My brother, that was a very helpful answer to me in one way, and see if I'm getting what you're saying. I want to address that first point of equity. You're saying that the laws of Israel, with the confession, the laws of Israel, all of them expired with that state, all of the judicial laws, every one of them. So the fact that it's found there is not in any sense obligatory to me because it expired with that state. You're prepared to affirm that, and I think that's what the confession absolutely is insisting. And if that's theonomy, yay and amen, I'm betting on theonomy. But what I heard you saying is, but that, in my, yeah, but now then you said, but that, in my judgment, perhaps Rutherford and Gillespie, the penal laws, nevertheless, They're not obligatory because they were in Israel, because that expired altogether, but they're obligatory because I believe, I see in that an expression of the moral law. And that's the precise pattern of argument, it seems to me, that the Reformed tradition has maintained. But here's the point. It's no fair to say then, if I say, no, no, no, that's too strict. Because God intended that because of the peculiar sanctity of Israel, for you to tell me I'm saying something bad about God. You see that? Which seemed to me, again, what you were saying, you were saying, if I said that law is too strict or that's too harsh or something, so for our land, that seemed to me just the kind of debate that you'd have to have. Is this law reflective of Israel's peculiar sanctity, and thus has a kind of ceremonial Israel element? Or is it reflective of your moral statutes? And that's an entirely wholesome argument, and seems to me ought to go on and entirely helpful. But we may differ on that, and then however we differ, here's the point, then you don't have, see, the earlier argument that you've got to have the absolute standard of God's law to tell you all of these things is vitiated, because it's, you're agreeing with me, it's a matter of us prudentially weighing and arguing, and maybe the majority of us for a certain time will think that that element is a moral element, and therefore ought to be instantiated in a different majority. You see, we're back to the Hurley-Burley of politics and the inadequacies of it, and yet adequate because that's what God intended for our time. Now, with respect to 191, I just know in a moment or two people are going to be thinking, that deconstructionist coffin. But let me say that I had this view before there was deconstructionism, so I plead either the source of deconstructionism or it's rational and not liable to this charge. Listen to, if I can get this quickly, I'm taking a second more, but to explain this point, it needs the second. I hope you'll grant it to me. Well, I was asked to write, you know, I got a comment on two parts of the confession. If you turn to the original in 23, and I presume since we're talking, we've got the Scots in front of us here, The, yeah, this is it. The civil magistrate may not assume to himself administration of word and sacraments to the power of the peace of the kingdom, yet he hath authority and it is his duty to take order that unity and peace be preserved in the church, truth of God be kept pure and entire. Presumably either he knew that truth himself or listened to the church. There's a double problem. It's our General Assembly. We're going to tell the magistrate what the truth of God is, if pure and entire, that he should maintain, or he'll have a council, perhaps the Senate will have a little side, where right now we're arguing about the chaplain. Well, the point is, this is his duty. The truth, God be kept pure and entire, that all blasphemies and heresies be suppressed. Blasphemies and heresies suppressed by the magistrate, by the civil arm. All corruptions and abuses of worship and discipline prevented and reformed. No, suppose we end up with a magistrate who's a willow creaker over here. And all the observances of God duly settled and administered and so on. I'm going to go on. You get the general drift. Now, 191 is perfectly consistent with that. And when that phrase appears, where is it here? The church furnace with gospel officers, ordinance for corruption, countenance, and maintained by the civil magistrate. That's perfectly consistent with that section. Now our American forefathers changed that paragraph. That's not what our confession reads. Our confession reads this. Civil magistrates may not assume the power of administration, word, and sacraments, the power of the peace that came with heaven, or at least interfere with matters of faith. Yet as nursing fathers, it is the duty of the civil magistrate to protect the church of our common Lord without giving preference to any denomination of Christians above the rest. in such manner that all ecclesiastical persons shall enjoy full, free, and unquestioned liberty of discharging in every part of their sacred function without violence or danger, and so on and so on. It's the duty of magistrate to protect the person's good name of all their people in such an effectual manner that no person is to be suffered upon pretense of religion or infidelity to any indignity, violence, abuse, or injury of his person whatsoever. Religion or infidelity, the magistrate has to protect all of them in that. Now, that's a very different point of view than the original Confection. My view, it's a superior point of view. It's a more biblical point of view. I think our American forefathers advanced the cause on this subject considerably, and I rejoice in that. I think they were asleep at the wheel when they amended the Confection of Faith. They caught it in a couple of places. I think that they just didn't notice. I have testimony of that fact from Samuel Miller, or Asheville Green. It's probably Green, Asheville Green in his commentary on the Shorter Catechism. but that these words, countenance then maintained, could be construed consistently with this new section, and they said, well, we'll just live with it. So that what the words meant to the Westminster divines, they didn't mean to American forefathers because they changed the section, which elaborated on that, and that you could understand, the magistrate under the new version, he's to protect this along with all other free associations of his people. in that sense, countenance. He's to protect it from abuses and so on. In that sense, maintain the negative kind of countenance and maintaining, in my judgment, the language of 191 is historically inconsistent with our American chapter, but the language is amenable to the new governing sense and therefore I think that that's the way it ought to be construed. The question is, I must admit that a nation living under the law of God would be beautiful, underline, if, double underline, I could only keep the law, might such a land be what we are to look forward to in the new Jerusalem? Should we be trying to conform this world to be like that which is to come? Where is that mandate in scripture? Well, first, you say if I could keep the law. Well, unless you are a murderer or somebody who's stealing every chance, you are keeping the law in one sense. Obviously, we can't keep God's law in the perfect, thorough sense. We are sinning all the time by omission or commission. But when we're talking about legislation and civil law, then you are is possibly be a law-abiding person because we're talking there about external actions. I can refrain from committing adultery. but I confess I lost which Jesus says is a breaking of that commandment and so I've broken the commandment though I have kept the civil law I haven't broken that thanks be to God but it is possible to do and I think you're