Marks of the Church

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The good father: you are what you eat...

The last thing you think about when your first child is born is your church. Rather, your mind is focussed on the hospital (or midwife) bill, whether you have enough diapers, how long your mother-in-law will stay, which car seat to buy, whether you and your mother-in-law will get along, whether your mother-in-law and your wife will get along, when your baby's conehead will go away... But the church?

Isn't the church like a sound system; if you have to think about it, it's failed? Your wife has just given birth to your first child and the church should stay in the background. Yeah, the first day or so it would be nice if the pastor and his wife visit, hold the baby, read Psalm 139 (except those crazy verses near the end), pray, and leave. Also, it would be nice if the church women helped with food. They can fill your refrigerator with...


In the Church's womb...

Commenting on the parable of the dragnet (Matthew 13:47-50), Trench writes:

...the Lord did not contemplate His visible Church as a communion in which there should be no intermixture of evil; but as there was a Ham in the ark, and a Judas among the twelve, so there should be a Babylon even within the bosom of the spiritual Israel; Esau shall contend with Jacob even in the Church's womb... This fact does not justify self-willed departure from the fellowship of the Church, an impatient leaping over , or breaking through, the nets, as it is often called; but the Lord's separation is patiently to be waited for.... (R. C. Trench, Notes on the Parables of Our Lord)

Following Trench's footnote pointing to Augustine's exposition of Psalm 126:3 (127:3), "the fruit of the womb is a reward," Augustine...


Elders who rule well...

In two weeks, we'll be holding our conference for church officers here in Bloomington. The conference is February 19 - 21 and it's not too late to register. Our title is "Elders Who Rule Well," and here's an explanation.

Sometime this past year, it struck me that this word 'rule' needs to be restored to a place of dignity among us. It is what elders are called to do, after all, and in a healthy church, most of the session's time, energy, and prayers are given to this work.

Jethro told his son-in-law, Moses, to appoint one elder for every ten people. What was their work?


Making preaching safe for consumption...

Your prophets have seen for you false and foolish visions; and they have not exposed your iniquity so as to restore you from captivity, but they have seen for you false and misleading oracles. - Lamentations 2:14

We oppose the men who evangelize for the Radical Two-Kingdom (R2K) and Redemptive-Historical Preaching (RHP) errors because they leave pastors standing in their pulpits bound and gagged. The only iniquity they expose is the iniquity of preaching contrary to their hermetically-sealed hermeneutics.

Understand, of course, that RHP men haven't said anything new about preaching when they exhort pastors to find the shortest path from the Old Testament to Jesus Christ. This approach may easily be traced back through all the godly preachers of Church history. As I said in an earlier post, our Lord Himself did it on the Road to Emmaus when He showed his travelling companions how Moses and the Prophets pointed forward to His life, death, and resurrection.

Who opposes the preaching of Christ from Moses and the Prophets? Every preacher needs to grow in his knowledge of the Old Testament's proclamation of God's plan of redemption--myself included.

But of course, that's the front end of the RHP plan, whereas the back end is where things run amok...


Burk & Trueman agree: feminism no "erosion of fundamental Evangelical commitments..."

(I)f a blind man guides a blind man, both will fall into a pit. (Matthew 15:14b)

"Seminary profs who make nice with feminists remind me of the Apostle Peter at a church potluck." - Anonymous (attributed)

Denny Burk has written a very polite and respectful response to Carl Trueman's defense of the egalitarian feminists' bona fides as faithful inerrantists (about which David and I commented in this and this post). A good summary of Burk's making nice is this commendation of Roger Nicole he gives in the middle of his post:

Roger Nicole remained a convinced egalitarian and an evangelical stalwart all the way to the end. We can think of other individuals for whom egalitarianism has not and likely will never lead to an erosion of their fundamental evangelical commitments.

It's notable that, in his follow-up to the original post defending feminists' doctrinal integrity at the point of the doctrine of Scripture, Trueman joined Burk in tipping his hat to the late Roger Nicole. Why such obsequiousness toward the late Roger Nicole who, having recently departed this world, no longer has a dog in this fight?

