All right, topic this afternoon, a bit controversial, but it's necessary. Doug Wilson, heretic or reformer? Doug Wilson, heretic or reformer? In our text is Romans 3, 21 to 28. But now the righteousness of God apart from the law is revealed, being witnessed by the law and the prophets. even the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ to all and on all who believe. For there is no difference. For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, being justified freely by his grace to the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God set forth as a propitiation by his blood through faith to demonstrate his righteousness. because in his forbearance God had passed over the sins that were previously committed to demonstrate at the present time his righteousness that he might be just and the justifier of one who has faith in Jesus. Where is boasting meant? It is excluded. By the law of works, no, but by the law of faith. Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith apart from the deeds of the law. Today we're going to examine how false teachers use tactics of equivocation. That is, they use terms in a non-clear manner. They contradict themselves. They give new definitions to old, well-established terms. They speak in a way that can be interpreted in two different ways. They equivocate and toleration to infiltrate churches with false doctrines. For an example of this procedure, we're going to look at Doug Wilson, who's a vocal advocate of the federal vision heresy. And I'm picking Doug Wilson deliberately. If anybody who's studied the Federal Vision Theology in depth, who's read Steve Wilkins, Steve Schlissel, Baruch, and the others, their statements are quite clear, their heresies are stated quite clearly. Richard Lusk. Wilson, however, is much more clever and much more subtle, and he's actually convinced some people that he's actually indeed Orthodox even though he's a major advocate of this new paradigm, this new heresy. He helps publish their books, he contributes to their books, he's in all their conferences. He hired Peter Lightheart and Peter Lightheart teaches at his school and so forth. Wilson has been exceptionally skillful in speaking out of both sides of his mouth and has even convinced someone as sharp as James White a Reformed Baptist scholar, and he's a good scholar, that his views on justification are orthodox. Now keep in mind, the statements he gave to James White may have been totally orthodox. I could take his writings, and I could take his lectures, and I could take his articles, and I could quote things to you that are on justification and on salvation that are totally, totally orthodox. But I can also quote things to you that are heretical and contradict the Westminster standards and the Reformed And I'm not singling out Wilson because I personally dislike him. I have no axe to grind against him at all. He seems like a fine fellow to me as far as, you know, he's a nice guy and he likes good beer and he likes chocolate. I've chosen Wilson because the Auburn Advocate or Federal Vision Advocates of him, he is the most slippery and, in my opinion, the most dishonest. and dangerous. Give me a Steve Schlissel who flat out says Martin Luther was wrong, we have to reject what Martin Luther said. Or give me a Wilkins who makes very clear statements that are easy to pin down as totally false. Wilson, you can read something on one page that's totally unscriptural and then turn right around and read something that's excellent on the next page. Now I'm not saying that he deliberately lies. I do not impugn his motives. And I have no business attempting to read his heart. I'm not going to do that. He may be totally sincere in everything he says. I think he is. I'm simply going to deal with his public statements and writings, which of course is fair game. It's out there floating around the internet and floating around in magazines and books and lectures. I will simply deal with public statements. I will demonstrate that he has followed the identical procedure of heretics throughout the centuries, in fooling the mushy middle and sloppy churchmen by speaking out of both sides of his mouth and by equivocating, and has really followed the procedure of modernists who destroyed the mainline denominations in the last century. Now, keep in mind, the modernists If you went to a modernist in, let's say, 1920, and you say, do you deny the resurrection of Jesus Christ? They say, oh, no. I totally believe in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. But then if you talked to him a little further, if he was honest with you, you'd find out he completely redefines it. For him, it doesn't mean a body actually came out of the tomb. For him, it's a spiritual experience or so forth. Well, it's the same when we're dealing with the Auburn Avenue people, the federal visionists. They redefine terms and use them in a new way. and they're not clear about it. You know, if you're going to come up with a new paradigm of theology, which they admit it's a new paradigm of theology, you're going to come up with, as Schlissel says, a new way of seeing, you're going to come up with things that contradict the Reformed symbols, the Reformed