confusing two things and that that is part of the problem I think when I say law and word and I'm using the Word of God the law of God and I'm I'm using it in a very broad way. I think that's true and I think that is part of the problem in trying to understand exactly what's being said and I confess that that contributes to confusion and your question indicates that sort of confusion. Might such a land be what we look forward to in the New Jerusalem? No, because then we will not have, if you're talking about heaven, we will not have lawbreakers in heaven, criminals there, so there's no need to restrain evildoers in heaven. The New Jerusalem, as I understand it, is the church. not heaven, the church here and now, which will, of course, be perfected in eternity. So that is probably another question that I shouldn't raise, but there it is. Should we be trying to conform this world to that which is to come? Yes, it seems to me that's the whole point of the Great Commission, teaching men to do whatever Christ commands in all things. Does that mean that we're going to be able to accomplish that in perfection? No. but will we be able to have success in that? I think yes. Now there my eschatological bias kicks in, you see, but of course I do think we will have success in that. I don't believe that we were commanded to pray for something and do something that Jesus knew it was not God's will to enable us to do. Though if someone said, well, do you think it would be perfect? No, I don't. I don't ever. I think there'll be always tears among the weak, but should we seek for real justice in this world? Yes. Should we seek to diminish oppression? Absolutely. Should we seek to punish the evildoer and discourage law breaking? Absolutely. The issue is by what standard will we do that? And my concern is to maintain the word of God as the standard. I think these sorts of debates about how do we view Israel's law, how does it continue, what is not applicable to other places, is the very thing we need to talk about. As I understand the discussions that went on in history, that is the thing that's been in dispute, but that's where we have to continue to talk, but I don't want to throw out the word of God and start saying, well, let your conscience be your guide. Now that's, I'm not implying that David holds that, I know he doesn't, but that's not where we want to go. We want to hold the word of God as the standard. And yes, I do want everyone to conform to that word. I might say, just to put a little pressure on the administration here, that I much prefer the kind of give and take you could have if you could just raise your own question without writing it down. I hope someday we can get rid of this written question business and you could just assault me and I could know who you are and see you and I could answer and so on. And furthermore, I wouldn't have to try and read your handwriting. Is the standard of natural law for justice different from or contrary to the standard of justice, something or other, revealed in Israel's civil code? And the answer is yes, and the answer is yes, necessarily so, because the code either, number one, is also at work ordering a peculiar sanctity for Israel as a covenant people, Or number two, the standard of natural law of itself has to be applied to particular circumstances and need of a people and therefore necessarily any positive law goes beyond what the law of nature reveals. Now the law of nature is perhaps not the happiest terminology. This is the law of God. If we're to set forth our terms properly, absolutely, God's word, his revelation, is the standard for all justice. The question is how do we know that word or revelation? In what place do we find it? And the confession itself is quite plain. Not only does the light of nature reveal the law or word of God, but in fact there used to be regularly ongoing conversations, as it were, with God. So there was another source of the word of God. But now that that has ceased, The better preserving and propagation of the truth and so on the scripture becomes for us with respect to salvation, the final rule of faith and practice. But that never vitiates the word of God or the law of God as it's revealed by the light of nature. That's what I'm pleading for then as a standard. Look, it's right that evildoers be punished. Now the military code reflects this perfectly well. If you have some difficulty while you're on guard duty at a time of peace, it's a different crime than a time of war. The circumstances change the justice of the matter in the way penalties are applied. And the law of nature, or the light of nature, or the moral principles establish the principle to be applied, but then it must be applied to the circumstances where both aggravations, as our larger catechism insists, and mitigations are to be taken into account. The other question here appears to be roughly the same. You use words like just, evil, moral. In relation to the state's duties, how without God's law can the state know what justice or evil is? Well, see, here is equivocation again. God's law. I'm not saying without God's law. If your question is how without the law, the Mosaic code of Moses, can a state know justice and so on, I say easily. God has revealed it in other places accessible to such a state. And that's just what Paul claims in Romans 13. But if you say, how without God's law can there be a justice, meaning God's law in any possible form, law written on the heart, law testified to in conscience, law revealed by the light of nature and so on. I say, absolutely, there's no standard. That's why I urge theonomy or autonomy is a false dichotomy. I'm not saying autonomy, I'm just saying God's law in a different place, a different place than the mosaic code. But God's law is absolutely essential. Without a standard, we're hopeless. We'd be blind. We'd be groping. We'd be calling wrong right and right wrong, and so on. I think this is essentially the same point. This question here, if I haven't fully grasped what you were getting at, And what I've commented on already, I'd be glad to have you follow up in some way. But I think that I've already addressed it at that point. OK, well, this is really overwhelming in a way to get all these questions. And let me get the ones that I've read previously. And perhaps I can get the next one set. Does it necessarily follow that a theonomist is a post-millennialist and vice versa? Is theonomy inherently post-millennial? And then if a post-millennial eschatology underlies theonomy, are we not currently standing, shedding blood over something which is generations away? Would not a post-mill Christian nation have a godly ethic? What does the theonomic debate accomplish? that the victory of the gospel will not. All right, let me run through these rather quickly then. Does it necessarily follow that a theonomist is a post-millennialist and vice versa? No. There are post-millennialists who are most definitely not theonomists. They would bite you if you said it. Is theonomy amenable to post-millennialism? Yes. And obviously because The reason would be is we're not tilting at windmills then. If you actually do believe that the kingdoms of this world will become the kingdoms, or have become the kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ, then that means that the nations will come in, be brought in by the gospel and learn God's word, and go forth walking in his ways. Then, theonomy is very amenable to post-millennialism. I understand, I mean, I have heard, I'm not sure I understand this, but I have heard that some pre-millennialist or post-millennialist, I mean, or the omniscient. I don't quite understand why they would want to be, but