman Catholic doctrine of Mary needs to be done with a bit of care, because a sophisticated Catholic can argue for the appearance rather than reality of idolatry.

Allison’s Assessment

And it’s here that we come to Allison’s Roman Catholic Theology and Practice: An Evangelical Assessment, published by Crossway in 2014.

Dr. Allison is a professor at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky, a former missionary to Italy and former Cru staffer to Notre Dame University in Indiana. He has written a scholarly and evangelical assessment of the CCC.

Allison carefully notes where Protestants and Catholics agree and disagree in theology, then works through the major sections of the CCC providing a Protestant critique of the Roman system. He carefully demarcates between Baptist, Presbyterian, Calvinist, Arminian, Covenantal, and Dispensational responses to Catholic doctrine. His individual comments are valuable, but the most important insight is explaining the coherence of the papal theological system.

Allison finds the fundamental difference between Roman Catholics and Protestants in the issues of nature-grace interdependence and the Christ-church interconnectedness.

The nature-grace interdependence allows grace within the Roman system to function as a spiritual substance that can be stored, traded, purchased, infused, and earned. Further, nature, including the human will, is considered receptive to grace without regeneration. The Christ-church interconnectedness allows the papal system to grant the attributes of deity to saints, clergy, and the church.

These two components taken together then provide a coherence to Roman Catholic theology which may be missed by more piecemeal assessments. Behind transubstantiation, intercessions of the saints, purgatory, papal infallibility, justification by works, and so forth are these two larger conceptions.

In our next article, Lord willing, I will attempt to exhibit how these two big ideas function in the CCC and why they are so important.

Aphorisms for Thinking about Separation: Jesus Separated Better than We Can

Aphorism 8: All applications must include the sure knowledge that we can’t separate perfectly because we are still sinners living in the regime of sin and death. Thus part of the grace we extend to others must include the possibility that we ourselves are too narrow or too loose.

In seminary, a friend of mine from the Midwest told me that his father, who was a fundamentalist pastor, received a letter from a brother in Christ practicing strict separation. The letter informed him that he was being separated from. It was polite and earnest, established the chain of separation between the author and the recipient, and closed pleading that he separate from the closest of the offending parties. The only odd thing about the letter was that my friend’s father had no idea who the author was. They had never met.

My memory of the conversation is that the fellow writing the letter was practicing 5th degree separation, but the memory is hazy, so perhaps it was only 3rd or 4th. But if we were to imagine a chain of 5th degree separation, it would look something like this: the Roman Catholic Church (1st), J. I. Packer who signed Evangelicals and Catholics Together (2nd), prominent evangelical pastor who disagrees with Packer but does not separate from him (3rd), me who also disagrees with Packer, but who will not separate from him or my former pastor who is a friend of Packer’s (4th), anyone who remains in fellowship with me (5th).

It should be apparent that if this list spreads out to include all the signers of Evangelicals and Catholics Together, all the friends of the signers who don’t separate, all the friends of the friends, and their friends, we would soon be fellowshipping with everyone who fits into our hat. And we can do the same thing with associating with Billy Graham, Jack Hyles, Fuller Seminary, the General Association of Regular Baptist Churches, The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, and so forth.

In general rigorist separatists avoid the term second degree or for that matter third, fourth, and fifth degree separation. The preferred language is separating unto holiness: thus we read statements like this quotation found in Mark Sidwell’s The Dividing Line:

Separation does not really admit of degrees. It is directed to the other person because of his deviation from Scripture in whatever ways he may express them. If he runs with the wrong crowd, separation at this point is from him and not from the crowd he runs with. (Rolland McCune, Ecclesiastical Separation, 5-6, found on page 6 of Sidwell)

This sort of language sounds defensible, but allow me to challenge it a bit. Is it defensible to say there are no degrees in our separation from deviations from Scripture?

Consider the implications of this explicit command in 1 Corinthians 5:11 (ESV):

But now I am writing to you not to associate with anyone who bears the name of brother if he is guilty of sexual immorality or greed, or is an idolater, reviler, drunkard, or swindler—not even to eat with such a one.

Jesus defines the guilt of sexual immorality this way in Mathew 5:28—“But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” The Apostle Paul defines greed as “covetousness, which is idolatry” (Col. 3:5).

So then when we come to whom we associate with, are we going to separate based on Jesus and Paul’s standards for greediness, and sexual immorality, and idolatry? Or are we going to use some other standard? And who exactly do we know that we can fellowship with under Jesus and Paul’s standards for greediness and sexual immorality if there are no degrees?

If we don’t have degrees of allowed deviation from the biblical standard, can we even fellowship with ourselves? Under the standard of, “Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect” (KJV, Matt. 5:48), we are all damned to isolation, separated both from God and the people of God.

Further a willingness to repent when confronted doesn’t forgo the necessity of degrees. A godly young man in the congregation who struggles with lust but not fornication is allowed to continue in fellowship with the church even though he stumbles the next week. We do the same with coveting, but we don’t allow multiple repentances with bank robbing or more exotic forms of fornication without separation. We are forced by the sinful human condition to allow degrees of sanctification and therefore degrees of wickedness within our congregations and fellowships. And what is allowed and quashed is often conditioned by local issues.