standards, which they acknowledge, at least the more honest ones acknowledge that it does, then you ought to be clear about it and you ought to have biblical exegesis to back it up. And one thing that's shocking about the stuff they put out, there's very, very little exegesis. It's mostly creative theologizing and giving you conclusions without the supporting evidence to back it up. Well, here's tactic number one, which I've labeled, we are orthodox, leave us alone. We are orthodox, leave us alone. Whenever a new heretical paradigm of theology comes on the scene, the first thing that occurs is a concerted effort on the part of its main advocates to get church officials and the people in the pews to leave them alone. That is, accept them as just another variation of orthodoxy. Yeah, we may be teaching something different, but we're orthodox just like you. Leave us alone. They do this while they spread their new doctrines. The leaven is leavening the lump. It is spraying. If you know church history, the Arians, the Pelagians, the Armenians, and modernists all follow this tactic to a degree. I believe it was Augustine who said there was a meeting where some Pelagians had come and spoken and they equivocated so much that he said, well, he basically said it was hard to tell they were heretics because they were trying to sound orthodox. Well, that's very true. Modernists did the same thing. Modernists were so adept at fooling people about their intentions and the extent of their departure from Scripture that many evangelical Presbyterians in the PCUSA, the Presbyterian Church of the United States of America, considered Machen to be the bad guy for attacking the modernists. How dare you disturb the peace of the church? How dare you hurt missions? How dare you disturb the unity of the church when the world needs the gospel? And us modernists, we just care about Jesus and getting the gospel out there. We're Orthodox just like you. We'll let us look now at Wilson's version of We Are Orthodox, Leave Us Alone. In his overview of the federal vision in the Knox Seminary Colloquium, it's a book that came out quite a few years ago, five years ago or so, six years ago, Wilson writes this. As Christians, quote, as Christians, All participants in this discussion are under an obligation to be covenantally faithful, to be obedient in how we undertake our debates and discussions. We are not charged to be faithful to God's foreordination in this, for unfaithfulness to foreordination is impossible by definition. But we are still charged to be obedient, and one of the central covenantal responsibilities we have in such discussions is to strive for like-mindedness. Philippians 2.1-5, See Psalm 133. That said, In our view, all the positions represented in the current discussion, as well as some others not currently engaged, are part of the historic Reformed world and are Orthodox and Christian. It is important to remember our context. None of this controversy has happened because any of us tried to drum anyone out of the historic Reformational core. We are happy to accept Lutherans, Anglicans, Lingolians, TRs, Southern Presbyterians, and Reformed Baptists as Orthodox Christians, as our brothers in Christ. Moreover, we do not regard their positions as recent innovations, but we are also happy, not surprisingly, to accept our own position, call it what you like, as part of this historic Reformed mix. Just stop for a moment. See, we're okay. We're Orthodox. We're just part of the historic Reformed mix. We may be saying some things different, but we're fine. Leave us alone. Continuing, quote, we do this because we are commanded to. All of us together have one Lord, one faith, one baptism, Ephesians 4, 5. We also do it because we know that certain things in Paul's letters are hard to understand, 2 Peter 3, 16. Of course, ignorant and unstable men twist such things that are on destruction. But in a fallen world, even for those who are not ignorant or unstable, it is perilously easy to misrepresent what a brother is saying if the subject is at all complicated or controverted. I mention this because the scriptural teaching on the relation between faith alone and necessary works, obedience unto life, and the works of the law is easy to misunderstand. It is also easy to misrepresent brothers who differ in discussions like this, and so we have to be very careful, and not only careful, but charitable." End of quote. Now regarding this statement, there are a number of things to note. First, in the Bible it talks about like-mindedness. in the epistles more than once. Things like, let us all have the mind of Christ. Let us be of the same mind. It means that there should be unity in all the essential doctrines. It most certainly does not refer to modern forms of loose subscriptionism where various elders and pastors can hold different views of creation, different views of the covenant of works, different views of the imputation of Christ's righteousness, justification, election, perseverance, union with Christ, and so on, and yet remain within the communion that they claim to be part of. And, as we'll see, these things are redefined by the federal visionists. Wilson's argument that some things