you know, there it is, that's what it is. Is theonomy inherently post-millennial? No, I don't think, at least Greg always, Greg Boston always insisted that it was not inherently post-millennial. as I say I think it is clearly amenable to but it's not necessary so now the next one are we currently shedding blood over something that's generations away well I hope we're not what I'm concerned to do is quit this blood shedding on the thing and let's let's have some good talk like I think we're having some is it is it generations away well it seems to me to be generations away like I say I We are not revolutionaries, and I don't believe that reformation comes in a day. Not even if we had a great awakening, would reformation come in a day, because then all you have is a bunch of people who've been converted, but they still don't know how to live, and it takes us a long time to learn to live faithfully. Would a post-mill Christian nation have a godly ethic? I believe it would, simply because we're talking about a predominantly Christian nation. Obviously, it would have a godly ethic. What would the theonomic debate accomplish apart from the victory of the gospel won't? Well, let me just say debate doesn't really accomplish anything. The victory of the gospel is the key. That accomplishes things, and hopefully by talking about this, we'll be equipped to help when the victory of the gospel comes about. I agree entirely that the discussion is very, very helpful insofar as it drives us to first principles. Do you acknowledge that our, that is God's covenant people's, unwillingness to press biblical claims on our of our Lord's supreme rule over every area of life, antinomianism, i.e. antinomianism, has led to or at least significantly contributed to the state becoming an idol to our culture. This is one, again, it's hard to answer for not having clarity on precisely all the meaning of the terms here. I'll start probably where you're least happy to hear me comment. I think in some ways that some elements of what I'll call a degeneracy of theonomic thought, I don't believe thoughtful theonomic folk ever fell into this, but a degeneracy of theonomic thought has actually led to the state becoming an idol. In my judgment, there are folk who've been affected by theonomic claims who actually think the kingdom is going to be brought about. by the advance of the law of God in the nations of the world. Now let me be clear, I'm not saying that thoughtful theonomic folk have ever argued that, but sort of theonomy, as it were, gone to seed is that way in some ways, because it puts far too much, it really confuses eschatology with life in this age. But I'd say that there is certainly many ways in which Christian failure that's non-theonomic has also led to a kind of idolatry with the modern state. But I'd say that it's not precisely because we haven't pressed the claims of our Supreme Lord to have rule over every sphere of life necessarily. It might be in some ways that we would, but the whole question before us is not our Lord's supreme reign, but how that reign is affected in the world today. what are those claims and that's what we're debating. Okay, how does theonomy then explain that he who is without sin cast the first stone and I assume that's referring to John 8 the passage where the woman was caught in adultery supposedly by the leaders and remember they are coming to test they come, they bring this woman and say she was caught in the very act and they challenged the Lord about what should you say. Moses says that such should be stoned but what do you say? Now of course it seems like they're trying to place him in a kind of dilemma. if he's whichever they think they're going to get him where if he says well I think she should be stoned perhaps they had some thought of going to the civil magistrate and raising a ruckus there or if they say no he says no I don't think she should be stoned then they can go to the Jews and say you thought he was upholding the law, he's not, he's denying the law. I think they're trying to put him in an ethical dilemma it doesn't work because It seems to me that he's actually following and applying the procedure set forth in the Mosaic Code. That is, there must be the man and the woman. If she was caught in the act of adultery, as far as I understand that, and I think the Lord himself knew that that could not be done by yourself. So, something is amiss when there's only the woman being brought. And so she's being brought and made an accusation. Jesus, remember, stoops and writes with his finger in the dust of the temple and the stones of the temple and maybe some, I think, a real symbolic significance to that. I'm not sure what it is, but I think there's a real symbolic significance to what he does there. And then he raises himself up and says, well, if I can amplify it a bit, The law says whoever is without sin can cast the first stone. Now he refers to the conclusion, which was there must be witnesses, she has to be caught in the act, and there has to be some kind of evidence presentation, testimony, and so forth, and of course the accused would get to respond, but the innocent party was allowed to cast the first stone. he's not saying you have to be sinless in order to condemn someone rather he's saying those who are innocent of this crime have the privilege of doing that and at that point he again stoops down and writes in the ground and then the people go out one by one being convicted it says by their conscience so we have here it seems to me not a place where he's setting aside mosaic code but rather applying it and it confounded the hypocritical Pharisees and Sadducees. Can the justice of execution for murder defined as a hate crime and imprisonment for some murder deemed not a hate crime be determined? Is it a matter of indifference to God? Well, I would dispute the whole matter of hate crime. See, I don't think that's a legitimate thing. The law concerns actions, not heart. And that is the problem with this whole business of hate crime. I don't think you should be executed. I mean, unless you hate someone and go kill them or, you know, stamp them, then you should be put in prison or you should be punished, I think. Not put in prison, but punished in a proper way. But no, hate is not an indifference. It's not a matter of indifference to God. Hate crime probably is. Please explain the difference between theonomy and Christian Reconstruction. I don't know that I can, but I'm not sure there is a great deal of difference, frankly. Obviously, theonomy is necessary for Christian Reconstruction in some form. but I'm not sure I can explain that. In the case of a person convicted biblically of a capital crime, would a theonomist hold that the remaining spouse be granted the divorce if the state fails to procure execution and widowhood? That is of course a matter of discussion. It seems that Paul in 1st Corinthians 7 talks about lays down and I think expands the term fornication that Jesus says is the ground for divorce for extreme gross covenant breaking. He uses the term, it seems to me like Moses uses the term in the old covenant to refer to these gross forms of covenant breaking which in most cases were potentially capital crimes. In other words, the divorce would have come about under the righteous legislation because your spouse would have been executed. You wouldn't have had a spouse anymore. Paul says the equivalent of that is breaking covenant with you in a gross way. Desertion, obviously adultery, those kinds of things which are very sodomy, those kinds of things which are gross covenant breaking would, in my judgment, be grants for divorce. I add my amen to the hate crime analysis. I think