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Onward to the Obvious

“Shall their unbelief make the faith of God without effect?”

Romans 3:3 Geneva Bible

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“Every act of the Will whatsoever is excited by some motive: which is manifest, because, if the mind, in willing after the manner it does, is excited by no motive or inducement, then it has no end which it proposes to itself, or pursues in so doing; it aims at nothing, and seeks nothing.” – Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758), Freedom of the Will [1]

The Wetness of Water

One might dismiss the weight of historical testimony which identifies “faith” as the intended meaning of the Greek pistis in Romans 3:3, [2] concede to the 1881 revisionists, and proceed to adopt the idea that we are called to be “imitators of God” [3] in every matter except “faith.” Or is faith the ground of faithfulness? And that is like asking whether water is the basis for wetness! Could anyone possibly read the Old Testament account of God’s establishment of covenants with Adam, Noah, Abraham, the nation of Israel, and King David and then conclude that God fulfilled every covenant without himself believing in the covenant? Is there any hint of divine indifference, doubt, vacillation, or lack of faith in either the Old or New Testament that would prompt such a conclusion? God’s speech and actions are consistent with his sovereignty, [4] his character, [5] and the specific promises, commands, and warnings which comprise each covenant. [6]

If God did not believe in his own words or actions, no less than being faithful concerning them, he would have to deny himself–the very thing that Scripture says he cannot do! [7] For how could God be faithful to his own word if he did not, in the first place, believe it? Or how could he have placed Adam, and all men, under condemnation and death on the basis of Adam’s transgression, [8] if he himself did not believe what he had instituted in Genesis 2:16-17? In that case (hypothetically speaking ) the serpent would hardly have bothered to  undermine the woman’s faith in God’s covenant of life in order to realize his objectives! [9]

Contingency or Condescension?

God did occasionally employ anthropomorphic language as a means to reveal his divine personhood and to interact with humans. Such condescension is central to the Judaeo-Christian faith. [10] While skeptics insist that such a mode of communication indicates contingency within the Godhead, biblical anthropomorphic language actually depicts the immutable character of God.

The Incarnation redefined the anthropomorphic whereby Jesus Christ, the eternal Son of God, fully participated in our earthly human weakness and struggle, [11] yet without yielding to sin. Unique in self-control, poise, and ministry, Jesus, on our behalf, faced and settled the ultimate human question, “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” At once the greatest test of faith and the greatest triumph of faith, this act of obedience was punctuated by Jesus’ victorious cry: “It is finished!” [12] This is “the faith of God” of Romans 3:3, even as the blood shed on that occasion was God’s own. [13] Later Jesus explained to his disciples how his own death and resurrection on the third day had fulfilled the Scriptures–thereby documenting his faith in the Old Testament, just as he had done in his Sermon on the Mount. [14]

Sine Qua Non

If God did not display his Son as a propitiation [Greek hilasterion], [15] through the “excitement” [16] of a personal faith motive, and specifically “faith [Greek pistis] in his blood,” [17] or if that “faith [Greek pistis] of God” [18] did not represent the “assurance” [Greek pistis] associated with the resurrection of “the man whom he . . . appointed,” [19] there would have been no “good faith” on the Father’s part whatsoever, no covenant at all, and nothing but a fictitious propitiation. These conclusions are inescapable since the public displaying of the Son upon the cross was more fundamentally a foreordaining on the Father’s part which would be inconceivable apart from “faith in his blood.” [20] That foreordaining was significantly reflected in, and that faith was significantly typified by

1. the tree of life in prelapsarian [21] Eden;

2. Abraham’s consoling word to Isaac at Mount Moriah followed by God’s intervention and substitutionary provision of a ram for the sacrifice; [22] and

3. God’s designating blood as the medium of atonement for sin in Leviticus 17:11.

Jonathan Edwards, Jr., D.D., President of Union College, addressed this matter in a sermon on Acts 20:28 entitled “The Purchase of Christ’s Blood” at New Haven, Connecticut in 1786:

Sufficiency avail without an express purpose! Was it ever known or heard of that Christ rendered it consistent with the honor of the law for any to be pardoned even by faith without dying as their proper and avowed Substitute? Did you ever read of any influence which he exerted upon the actual or possible pardon of men, but by dying in their stead, ” the just for the unjust?” How in any other way could he have such an influence? If a real and acknowledged Substitute was necessary to actual pardon, it was equally necessary to the grant of conditional pardon, if the grant was made in good faith . . . [23]

For this son and namesake of “the first American philosopher,” [24] logic dictated that the death of Christ was meaningless if the Old Testament promises related to it were not made in “good faith”!

Endnotes

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[1.] Works, 1:26-27

[2.] See David Brand’s “1800 Years of History Undone?”, Christian Observer, April 2012

[3.] Ephes. 5:1

[4.] Exod. 33:19

[5.] Exod. 34:6-7

[6.] 2 Cor. 1:18-22

[7.] 2 Tim. 2:13 If it be argued that the Greek pistos cannot mean “believing” in reference to God in the context of 2 Timothy 2:13, it should be noted that the Lord Jesus used this word in John 20:27 in contrast to apistos, and it is rendered “believing” while apistos is rendered “faithless” by the King James Version, as well as the American Standard Version of 1901 which followed the English Revised Version of 1881. The point of 2 Timothy 2:13 is that “the faith of God” remains constant and invincible whatever relapse his children’s faith may suffer, and that is a great comfort to his children. When we read the Gospels, we see this phenomenon quite often in Jesus’ training of the twelve. If “faithful,” rather than “believing” be the English rendering of pistos in 2 Timothy 2:13, it can well be understood as “full of faith” or “constant in faith.” This is not to deny or overlook God’s trustworthiness but to underscore the basis of it. God cannot deny himself.