in Paul are difficult And thus we need to be charitable as we all try to figure out the truth is disingenuous or simply ignorant. Now why do I say this? Because the doctrines that the federal visionists are redefining have essentially been settled doctrines among Protestants and Reformed persons for hundreds of years. The relationship of faith to obedience. The definition of union with Christ, the definition of election, the definition of perseverance, the definition of saving faith, the definition of even baptism in the Lord's Supper. These things have been around. These things have been settled doctrines for hundreds of years. The doctrines of justification, election, the church is visible and invisible, union with Christ, perseverance, the sacraments and so on are dealt with in some detail in the Reformed symbols. the Westminster Confession of Faith and larger and shorter catechisms, the Heidelberg Catechism, the Belgic Confession, the Helvetic Confessions I and II, etc. Even baptism is defined. The doctrines of the standards on all these issues are settled doctrines. In other words, they were studied, they were debated, the men were in agreement, and they wrote out statements of their beliefs. You can compare all of these documents and they are in agreement. The major disagreement is some of the Dutch documents allow for a few holy days. But other than that, they're all in agreement on all the essentials, election, perseverance, all these things. We're not talking about typical things in Paul that people don't understand and we're having a tough time coming to a conclusion. We're talking about things that were settled 400 years ago, 500 years ago, and have been held ever since. The doctrines of the standards on all these issues are settled doctrines. There was no major disagreement on the major issues, these major issues between the Puritans, Presbyterians, Independents, Dutch and German Reformed, Huguenots, etc. They don't disagree. Now, there were some modern Canadian Reformed or some modern Dutch Reformed who didn't like the Covenant of Works, but they're outside the mainstream of Reformed thought on that topic. Rita Brackle on that, for example. Therefore, to come along and act as though we are all infants groping in the dark attempting to come up with conclusions is not honest. It's simply not honest. I'm not saying he's deliberately twisting the truth here, but he's wrong. When doctrines have been carefully studied by church councils or general assemblies or international bodies of Orthodox pastors and elders, and they come up with a statement of orthodoxy, a statement of faith, we must not treat what they have done like some seminary students, some first year seminary students having a beer down at the pub talking about election for the first time. By the way, once a council, a church council, or a synod, or an international body of church representatives comes to unity on a doctrine, what do they do? What do they do? Or what is one of the purposes of coming to a unified understanding of a theological topic? It is to exclude teachers and elders from the Church who do not adhere to the stated standard of orthodoxy. The Apostles' Creed excluded Gnostics. The Chalcedonian Creed excludes Arians and non-Trinitarians. Dort excluded Armenians. The Westminster standards excluded those who perverted election, justification, perseverance, and so on. A statement of faith is not simply, this is what we believe, and that's a crucial part of it, but it also is, this is what we hold to, and if you don't believe this, you shouldn't be an elder and you shouldn't be a teacher in the church. For Wilson to say we are not excluding anyone from the historic reformational core, And, quote, we are also happy, not surprisingly, to accept our own position, call it what you like, as part of this historic mix, end of quote, is either dishonest or ignorant. Now I've studied this stuff quite thoroughly, and what James Jordan and Peter Lightheart and Steve Slisl and these men are saying is unique. Their definition of regeneration, their definition of election, Their definition of union with Christ, their definition of several major doctrines, the church is invisible, invisible, and so forth, is totally unique. It's totally new. So to act like we're part of this historic mix is disingenuous. Confessions of faith do not simply define what a church or communion believes, but is used as a standard of exclusion to those who reject its doctrines. if one rejects the covenant of works, the church is visible or invisible, the confessional definition of election, the confessional definition of union with Christ, and so on. They cannot claim to be part of the Reform mix. Now, what they do is they redefine these terms. They don't openly admit they're redefining these terms, and sometimes they switch back and forth from the Orthodox use of the term to a confessional use of the term, to then their own new, unique use of the term without telling you. And that's exactly what the modernists did. And if you're going to do that, you're being deceptive. I'm not saying they're doing this purposely. They're just sloppy, perhaps. But you can't claim to be part of a historic mix when you're coming