We are not very far along into this discussion but I already have a distinct impression that the original question for the forum has been lost, and that it is not terribly important to the proponents of FV. I do not mean this pejoratively or provocatively. I am trying simply to make an observation.
The original premise was what ails Reformed Christianity and what FV was proposing to remedy the situation. Several of the FV interlocuters here seem to reveal little investment in being Reformed. It is by no means a bad Christian identity. And so far as it goes it is an adequate expression of the Christian religion. But as for fixing it, well, that was not the point of FV.
To try to prove the validity of this perception let me cite remarks about FV simply being biblical, or those calling for a revision of the Reformed tradition’s federal theology, or other remarks about all that Reformed folk have to learn from other traditions, or those warning against Reformed sectarianism.
All of these comments come across to this Presbyterian-on-steroids as lukewarm about the Reformed faith. Chalk this up to my own sectarianism if you want. But I find it odd that anyone claiming to be a high church Calvinist would be blasé about weakening Reformed resolve. My own sense of being in this tradition is that it needs to be defended, maintained, and nurtured, and that this happens by defining it often against other Christian expressions. Yes, the work of tradition maintenance also requires positive nurture, but the boundary markers are crucial. This might sound defensive. It is also, as MacIntyre argues, what traditions and moral communities do. To do this it seems to me very important that one’s primary identity and allegiance be with one’s own tradition and community (in this case, communion). This would be an important factor in avoiding disembodied traditions. In other words, as anti-ecumenical as it sounds, a Reformed Christian’s first identity is Reformed and then Christian. To reverse those words is to invite vagueness that however warm and fuzzy is squishy and borders on meaningless.
But rather than starting with the Reformed tradition, what ails it, or what should be done to recover its strengths, the FV folks on this blog at least seem to be more interested in putting together a new and improved theology. This theology may derive some of its substance from the Reformed tradition. But in the end a lot of the intellectual fire power comes from guys who are reading their Bibles and whole bunch of sources to try to get the meaning of Christ and his people just right. That is, let me add, a noble project. I’m just not sure it counts as being Reformed.
This perspective, I might add, suggests a way around the apparent impasse of the Westminster Standards, what they meant, and when they meant it. If the Standards are your sole tie to the tradition, then figuring out its logic and chronology becomes acute (I believe Caleb would call it constitutional). But if you regard the Standards as simply one of many expressions of a theological and ecclesial tradition (a common law tradition as it were), then the actual wording or the reception of them is not as important. As a piece of Reformed orthodoxy you know what the Divines were up to and that they were taking from the past and handing it on to the future. But as a definition of Reformed orthodoxy the Standards become a brittle document that cannot sustain all the weight placed upon them.
Well put. From my point of view as well, the most important questions here concern the Reformed tradition, how it can be properly defended, ressurected, preserved, and brought, more or less, into a state of health.
This presumes, of course, that our tradition is currently under attack, dying, decaying, and sick.
Which brings us back to the original questions posed on this forum.
I guess it depends on what you mean by “Reformed Christianity.” My understanding is that RC is grouped around the weltanschauung of the Reformation, noted in various confessions, committed to the discipleship of the nations, either postmil or optimistically amil, and a few other things that were common coin at the time of the Reformation and for a century afterwards. If by RC one means something else, it may well be that I as a supposed FVer have absolutely no interest in it at all. I’m not interested in recovering the sinfulness of harmonizing when we sing, or of having musical instruments, or of using misleading phrases like “covenant of works.” And so perhaps I’ve no business in this conversation. But then, if that’s what the issue is, then I don’t think the supposed FV, whatever it is, ever had any interest in reviving that kind of RC. God has 99.99% of His believers in “non-Reformed” churches these days, and that’s got to be significant.
Properly defending, resurrecting, and preserving “Reformed tradition” should be all about recovering what ought to be central to our theological life—namely, sola scriptura. After all, our tradition is really kind of an a-tradition. Twenty-seven years ago when I first came into the Presbyterian church I was told that “Reformed” is short for “Reformed according to the Word,” and not “Reformed by constant reference to the Westminster tradition,” or any other “common law tradition” for that matter. Isn’t that correct?
Reforming the Reformed tradition according to the Word does not mean disengaging with what has been passed on to us. Just the opposite. Subjecting our tradition to biblical critique is simply being faithful to our identity as Reformed Christians. Nor does it require us to float about on a sea of disembodied subjectivism.
I believe our Reformed forefathers would be shocked and disappointed to learn that we are still clinging to a 500-year old document as our theological security blanket.