it's very fine, Steve. Is there a clear distinction between the theonomic ethic and the Scottish establishmentarian position? I would have said yes. Again, it seemed to me the peculiar thesis of the theonomic position was that the law of Israel, as Israelitish in all of its parts, was obligatory upon the modern state and that you have a duty to do so. That is very different from the Scottish establishmentarian position. But if it is the theonomic premise that the law of Israel might provide for us instances and grounds of what would be proper and just for the state, then I think that is consistent with the establishmentarian position. I'm asked, could you objectively demonstrate one natural law? This is a wonderful question, in that it has so many terms that just cry out for analysis and further elaboration. Objectively, is that opposed to subjectively demonstrating? I'm not making fun of the questioner. I'm just saying that this manner of praising is just so complicated, it defies the possibility of saying yes or no. Maybe I should have just said yes and sat down. That would have been the easiest to demonstrate what constitutes a demonstration in your mind and so on. But I say this, that if generally you're saying, can I in fact point to the evidence in some way in this world that natural law functions, I think yes. For example, among every society of people, they believe in some way or another there are those who have the right to rule, and they, generally speaking, are thought to have a right to rule for the good, roughly speaking, meaning human flourishing, and to oppose evil. Governments exist everywhere. And they exist, roughly and broadly, on those principles. Roughly and broadly, folk have insisted that it's right to tell the truth. I mean, Lewis, in his The Abolition of Man, a wonderful treatment of this subject, charts out the Tao, as he calls it, in an appendix in that book. The ample evidence of the consensus popular, the testimony of the nations, that the light of nature is in fact shining and folk regularly order their lives by it. It works. Something like this, we can see it in Proverbs. The wonderful passage, I went by the field of a slugger and I saw weeds overgrown and stones falling down. What did I do? Did I think, oh, how odd. What an anomaly. Weeds grow and stones fall down in the field of a slugger. No, I reflected upon it. And thinking to myself, I said, there must be a connection between indolence and dissolution, defect, poverty. And in fact, I framed for myself then a little aphorism, a little lumber, little folding of the hands to rest, and your poverty will come upon you like a vagabond, your want like a strong man, armed man. So I frame for myself a rule out of this, that if you aren't diligent and careful, generally speaking, you're going to find difficulty in this world. So there it is, the light of special revelation in the scripture, in fact, teaching us how, in fact, all the time, of natural law functions. To find the light of nature, I think I've roughly done it in the illustration. Must the light of nature be viewed by the interpretive rule of scripture or majority rule? As I'm insisting, that this is roughly equivalent with God's word, different forms of it. The more explicit form is to be preferred. That is where God reveals his mind and will with respect to special purposes, so that always takes precedence and so on. But they never, properly construing either of them, can be in conflict. So certainly not majority rule in terms of what is right interpretation, but on the other hand, With respect to which interpretations are going to prevail among us, well, majority rule is the only way we have to decide, unless you suppose that the bishops of the church are specially conferred with insight and they ought to rule by fiat or something like that. Roughly, the way that they prevail among us is through the consensus of the eldership. That's what I'm going to say. I'm telling you. Here you go. Now I'm going to go bloop over my head. What is the relationship, if any, between theonomy and NT Wright's identification of the gospel as normative proclamation of the rule and reign of Jesus Christ? I'm not sure, honestly. I really need to think more about that. I really have profited from Dr. Wright's works, and I'm working through them at present, so I'm not sure I'm able to answer that question, though I'm sure it's a great, great question. It's too bad you don't have somebody who can answer it. What would the principles of theonomy imply toward a theology of the kingdom? Well, one would be the definition of the kingdom. Is the kingdom only the church or is it, more broadly speaking, the entire realm of the creation? And see, in my understanding, it is the creation itself. Obviously, the kingdom is most clearly expressed in the church. in the sense that there you have people who willingly delight in the law and rejoice in God's word and want to follow him and do his will and pray for his glory and seek his glory. But as I understand it, that is simply the instrument of bringing in or expanding, as the gospel goes forth, then the blessings and benefits of the kingdom expand. But Christ rules over all the earth. He is the governor of the nations. the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. And all the nations have, in principle, become his. As I understand it, the nations became delivered over to Satan with Adam's sin, as Adam acknowledged the lordship of Satan by affirming his word. So, covenantally, the nations, the world, goes over to Satan. It is bought back by the second Adam, so that Psalm 2 tells us that at the resurrection and ascension, Jesus, by the Father, was given back all the nations of the earth. and now they all rue him. Now, will that have no effect or great effect? Well, I think then you think the rest of the prophecies of the scriptures, the Psalms, and in the New Testament, it will have earth-shattering effect because all the kingdoms of this world have become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ. There are great blessings that will result from the fact that he is now the mediatorial or the covenantal head of all the nations. And so, yes, It will, I think it does perhaps contribute that to a theology of the kingdom, but there's probably more to be said, but I'm sorry I can't say any more. Okay, we've gotten through most of the questions here. We're going to shift to at least one question for Dr. Knight, one question for Dr. Smith. from the conference at large, and we'll see where we are with respect to time. It's been amazing. I've done a lot of conferences over the years. I've never seen this amount of questions come in, which means we have struck some nerves. On your evaluation form, which please, either put them in the box back there or on the table or down, we'll keep the puzzle downstairs. Stick those into us and Two of the topics are extensions of this year that we're talking about, a possibility of worship and role of women. And then the third is sanctification. Also, we would like to address some of the current, again, in the mural discussion, sanctific theology, hyper-biblical theological approach to sanctification, as well as the quietism. So let us know. You should rate those one, two, three. in terms of your preferences. We'll address all of them in the next few years. With counseling, one of the things I'm doing, I'm talking to George Scipione about actually sponsoring an East Coast summer named conference. We do one out there on the West Coast in the summer. If you got interested in that, put that on the bottom of your form as well. so that we could do a summer conference that would be committed to a lot of unanswered