[8.] Rom. 5:12-21; 1 Cor. 15:22

[9.] Gen. 3:1-5

[10.] John 1:18

[11.] Luke 12:50; 22:41-44; Mark 15:34

[12.] Mark 15:34, 37; John 19:30

[13.] Rom. 3:3; Acts 20:28

[14.] Luke 24:25-27, 44-47; Matt. 5:17-20

[15.] The Greek hilasterion of Romans 3:25 designated the “propitiatory” or “mercy seat” in Hebrews 9:5 and in the Greek Septuagint. The Geneva Bible rendered it “reconciliation.” John Chrysostom, and later, John Calvin, in his Commentary on Romans, rendered it “propitiation” or “propitiatory.” The Revised Standard Version rendered it “expiation.” These terms are the subject of Leon Morris’s scholarly work, The Apostolic Preaching of the Cross.

[16.] See opening quotation from Jonathan Edwards on first page of this article.

[17.] Rom. 3:25

[18.] Rom. 3:3

[19.] Acts 17:31; cf. 1 Cor. 15:21-22

[20.] This view of the Greek proetheto in Romans 3:25, was held by John Chrysostom (c.347-407), Archbishop of Constantinople, and is confirmed by Harper’s Analytical Greek Lexicon which notes that proetheto is 3rd person, singular, aorist 2, indicative, and middle voice of the Greek verb protithaimi. While protithaimi means “set forth” or “propose publically,” it conveys the idea of “purpose,” “determine,” or “design beforehand” when it occurs in the middle voice.

[21.] “Prelapsarian” is derived from the Latin lapsus which means “lapse” or “fall.” “Prelapsarian,” accordingly, refers to that period of contractual arrangement described in Genesis 2:15-17 which God established with Adam in Eden prior to Adam’s lapsing or falling into sin.

[22.] Gen. 22:8, 11-14

[23.] Edwards, Jonathan, Jr., D.D., The Necessity of the Atonement, p. 315 (emphasis mine)

[24.] In The Story of Philosophy, p. 365, Will Durant recognized Jonathan Edwards, the famous eighteenth-century pastor at Northampton, Massachusetts, who later became President of the College of New Jersey, as “the first American philosopher.”

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Sources

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Analytical Greek Lexicon, The: Consisting of An alphabetical Arrangement of Every Occurring Inflexion of Every word Contained in the Greek New Testament Scriptures, with a Grammatical Analysis of Each word, and Lexicographical Illustration of the Meanings. A complete Series of Paradigms, with Grammatical Remarks and Explanations. n.d. New York: Harper & Brothers Publishers.

Brand, David C. 1991. Profile of the Last Puritan: Jonathan Edwards, Self-Love, and the Dawn of the Beatific. American Academy of Religion Academy Series, edited by Susan Thistlewaite. Atlanta: Scholars Press.

Bruce, F. F. 1961. The English Bible: A history of translations. New York: Oxford University Press.

Calvin, John. Commentary on Romans. Christian Classics Ethereal Library. www.ccel.org.

Chrysostom, Saint. n.d. Homilies of S. John Chrysostom, Archbishop of Constantinople, on the Epistle of S. Paul the Apostle to the Romans. Google Books. http://books.google.com

Durant, Will. 1926. The Story of Philosophy. New York: Simon and Schuster, Inc.

Edwards, Jonathan, Jr., D.D. 1859. The Necessity Of Atonement And The Consistency Between That And Free Grace In Forgiveness: Three Sermons: Delivered At New Haven, Ad. 1786 by Jonathan Edwards, D.D., President Of Union College as part of The Atonement: Discourses and Treatises by Edwards, Smalley, Maxcy, Emmons, Griffin, Burge, and Weeks with an Introductory Essay by Edwards Amasa Park, Abbot Professor of Theology, Andover, Mass. Edwards A. Park, ed. Boston: Congregational Board of Publication.

Edwards, Jonathan. 1879. The Works of Jonathan Edwards, A.M., rev. & ed., Edward Hickman, 2 vols. 12th edition. London: William Tegg & Co.

Geneva Bible. 1560. www.genevabible.org/Geneva.html.

Morris, Leon. 1955. The Apostolic Preaching of the Cross. Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co.

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About the Writer

David Clark Brand is a retired pastor and educator with missionary experience in Korea and Arizona. He and his wife reside in Ohio. They have four grown children and six grandchildren. With a B.A. in the Liberal Arts, an M. Div., and a Th.M. in Church History, Dave continues to enjoy study and writing. One of his books, a contextual study of the life and thought of Jonathan Edwards, was published by the American Academy of Religion via Scholars Press in Atlanta.

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1800 Years of History Undone?

.“Shall their unbelief make the faith of God without effect?”

Romans 3:3 Geneva Bible

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“We’re lost, but we’re making good time.” -Yogi Berra [1]

“My father used to say, ‘When we open the Bible, we are opening God’s mouth.’”
Huron Claus, President of CHIEF, and a fifth generation follower of Jesus Christ
from the Mohawk and Kiowa Nations. [2]

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The Voice of History

Against the backdrop of Israel’s spiritual defection, the apostle Paul rhetorically challenged his leaders in Romans 3:3: “Shall their unbelief make the faith of God without effect?” [3]

John Chrysostom (c.347-407), Archbishop of Constantinople, had been a preacher in the church at Antioch. Greek was his native language and the common language of the ancient civilized world. Commenting on Romans 3:1-4, he highlighted the fact that God demonstrated “faith” toward the Jews in the divine act of entrusting oracles to them. Chrysostom thereby made it obvious that “faith” was the recognized meaning of the Greek pistis in Romans 3:3.

Given Chrysostom’s stature in the 4th-century church, his testimony is of foremost significance. Sanctioned by the bishop of Rome, the widely acclaimed Jerome (347-420) translated the Greek and Hebrew Scriptures into the Latin Vulgate. His rendering the Greek pistis in Romans 3:3 by the Latin fides [meaning “faith”] concurs with Chrysostom’s ancient testimony.