If the standard of perfection is not our Lord’s standard, what is? Shall our standard be the more or less idiosyncratic practice of a strong personality? So we will we be the people who separate like John R. Rice (1895-1980)? Bob Jones’ (1883-1968) practice of separation prior to 1958 or the shift that occurred in response to Graham? Or shall we separate like Roger Williams (ca. 1603-1684) and A. W. Pink (1886-1952), who both ended life unable to find a church pure enough to include anyone but himself and his spouse? These men understood themselves as obeying God on the issue of separation.

Obviously, our model must be the Lord Jesus Christ who was known as “a friend of tax collectors and sinners” (Matt. 11:19). According to Jesus’ own standards all of his Twelve Apostles, including Judas, practiced sexual immorality, idolatry, coveting, theft, and so forth. Jesus taught this clearly in the Sermon on the Mount, but he didn’t separate from them. And Jesus was separated unto holiness. Jesus was perfectly separated. And yet Christ was “a friend of tax collectors and sinners.”

We’ve been focusing on deviations from the moral norms of Scripture, but Jesus was also perfectly separated on the issue of doctrine. Our Lord Jesus in his human nature had a perfect knowledge of theology. And because Jesus’ theology was perfect this requires that he actively fellowshipped with those with imperfect theology. Many of his followers continued to believe untrue things about him and the Bible. The Apostle Peter was still sinfully separating from the Gentiles as late as Acts 10, causing Jesus to correct his doctrine from heaven (10:15).

We also need to note that Paul allows for degrees of doctrinal deviation in his churches. He explicitly states, “Let those of us who are mature think this way, and if in anything you think otherwise, God will reveal that also to you. Only let us hold true to what we have attained” (Phil. 3:15-16). While Paul’s understanding of theology was not identical to the Lord’s, he himself allowed for disagreement and maturing among his converts as long as they did not reject the gospel.

So what is the standard for fellowship and separation? On the one side we know with certainty on the issue of apostasy and disbelief. But on the issue of how much drunkenness to allow (1 Cor. 11:21), how much sexual immorality (Matt. 5:28), how much greed, even how much murder (Matt. 5:21-22; James 4:2), or how much doctrinal error to allow, it’s an issue of context and wisdom.

Wisdom about unrevealed things, for instance how to apply general commands of Scripture, allows for a diversity of outcomes. This is seen not only in church history, but in God’s word. Apollos and Paul disagreed about how to personally obey Jesus’ command “to make disciples” (Matt. 28:19) in 1 Corinthians 16:12. And they agreed to disagree and moved on while continuing to fellowship and cooperate together.

What both experience and the Bible should make clear is that different godly men and women will often make different decisions in reading the contemporary context and on what is wise. The godly Gurnall (cf. Aphorism 7) disagreed with the equally godly John Owen about the Act of Uniformity of 1662. Bob Jones, Sr., Martin Lloyd-Jones, and Francis Schaeffer disagreed about the best strategy to pursue with Billy Graham. All three to a greater or lesser degree separated from Graham, either in their teaching or explicitly, but the methods were different.

There is a second issue that must be pursued and that is how Jesus himself separated unto holiness. Our Lord separated himself from those who rejected the gospel by taking the symbol of baptism for the repentance of sin. In so doing he united himself publicly and symbolically to sinners. Holiness in Jesus’ estimation included the title friend of sinners even though he himself knew no sin.

Jesus’ separation involved fellowshipping with and worshiping with people who were explicitly disbelieving (John 5:46-47) and misunderstanding (Acts 13:26) portions of God’s word, and he did so not only in the Temple, as commanded by the law, but also in the synagogues. When Jesus entered into a synagogue he was required to obey Isaiah 51:2, as repeated for the church by Paul in 2 Corinthians 6:17, “Therefore go out from their midst, and be separate from them.” Jesus in Matthew 12 (cf. vs. 2, 9, 14), and throughout the gospels, worshiped with people that he describes in Matthew 23:15 as children of hell. Jesus separated from sinners by his obedience to the Law, by his preaching, while uniting with sinners in worship.

Prior to the gospel era, the visible people of God were the genetic offspring of Abraham that had not openly apostatized by profession or gross misconduct (Num. 15:30). As far as we can tell from the Gospels, Jesus only separated from the people of God by preaching against their error. Separating to holiness for Jesus meant even commanding that his followers remain in fellowship with the Pharisees: “The scribes and the Pharisees sit on Moses’ seat, so do and observe whatever they tell you, but not the works they do” (Matt 23:2-3). It is important to note that there is no explicit command to attend synagogue worship in the Old Testament.

In the post-resurrection era, the visible people of God are those who maintain the profession of faith in the gospel (Gal. 1:8) and have not fallen into gross misconduct. And further there is an explicit command to attend church (Heb. 10:25) or the synagogue as James calls it in the Greek of James 2:2.

At Corinth, the only sins that Paul immediately required separation from was apostasy (1 Cor. 16:21) and incest (1 Cor. 5:5). On the other sins listed in 1 Corinthians 5:11, as well as rejecting the general resurrection (1 Cor. 15:12) and visiting prostitutes (1 Cor. 6:16), he takes no action besides creating a timeline for repentance and proclamation.

Local churches are to have professed Christians and a variety of people with different levels of sanctification. Christian fellowships and associations must include the same, because associations are made up of the very same people as found in the churches.