questions. And of course, Jay does that for you. He can provoke two questions for everyone he answers. And then leave. But we would like to be working with George Scipione and some of the main people in doing that as well. If you're interested in that, put that in the bottom of your form. Dr. Piper gave me five questions and didn't tell me I was to come up and answer one. Now I'm trying to decide which one of these to pose to you and to answer. I'll pose the second one thinking it perhaps would be most helpful to us. May a woman teach men scriptural things in a non-worship service setting? I think the answer to that is she may on a one-to-one, as Priscilla and Aquila helped Apollos, she is prohibited from the general teaching of the Apostle Paul, verse Timothy 2, from teaching man scriptural facts. The question I have is, if the Westminster standards hold general revelation to be insufficient, how are we to evaluate Van Til's claim that both modes of revelation, special and general, each have four attributes of scripture? Authority, necessity, sufficiency, and perspicuity. Van Til says both of the modes are sufficient for their ends. They are, however, inseparable in their proper function, in Van Til's opinion. Is Van Til a better formulation or not? I think that Van Til is right, and I remember preparing a paper for the class, or prepared a paper, and he made me present it to the class, in which I developed those four different The same four attributes that you find the Westminster Confession in the first chapter do it. The authority of scripture, the necessity of scripture, and then the authority and then the sufficiency and perspicuity can be found with regard to the general revelation. And what his thesis is, and I think it's a good thesis, the Westminster divines do not use this particular language. They say it's insufficient for salvation. And he would agree that general revelation is insufficient for salvation, but he insisted it was sufficient for the purpose that God intended it, namely to be a backdrop for the special. Sometimes I illustrate this with regard to the pre-redemptive revelation in the Garden of Eden, that if there had been only bushes in the garden and one tall tree, And God says you're not to eat of that one tall tree. Adam could have reasoned, well, that's different from what we're supposed to be eating out of, and therefore I won't touch that one. But the fact is that tree, that one tree that God designated because he designated it, that was the test that Adam was really tested on. Will you obey God because God is God? That was the real test, essence of that test, because that tree looked just like all the rest of them. And you see, there's the general revelation, the backdrop. But what made this special, special was God's Word. God said, this tree you're not eager. And that's what made it special, but it stood in there against the backdrop of all the natural revelation that was there in all the other trees. Then after the fall, you see tornadoes. There was one in Wisconsin, I believe, last night from what you said this morning. you see all sorts of upset of nature. And now the general revelation not only points to the general backdrop of God's general revelation, but also to the fact that even nature has been upset by the sin of the peak of God's creation, namely the man who was made in the image of God. And now that nature That general revelation of nature with its upsetness, in a sense, demands almost the redemptive special revelation. I don't think Van Til was critical, necessarily, of the Westminster Confession, and I think that he was simply, in a sense, supplementing what he saw the Confession teaching. But I think that the Confession is, that Van Til's structure is quite correct, that It was sufficient, general revelation is sufficient for what it was intended to be, but it's still insufficient to give us a plan of salvation. The general revelation that now shows the effect of man's sin doesn't point somebody to the plan of salvation. I remember hearing a girl a couple of years ago, just in front of me in the checkout line in a grocery store. I guess it was about Christmas and somebody was asking, well, what church are you going to? I don't go to church anymore. I go to the woods. And I couldn't help but speak to her and say, you will never hear anything about Jesus from the woods. And the man that had first asked her, and he knew her, went on to say, well, you need to be like the live coals. You need to be next to each other. If you break up a wood fire and break it up and pull the pieces apart, they'll all die. And he said, you need to get back into fellowship with the church. I hope this young lady heard us. I don't know that she did, but I don't know her at all. But I hope that she heard us and that she's back in fellowship with God. I'm going to answer a question. Dr. Knight can say anything to this. It was addressed to him, but it happens to be a PCA matter that Dr. Smith and I have been the ones involved in. So I think I'm better equipped to give the answer. And then if Dr. Knight wants to add to that or correct me, tell me that I'm wrong, that's fine. He always has that liberty. He's my boss, as well as my mentor. present situation the PCA is debating at present is debating a situation which could occurred at a particular PCA church regarding women in the pulpit appears that action is being taken against the minister is that consistent with Presbyterianism instead I suggest the action should proceed against the session my question would be who has authority over the pulpit the minister or the session who would have authority to borrow women from the pulpit in the local church it's an excellent question The second half of the question is exactly true, that if one was going to deal with the Church on the issue, then the Presbyterian should be dealing with the session of the Church, but that happens not to be the issue. When we brought this matter to our Presbyterians, I clearly stated we're not dealing with the session, we're dealing with a minister's beliefs. which is the responsibility of Presbyterian. The minister in question was interviewed both by Dr. Smith and me in order to confirm that he held these doctrines. I asked a series of questions to give him every out possible. He answered every question openly and honestly to us that he believes that women may preach. That is the issue and that's why the or press secretaries have petitioned the General Assembly to take jurisdiction. It's not against the session. It's not against the particular act that's involved in there. But the primary thing has to do with his position. So I believe the questioner is right. I was asked at the press secretary, what should we be going after the session? I said, that's not our prerogative at this point. And so I trust. Do you want anything to that? Do you want to add anything to that? The Presbyterian ought to deal with the section and if they don't, the same petition can come from other Presbyterians to the General Assembly during the session. Does natural law ever contradict God's revealed law? No. The natural law sets forward certain central principles that are the moral foundation. I mean, we regularly think about God's law and it's capable of being distilled into a fundamental principle. your nature, neighbor. And then if you want to know what loving God and loving your neighbor is all about, well, if you want to see it spelled out in a more elaborate form, you could go to the Ten Commandments and the moral principles there. But of course, the Ten have associated with them peculiarities. They're given to people who've been brought out of the land of Egypt. They're promised with