Chrysostom and Jerome, representing both eastern and western branches of Christendom, confirm that “faith” was the established meaning of pistis in Romans 3:3 and had been from the days of the apostles. This established meaning continued for 1800 years as attested by all the major English versions: Wycliffe (1380, 1384), Tyndale (1525), Coverdale (1535), the Geneva Bible (1560), [4] the original Roman Catholic Douay-Rheims New Testament (1582), [5] and the King James Version (1611). Change came in 1881.

Beginning with the English Revised Version of 1881, followed by the 1901 American Standard Version, virtually all English versions, including the New King James Version, have substituted “faithfulness” for “faith” in Romans 3:3.

In the light of such substantial historical testimony, C. S. Lewis’s perspective resonates:

Would you think I was joking if I said that you can put a clock back, and that if the clock is wrong it is often a very sensible thing to do? But I would rather get away from the whole idea of clocks. We all want progress. But progress means getting nearer to the place where you want to be. And if you have taken a wrong turning, then to go forward does not get you any nearer. If you are on the wrong road, progress means doing an about-turn and walking back to the right road; and in that case the man who turns back soonest is the most progressive man. We have all seen this when doing arithmetic. When I have started a sum the wrong way, the sooner I admit this and go back and start over again, the faster I shall get on. There is nothing progressive about being pigheaded and refusing to admit a mistake. And I think if you look at the present state of the world, it is pretty plain that humanity has been making some big mistake. We are on the wrong road. And if that is so, we must go back. Going back is the quickest way on. [6]

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Romans 3:3 Lead-Out

If Paul can be considered a progressive in his own day “now that faith has come,” [7] it is never at the expense of the foundation. “To the Jew first” [8] was the modus operandi of “the apostle of the Gentiles.” [9] The Jews had the first and foremost advantage in that “unto them were committed the oracles of God.” [10] Not only is this the answer to the question Paul posed in Romans 3:1: “What advantage then hath the Jew?”, it is the key for understanding “the pistis of God” in Romans 3:3. The connection between the entrustment of the “oracles of God” to the Jews in verse 2 and “the faith of God” in verse 3 is established by Paul’s use of the Greek verb pisteuo to convey the meaning of “commit” or “entrust” in verse 2. For this verbal first cousin of the Greek noun pistis is normally rendered “believe” or “have faith.” God’s commitment of his oracles to the Jews, accordingly, was a demonstration of faith on God’s part. Thus he honored them as no nation had ever been honored. [11] Further, the “oracles” themselves were an inscription of that “faith of God” even while that “faith” was subdued under old covenant shadows and types. [12] In fact, Stephen, under the new covenant, in his final sermon leading to his martyrdom, notably designated the law Moses received at Mt. Sinai as “lively” or “living” oracles. [13] This very Letter to the Romans which Paul, himself a Jew, was writing by divine commission, [14] would soon be recognized as among the sacred “oracles of God.”

While “the pistis of God” in Romans 3:3 is a perfect match for “the faith” that “has come” in the person and work of Jesus Christ, [15] Paul insisted before Governor Festus that his preaching added nothing to what the prophets and Moses said would come to pass. [16] This is the “faith” of which it was said Paul was now preaching but “which once he destroyed.” [17] The apostle’s rhetorical question in Romans 3:3, however, and the “God forbid” which follows in verse 4, assures his readers that no Jewish unbelief, least of all his own previous state of unbelief, could nullify “the faith of God.” This is reinforced by the resounding affirmative: “. . . yea, let God be true, and every man a liar.”

Chrysostom commented,

As if one should say, I have honoured such an one. And if he did not receive the honour, this gives no ground for accusing me, nor impairs my kindness, but shews his want of feeling. . . . not only does their unbelief not leave the soil of a complaint upon God, but even shows His love and honour of man to be the greater in that He is shown to bestow honour upon one who would dishonour Him. [18]

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Propositional Dimension

Paul’s highlighting the entrustment of “the oracles of God” in Romans 3:2, immediately preceding his reference to “the pistis of God” in Romans 3:3, lends a propositional dimension to “the faith of God” by identifying it with that “faith once for all delivered to the saints.” [19] To substitute “faithfulness” for “faith” in Romans 3:3, on the other hand, does injustice to “the faith of God” by obscuring its propositional dimension, thus suppressing the Bible’s witness to its own infallibility. [20] For, by removing “the faith of God” in Romans 3:3, the English Revised Version Committee removed the bridge of biblical infallibility which, to English readers prior to 1881, had closely associated Paul’s affirmative: “Let God be true though every man a liar!” with “the oracles of God.” And it is perfectly understandable why a Unitarian on the English Revised Version Committee would be inclined toward substituting “faithfulness” for “faith” in Romans 3:3 inasmuch as “the faith of God,” strictly considered, can be nothing short of “faith in his blood.” [21] Ralph Waldo Emerson understood that when he vacated his Christian ministry in the midst of officiating at the Lord’s Table. But that is a subject for another chapter.

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In summary, “the faith of God”

1. is an eternally existent, shared property in the triune Godhead;

2. was historically expressed in God’s acts of entrusting his “oracles” to Israel;

3. is inscribed as the “oracles of God” now co-extensive with the biblical canon, complete,
and consisting of 66 books (in our English Bibles);

4. is incarnate in the Son; [22]

5. is tantamount to the gospel itself; and

6. constitutes and indwells the saints. [23]

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Rev. Dr. Edwin Elliot, former Publisher of the Christian Observer, once commented to this writer that “orthodoxy,” though commonly understood as “right thinking,” is more properly understood as “right worship” as in “doxology.” Hymn writer Frederick W. Faber (1814-1863) closely associated the “holy faith” of our fathers “living still” with “that glorious word” that causes “our hearts” to “beat high with joy” whenever we hear it.