The model given to us in the New Testament on the issue of separation, as in all other issues, is found in 1 Corinthians 11:1, “Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ.” As we strive to separate unto holiness, we must recognize, first that Jesus is our model; second, we aren’t even able to separate as righteously as Christ. We know that Paul could not separate perfectly, because he himself was still a sinner (Phil. 3:12). Paul’s instruction is perfect, but to understand his commands we must observe both his actions within the church and our Lord’s.

It is clear that both Paul and Jesus separate from apostasy. But when it comes to the issue of how much doctrinal deviation or what constitutes gross immorality sufficient for separation, we must use our best wisdom, because that’s what we see Paul doing. And if we claim anything beyond wisdom, we are then adding to God’s word and in danger of being cursed (Rev. 22:18).

At the same time, if we do not separate from apostasy, and if we make no effort to separate from gross doctrinal deviation or immorality by wisdom, we are then taking away from God’s Word and in danger of being cursed (Rev. 22:19).

Simply put, there are no axioms of separation. We have the commands, Christ and Paul’s model, the Spirit of God, the counsel of the godly, but at the end of the day we must act trusting in God’s grace. And we must say for ourselves and others with Paul, “It is before his own master that he stands or falls. And he will be upheld, for the Lord is able to make him stand” (Rom. 14:4).

Aphorisms for Thinking about Separation: Grace Toward the Godly of the Past

Aphorism 7: Our patterns of application of separation today must include the grace we allow the godly of the past.

Gurnall’s work is peerless and priceless; every line is full of wisdom; every sentence suggestive. This “Complete Armour” is beyond all others a preacher’s book: I should think that more discourses have been suggested by it than by any other uninspired volume. I have often resorted to it when my own fire has been burning low, and I have seldom failed to find a glowing coal upon Gurnall’s hearth. (Charles Haddon Spurgeon, 1834-1892, quoted in The Christian in Complete Armour abridgment and modernization printed by The Banner of Truth Trust)

I am in full agreement with Spurgeon. The Christian in Complete Armour is a spiritual delight and treasure trove. Much of my preaching and illustrating from Scripture relies heavily on Gurnall’s example and even remembering his sermons warms my heart to Christ.

Let’s consider a little background on William Gurnall (1616-1679). He signed the Act of Uniformity in 1662, which imposed The Book of Common Prayer, required episcopal ordination, and made the crypto-Catholic Charles II the “only supreme governor” of the Anglican Church. At least 2,000 ministers refused to sign the act and lost their churches. Men like Bunyan, Owen, Howe, and Baxter were persecuted because of the act.

So if we understand the commands to separate to go beyond disbelief and apostasy, when did it stop being a sin to obey these commands in the case of Gurnall? Does anyone believe Paul would have signed off on the Book of Common Prayer as a burden to the conscience of pastors and congregations or accepted Charles II as the “supreme governor” of the church?

What do we do with Gurnall? It’s obvious from Spurgeon’s statement that Gurnall played a role in the worship at the Tabernacle in his preaching. I’ve testified the same. If we must not only separate from apostasy but also those who do not separate, did Spurgeon sin, am I sinning?

This issue becomes more dire if our practice is to separate from those who cling to different practices and boundary markers then we hold to, where is the cutoff point in time?

Weigh with me just a partial list of unacceptable practice of past historical figures off the top my head: C. I. Scofield was a divorced, old earther. Spurgeon smoked cigars. John Wesley’s relationship with his wife was strained to say the least. Both Wesley and Whitfield were open to personal continuing revelation, and Wesley to speaking in tongues. Apparently, J. C. Ryle flirted with Anglo-Israelism; Richard Baxter had the “new perspective on Paul” before it was new. Jonathan Edwards tended towards pantheism or panentheism—depending on how you define the terms. The list of early American theologians supporting or participating in the American system of race slavery is horrifying. Wilberforce was an opium addict, Luther wrote a stupid letter justifying polygamy and said gross things about the Jews, and so it goes through history.

We might be tempted to think that once they’re dead they’re safe. But saved dead people are still worshiping God, and though dead, their example and teaching still influence us. We can’t fellowship with the godly of the past in the sense of intercommunication, but we do fellowship with them in that we allow them to help direct our worship through their teaching and doctrine.

I know the above argument seems a bit strained, and I am aware it is. But here’s what I am attempting to expose: there’s something unreasonable and unholy about publically separating from a seminary that teaches modern theistic evolution while supporting the work of a Scofield or a B. B. Warfield and A. H. Strong—all of whom also held to or allowed an old earth and theistic evolution. And there is something wrong about separating from a living evangelist who directs those coming forward to Catholic churches while lauding as a model a dead evangelist who gave decision cards to Unitarian and Catholic churches but preached against liquor—Billy Sunday.

What ends up happening with historical figures is that we praise God for what they did that we find godly and we separate from them by critiquing what they did that we find deplorable. But what we don’t do is absolutely separate from them, unless they rejected the gospel.

In other words, we tend to follow Paul’s model in the letters to the Corinthians and the Galatians. Paul opens up the letter to the Corinthians with thanksgiving for the work of the Spirit in the lives of the Corinthians (1 Cor. 1:4-9) and then he preaches against the schisms, divorces, drunkenness at the Lord’s Supper, lawsuits, denial of the resurrection, and so forth.