Because more faithfully than any other theologian of the last half of the twentieth century, Dr. Nicole defended the Evangelical Theological Society's confessional commitment to inerrancy. Among professional exegetes and theologians Dr. Nicole was Mr. Inerrancy himself...


Where are the Escondido men when we need them...

This past week, the Anglican Archbishop of Nigeria, Nicholas Okoh planted a new Anglican diocese in Indianapolis right under the nose of The Episcopal Diocese of Indianapolis and its liberal bishop, the Rt. Rev. Catherine Waynick. ...They duly elected and consecrated The Rt. Rev. Amos Akinseye Fagbamiye and enthroned him at the Anglican Cathedral Church of the Resurrection as the first bishop of the Diocese. ...

This is an example of the direct intervention of an African Anglican archbishop on US soil in order to lay the groundwork and foundation for orthodox Anglicanism on these shores. There is not a thing the US Episcopal Church can do about it. They can grind their teeth, yell, and scream to the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Anglican Consultative Council about violating boundaries, but it will all fall on deaf ears. The Nigerians have landed. They want the gospel reclaimed on US soil because, they argue, the Episcopal Church has abandoned the historic gospel... (excerpt of an article by David Virtue)

Anglican bishops from Africa are violating parish boundaries here in these United States, planting orthodox Christian parishes where the presiding Anglican/Episcopal authorities have betrayed the faith. Is this good or bad?

Ask Darryl Hart and his fellow Escondidoites and it's bad...


Quality control in the church...

Anyone else have fantasies of best practices and quality control infiltrating Reformed pulpits and sessions? Is the church really above objective criteria and good metrics? These thoughts were spawned by this article about Pottery Barn's decision not to sell a coffee table many of their customers wanted and had already ordered.

I've asked profs to suggest to their doctoral candidates that they work to put together studies of churches that go beyond hip factors and numbers and dollars, to objective measures of ecclesiastical excellence. Maybe things like proportion of men to women, percentage of sons and daughters of the church who are active in...


Why men leave church...

When I was serving my former churches (a yoked parish of two congregations) an hour north of Madison, Wisconsin, a young man working toward a graduate degree at UW(Madison) served the congregations as a pastoral intern and we became close. As time went by, he decided to enter the ministry and to train at the Christian Reformed Church's Calvin Seminary.

Even then, back in the eighties, Calvin Seminary was going down the tube. Turning our backs on God's Order of Creation, Adam first then Eve, was all the rage and Calvin was drowning in this rebellion. Dutchmen were reaping the fruit of their diffident-to-cold relationships with their wives and children and, having sown the wind, they were about to reap the whirlwind.

Ortega y Gasset pointed out that true thinking begins with exaggeration, you understand.

Another pastor in the area was on the board of Calvin and he told us the school was going liberal and it was only a matter of time before the Christian Reformed Church would follow...


An economist's advice on choosing a Church...

A couple months back, Six Rules for Dining ran in Atlantic Monthly. The article was written by economist Tyler Cowen and had some tips on how to choose where to eat. The article was insightful, but what I found more interesting...


Clearnote Fellowship Conference 2013: She Is Our Mother...

Thank you to our conference chairman, Jared Cochran, and all the brothers and sisters who did the work of Clearnote Fellowship's 2012 Conference, "I Believe in God, the Father Almighty," which concluded yesterday afternoon. The preaching and teaching strengthened me, personally, and it was a great joy to meet new brothers and sisters, as well as to renew bonds of love with those who have been here before.

In our world bound in chains of the lusts of the flesh, the lusts of the eyes, and the pride of life, we must take time apart to sit under the preaching of the Word of God, to pray, to worship, and to share in Christian fellowship. This was our work this weekend and it was food for our souls. Time apart for God and His beloved.

Make plans now to join us next year for Clearnote Conference 2013 titled "She Is Our Mother."

It has been the testimony of church fathers from the time of Jesus Christ that you cannot have God for your Father if you refuse to...


Looking for a church in Toledo, Bloomington, or Indianapolis?

Looking for a church home in Toledo, Bloomington, or Indianapolis? We'll put up a post about Christ the Word soon, but much of what is said here about Clearnote Church Indianapolis and Clearnote Church, Bloomington is characteristic of Christ the Word, Toledo, also.