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Faith of our fathers, living still

In spite of dungeon, fire, and sword,

O how our hearts beat high with joy

Whene’er we hear that glorious word!

Faith of our fathers, holy faith,

We will be true to thee till death. Amen. [24]

Endnotes

[1] Yogi Berra, New York Yankees Hall of Fame catcher, outfielder, and manager is known for his unique style of wit.

[2] Quotation of Huron Claus as he spoke to a gathering of Native Americans (and this author) in Arizona, 2007. CHIEF is an acronym for Christian Hope Indian Eskimo Fellowship whose mission is to disciple and equip a strong Native American leadership for the development of the indigenous church throughout North, Central and South America.

[3] Geneva Bible

[4] The Geneva Bible was the translation of some of the greatest scholars of the 16th-century Reformation. It became the household Bible of English-speaking Protestants on both sides of the Atlantic, and was the Bible quoted in the works of William Shakespeare.

[5] The original Douay-Rheims Bible was translated directly from Jerome’s Latin Vulgate.

[6] Mere Christianity, 36-37.

[7] Gal. 3:25

[8] Rom. 1:16

[9] Rom. 11:13

[10] Rom. 3:2

[11] Israel’s honored status is described in Deuteronomy 4:7-8; 36 and Psalm 147:19-20.

[12] Gal. 3:23-24; Col. 2:16-17

[13] Acts 7:38

[14] Paul describes his own divine call and commission in Ephesians 3:2-11.

[15] Gal. 3:25; 4:4

[16] Acts 26:22

[17] Gal. 1:23

[18] Homilies on the Epistle of St. Paul to the Romans, p. 82

[19] Jude 3

[20] The chapter entitled “The Real Problem of Inspiration,” in B. B. Warfield’s The Inspiration and
Authority of the Bible focuses on the Bible’s witness to its own infallibility.

[21] Rom. 3:25

[22] Gal. 3:25; 4:4

[23] Rom. 1:17; 10:8-10; Ephes. 3:17

[24] The hymn Faith of Our Fathers was written by Englishman Frederick W. Faber (1814-1863). The refrain was written by James G. Walton in 1874. This hymn was sung at the 1945 funeral of American president Franklin Roosevelt, in the East Room of the White House in Washington, DC.

Sources

Bruce, F. F. 1961. The English Bible: A history of translations. New York: Oxford University Press.

Chrysostom, Saint. n.d. Homilies of S. John Chrysostom, Archbishop of Constantinople, on the Epistle of S. Paul the Apostle to the Romans. Google Books. http://books.google.com

Cyber Hymnal, The www.hymntime.com

Geneva Bible. 1560. www.genevabible.org/Geneva.html

Lewis, C. S. 1960. Mere Christianity. New York: The MacMillan Company.

Warfield, Benjamin B. 1948. The Inspiration and Authority of the Bible. Grand Rapids: Baker Book House.

About the Writer

David Clark Brand is a retired pastor and educator with missionary experience in Korea and Arizona. He and his wife reside in Ohio. They have four grown children and six grandchildren. With a B.A. in the Liberal Arts, an M. Div., and a Th.M. in Church History, Dave continues to enjoy study and writing. One of his books, a contextual study of the life and thought of Jonathan Edwards, was published by the American Academy of Religion via Scholars Press in Atlanta.

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Progressivism and Infallibility:
“Shall their unbelief make the faith of God without effect?”
Romans 3:3 Geneva Bible

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“Ay, Master Charles,” . . . “‘tis any fool can see what’s wrong with the world and ought to be changed. But ‘tis the wise man who can see what’s right and ought to be preserved.” Bobby McFee’s Irish accent gave the words almost a mystical import in the boy’s youthful imagination. This reaction was strengthened no doubt by a somewhat wild appearance, as well as the fact that he was in the habit of saying such odd, out-of-the-way things. [1]

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Turbulent upheaval was in the making! The dialectic of German philosopher George Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770-1831) is characterized by a clash of thesis and antithesis resulting in a higher synthesis of ideas. This dialectic would have violent application in Karl Marx’s “progressivist” Communist Manifesto of 1848 which regarded religion as “the opiate of the people.” Wilhelm Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900) incorporated Hegel’s dialectic in his “superman” philosophy propelling Germany to the status of a world power, and subsequently, to World War I and World War II. The Hegelian dialectic would also be the key to the post-World War I neo-orthodox theology of Karl Barth (1886-1968).

One Sunday morning, Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882), a New England Congregational pastor, walked out of the church where he had been administering the Lord’s Supper. He never returned. Harvard’s Perry Miller described Emerson as a Jonathan Edwards “in whom the concept of original sin had totally evaporated.” [2] Emerson’s transcendental meditation became the springboard for Mary Baker Eddy (1821-1910) and her Christian Science movement. As a frequent household visitor at the childhood home of William James (1842-1910), Emerson pronounced a “blessing” upon the young lad. James’ father, Henry, had dabbled in electric shock treatment, and like Emerson and John Chapman (1774-1845), commonly known as “Johnny Appleseed,” Henry James imbibed the cultic teachings of Emanuel Swedenborg (1688-1772).

William James experimented with hallucinatory drugs and became the philosopher-psychologist author of The Will to Believe and Varieties of Religious Experience –treating all religious experiences whether Christian, atheistic, or otherwise, as qualitatively equal and subject to scientific inquiry. William James’s circle of friends included John Dewey (1859-1952), the father of American “progressive” education, and the “progressive” Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. (1841-1935). Holmes’ Common Law contained his famous quote: “The life of the law has not been logic; it has been experience.” [3] During his travels, James met British atheist Bertrand Russell and Austrian neurologist Sigmund Freud (1856-1939), and stated his hope that Freud and his trainees would “push their ideas to the utmost limits.” [4]

Charles Darwin, the persona of natural evolutionary progressivism based on “the survival of the fittest,” accounted for all living organisms without reference to divine revelation, with the publication of his Origin of Species in 1859. Also in 1859, abolitionist John Brown was publicly hanged. Earlier Brown had been a Calvinist. After several years working with the Underground Railroad, he pushed the limits of civil disobedience in a violent direction in Kansas and finally in Virginia at Harper’s Ferry.