So in the case of C. I. Scofield, I praise God that it was his notes that assisted a group of farmers in rural Iowa to separate from the United Methodist because the denomination had sent down a female pastor in about 1954. The farmers started the Fundamental Gospel Church where I came to know the Lord. But when it comes to Scofield’s gap theory on the age of the earth, Jesus having two wives (cf. notes on Hosea 2:2), prophetic winds sweeping away extra numbers (cf. notes on Daniel 12:12), I am rather more critical and separate from him in my teaching.

On the other hand, when it comes to a teacher like the heretic Pelagius (c. 354-c. 418), it’s much more of a Galatians issue. Paul has no thanksgiving for those who reject the gospel, and his final blessing is to those who “walk by this rule, peace be upon them” (Gal. 6:16). There is no peace between a Pelagius and a Christian or between a Christian and unrepentant T. D. Jakes or Bishop Spong.

And it’s here that we enter into the morass of practical application: it’s easy for us to be gracious about Jonathan Edwards owning slaves. He’s dead, it was legal, and he made up for it by preaching to the Indians at Stockbridge.

It’s also easy for us to be gracious with a Gurnall, but it was a rather different case among contemporary Christians. The contemporary response included statements like this:

Neither is Mr. Gurnall alone in these horrible defilements, hateful to the Word of God and His saints, but is compassed about with a cloud witness, even in the same county where himself liveth, men of the same order of anti-Christians priesthood and brethren in the same iniquity with himself. (J. C. Ryle, “William Gurnall,” in Light from Old Times. Charles Nolan Publishing, 2000, 335)

And it’s here that we come to our current application. I can no longer remember the wag who said it, but the following quote may help us, “the difference between an evangelical and fundamentalist is essentially what they think of Billy Graham.” And while he’s not dead, he is old enough to provide a helpful example.

The response among the godly was various: Martin Lloyd-Jones privately and personally critiqued Billy Graham and refused to publicly cooperate with the Graham Crusades (Iain H. Murray, Evangelicalism Divided, 75-77), but he did not widely publicize his actions. Francis Schaefer cooperated with the Graham Crusades to a degree, but also publicly critiqued his strategies (Ibid. 77).

In the circle of churches that I grew up in, Graham’s actions were viewed with frustration and a degree of exasperation while there was great appreciation for the number of people saved through his preaching.

Others’ responses were more extreme including not only publically separating and critiquing Graham, but also spreading tenuous accusations against Graham, including attending a “marijuana party” (Ashbrook, The New Neuteralism, 85), and against anyone else whom they saw as compromising with Graham. And such authors’ works abound with statements like, “This silly ‘Second Degree’ Separation myth is an invention of the Neutralists, who for the sake of money support or popular approval, refuse to pay the price of obedience” (Ibid, 51).

Personally, as I sit here in my office of a small church struggling to serve Jesus Christ with the gifts he’s given me, it’s not clear to me that my rejection of second-degree separation is motivated by “the sake of money support or popular approval” or that I “refuse to pay the price of obedience.” From what I’ve observed, there’s money to be had and popular acclaim in both separatist and non-separatist camps.

Further, I do not know why Billy Graham cooperated with Catholics or for that matter why J. I. Packer did the same, nor do I know why Schaefer didn’t follow McIntire’s example, or why Lloyd-Jones remained fairly quiet about his disagreements with Graham, or why John Calvin was a hostile witness against his sister-in-law in a suspect divorce case, why Peter Lombard misrepresented Augustine’s positions in The Sentences, or why Augustine and his friends thought it was appropriate for him to abandon his concubine with whom he had a child. All that I know is their actions. I can condemn the actions and doctrine that are clearly ungoldy, but claiming to know the motive goes beyond what I know.

As I’ve read through separatist material and observed my own heart, the key difference that I can see between our assessment of Gurnall’s submission to the crypto-Catholic Charles the II and Billy Graham’s work with Roman Catholics is our perceived ability to identify and judge motives. We assume that we can judge not only the actions but the motives of our contemporaries, but we tend to be more circumspect with historical figures and more willing to be ignorant.

What our graciousness with historical figures and strictness with contemporaries requires is that separation is always contextual and always based on wisdom. The context of our day may require that we limit cooperation with someone like Gurnall, Scofield, or Spurgeon, but we can do so only as our best wisdom and not as if this was the only possible way to obey God.

Next week, we will close with Aphorism 8: All applications must include the sure knowledge that we can’t separate perfectly because we are still sinners living in the regime of sin and death. Thus part of the grace we extend to others must include the possibility that we ourselves are too narrow or too loose.

Letters of Samuel Rutherford

Samuel Rutherford (1600-1661), Letters of Samuel Rutherford

Reprint of the 1891 edition; Carlisle: Banner of Truth, 744 pgs. 

Summary: The letters of the pious, devoted, lover of Christ, Samuel Rutherford. Rutherford was entranced by Christ and had a moral imagination capable of allowing him to exhaustively incorporate the language of the Song of Solomon to describe his devotion for Christ: 

I would desire no more for my heaven beneath the moon, while I am sighing in this house of clay, but daily renewed feast of love with Christ, and liberty now and then to feed my hunger with a kiss of that fairest face. . . . have no other exercise than to lie on a love-bed with Christ, and fill this hungered and famished soul with kissing, embracing, and real enjoying of the Son of God (341-342). 