respect to the honoring of parents that they'll live long in the land which the Lord thy God has given you. Now, unless the Lord's given you any land, recently, that part of it is not relevant to your particular circumstances. It's interesting to note that Paul, when he makes reference to that portion, even at the 10, he changes it. Live long in the earth. Broadens it, regeneralizes it. So there's a moral principle instantiated there, which is then applicable in a variety of contexts. But the fundamental insights concerning right that are available in this revelation never contradict the revealed word because, of course, Now, that's not to say that, of course, God's decree doesn't, at times, contradict his precept. God's perfectly willing to decree things that are violations of his written appeal and his precept, and that's one of the perplexities of this life. But Joseph helps us, gives us the remedy. Those who are the perpetrators of these violations, they do it for their purposes and are simply culpable of God and decreeing it at points of good for his own purposes. I just mentioned, since Dr. Dyer is standing here, that he's correcting me on that interpretation. Today, earth there is a Septuagint word that translates to Hebrew word, Eretz, which means Eden, as it is used in the New Testament as well. Before Dr. Knight does his next, I see Wilkins is off, but he'll stay. We'll say goodbye to you. Here's a rather long question, let's give, good to have you with us, give good attention to it. If women are forbidden to teach men in the church concerning spiritual things, and if there is no neutral ground in any subject matter, so that all subject matters are connected in some way, a presuppositional framework, for example, to spiritual matters, And are you not arguing, in effect, that women should not teach men, period, whether the immediate subject is the scriptures, theology, for example, women should not teach men on any subject matter? I think I can answer clearly in the beginning. The answer is no. And let me give you some examples about this. as well as referring to one figure in the Old Testament. You've come home and you and your wife have had your first baby. She, as someone assigned to give birth to and train the child, has been reading up on all sorts of ways of taking care of the child. And she developed some, what we call, at least commonly in our society, postpartum blues. And she asked you, first time in your life, to change the baby's diaper. Now, there are two alternatives you have here generally. One is that you can go and stick the baby with a pin, not clean the baby up and do a few of the other things. Or you could say to your wife, could you explain to me a little bit about how we do this so that I can do that carefully? I think that's a prudent thing to do. Now, maybe you have a great biblical theology about cow rearing, and you've preached a great series on that, but it seems to me you ought to seek for a little wisdom. Or something else happens, your wife goes in for a serious operation, come home, and she turns to you and says, dear, you're going to have to wash the clothes. And in your marriage, up to this point, because there have been allocations of duties, not because you've jerked anything, you've never gone near the washer or dryer. In fact, you're not sure which is which. You're not sure whether you should put all the clothes together. Well, you've seen her make tiles before, but I don't know why she's doing that. And then there's this container that has borax or something in it. I don't know whether I pour this in first, or the soap, or I do. I don't want to host or pre on this matter. So finally, in an act of desperation, hoping that no one in your church will ever hear about it, you go to your wife and say, I'm certainly willing to help on this matter, but could you give me just a few pointers as to how I ought to do that. Now, it's true that you know how God demands us to be obedient and Cheerful and when I finally in our clothes and so on you have that all Down pat, but you just didn't know this detail. I think you would be wise Now there was a fellow in the Old Testament I Getting to be a senior now. I'm forgetting names. I'm sure someone will remind me of the name of the gentleman and of his wife Yes, you've got exactly Nabal and Abigail, who was determined that David would have nothing that he desired from him. No food for his army, nothing. And he was determined to give him an absolute no, to reject him, even though Abigail could see that David wasn't taking the rejection too well, and was about to come and slit the throat of her husband. So she recommended to him that he respond a different way. David noted that response. And after this man later on died, she saw her she had watched. I think we should learn from biblical examples for good morals are set forth. And I would commend us, therefore, to listen to our wives and all the things that we rightly should do so without encouraging her to keep the spiritual things that we should do. Open mic. Three or four questions here that get beyond actually this assignment about sufficiency of Scripture, but it is dealing with the question of the canonicity. Does the Scripture define its boundary? How does one infer from what counts in the Scripture and what doesn't count? Is the ordering of the book as well as which books are canonical? Is that part of God's inspiration and so forth? Number one, with regard to the matter of the canonicity, I think personally that Laird Harris's volume on inspiration and canonicity states the principle quite well. His principle was, is to the effect that in the Old Testament, as a book was written, the people of God recognized it. Now that's certainly clear with most that when Moses completed his dependitude. It even says that this scrolls of Moses books are to be laid up beside the ark, there to be recognized. Same is said of the book of Joshua, the added whip, the writings of Moses. You see, those men were recognized as God's servants and therefore writing God's word. Now, Harris developed a line that begins after Joshua and goes right on down through to the end of Chronicles, in which you have various prophets named as associated with various kings. And so it's his thesis. You can't absolutely demonstrate this, but it is his thesis, and I basically would concur with him. that each of the historical sections about these lives of these kings and so forth were not written by the king, not written by some general scribe of the court, but written by the prophet who was recognized by Israel as being a prophet of God. And then of course the books of the prophets, the book of Psalms being under David, David is spoken of as the Strong one who sings the words of God and so forth That these various books would be recognized by Israel as they came from the pen of the writers Now Esther perhaps would be one of the most difficult ones to confirm with that was that virtually gets us down to to that sort of Just one or two books that you have a question about the historical books being by prophets as as Laird Harris argues for it Then the prophetic books being by the prophets, both major and minor prophets. The writings, some of them by men who were recognized in office. The Song of Solomon, for example, being by Solomon, and the Psalms, many of them by David himself, or being gathered later under Hezekiah. This was done under God, and the church as a whole, God's people of Israel, would have recognized these books at the time. Now, it's rather interesting confirmation that Laird Harris brings to that, is that Josephus, writing at the end of the first century AD, says that he gives the list of the books. And