In 1848 the First Women’s Rights Convention was held in Seneca Falls, New York, producing the “Declaration of the Rights of Woman” and the demand for women’s suffrage. [5] Emmeline Pankhurst (1858-1928), a progressive for the women’s suffrage cause, substituted “deeds” for “words” in England [6] even engaging in the destruction of public property. Margaret Sanger (1883-1966), founder of Planned Parenthood, would coin the expression “birth control,” fight for its legality, and champion abortion as a woman’s right.

Meanwhile the Darwinian age of optimism, innovation, and industry fed on the inventive genius of Eli Whitney (1765-1825), Cyrus McCormick (1809-1884), Michael Faraday (1791-1867), Thomas Edison (1847-1931), Charles Goodyear (1800-1860), Henry Ford (1863-1947), Alexander Graham Bell (1847-1922), and Orville (1871-1948) and Wilbur Wright (1867-1912).

In England the writings of George MacDonald (1824-1905), a former Congregational pastor who abandoned the teaching of John Calvin (1509-1564), [7] would have major impact upon such notable Christian writers as C. S. Lewis, Tolkien, Oswald Chambers, Hannah Hunnard, and
Hannah Whitehall Smith. If Scottish author George MacDonald regarded “Fatherhood” as “the core of the universe,” [8] Sigmund Freud interpreted “God” as the psychological projection of a person’s father-image. Nineteenth-century Unitarianism constituted a renunciation of the doctrine of the Trinity. Darwin’s theory of evolution brought into question the very existence of God the Creator. Freud reduced all reality to the category of human consciousness. Thus, the religious challenge of 19th-century “progressivism,” eclipsed the Arminian [9] controversy of 18th-century New England.

In the meantime, the Bible had long been under assault by German higher critics. These critics concocted an extreme fourfold dissection and post-dating of the books of Moses based on supposed sources identified as J, E, D, and P. [10] They imposed a theory of Jewish nationalism to override the biblical account of Israel’s divine call, and projected three Isaiahs “explaining all apparent fulfillments as mere vaticinia ex eventu, that is, prophecies after the event.” [11] On the basis of comparative religious study, the German critics pitted Paul against Jesus on the assumption that biblical elements pointing to Jesus’s deity had to have been written into the record by well-intentioned disciples mesmerized by the man Jesus and therefore were mythological in nature. [12] The underlying assumption was that all religious literature, whether pagan or Judaeo-Christian, was on equal footing and subject to form criticism and reinterpretation. [13]

In response to such a challenge to the Bible’s infallibility, on July 18, 1870, the Vatican issued its pronouncement of papal infallibility (when speaking ex cathedra).

Meanwhile Protestant leaders were caught up in the “progressive” thinking of the higher critics which blended in with American Unitarianism. They pitted their doctrines which included the universal fatherhood of God, the brotherhood of man, and the gospel of religious feeling associated with Friedrich Schleiermacher (1768-1834), over against the Deity of Christ, Substitutionary Atonement, and an Infallible Bible.

Schleiermacher’s father had stated in a letter to his son that faith was the “regalia of the Godhead,” that is, “God’s royal due.” In reply, Schleiermacher confessed:

“Faith is the regalia of the Godhead, you say. Alas! dearest father, if you believe that without this faith no one can attain to salvation in the next world, nor to tranquility in this — and such, I know, is your belief — oh! then pray to God to grant it to me, for to me it is now lost. I cannot believe that he who called himself the Son of Man was the true, eternal God; I cannot believe that his death was a vicarious atonement.” [14]

“Faith is the regalia of the Godhead.” Schleiermacher’s father was right. Tragically, Scheiermacher himself could not affirm it. Neither could the distinguished British Unitarian, Dr. G. Vance Smith, who accepted the invitation to serve on the English Revised Version Committee. [15] The  rendering of the Greek pistis in Romans 3:3, therefore, would become a very critical issue following the Committee’s inception on February 10, 1870, even precedent-setting.

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Endnotes

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[1] Bobby McFee’s counsel to Charles Rutherford in the historical fiction series, The Secrets of Heathersleigh Hall, was almost certainly a verbatim quotation from Scottish author George MacDonald. Michael Phillips, The Secrets of Heathersleigh Hall 1:53; 4:441

[2] William E. Graddy, “The Pilgrimage of Ralph W. Emerson,” quoted in Mark A. Noll, et al, ed. Eerdman’s Handbook to Christianity in America, 230-231

[3] “Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. (1841-1935)” Text prepared by Judge Mark P. Painter for From Revolution to Reconstruction – an .HTML project. www.let.rug.nl/usa/B/oliver/oliverxx.htm

[4] “Chronology” William James, The Varieties of Religious Experience, pp. 471-499.

[5] Ruth Rosen, The World Split Open, p. xvii

[6] Michael Phillip’s The Secrets of Heathersleigh Hall series, volumes 1 & 2, includes an insightful treatment of Pankhurst’s “progressivism” in England.

[7] The 16th-century leader of the Protestant Reformation in Geneva who wrote the Institutes of the Christian Religion, a theological work that shaped the thinking of the Reformed movement. The 1618-19 Dutch Synod of Dort summed up Calvin’s teaching as it related to salvation in five points: Total Depravity; Unconditional Election; Limited Atonement; Irresistible Grace; and Perseverance of the Saints.

[8] “Preface,” C. S. Lewis,ed. George MacDonald: An Anthology

[9] Jacob Arminius was a Dutch professor at the University of Leiden who adopted religious beliefs antithetical to the so-called “five points of Calvinism” set forth at the Synod of Dort, 1618-19.