Yet, the reader cannot be distracted either by our eroticized imaginations or Rutherford’s stretched allegories. He writes with devotional power:

“They lose nothing who gain Christ” (42).

“I have received many and divers dashes and heavy strokes since the Lord called me to the ministry; but indeed I esteem your departure from us the weightiest. But I perceive God will have us to be deprived of whatsoever we idolize, that He may have His own room. I see exceeding small fruit of my ministry, and would be glad to know of one soul to be my crown and rejoicing in the day of Christ” (43) 

“[T]he King of kings also hath servants in His court that for the present get little or nothing but the heavy cross of Christ, troubles without and terrors within; but they live upon hope; and when it cometh to the parting of the inheritance, they remain in the house as heirs” (86). 

“If contentment were here, heaven were not heaven. Whoever seek the world to be their bed, shall at best find it short, and ill-made, and a stone under their side to hold them waking, rather than a soft pillow to sleep upon” (129).

“Say, ‘I shall rather spill twenty prayers, than not to pray at all.’ Let my broken words go up to heaven: when they come up into the Great Angel’s golden censer, that compassionate Advocate will put together my broken prayers, and perfume them’” (590).  

“I desire to desire, and purpose by strength from above, to own that cause. . . .” (686).

The letters essentially span the convulsions in Britain as the House of Stuart under Charles I (reigned 1625-1649) and Charles II attempted to establish an absolute monarchy in the face of popular uprisings, religious dissension, and common law. 

The letters begin in the parish of Anwoth (1627), Scotland, continue into the years of exile as a “prisoner hope” in Aberdeen (1636-1638), his translation to professorship (1639) and principal at St. Andrews (1647), in London (1643) working on what will become the “Westminster Standards,” and then back to Scotland as the Proctorship collapses and Charles the II returns (1660). Rutherford was summoned back to London to stand trial for sedition by Charles, but died before his arrest (1661). His last words were, “Glory! Glory, dwellth in Emanuel’s land.” 

Detriments/Benefits: Rutherford is an example, perhaps the best, of high Presbyterianism. He taught that the national church ought to be Presbyterian and that the government and its agents must submit to the Presbytery in areas of churchly authority (cf. review of Light in the North). 

Further, Rutherford was a scholastic theologian and political theorist, writing Lex Rex for the secular realm, Plea for Presbytery for a national Presbyterianism, and A Free Disputation against the Pretended Liberty of Conscience, defending state persecution of non-Presbyterians. 

Rutherford developed a hermeneutic of Scripture that essentially allowed Scotland to become an Israel, and Presbyterian pastors to become the prophets of Scotland. He freely appropriated Old Testament passages directly to Scotland without considering the differences between the old and new covenant. Such an interpretation allowed him to publicly desire and pray for God’s judgment on other born again Christians who disagreed with him on secondary matters (651), reprobate those who disagreed with him, and to command in contradiction to Scripture, “whosover would keep their garments clean are under that command, ‘Touch not, taste not, handle not’” (703). (Rutherford’s application of Colossians 2:21 is exactly opposite the Apostle Paul.) 

The Banner of Truth reprint contains excellent notes by Andrew Bonar (1810-1892) and a glossary of Scottish and archaic terms (i.e. barins=children, horolouge=watch).   

Having said so much, his letters are a balm and succor to my soul and the majority of Christians who have read them. The overheated language must not be allowed to mask his loyalty and fervency for Christ and a holiness of enormous depth and devotion. The Letters and their historical context are also a reminder of 1 John 4:11, “Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.”

Recommended for all. 

Aphorisms for Thinking about Separation: 'Imminent' May Not Mean 'Soon'

Aphorism 5: No one knows when Jesus is coming back or how long it will be before Jesus comes back, and so application of separation passages cannot be dependent on how close or far the return of Christ is.

The words are startlingly clear—“the Pope of Rome … is that antichrist, that man of sin, and son of perdition, that exalteth himself in the church against Christ, and all that is called God; whom the Lord shall destroy with the brightness of His coming.” This statement is found in The London Baptist Confession of Faith of 1689 (26.4) as well as in unmodified versions of the Westminster Confession of Faith (25.6). Currently most modern Presbyterians and Baptists using these confessions have changed the wording or do not enforce this section. However, some stalwarts still remain.

Let’s unfold the exegesis a bit. There are about a dozen passages of Scripture in play, and application has been made. The “man of sin [has been] revealed, the son of perdition” (2 Thess. 2:3, KJV). The “falling away” has occurred and the person bearing the title “the Pope of Rome” is the end time’s figure of the final antichrist (cf. 1 John 2:18). Of the 7 billion people on the planet currently, only one man or his successor can be the antichrist. There is now no possibility of salvation for some future pope, because he is the antichrist. And there is no point in continued exploration of the meaning of Daniel, Matthew 24, 1 and 2 Thessalonians, and Revelation on this issue.