up with new doctrines that contradict what the Confession says. Wilson is speaking irrational nonsense. If these men who redefine a number of crucial doctrines want to start their own denomination, so be it. Go ahead. But they cannot claim to be part of the historic reform mix while rejecting historic definitions of key doctrines. If they want to start their own denomination and have paedo-communion and wear robes and burn incense and have statues and make the sign of the cross and celebrate Lent and all that stuff, go ahead. Don't claim you're reformed. The probable reason that Wilson and his cohorts get away with such irrational nonsense is the exceptionally loose confessionalism of the OPC and the PCA, where a lot of the debate is going on. Confessionalism means almost nothing when dozens of exceptions are tolerated and strict confessionalists are persecuted and mistreated. If you were a John Knox or a George Gillespie or a Samuel Rutherford, you couldn't get a job in the OPC or PCA today. I honestly believe. You certainly couldn't get a teaching job at any of the major seminaries. They'd think you were a crackpot. And this is one of the major reasons I believe the OPC and the PCA have so mishandled the federal vision heresy. They're not very faithful. And therefore, when they deal with men that are, seriously unfaithful. They don't have the guts to call heresy heresy. Now, while it is true that Protestant confessions acknowledge that synods and councils may err, what they have done, and what the Reformed churches in the British Isles, Scotland, the Continent, New England, etc. have accepted as true, cannot be simply treated as the opinion of an individual. I'm talking about what the Communions have done that have had synods and have councils, international councils and so forth. It cannot be treated as the opinion of an individual having a bar after a lecture at a seminary or a theory of a single theologian. The church has spoken on this issue. It has to be taken seriously and given weight. Therefore, how should a disagreement or disagreements or a new theological paradigm deal with what we should call settled confessional doctrines? Well, the proper procedure, whether you are Presbyterian, Dutch Reformed, German Reformed, Independent, or even Episcopal, which although originally Reformed in soteriology is technically not Reformed, And we should never refer to Baptists as Reformed Baptists. You can call them Particular Baptists or Calvinistic Baptists. They're not Reformed, technically. It's to present your views, your differences, your new theological paradigm to the courts of the church for theological analysis and discussion. That's what humility does. If you're humble, if you really respect the church, if you really respect church councils, if you really respect church history and what is accomplished in corporate sanctification, you take it to the courts of the church, you present your views to the theologians and teaching elders and elders for analysis, theological analysis and discussion. This is especially true when we are discussing such foundational issues as justification, the nature of saving faith, election, union with Christ, perseverance, the amputation of Christ's righteousness. These are not You know, this is not a minor discussion about, well, is the Pope the Antichrist? This is not a discussion about a minor doctrine. These are very important doctrines. If Doug Wilson and his cohorts were truly concerned about the unity of the body of Christ and the body of Christ achieving the mind of Christ, having true unity, then they would respect biblical procedure. and debate their doctrines with the chief theologians of the churches and attempt to convince them and or arrive at a consensus. Anybody who comes up with something unique or new that's different that's in the Confession, that's different that's in the Reformed symbols has an obligation to do that. Instead, what do they do? They came up with a new paradigm in theology and they openly admit it's a new paradigm. And they went public worldwide with no consideration for church standards or church courts whatsoever. See what you would do in this situation if you come up with a new paradigm. and it contradicts the Westminster Confession. What you do is you write a position paper with detailed biblical exegesis justifying your position and you present it to the courts of the church and say, look, look at this wonderful discovery about election we have, or look at this wonderful discovery about the church is invisible, invisible. Look at this wonderful discovery about the sacraments. Look at this. What do you think? Now, if you go through the procedures of proper biblical church government, and you think you're 100% right, and the church tells you to jump in a lake after procedure, and you want to leave and start your own denomination, that's fine. But don't stay in that body and corrupt it when they adhere to a standard. What these men have done, in essence, they've logged a theological hand grenade into the Church of Christ with no warning and no theological counsel whatsoever. That's what they did. How did the pastors and elders that I know hear about this? They heard about it. Hey, have