[10] For an excellent scholarly refutation of the Documentary Hypothesis see Oswald T. Allis’s unsurpassed study entitled The Five Books of Moses.

[11] Gleason L. Archer, Jr., A Survey of Old Testament Introduction, p. 321. See Oswald T. Allis’s classic work entitled The Unity of Isaiah.

[12] See John Gresham Machen’s The Origin of St. Paul’s Religion for the classic refutation of this assault on the New Testament.

[13] See George Eldon Ladd’s The New Testament and Criticism.

[14] B. A. Gerrish, A Prince of the Church: Scheiermacher and the Beginnings of Modern Theology. p. 25

[15] F. F. Bruce, The English Bible, p. 136

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Sources

Archer, Gleason L. Jr. 1964. A Survey of Old Testament Introduction. Chicago: Moody Press.

Brand, David C. 1963. “The Religious Implications of Naziism.” Prepared for Senior Independent Study. The College of Wooster. Wooster, Ohio

Bruce, F. F. 1961. The English Bible: A history of translations. New York: Oxford University Press.

Calvin, John. 1960. The Institutes of the Christian Religion, ed., John T. McNeill. 2 vols. The Library of Christian Classics. Vols. 21 & 22. Philadelphia: The Westminster Press.

Geneva Bible. 1560. www.genevabible.org/Geneva.html

Gerrish, B. A. 1984. A Prince of the Church: Scheiermacher and the Beginnings of Modern Theology. Philadelphia: Fortress Press cited from online article at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friedrich_Schleiermacher#cite_note-A._Gerrish_1984-1

Lewis, C. S., ed. 1978. George Macdonald: An Anthology. New York: Macmillan Publishing Co., Inc.

Noll, Mark A., Nathan O. Hatch, George M. Marsden, David F. Wells, John D. Woodbridge, eds. 1983. Eerdmans’ Handbook to Christianity in America. Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company.

Painter, Judge Mark P. n.d. “Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. (1841-1935)” Text prepared for From Revolution to Reconstruction – an .HTML project. www.let.rug.nl/usa/B/oliver/oliverxx.htm

Phillips, Michael. 1998. The Secrets of Heathersleigh Hall. 4 vols. Minneapolis: Bethany House Publishers.

Rosen, Ruth. 2000. The World Split Open: How the Modern Women’s Movement Changed America. New York: Penguin Books.

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David Clark Brand

David, a retired pastor, educator, and volunteer missionary to Korea, resides in Ohio. He and his wife have four grown children and six grandchildren. With a B.A. in the Liberal Arts, an M. Div., and a Th.M. in Church History, Dave continues to enjoy study and writing. One of his books, a contextual study of the life and thought of Jonathan Edwards, was published by the American Academy of Religion via Scholars Press in Atlanta.

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[Editor's Note: Republished with permission from The Christian Curmudgeon blog, Sunday, February 26, 2012. The author is the Rev. William H. Smith, a minister in the Presbyterian Church in America]

When I was in my first months of campus ministry, two young men came to my house one night to tell me that a student was pregnant and was going the next morning with her boyfriend to New Orleans for an abortion. To make a long story short she ended up not having the abortion. However, like all decisions, this one had consequences. She was attending a certain church. One day the minister of that church asked me to come to his office. He told me he needed a favor. His son was a friend of the girl, and he was afraid that the people of his congregation might make some association of the girl, the pregnancy, and his son. So he asked me to get her to go to another church.

It was very difficult for me to tell her that she needed to find another congregation because of the minister’s discomfort, but I did, and she became happily settled in a congregation that supported her through her pregnancy. I understand the minister’s concerns. Here was a young woman, who had acted immorally, and she attended his church, and his son was her friend. He was afraid of the scandal that might come from the company his son kept. But, on the other hand, I felt the greater scandal was a church not willing to minister to a sinner who needed to be helped to carry on her repentance and to find forgiveness.

That experience of more than twenty-five years ago helps me to understand what happened when Jesus started keeping company with the wrong kind of people.

I. Call

Jesus was out by the Sea of Galilee, not far from Capernaum. His ministry was still enjoying great popularity, so a big crowd gathered around them. Again Mark notes that Jesus acted consistently with His priority for He “was teaching them.” For Jesus the miracles were signs that in Him the Kingdom of God had come, but the first thing was always teaching or preaching. We must always keep before us that Jesus’ priority must be the church’s priority.

But, following the teaching, Jesus was walking along the shore of the sea, when he came to a tax booth. An important road ran near Capernaum, and the purpose of the tax booth was to collect taxes on merchandise that moved along the road. This area was governed indirectly by the Romans through a king name Herod Antipas. The Jews did not like Antipas for he was half-Jewish and half-Edomite, and the hostility between the Jews and the Edomites went all the way back to the time of Jacob and Esau. They saw Antipas as a puppet king who supported the domination of Rome.

Now tax collectors are never popular, but the tax collectors of Jesus’ time in Palestine were especially disliked. The way the system worked was that the potential tax collectors would submit bids guaranteeing the government a certain amount of money. But, beyond collecting the money for the government, the tax collector had to collect enough to cover his expenses and profits. There was no regulation of this practice, and some of the tax collectors were quite greedy and dishonest. Jewish tax collectors were seen not only as corrupt but as collaborators with a hated government. So, though a tax collector might be wealthy, he was not accepted in good company. He was ostracized.

It was a tax collector, named Levi and whom we also know as Matthew, to whom Jesus said, “Follow me.” This means much more than, “Get up and walk behind me.” It is a call to discipleship. It means, “Attach yourself to Me. Put yourself under My teaching. Commit yourself to Me. Become a disciple.” This shows us that following Christ, and becoming and being a Christian, means more than, “Say the right words and show up at church once in awhile.” If we are called to Christ, we are called to so entrust ourselves to Him that we commit ourselves to becoming and remaining His disciples.