CNBHomePageIt's hard to move and have to find a new church home. All of us have done it and those of us a part of Clearnote Fellowship want to make your work a little easier by telling you why we love our Clearnote churches in Bloomington and Indianapolis. So read on and spend a little time learning about the work God is doing within Clearnote Fellowship.

First, a few words about our doctrine and denominational roots. If this stuff isn't your brand of coffee, click through and start reading about our ministries.

ClearnoteFellowshipDoctrinal and denominational roots...

The roots of Clearnote Fellowship are deep into the Presbyterian Church in America: I've served as a teaching elder of the PCA in Wisconsin and Indiana for almost twenty years; six of Clearnote Church, Bloomington's elders have been members of PCA churches; son Joseph Bayly who pastors Clearnote Church, Indianapolis was a part of the PCA's campus ministry (RUF) and attended a PCA congregation while studying at Vanderbilt; we have referred many families moving away from Clearnote Church, Bloomington to PCA congregations across the country; and several sons of our church now serve as PCA pastors.

This to say the people of Clearnote Fellowship have decades of experience as members and officers of the PCA, so those of you moving and looking for a PCA church in Bloomington or a PCA church in Indianapolis will find the congregations of Clearnote Fellowship to be spiritual homes where you and your children will thrive. Come and visit our Bloomington or Indianapolis congregations...


Faithful are the wounds of a brother...

If you've not read Citizens' Arrest! Citizens' Arrest!, please read it first. Then this. (TB)

Here's a true story showing how important it is for pastors and elders to challenge one another's motives. Our session (elders board) had been working with a schismatic family of our church for years when MTW TE David Wegener came home on home assigment one year.

We have a policy that David is a pastor of our church when he's here. He'd served our congregation before leaving for Zambia and we have never wanted to lose his wisdom and counsel, as well as that of his wife, Terri, when they're in town. So David favors us with his presence when we have session meetings each month and he often gets into the yoke with us on some of our thornier pastoral matters. Terri teaches our women's groups and David preaches in worship and teaches in Clearnote Pastors College as often as he and Terri are not out deputizing at their supporting churches.

So this particular evening we were again discussing the latest schismatic behavior of this family and David had just gotten back in town and was present. He knew the family well, including that they were quite wealthy...


2011 ClearNote Conference Audio is Available

If you missed the 2011 ClearNote Summer Conference this past weekend, you missed something special. You can still listen to the sermon recordings, though: just click here.


Defend your shepherds from slander...

Sure I am, if it were well understood how much of the pastoral authority and work consisteth in church guidance, it would be also discerned, that to be against discipline, is near to being against the ministry; and to be against the ministry is near to being absolutely against the Church; and to be against the Church, is near to being absolutely against Christ. Blame not the harshness of the inference, till you can avoid it, and free yourselves from the charge of it before the Lord. - Richard Baxter, The Reformed Pastor, (Banner of Truth, Carlisle PA: 1974) p. 111.

When a man rejects the exhortations and admonitions of his elders over a period of years, the time will come when he will turn his back on Christ's Church. If he refuses to repent and continues to give himself to sin, his sin will bear fruit and he will be separated from the Body of Christ. He may find another church that will allow him to hide in his sin; that church may marry and baptize and bury him and his family as churches have done across the centuries; but his repudiation of the discipline of Christ's Bride is his repudiation of Jesus Christ. The binding of earth and Heaven is no game of Angry Birds or Where's Waldo...


Mutiny in the church...

(Tim, w/thanks to Steve M.) Read this post by Carl Trueman. It's almost excellent.

Almost because, sadly, the salient point to make about it is that there are no specifics mentioned, no men and their errors exposed. Sadly, that neglect says more than the good words Trueman has written.

To warn against theological and ecclesiastical and confessional and Biblical rebellion without warning against any particular man is to gnaw with gums instead of chewing with teeth. Until you name names, it's only one more hypothetical construct.

It wouldn't surprise me if reformation 21 had a policy against questioning or warning against any particular man's faith or practice--particularly if that man sells lots of books and is cited more than anyone else by Reformed pastors, today.