you heard about this conference? Have you heard these tapes? Have you heard what these men are saying? This is the height of arrogance and disrespect for the historical creeds of the church. So don't come and say, we respect the creeds. We respect the church of Christ. All we want is everyone to have the mind of Christ and follow The procedure of arrogant fools, which is what has happened. Even if they were right, they should respect church procedure. Because what they have done is they split churches, they've caused untold harm to many churches that have been split, to families, and they've caused a real mess. And they've done all of this with no proof that their positions have been held throughout church history at all. Now, when it comes to their view of sacramental efficacy, they've appealed to Calvin and Zwingli and others, taking things out of context. At least there they try to appeal to church history. They cannot appeal to church history for their views on justification and future justification and these kind of things, which are completely unique. Thus, Wilson's plea for church officials to seek unity and be charitable and accept their new paradigm is like the pleading of a child who just got caught with his hand in the cookie jar. It really is. It's immature and it's dishonest. The federal vision advocates throw a hand grenade into Christchurch and then act shocked when they are attacked for their views. What did they expect? What did they expect when they mocked the Westminster Confession of Faith, when they mocked Martin Luther, when they mocked the Reformation, when they mocked the Reformed symbols? What did they expect? Second, to say there are difficulties, doctrinal difficulties in Paul that are hard to understand and imply, that disagreements over the Reformed standards is somehow in the same category and he's implying that. as key doctrines in the Reformed symbols as comparing oranges to apples. This is deceptive. It is one thing to say that what Paul meant when he talked about baptism for the dead is difficult and we don't really know what he means. And it's quite another thing to say that the key doctrines of the Confession are easy to misunderstand. It's nonsense. When we talk about, for example, the relation of faith, justification by faith, the sanctification. We talk about the relationship of saving faith through obedience. You can read Samuel Rutherford. You can read John Calvin. You can read Martin Luther. You can read Lutheran documents. You can read Calvinistic documents. You can read the Independence. You can read stuff on the continent. You can read stuff on the British Isles. You can read stuff on New England. They all agree. There's no disagreement. They all are in agreement. The symbols all agree. To say that that's the same as baptism for the dead or some difficult thing Paul has to say is simply nonsense. Wilson's example of faith to good works as something that is very difficult is very puzzling in that Lutheran, Reformed, and Episcopal theologians all agree, they all agree, that good works are a fruit of faith. and not the instrument of justification or the same estate, they all are in agreement. I can quote very old Lutheran statements. I can quote Martin Luther. I can quote Calvin. I can quote the first generation of reformers. I can quote the second reformation of Scotland. I can quote the second reformation among the Dutch. I can quote all these documents and show they are all in unanimous agreement. And that would include particular Calvinistic Baptists like John Gill, for example. There's no disagreement. It becomes difficult when you redefine things and you try to basically say that we're justified by faith alone, but we're also justified by our works. When you teach two things that are explicitly contradictory to each other, that don't make any sense, that even smart theologians have trouble getting their minds around, yes, it becomes difficult because you've made it difficult by departing from the standards. So that's number one. Number two, or we could call it tactic number two. We adhere to Reform standards, therefore we must not be heretical. We adhere to Reform standards, therefore We cannot be heretical. Now, one of the more obvious tactics of the federal vision advocates is their insistence that they adhere to the reform standards at the same time that they assert the standards are wrong or contradict the Bible. In fact, I have a quote in a moment where Wilson mockingly refers to the Westminster standards as the Talmud. The scriptures are the scriptures. They're great. Then we have the Talmud. Then we have the Midrash on top of it. With one side of their mouth, they talk about how great the standards are and we hold to the standards. With the other side of their mouth, they talk about how the standards are deficient and wrong. This tactic, like the previous one, was used by modernists in the early 20th century. We will quote Doug Wilson as he first insists that he holds to the standards, and then we'll quote him as he feels free to reject the standards. Now, after the RPCUS, that's the Report Presbyterian Church of the United States, that's Joe Morecraft, which I consider really the best hymn singing