The result of the call of Jesus is that Levi got up, walked out of the tax booth right then, and followed Jesus. This, too, is involved in following Christ. We do not negotiate terms or conditions; we simply follow with a “whatever it means and whatever it takes” attitude. The call of Levi shows also the power and effect of Jesus’ call. When we hear Jesus call in the way that Levi did, we will without doubt follow Him. This is what we mean when we speak of the “effectual call” and of “irresistible grace.” We can hear Christ’ s call many times with our ears, and even with understanding, but when Christ issues the kind of call He did to Levi, we will surely follow.

II. Celebration
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Soon after Levi left the tax-collecting business to follow Jesus, he entertained Jesus in his home. He invited his friends, other tax collectors and those who were identified as sinners to a dinner with Jesus.

The dinner he gave had a festive atmosphere. We know that from the fact that the guests reclined on couches for the meal. If you grew up in the church and went to Sunday school you may have learned that this was the way the Jews ate their meals. If you did not grow up in the church, you may wonder why people were lying on couches as they ate. As it turns out, what some of us learned in Sunday school was not correct. Reclining at the table was not the usual Jewish posture for meals. This practice was something they learned from the Grecian culture. The Jews had adapted it to their life by choosing the reclining posture for festival occasions and celebrations. Reclining was for special occasions.

We still have special things we do on special occasions. Most of us seldom eat turkey as an entrée except at Thanksgiving and Christmas. It’s interesting that we go all year without roasting a turkey, and then, we roast one twice within about a month. Many reserve the china, crystal, and if we have it, silver for festive occasions. We like to make some meals special ones.

So Levi threw what we one preacher (Sinclair Ferguson, p. 29) calls a “conversion party.” He had responded to the magnetic call of Jesus by leaving behind his old business and old life to devote himself to Jesus and to following Him as a disciple, and he was happy about it. He wanted to honor Jesus and share his joy with his friends, so he gave a festive dinner. I think we can learn from Levi.

Too many Christians live as though they had just lost their best friend. We act as though the Christian life is drudgery at best and misery at worst. There does not seem to be much celebration. Now celebration does not have to mean mindless frivolity. There can be solemn celebrations that have great meaning. The point is that there should be celebration in the Christian life, both really and metaphorically. In our church we do some special things at Christmas time, some in worship and some outside worship, so that there can be communal celebration. Of course, Easter is the greatest of festival days for the Church. Some churches have special receptions when new members are received. Some parents like to invite guests to a luncheon after a baptism. These are good things.

But, we also have a “celebration attitude” as we live. Not that there are not times of sorrow and tears and grief, but we should not give to people the impression that Christians are the most miserable people on earth. There should be a joy, not empty and shallow giddiness, but joy as we go about our lives. Jesus has called us, as He called Levi, to follow Him. He has promised the forgiveness of all our sins, complete salvation, and in the end the righting of all wrongs, the defeat of death, and the glorious victory of the resurrection. Those are things to celebrate.

There is also something about company that Levi invited. Of course, he invited Jesus and Jesus’ disciples, but he also invited his old companions – fellow tax collectors and others who were more or less outcasts from religious society. It can be said, and rightly so, that he didn’t know anybody else to invite since he lived his life as a man classed with the tax collectors and sinners. But, while some of us are embarrassed about our faith when we are with those we work with or may socialize with outside of work, but for Levi it seemed the most natural thing in the world to invite these people to dinner with Jesus whom he had begun to follow. And these were surely people who needed to be introduced to Jesus and to find in Jesus the salvation Levi had found. There is a challenge there to us, not to be ashamed of Jesus, but to seek to introduce our co-workers, and friends, and relatives to Him. We can invite them to church, and we might even have dinners and throw parties with the goal introducing people to Jesus and sharing with them the joy we have found in being found by Him.

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III. Criticism

Jesus’ participation in this meal was found scandalous by the scribes of the Pharisees.

We have to learn or remind ourselves about whom the Pharisees were. Within Judaism of the time they were always a minority group. Their spiritual roots were in a group called the Hasidim, who, when Greek philosophy and religion started to have an influence on the Jewish faith and practice, stood strong and firm for God’s Law.

The Pharisees shared this commitment to the Law and saw law keeping as a primary religious duty. The scribes among them were specialists in showing that the Law applied to and was binding on every situation. They analyzed the Old Testament and found that there were 613 commandments, 248 positive, 365 negative. But they went on to make rules that were meant to put a hedge around the Law, so that a person might not even get near to breaking the law.

We can understand this because something like it arises at times within Christianity. For instance, someone might look at the Bible’s condemnation of lust and decide for himself that in order to avoid lust he must not watch any television at all.  He even removes his television from his house so that he will not be tempted to watch it. Now he goes a step further. He decides that all need the protections he has put in place in his life. So he asks his church to make a rule that no one who is a member may own a television set. He started with what is clearly the will of God – not to lust after a woman who is not your wife. He then put two hedges around the law for himself, and he ends up trying to put those same two in the lives of all God’s people. That is what we call “legalistic,” and it is the kind of thing that the scribes of the Pharisees did as a calling.

These folks were separated from the rest of Judaism first by their devotion to the Law itself, and then by their lists of do’s and don’ts that were meant to keep people well away from violations of the Law.

These scribes said to some of Jesus disciples, “Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?” The sinners who were attending with the tax collectors were people who might be open and notorious sinners – immoral people, prostitutes, drunkards, dishonest businessmen. They could be people who weren’t careful about keeping themselves ritually clean. They and the tax collectors were ineligible to participate in the life of the synagogue, and good people did not mix with them for fear of becoming defiled morally or ritually.