then he says that there are other books that have been written since the close of that list. And that list, by the way, is the same list we would have if you go to a bookstore and ask for a Hebrew Bible. that we get in the Hebrew Bible today. And then he talks, he's talking about the apocryphal books. He says, other people have written our history accurately, but being without a prophet during this period, they are not counted as scriptures. That was Josephus' view. So it wasn't some council after the fall of Jerusalem that put together the Old Testament canon. It was already recognized and That's the canon that Jesus used in the New Testament. Jesus and his apostles quote virtually every, all sections of the Old Testament. And they quote them as God's word. And one of the bywords of Jesus, you remember, is then the scripture cannot be broken. By the way, he quotes from a psalm at that point and calls it the law. So this great division law prophets and writings all of its law In the sense that God's command all of it is prophecy in the sense It's come by inspiration all of it is sacred writings And so you can divide them in those three ways and yet Jesus Interchanges he talks about one of the sections of the writings the psalms and calls it the law. Is it not written in your law? And he's defending by the way his his claim to be at that point Doesn't back off when they're ready to stone him. He doesn't say, oh, you misunderstood me. No, he continues to claim that the scriptures cannot be broken. With regard to the apocryphal books, and I think there's several of these questions in this, in this listing of three or four questions I have, that's one of the issues. The early councils, what you have in the New Testament, again, let me go back to Larratt Harrisburg. His basic thesis, same thesis, operates in the New Testament. The New Testament writings were either by apostles or by men under the authority of apostles. Matthew was one of the apostles. John was one of the apostles. Mark was not one of the apostles, but the tradition is that he wrote Peter's preaching of the gospel. that he apparently would have written under the imprimatur, then, of Peter. Luke, you know, and this is striking to think about, he was a Gentile. And he wrote the largest number of pages of the New Testament in Hebrew that was not written by Paul. He was quite amazing, Luke Agnes. And what does, we had this reference referred to in some of our addresses, to the effect that Paul quotes both Moses and Luke, and he speaks of them both as scriptures in 1 Thessalonians, or 1 Timothy. He talks about Luke. And so there you have Paul's imprimatur of Luke. Luke acts, you see, would be included there. Peter even, and again an allusion was made earlier, to Peter talking about Paul having written many things, some of which are difficult to understand. But Peter's giving his imprimatur to Paul if there was any question about that and That leaves relatively few books of the New Testament that you have difficulty accounting for but And the church what you have in the with regard to the church in the council is not the establishment of the canon And this is our Protestant principle with regard to canon Who established it the Holy Spirit? He's the one who inspired both the Old and the New Testament books. What you have in the councils of the New Testament church as they begin putting out the list, Marcion's the first one, a heretic, he first puts out his own canon to stimulate the church to respond to it with a better listing. And what you have is the recognition of the canon. And Dr. Knight may want to elaborate on this more because he's much more up on this. But basically that's what you'd have in the New Testament version. You have one of the councils, I believe it's Hippo that recognized the apocryphal books. I think that's correct. But doesn't even put them quite on a par with the rest. And then you see basically the church has in a sense come to the same New Testament books that we would have in the same Old Testament books Apocryphal books mentioned by one of the councils where it comes into Roman Catholic Theology though and their doctrine their dogma was with the Council of Trent Trent adopted the Vulgate as the official Bible the Vulgate had the apocryphal books Attached to it, but Jerome who had translated them. It said they were he didn't believe they were scripture Was willing to attach them translate them have it attached there, but did not hold them on the same level with Scripture So it's there that you have Rome declaring this in opposition to the Protestants with their sola scriptura and the fact that they were going only to what we know as the Old and New Testament books and Rome then coming back in because of the adoption particularly of the Vulgate as the official Bible. then they have, as part of that, evoke the apocryphal books as well. And this is why you have, I think, the Belgian Confession does it and the Westminster Confession does it, simply list these are the books we believe are God's work. The Old Testament is just the same book that we have and the same book we have in the New Testament. So that the councils of the Protestant Reformation were very definite and very specific about that. that they were accepting really Jesus canon with regard to the Old Testament. The issue in one of the questions with regard to the matter of, well, the whole issue of how do you know that nothing to be added, like the Book of Mormon, there's a question about the Book of Mormon, they claim the same thing for the Book of Mormon that we claim for the Scripture. Well, we take seriously Particularly that passage in Hebrews 1 that speaks about God having spoken in divers ways and divers manners in the past, as at the end of these days spoken unto us by His Son. That there's a finality that is noted there. Now, as I had in my paper a reference, the finality is not completed with the leaving, the ascension of Christ, there's still yet to be the writing of it, and Jesus Indicates to his disciples now Holy Spirit's going to come to them and bring to the remembrance all the things that they had said he had said and so forth So that the he prophesied the giving of the New Testament but with the completion of the New Testament And I think we take ought to take seriously the words at the end of the book of Revelation That are not just spoken about that book I mean what they they are true about that book not to add anything or take anything from it But neither are we to add anything or take anything from the rest of scripture. And there is a finality with regards to that final book that is satisfying, has been satisfying to the church down through the ages with regard to that. So I think that we've covered those questions. Let me see, I have one other one. How is the appeal to the writings and statements of their Puritan divines different from the Roman Church appeals to the Pope's counsel, etc, etc? Is it not an argument from tradition? Yes. Perfectly good arguments from tradition, but we don't appeal to it as Trent says you should with regard to the church's tradition. They put it explicitly on a par. We have the Word of God in the Scriptures and the tradition, both of which are given, be given equal reference. We don't appeal to the Puritans in that way, or Dabney, or anybody else in that way. We appeal to them because we believe they've expressed the truth beautifully for us. But we don't put them beside Scripture and say, because John Owen said it, that makes it true. We've had criticism of Calvin, even references, not everybody would hold everything to Calvin. That's what Calvin says. Calvin's not our judge. It's Scripture. Let me see if I've covered