Are video recordings of famous men, used in corporate worship services, the true preaching of God's Word...

(Tim) This post was a comment by son Joseph under a previous post titled "Beware of Despising Preaching." I thought it should be a post of its own.

* * *

Let's start with a book of sermons by D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones. These are actual sermons that he preached and were recorded onto paper. You read one of them. Is it a real sermon? Yes. Did M.L. Jones preach it? Yes. Was it the proper preaching of the Word when he delivered the sermon? Yes. Did he preach it to you? No. Therefore, you have not been "under" the preaching of the Word. You have indeed read a written record of the proper preaching of the Word, and it is more than likely to be beneficial to you, but not in the way that you would be benefited had you been present in the congregation when he originally preached the sermon. And similarly, although it might have been infinitely better preaching, reading it is not going to benefit you as much as attending a real church where you are a member, submitted to the authority of the pastor preaching *to* you.

Now let's move to radio/mp3 sermons. The same thing can be said. You've heard an audio recording of a real sermon, but it wasn't preached to you. There is a big difference between the two. (I will ignore radio "sermons"  that are "preached" to a studio microphone instead of a congregation as they are not even preaching in my mind.)

Now what about public video recordings (as opposed to private video feeds, which I will address next)? Here I would make the same argument. Watching a recording of somebody preaching is not the same thing as them preaching to you. And yet there is a big difference between audio and video, isn't there? One difference is that video makes you *think* and *feel* that the person is addressing you directly, much more effectively than audio does. Why?


Beware of despising preaching...

(Tim) This forwarded by Jeff Moore:

Let us beware of despising preaching. In every age of the Church, it has been God’s principal instrument for the awakening of sinners and the edifying of saints. The days when there has been little or no preaching have been days when there has been little or no good done in the Church. Let us hear sermons in a prayerful and reverent frame of mind, and remember that they are the principal engines which Christ Himself employed when He was upon earth. Not least, let us pray daily for a continual supply of faithful preachers or God’s Word. According to the state of the pulpit will always be the state of a congregation and of a Church. (J. C. Ryle)

Multi-site churches where the preaching of God's Word in Lord's Day corporate worship is replaced by a video facsimile of a man preaching God's Word someplace else is not the preaching of God's Word...


Rick Phillips reviews Tim Keller reviewing Bill Hybels...

(Tim, w/thanks to our Redeemer Manhattanite correspondent) Pastor Rick Phillips recently did a post critical of a review of Willow Creek written by the Rev. Dr. Tim Keller. Rick was apologetic as he got started:

Our

poor friend Tim Keller suffers the fate of having his every word parsed

over a thousand times...  For this reason, I try to avoid such parsing...

But fortunately, truth got the better of Rick and he quickly hit his stride. Check it out.


"He Who sits in the heavens laughs."

(Tim, w/thanks to Bob) Uwe Siemon-Netto comments on his fellow Lutherans' approval of the ordination of sodomites to pastoral ministry and the tornado many Reformed men are quick to say should not be attributed to any Divine purpose communicating any Divine message. Don't miss it.


Validity of this and that baptism...

ShowalterFountain (Tim) Often, our session wrestles with the question whether this or that baptism is valid. For instance, if a young woman has come to faith through the ministry of Campus Crusade here at Indiana University, following which several of her Crusade sisters baptized her in Showalter Fountain, should we require her to be baptized again for membership in Church of the Good Shepherd?

We did.

More common are questions related to the validity of baptisms done by churches holding membership in non-profit religious organizations where the marks of the Church are absent and the organization publicly confesses that, for instance, sodomy and baby-slaughter may be acts of faithfulness before God. From my years in the PC(USA), it will increasingly be true that baptisms under the aegis of these non-profit religious organizations and their affiliates are not done in the Name of the Triune God, but rather using the modalistic language of "Creator, Redeemer, and Sustainer." 

Good brother, Andrew Webb, has a helpful blog where he recently wrote about this question, giving a history of the debate among Reformed churches with particular emphasis on North America, and linking to a number of helpful historic documents related to this matter...