Our brothers in the 1600s and 1700s created a particular reading of human history and the Bible. The exegesis of both history and the Bible was then made normative and placed in their doctrinal statements and to a greater or lesser degree enforced. The wider context of the unfolding of human history was simplified to provide a single possible context—the pope is the antichrist—and then all Scripture and applications of Scripture related to this were understood under the first interpretation. By elevating a probable interpretation of Scripture and history to the level of a necessary interpretation, they began the process of adding to God’s Word.

Please allow me to be clear the Bible commands separation from apostasy—apostasy liberal, conservative, and historical. As long as any church denies salvation by faith alone, Bible believing Christians should separate from them. Having said this, there is no necessary conclusion within Scripture that the pope is the antichrist nor does history require it. For all we know the antichrist will be an independent Baptist. We should not separate from Rome because we know that the pope is the antichrist, but we should separate from Rome because she teaches a false gospel. We should also separate from Bible churches, Baptists, Brethren, Methodist, Anglicans, Episcopalians, Presbyterians, and anyone else who does not love Jesus as reveled in the Bible. Paul puts it rather clearly, “But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed” (Gal. 1:8, ESV).

We need to highlight a brief distinction here between a necessary and probable interpretation. The doctrine of the Trinity is a necessary interpretation of the Scripture. To hold the unity and diversity of the relationship of the members of the Trinity as revealed in Scripture, one must come to the conclusion of the Trinity. We can add other necessary interpretations—the virgin birth, Jesus Christ being fully God and fully man, inspiration of Scripture, and other cardinal doctrines. These are often rightly called the fundamentals that make up the “faith that was once for all delivered to the saints” (Jude 3). But on other and secondary issues, there are more or less probable interpretations and applications. This is particularly the case in issues of the end times.

What the London Baptist and Westminster Confessions of Faith illustrate is the tendency to absolutize a probable interpretation as a normative application. The list of ways that Christians have made the probable absolute is mind boggling. And one of the first steps is to universalize the context outside of the intention of Scripture or what is knowable—all Christians everywhere must do x, because all Christians everywhere share in the identical context.

One historical way of absolutizing is to assume that the doctrine of the imminent return of Christ necessitates the contemporaneous return of Christ. If the soon return of Christ is knowable, then how the Scriptures are applied is dependent on this knowledge.

The logic of such a misapplication of Scripture might work like this: Jesus must soon return. Therefore Satan is currently preparing his antichrist and the single world religion foretold in Revelation; any cooperation with impure, confused, or compromising churches or organizations is then to cooperate with the end times’ church of Satan. The possibility of reformation or revival within impure or confused churches is rejected because of the lack of time before the return of Christ.*

Please notice, I am not claiming that the pastors and authors who promote this view are setting a date for the return of Christ. But they are confusing the scriptural truth of an imminent return with the likely return of Christ within the lifetime of their hearers.

The rhetoric of “we know the ship is sinking fast” tends to ratchet up the perceived need for separation and to develop models of separation that prioritize separation over the other commands of Scripture. Their reading of modern history coupled with their interpretation of the end times then create applications. Yet to prioritize separation over the other commands of Scripture is directly forbidden by Jesus Christ in Matthew 9:11-13 (cf. Aphorism 4).

Until Jesus returns, we cannot know if the Spirit of God will sweep through the Roman Church, the apostate liberal denominations, or any other group of professed Christians. We cannot separate to avoid cooperating with the satanic one world religion of the last day, because we won’t be able identify that entity until the return of Christ. All that we can do with biblical warrant is separate from disbelief as wisely as possible.

The same tendency that drove the authors of the Westminster and London Baptist Confessions of Faith to identify the pope as the antichrist rather than an antichrist can now be used to motivate separation from those perceived as compromising. The impulse is the same even though the historical motives are somewhat different (cf. Joel R. Beeke and Mark Jones, A Puritan Theology for a fascinating discussion of end time views in the Westminster era).

The difficulty facing all of us on the issue of separation, and many other secondary theological issues, is that we all fall into patterns of interpretation and application. The patterns tend to be ingrained in other theological conclusions as non-articulated assumptions, and we rarely pause to think through the relationship between our reading of the world, the Word, and our applications.

The entire purpose of this series up to this point has been to tease out these assumptions in our exegeses and application to make sure we are biblically framing the issue of separation. We now need to turn to how our patterns of application expose our agreement or disagreement with God’s Word. Lord willing, we will continue next week with aphorism 6.

Aphorism 6: Our patterns of application of separation need to include people to the left and the right on the group boundary markers—our “friends” and those who make us uncomfortable. Grace on believers who are like us or provide advantages to us but no or little grace on believers who are different is a sin (James 2:1; Luke 6:3-32).

Notes

* I’ve included a selection of quotes from William E. Ashbrook to show that this summation is not hyperbole on my part: “[The New Neuteralism] is propagated for the most part by men who at best are shaky and uncertain as to that great New Testament doctrine of the imminent return of Jesus Christ… . Uncertainty concerning the truth of our Lord’s return, coupled with fuzzy thinking as to the rapture of the Church, has provided an open door to the errors of this current neutralism.”(4) “[H]ave highly intelligent men learned no lessons from Church history? Can they not see that embracing New Evangelicalism means helping build the World Church and the World Government of the end times?” (26) “Put these signs together in one unprecedented package and one must conclude we are living in what the Bible calls ‘the last days.’” (118) William E. Ashbrook, Evangelicalism: The New Neturalism (Columbus, OH: Calvary Bible Church, nd).