everything else. I think I've covered those questions. Thank you. I'll put in an ad here. We... Okay. We... Coffman's talked about logical fallacies, and Art Smith talked about the quoting of authorities. One of the things we do now is teach logic here, and we deal with how do you quote an authority properly and not fall into a logical fallacy, and of course, we deal with the fallacy of justification and others. I will answer a couple of questions about worship. I've chosen one that I think is very important to stimulate your thinking. How can we neglect the lifting up of hands in prayer when this practice is specifically commanded by precept and warrant in both the Old and New Testaments? I think we can. I believe that there are two principles to keep in mind. There are some postures in the Psalms that would be postures that would have no longer any understandability in our culture. I believe that, let me back up one more step, postures have probably come under form with respect to worship of circumstance. I haven't quite decided as I'm working on this. But Rob Rayburn has a very fine principle, and that is when a posture has a transcultural basis when we find in the scripture it's something that we ought to be thinking about doing. I personally believe that one of the real weaknesses in reformed, strictly regulated worship is an ignoring of posture. That's why we use the corporate amen after spoken prayer. We've been doing the spoken amen after singing. standing for the reading of scripture and praying, lifting eyes into heaven in prayers, using the common kneeling. All of these things are areas that you will find in the Puritans and backwards. But in the 20th century, with formed churches, we've lost the whole concept of worshiping God with the whole body. I believe we should lift hands in worship, but we have to keep another principle in mind, and that is the corporate nature of corporate worship. The Westminster Standards speak to the fact that maybe it's the directive of worship, you come in late to service, you don't do your private devotions of preparation, you enter into the service where it is at that moment. You're not supposed to be late, but if you are, you don't pause in private prayer, You must enter into the acts of the assembly. It's a very important concept. Thus, and I believe we can build this out of 1 Corinthians 14 as well, there is to be a corporate order in what we do. Thus, I think it is, I'll make the more extreme example. If we are singing, and three or four of you decide to stand, and the rest of us have been told by the ones in worship to sit, your standing stands out, and you're not worshiping corporately. Thus, when in fact a person on his own lifts hands in prayer in the corporate assembly, a very fine posture in private prayer, but he does that on his own, one here and one over there, he stands out. He's kind of broken out of the pack of corporateness. I think what we should do as we teach our people about worship and plan worship, is to give the biblical defense, both from the Old and New Testament, and lead the congregation in a corporate lifting of hands. The prayer of adoration, invocation, is an excellent time to do that. Now, I recognize that when the minister leading worship lifts his hand, he does that, he acts for all. And that's also an important principle to keep in mind. I would never say that you're sinning if you don't do this. I think it's one of these areas to be governed by the elders. But, how much more glorious it is, and if you worship this way, you understand what I'm talking about. In that prayer, or perhaps in the doxology, after the offering, the entire congregation lifts their hands and sings that to praise to God, whether you use the doxology, the traditional doxology, or a doxology out of the Psalter, It's a glorious thing, and so I can't defend not doing it. I probably have gone way out on a limb over here, and Dr. Smith probably got stalled, but you already saw him. But I do encourage you to think about this, because I believe Our traditionalism in worship, it gets back to the first principles of business. One of the reasons that contemporary worship is sweeping through our churches is because the 20th century generation of Reformed Christians have not made their own, the first principles of worship. We have an inherited traditional worship that happens to be, for the most part, much more biblical than what we're seeing in the contemporary approaches to worship. but we've lost the first people. Let's get them back and worship with exuberance and enthusiasm. Our worship is so pale and so boring, both in our form of preaching and in our form of worship, that is no reason that people, lack of understanding why they run off for these humanly invented trivialities. So we need to Recapture the beauty of Reformed worship and cause and I mean this now with no jesting Steve Wilkins told me this he's actually had Charismatics come to his church Say we never knew That you Presbyterians could worship like this They sing mostly psalms and as somebody's already mentioned David mentioned they sing in a way I've never They sing the way you all have sung here. One little congregation singing like this with enthusiasm and joy and passion. And we need to capture these aspects of worship so God's frozen chosen don't sit there and sleep their way symbolically through worship. So I'm sure I'm way out on the limb at this point. I'm not cutting the limb off. Oh! You mentioned Rob Raven. I had the privilege of worshiping in his church out there in Tacoma. And they have places for you. You can get kneeling benches. During the intercessory prayer, not during the invocation, but during the intercessory prayer, the whole contradiction. And I felt it was quite in order, quite proper. It is. He has a real high sense of worship. David has, he wanted to make a comment about the Eucharist and why you're interested in that. Do you want to make it? David you are quite aware of the Westminster standards saying that God when he created Adam In a sense planted the law of God upon his heart Would this natural law of concept be derivative from that law of God that because he's the image of God, man is the image of God Therefore, what he derived just from his own conscience is really going back to what he was created with. That would be my understanding. Let's stand for prayer. Our gracious Heavenly Father, it has been good for us to be together in these few days. We thank Thee for the privilege that we've had of opening Thy Word and talking about it. hearing it read and proclaimed. We thank Thee for the privilege of singing to Thy praise out of Thy Word, and we thank Thee for the privilege of this corporate worship that we've enjoyed in this way. We thank Thee for the privilege, Lord, of being able to to sharpen our swords, as it were, with one another as we debate issues in a way that is not in any way with anger or antipathy to each other, but rather as loving brethren seeking to understand each other better. seeking to correct perhaps each other at times as things may come up. We thank thee for the conference as a whole, for each one who has been gathered here together on this occasion. We pray now as we will be dismissing that thou would bless the continued exercises of things that will be going on here at the seminary, bless those who will be traveling, grant journeying mercies that all may return to their homes safely. under thy grace and under thy care. And do continue to bless the seminary and bless the Presbyterian Church in America in this year of decision that we may be faced with in our General Assembly. Bless us all now and we ask it in the name of Jesus our Savior. Amen.