Interesting. Mr. Jordan’s comments suggest that he is as committed to “me-and-my-biblism” as are his baptistic critics.
Pastor Meyers strikes a slightly more conservative note.
Yet, I cannot help thinking. For all the talk of post-modernism among the FV and its supports, all of this sounds a lot like the same old American Protestant modernism.
Reformed first, then Christian is a very stark way of putting it. That’s the position of William Shea in his book “The Lion and the Lamb: Evangelicals and Catholics in America” in which he says, if pressed, he’d rather give up the label “Christian” than the label “Catholic”. I was pretty shocked by that statement, and yours is equally sharp.
This is tribalism. It is honest, but if there is no spirit or worldview of doctrinal criticism that constitutes a Reformed “approach” then we are left with static formulae, divorced from the spirit that motivated their initial construction and almost divorced from some of the major standards that were employed in its construction – the Bible, for one.
I think it comes down to whether subscription is a choice or whether it is an accidental match-up of one’s views with the confession’s views. I admit to thinking more in terms of the latter simply because the Bible is more important to me than fallible applications of it. Consider G.I. Williamson’s role in the creation of a majority report *for* paedocommunion in the OPC. And yet, when it was defeated, he did not register an exception, as far as I know. He simply subscribed – as an act of will – to the Westminster standards. A great act of sacrificing oneself, no doubt. A very anti-individualistic act. But ultimately an act that, if emulated absolutely, could tend to cut the tradition off from further reformation. In the PCA, we essentially take the “accidental” view. We allow exceptions, implying that one embraces the WCF because one generally agrees with it.
To put it another way, “Reformed first, then Christian” is very arbitrary if “Reformed” means something other than a method or pattern of wisdom that continues to reproduce the conclusions, cogently, that the tradition defends.
I also wonder how we can have paradigm shifts within traditions if we do not allow for the proposal of alternate theological accounts that take into account the relatively fixed points of the past while also solving the research problems of the past. I mean, how many strained interpretations of I John 2:19, Hebrews 6, Titus 3, etc. will we have to endure simply to keep “normal science” in place?
Perhaps these considerations are too drastic, though. Perhaps the FV is simply re-asserting one of the views that was accommodated by the very language of the confession that is now being used to judge the FV as lacking.
As for what FV is trying to “fix” in the tradition, perhaps this would be agreeable as a partial list:
1. Symbolic views of the Lord’s Supper, neglect of frequent celebration
2. A two-track soteriology, one for children, one for adults
3. Worship that centers on the sermon rather than culminating with a meal of peace. In other words, worship as “pre-game show” for the sermon.
4. A penitential mood to the communion rite
5. An “annulment theory” of apostasy that has magically produced false assurance and morbid introspection all at the same time.
6. A distraction from God’s real promises made in baptism, the Lord’s Supper, and even in sermons. People are pushed to doubt God’s promises; “Jesus loves me, this I know, because of modus ponens employed in the practical syllogism.”
7. A theory of justification via a “mere imputation” (fiat) rather than by union with Christ.
8. Finally, the decretal “creep” that now makes pastors assure their congregations in a “if the shoe fits, you’re forgiven” manner, rather than applying God’s word to God’s people.
Barlow, at this point in the inter-advental period do you really mean to suggest that there is a generic Christianity? Can you really mean that you know what Christianity is apart from any of its expressions that has dotted the globe since our Lord ascended into heaven? If you think my formulation is stark, I wonder if you should consider your generic approach.
Mine is not tribal. It takes embodiment — the point on which Doug started this whole discussion off — seriously. And once again, I am struck by the looseness with which FV holds its convictions. Embodied but generic, Reformed but biblicist, traditional but free. Again, I know there is no such thing as a FV institution with membership cards and coffee mugs. So there is a fair amount of diversity. But that diversity is looking more and more like either confusion or inconsistency.
I don’t see where I’ve promoted a generic Christianity. What I’m promoting is recognizing that confessions are snapshots of where the tribe is at a particular moment in its doctrinal development. As I wrote:
“if there is no spirit or worldview of doctrinal criticism that constitutes a Reformed ‘approach’ then we are left with static formulae, divorced from the spirit that motivated their initial construction and almost divorced from some of the major standards that were employed in its construction – the Bible, for one.”
The confession is not the embodied church and when the confession is old enough or was adopted without clear records of the nature of its reception, it becomes more of a burden than a blessing to the embodied church.