denomination in the United States, by far. And if you're a hymn singer and you're a very conservative Presbyterian, that's where you ought to be. If you're in the OPC or PCA, that's where you ought to be. After the RPCUS recommended that the governing authorities over Doug Wilson bring charges against him, forced theological views, spoken publicly, At the 2002 Auburn Avenue Presbyterian Church Conference at Reverend Wilkins Church, which I believe is in Monroe, Louisiana, Wilson submitted to 105 questions. And I forget if it's from the elders of his church in Moscow or was it Moscow, Idaho, or if it was by a panel of elders from his quasi-denomination. But anyway, he submitted to a group of questions. Wilson's church is a member of the Confederation of Reformed Evangelical Churches. This quasi-denomination holds, at best, to an independent form of church government. It's a loose confederation, really. There's really no real presbytery that can bring charges. It, I believe, is more of a mutual aid thing. It's like in the Baptists. The Baptists, you're independent, but if you have a problem, you can request other churches to step in and give a hand. to try to decide an issue. However, they do not have the authority to fire anybody or to defrock anybody. Now, I would take these questions more seriously if Wilson was questioned by an independent counsel, an independent panel, not people that pretty much agree with him. I would like him to sit before a panel consisting of, let's say, R.C. Sproul, Joel Beeke, Joseph Piper, Morton Smith, those kind of people. Now, if he sat before that panel and they asked him a lot of detailed questions and he answered them forthrightly, I would be impressed. But, you know, it'd be like the Pope sitting in front of a panel of his own bishops and they're asking him questions about Romanism. But anyway, when asked about his commitment to the Westminster Confession of Eight, Wilson had this to say. I currently subscribe to the Reformed Evangelical Confession. that Christ's church is in the process of adopting a book of confessions which includes the 39 articles, the three forms, and he means the three forms of unity, that's the Belgic and the, I believe the Belgic, the Habbatic, and the Heidelberg, and the original Westminster Confession of Faith. I have not yet subscribed to the Westminster Confession, but my subscription to the original Westminster Confession is therefore likely. And then on the website of their church we find these comments. As a body of Reformational evangelicals, we seek to display our unity and truth with other faithful churches, not only in the present, but also with the historic Christian Church throughout the centuries. Although not included here, we are also in essential agreement with the historic confessions of the Reformation, including the Synod of Dort, the Belgic Confession, the Heidelberg Catechism, together known as the Three Forms of Unity, the Westminster Confession of Faith of 1646, and the London Baptist Confession of 1689. Now, after reading this, one would think, now what's all the fuss? This guy's confessional. He said he's confessional. There's no doubt about it. He not only holds to the Westminster Confession, but he holds to the three forms of unity. What a great guy. Well, before you come to this conclusion, you need to hear what Wilson says that essentially contradicts these statements. And once again, remember, we live in an atmosphere today of loose subscriptionism. For example, the Westminster Confession of Faith and the continental symbols all teach the regular principle of worship, that nothing should be introduced into public worship that is not authorized by scripture. Well, that's a dead issue in the OPC and PCA and in most of the Dutch groups today. It's dead. Nobody believes in the regular principle anymore, or they give it lip service, but they don't hold to it. They don't really practice it. But anyway, and reformed is not enough. This is a book Wilson put out. He says this. It is our conviction that certain epistemological developments since the Enlightenment have caused many conservative Calvinists to read their confessions in a spirit alien to what produced them. As a result, we, now he's talking about Wilkins, Lisl, Barak, and himself, were taken to task, and that's by the RPCUS, for denying our confessional heritage in just those places where we are in fact upholding it. Our opponents say the confession is right as it gets, typical Christianity in its purest human expression, and then proceed to merrily disregard what the confession actually teaches in this area." End of quote. Look, this statement is completely false and it's baffling to anybody who has studied the Westminster Standards. Regarding it, let's note the following. First, note that he makes a rather bold statement. He accuses modern Calvinists of misreading or misinterpreting the Confessions because they have been influenced by essentially pagan philosophy, a humanistic philosophy coming out of Europe. And I think what he has in mind is probably rationalism, I would guess. But he provides not one shred of evidence for his assertion. It's just an assertion with no evidence whatsoever. And when you make