Similar language can be found in John E. Ashbrook’s writings. Ernest Pickering in Biblical Separation takes a more careful and scholarly stance but comes to similar conclusions.

Also, I would like to make two pleas in regards to William E. Ashbrook (1896-1977) to the readers of SharperIron. My research suggests that Ashbrook was a key figure in the development of secondary separation in the United States, but as far as I can tell this has not been explored by historians.

I am deeply concerned that the primary source documents (sermons, articles, letters, and biographical material) on both of the Ashbrooks may being lost to future historians. So, please if you are aware of primary source documents for William E. Ashbrook or John E. Ashbrook forward them to the Fundamentalist File at Bob Jones University or to some other research facility.

The second issue is that there is rich ground here for a dissertation that would help illuminate the background of the development of fundamentalism in the United States. Please consider this as an avenue of research if you are pursuing a doctorate in American church history.

Aphorisms for Thinking about Separation: Separating from Our Enemies and Friends

Aphorism 6: Our patterns of application of separation need to include people to the left and the right on the group boundary markers—our “friends” and those who make us uncomfortable. Grace on believers who are like us or provide advantages to us but no or little grace on believers who are different is a sin (James 2:1; Luke 6:32-33).

Seven years ago, I became the pastor of a church that had a history of practicing second-degree separation. My exposure to the defense of such doctrine and the organizations enforcing it had been rather limited. And so I began reading, watching, and asking questions. Many of the conversations that I’ve had were decidedly cordial—some less so.

Allow me to share how one conversation about separatism with a representatives of a mission board went:

Shane: I’ve noticed that your doctrinal statement requires that you not cooperate with neo-evangelicals.

Mission Board Representative: That’s right, we’re separatist.

Shane: I see that. My training in seminary didn’t include a lot on separatism. Perhaps, you could help me understand what a neo-evangelical is, because I am concerned that I may be a neo-evangelical and for you to accept money from my church would mean you’re violating your doctrinal statement.

MBR: Aah. Yes, well, “neo-evangelical” is a historical term that’s not really well defined. And our mission board is thinking through exactly what it means, because it’s unfamiliar to the younger generation.

Shane: I see. My understanding is that “neo-evangelical” is often traced to men like Carl F. H. Henry (1913-2003).

MBR: Yes that’s right. Henry was a neo-evangelical.

Shane: So, since Carl Henry and I were both members of the same church when he died, does that make me a neo-evangelical?

MBR: Seriously? Well, not really. What a neo-evangelical is has changed.

Shane: Okay. Well, perhaps, if I named some living folks you could tell me if they were neo-evangelicals. So, Billy Graham?

MBR: Yes, certainly Billy Graham.

Shane: Dr. Mohler?

MBR: Where did you say you went to seminary?

Shane: Southern, where Dr. Mohler is the president.

MBR: As I said, we’re still working on how best to define that term.

What I hope is obvious is that at least with this mission board second-degree separation meant something like “we separate from those who don’t give us cash.” And, as far as I can tell, to hold to such is a sin.

Our Lord Jesus warns in Luke 6:32-33:

If you love those who love you, what benefit is that to you? For even sinners love those who love them. And if you do good to those who do good to you, what benefit is that to you? For even sinners do the same.

The flesh tends to be more ready to “do good to those who do good to you.” But Jesus points out that this is the standard of sinners and not His followers. The flesh finds it easy to love those who love them back and to do good to those who benefit us. But Christ’s followers are to be those who do good to those who provide us no benefit. Our Lord goes on to remind us in Luke 6:37-38 we must have one standard of judgment for the application of mercy (cf. v. 36) and justice.

Like it or not, we feel more comfortable when others’ practices match our general practices. Communication is simpler among those who are similar to us. We intuitively trust those who run in our circles, graduate from our schools, and follow our practice. And we are all more willing to accept benefits rather than detriments from others.

By “practice,” I mean different actions and symbols that are essentially indifferent in themselves in particular contexts. So Jonathan Edwards preached wearing what would now be considered an effeminate powdered wig. Chrysostom wore a toga when preaching, Wesley sometimes a robe. My experience in rural China in 1991 showed that pastors wore long fingernails and open-toed, high-heeled sandals. Each of these in our context would lead to confusion, but in themselves and in their contexts are acceptable.

Practices that do not disobey the intent of the Scriptures are indifferent, and to separate on the grounds of indifferent practice or boundary markers is a sin. We can’t separate because other Christians have different non-sinful traditions. We must also notice that Jesus condemns requiring a higher standard of those who reject our boundary markers.

Boundary markers are doctrines and practices that create boundaries between groups and establish grounds for easy communication and group identity. Boundary markers tell us who is in and who is out of the group. Boundary markers between Christians and non-Christians are things like belief in the deity of Jesus Christ, the virgin birth, inspiration of Scripture, and the other fundamentals of clinging to the “faith which was once delivered unto the saints” (Jude 3). These beliefs create boundaries between Christians and non-Christians. To be a Christian, in the biblical sense, is to maintain this boundary.

Some boundary markers exist between both non-Christians and Christians and are biblical, for instance sexual purity (1 Cor. 5:1). Not all Christians obey God’s law in this area. The boundaries created by God’s word need to be maintained with wisdom and grace by all Christians as a form separation.