that kind of bold assertion, it would be nice to provide some evidence. Second, his statement is exceptionally odd, given the fact that many commentaries have been written on the Westminster Confession and the shorter catechism, and there have been a few in the larger catechism as well, from the 1600s to until very recently, I think the most recent is R.C. Sproul's, which is probably only a few years old, that are an essential agreement. So, you can compare stuff written in the 1600s to stuff written in the 21st century. Now, I'm not talking about stuff written by liberals. I'm talking about conservatives like R.C. Sproul, and they all agree. Here's just a list. Thomas Vinson, Thomas Boston, Thomas Ridgely, A. A. Hodge, Gordon Clark, R. C. Sproul, J. G. Voss, G. I. Williamson, and I left one out. I forgot his name. What's the one from the early 1800s? Remember that one? You remember that one? Anyway, there's one I forgot. There's a really good one in the early 1800s and I forgot the name. So, you have all these written over a span from the 1600s to the present. And guess what? They all agree. They all agree. Now, I haven't read Sproul's part on the regular principle yet, but generally even people in today's churches where they don't follow the regular principle, usually when they interpret the Westminster Standards, they are faithful to it. In addition, one can read the 16th century theologians' works where they discuss justification, election, the church, the covenant of works. the imputation of the righteousness of Christ, the nature of saving faith, the relationship of faith to obedience. You can read Rutherford and Gillespie and all these guys. And you can go back and read Calvin and all these guys. And one can prove that the modern views among conservative Orthodox Reformed scholars have not changed at all. They haven't. Let's be honest about that. The main areas of change have really been in eschatology. Historic postmillennialism is now not held by very many people, and in the OPC and PCA, amillennialism would be the favorite. And the main change has really been in worship. The regulative principle has been redefined by many out of existence. Now, like I said, if you read the commentaries in the Confession, commentaries in a larger and shorter catechism, Even by modern people, they're generally faithful to what the regular principle teaches. It's just that these denominations don't put it into practice. They make up all sorts of stuff. Third, he accuses the Orthodox Party of misreading the standards, yet the federal visionists acknowledge they are setting forth a new paradigm of theology. They reject the covenant of works. which is pretty much universal among theologians. They accept, perhaps, Wilson, reject the imputation of the righteousness of Christ. It's extremely serious. They redefine regeneration, making it into a corporate thing. They redefine election. They redefine saving faith. They redefine justification. They redefine perseverance. They redefine union with Christ in the sacraments. To say that they hold to the standards is dishonest. and to accuse the Orthodox Party of perverting the standards because the Enlightenment is dishonest. And then to say, well, we're the ones being faithful to the standards and they're not, and then turn around and say, we're giving you a new paradigm, is talking out of both sides of your mouth. So, once again, we're engaged in irrational nonsense, in any case. What he says to Assurist readers is taken back as he speaks out of the other side of his mouth. In his lecture on the Visible and Invisible Church, made in 2002 at the Auburn Avenue Conference, he says this. You've got to listen carefully. Quote, Well, our problem is that we assume that God has broken out of his word all of the truth that is to be broken out. Now we, of course, as conservatives, people who you have sat at Presbyterian meetings where someone said something like that and all the yellow blinking lights in your head went off because you started thinking, uh-oh, uh-oh, uh-oh, because you know what you know is the person, the person who says the Western Confession of Faith is not the high-water mark of church history. The next thing is we need to be ordaining women and we need to be doing this and that. And you have just gotten to this reflex motion. Well, no, I am going to defend, I am going to go down fighting on this one. We are just going to go into rearguard defense action and that's all there is to it. The fact remains that this is an awfully big bluff. The fact remains that there is an awful lot of truth here that we still need to master. And the fact remains that when you try to fix something in history, and when you try to hit the pause button and say, God, that's it, no more, no more, no more truth, Just stop for a moment. Maybe Steelites would say that, but I don't know anybody who says that. That's nonsense. It's a straw horse. It's a straw man, excuse me. Continuing. What happens is that action winds up overturning the truth that you think you are. The truth that you think you are defending. You find that you are the one that is overturning it. In Matthew 23, Jesus in chapter 23 is saying some very unchrist-like things. And the fact that it makes sense to you, the fact that the joke worked, means that you have a whole host of tradition that we have substituted in for the Word of God. End of quote. Now once again we have this incredible, serious accusation made against modern Presbyterians. Not one shred of evidence to back it up. Nobody says that the Westminster Confession is the end of truth. Nobody says that we're not going to make progress in other matters of doctrine at all since the Westminster Confession. But in most of the major areas, does anybody really think we're going to make progress on the two natures of Christ and one person? In fact, we haven't made progress in that since 451 A.D. There are certain settled doctrines where it's been said, you know, justification by faith alone, the nature of saving faith, these kind of things. Has anybody made progress in these areas since the Westminster Standards? No. They have not. In my view, there's been some progress made in eschatology. It's a matter the Westminster Standards don't talk a whole lot about. But, you know, he's setting up a straw man here. Let's get to the particulars here. I don't know whether I should stop here or not. Wilson on justification. Maybe I'll stop here and we'll consider this next week, but let's get to the particulars. Next week, we're going to talk about justification by faith alone. We're going to talk about the doctrine of justification. The Federal Visionists teach three major errors related to justification. Number one, This will whet your appetite for next week. They tie justification to water baptism. Now, keep in mind, with one side of the mouth they do, with the other side of the mouth they say, well, no, maybe not. So, they talk out of both sides of their mouth, but they do. Baptism unites a person to Christ and gives you all the saving benefits of the sacrificial death of Christ. They teach that. But then they turn around and say, yeah, but you can lose your salvation. Okay, we'll get into that. So, that's their view of water baptism. And then, of course, we're going to look at the, another thing we have to look at is their definition of faith as faithful obedience. And then the third thing we need to look at is their idea of future, of future justification at the final day, at the final judgment, based on God evaluating your works. God's going to evaluate your covenant faithfulness, if you were faithful enough. If you were obedient enough, God's going to let you into heaven. You know, it sounds crazy, but... And once again, you have to keep in mind, they'll say something that's totally heretical, Wilson especially. Wilson's very careful. He'll say something that's completely heretical, and then he'll turn around and say something that's totally orthodox. For example, Wilson denies the covenant of works, however, he turns around and teaches the imputation of the righteousness of Christ. He says, oh, I believe in that. Well, it doesn't fit into your system of theology. It doesn't fit into your paradigm. Because if you get rid of the covenant of works, there is no need for the imputation of the righteousness of Christ. It's not needed, you see. Peter Lightheart and James Jordan and Richard Lusk and the others are more consistent than Wilson. But we'll look at this next week. Let us pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you. We thank you for the church that you which in a sense is our mother. We thank you that throughout history you've sanctified the church, you've raised it up, you've brought forth wonderful statements of doctrine that are there to help us, that are guides to protect us from walls and to show us progress that the church has made. so that we would not lose the doctrinal attainments that we've achieved throughout the centuries. We ask, Lord, that you would raise up people who would see the heresy of the federal vision and that the OPC and the PCA would get some backbone and start disciplining these false teachers. And we thank you for the RPCUS and others who have been willing to condemn heresy as heresy and have received enmity and hatred because of it for the cause of Christ. We thank you for those people. We ask that you raise up more. We thank you for John Robbins. We thank you for others, John Garrity and others who have been willing to call heresy a heresy. We hope that their work would be more widely read. We thank you for John Otis and his work. in this matter, in Jesus' name, Amen. Stillwaters Revival Books is now located at PuritanDownloads.com It's your worldwide online Reformation home for the very best in free and discounted classic and contemporary Puritan and Reformed books, MP3s and videos. For much more information on the Puritans and Reformers, including the best free and discounted classic and contemporary books, MP3s, digital downloads and videos, please visit Still Waters Revival Books at PuritanDownloads.com Stillwater's Revival Books also publishes the Puritan Hard Drive, the most powerful and practical Christian study tool ever produced. All thanks and glory be to the mercy, grace, and love of the Lord Jesus Christ for this remarkable and wonderful new Christian study tool. 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