Two other kinds of boundary markers

Yet there are two other kinds of boundary markers that we must consider. The first is contra-biblical. Paul provides us an example of this in 1 Corinthians. In Corinth the grounds of fellowship and group identity among Christians were working out as a party spirit based on following particular leaders (1 Cor. 1:12) rather than on being Christians. We also see this attempted on the issue of biological heritage (2 Cor. 11:22) and wealth (James 2:3). Erecting and enforcing boundary markers that are contra-biblical is a sin. Paul tells us that at the heart of contra-biblical boundary markers is to “go beyond what is written,” because to do such leads us to “be puffed up in favor of one against another” (1 Cor. 4:6).

There are indifferent boundary markers described in Scripture as well. These remain indifferent as long as they are not used for sin. So we read in Act 6 that there were both Hellenistic Jews and Hebrews in the church of Jerusalem. The Hellenist were Jews that spoke Greek and generally led a Hellenized lifestyle and had an affinity with Diaspora Jews. The Hebrews were Jews who lived in the Palestinian manner and spoke Aramaic or Hebrew.

It’s not a sin for a Greek speaker to find it easier to speak to a fellow Hellenist than a Hebrew, nor for the Hebrews to find it easier to speak Aramaic in homes with a Palestinian order. But these boundary markers can lead to sin: “a complaint by the Hellenists arose against the Hebrews because their widows were being neglected in the daily distribution” (Acts 6:1).

Further, it’s no sin to be rich. But it is a sin “if you pay attention to the one who wears the fine clothing and say, ‘You sit here in a good place,’ while you say to the poor man, ‘You stand over there,’ or, ‘Sit down at my feet’ ” (James 2:3-4). James’ question makes the point: “have you not then made distinctions among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts?”

James and Paul both tell us the issue is not differences in the church. Christians may have different convictions regarding practice (Rom. 14:5), to a degree different convictions regarding doctrine (Phil. 3:15), and have different levels of wealth, giftings, preferences, language backgrounds and so forth. But we cannot make sinful “distinctions among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts.” Our boundary markers must remain indifferent or be biblical, but they cannot be contra-biblical. Because this is a great wickedness.

And it is here that we come to our boundary markers on separation. Part of the way we can discern if we are sinfully loving those who benefit us above Christians who provide us little benefit is based on our patterns of application. When we only have mercy on our friends—those that have our indifferent boundary markers—we are sinning. And when we are quick to separate from those with different and innocent boundary markers we are sinning. Christians are not allowed to hold to two standards of judgment in their bag (Deut. 25:13; Luke 6:38).

So a community of Christians that rigorously separates from those who provide them no benefits, but allows gross doctrinal deviation among their in-group is sinning. For instance allowing forms of racism as acceptable (a traditional boundary marker) but separating from those who are too friendly with modernism (a progressive marker) as sin. Rigorously separating from an evangelist who cooperates with Catholics but maintaining relationships with an evangelist full of doctrinal error, immorality, and gross pragmatism but who holds to our boundary markers is a sin.

And again, I want to emphasize that both modernist and traditionalist fall into this pattern of sin: the Sadducee and Pharisee impulse is a part of our flesh. Thus when the Presbyterian Church in the USA defrocked J. Gresham Machen (1881-1937), their pattern of separation was to behave as if the gospel was better preserved by taking way from God’s Word, or by consistent Sadduceeism. And this behavior is threatened with a curse (Rev. 22:18).

Yet we must notice the opposite conduct is wrong as well. A pattern of application that tends to support people who add to God’s Word (Pharisees/rigorist/traditionalist) while separating from those who take away from God’s Word (Sadducees/latitudinarian/modernist) is also a sin. To behave as if the gospel is better preserved by adding to God’s Word also has the potential of drawing a curse (Rev. 22:18).

Perhaps, the clearest test of our heart is how we speak, preach, and pray when tragedy strikes those who are not a part of our in group. When a nightmare scenario strikes a moderate evangelical’s family, how do we preach about and pray for him? When an arch-Pharisee is forced to step down because of accusations of impropriety, what do we hope or what level of evidence do we require prior to condemnation? What level do we require for our friends?

Notice I’ve avoided the use of the terms “liberal” and “conservative;” there was a time when to be a conservative was to remain in the Roman Catholic Church and to be liberal was to separate from them. There was a day when liberals stood against the Ku Klux Klan and the conservatives looked the other way.

By an accident of history and English usage the word liberal has come to be identified as a system of doctrine that rejects or minimizes the truth claims of the Bible. I agree strongly with J. Gershen Machen’s conclusions in Christianity and Liberalism—Liberalism isn’t Christianity. But we also need to note that some traditional boundary markers aren’t Christianity either. Conservatism can be just as damning as Liberalism.

Safety is never found in our extra-biblical practice and markers but in Christ and fidelity to His word. We must separate from unrepentant apostasy when it is found among our friends and outsiders. And we must also have the same standard of justice and mercy. The patience and hope we have for our friends must be the same as we have with Christians and professed Christians outside our camp. To do anything else is to begin to either add or take away from God’s word.

Next week’s aphorism continues to work through the issue of our patterns of application.

Aphorism 7: Our patterns of application of separation must include the grace we allow the godly of the past.