So they wondered how Jesus, Himself a teacher, could sit down to a meal with such people. He could become unclean Himself and so temporarily disqualified from the religious life of the Jews. They could not understand how any religious man could do that. But, eating at the same table with these people also communicated some kind of acceptance. After all, then even more than now, sharing a meal was an act of fellowship. Was not Jesus having fellowship with these people who were indifferent to God’s Law at best, and flagrant breakers of it at worse?

We well may be criticized, especially by those who make legalistic rules that go beyond God’s Law, if we associate with the wrong kinds of people. Remember we may never participate in the sins of people who break God’s Law. But that does not mean we should cut ourselves off from contact with them. Paul told the Corinthian Christians that they had misunderstood him to teach that they should cut off all contact from unbelievers. Paul said, no, that he was warning to break off fellowship with anyone who professed to be a believer but lived as an unbeliever (1 Corinthians 5:9 –11). That is the guidance for us. We should withdraw Christian fellowship from a believer who persists stubbornly in sin. But we must of necessity be among unbelievers if we are going to live in this world, and, just as important, if we are going to get them to Jesus whom they need.
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IV. Conclusion

When Jesus heard the criticism, He responded in way that, though it did not change the minds of the scribes, nevertheless brought the matter to a conclusion, for He spoke with His characteristic authority.

He showed them the truth first indirectly by using proverbial statement. “Those who are well have no need for a physician, but those who are sick.” Where do you expect to find a physician? Well, you might say, “On the golf course!” But the point Jesus is making is that you expect to find a physician among sick people. That is his job. Those who are well have no need of him, and he does not have anything to offer them. But the sick need him, and he has something to offer them. A man whose mission in life is to heal the sick must be among the sick.

Now the point is obvious, but Jesus drives the point home, by stating the matter directly in reference to the criticism that He was eating with tax collectors and sinners.   “I came not to call the righteous, but sinners.” Perhaps Jesus is speaking in an ironic way when he speaks of the righteous. He is, as it were, saying to the scribes. “You consider yourselves righteous. These people know themselves to be sinners. I came to call those who are sinners and know it.” But it is likely that Jesus does not intend for us to identify who the righteous are. His point was simply that, just as you should expect to find a physician among the sick rather than the well, so it should not be surprising to find Him among sinners. A doctor’s mission is to the sick. Jesus’ mission is to sinners.

He calls sinners. He does not call them to remain in their sins. As Luke’s account of this event makes clear, Jesus calls sinner to repentance, to reorientation of their lives. When He called Levi, He called him to turn his back on the tax both and to turn his face to Jesus. So He calls sinners to turn away from their old way and to follow Him into the life of forgiveness and discipleship.

This is good news for all us sinners. We are the kind or people Jesus calls to follow Him in faith and repentance. He is not ashamed to be found with us, for He came to save us from our sins. He sits down with us now in the fellowship of the Lord’s Supper. He invites us not because we are righteous but because we are sinners who need His salvation. One day He will sit down with us, and all kinds of sinners from all over the world, at the Marriage Supper of the Lamb. A numberless host of redeemed sinners will then feast forever on the rich food of salvation.

Sinner, who has never come, sinner who has come, come to Jesus who welcomes you, who came to look for, to call, and to save people just like you.
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A Christian Observer editorial from sixty years ago – the Christian Observer, October 10, 1951 – Harry P. Converse, Managing Editor – William T. McElroy, Editor.

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The final report of the Senate Crime Investigating Committee [Special Committee to Investigate Organized Crime in Interstate Commerce - Chairman - Tennessee Senator Estes Kefauver (D)] made public last month, the recent unhappy revelations at West Point [Eighty-three West Point cadets expelled for cheating], and figures issued by the Federal Bureau of Investigation regarding youthful crime, together with other less publicized facts indicate what J. Edgar Hoover defines as “a breakdown of the moral fiber of the country.” The whole nation is shocked– for the moment at least–over the proven alliances between the underworld and corrupt political powers, over what the traffic in drugs is doing to vast numbers of young people, and over the threat to the stability of our national life. What the nation will do about the present condition only the future will reveal. Our record in the past in such matters does not give reason for any great amount of optimism.

Many editorial writers express the belief that because the revelations indicate a general moral decline, court actions, the closing of obnoxious places, a superficial revamping of college athletics, and similar steps, will touch only the symptoms and have little or no effect on the real disease. One of our highly respected national leaders, John Foster Dulles, has expressed the thought in these words:

Something has gone wrong with our nation, or we should not be in our present plight or mood… What we lack is a righteous and dynamic faith. Without it, all else avails us little. the lack cannot be compensated for by politicians, however able; or by diplomats, however astute; or by scientists, however inventive; or by bombs, however powerful…. Our greatest need is to regain confidence in our spiritual heritage…. There is no use having more and louder ‘Voices of America’ unless we have something to say that is more persuasive than anything yet said.

Speaking particularly of the West Point revelations, the St. Louis Globe-Democrat, one of the nations most clear-spoken newspapers, in a widely reprinted editorial urges that “the time is here for moral regeneration.” It says further that “what happened at West Point reflects a present distorted attitude toward old-fashioned honesty and integrity,” and asks:

Where does the fault lie? In the home? Perhaps. In the schools? In part. In the churches? In part. But in the main the fault lies in that nebulous field of public morals and spirituality which was so highly cultivated by the founding fathers and which, of late has been so scantily tilled. Among too many of us the accepted premise is that anything is fair unless we are caught; that the world owes us a living; that an honest day’s work for an honest day’s pay is almost unethical; that gyping the other fellow before he gyps you, is the only policy that pays off.

Another outstanding daily newspaper, the Christian Science Monitor, calls for a raising of “fundamental moral standards” and the quickening of the consciences of of all the people as well as those of our political and other leaders. The editorial says in part:

This newspaper is convinced that the most vital task before the American people today is the raising of fundamental moral standards. In the last year or two the alarm has been sounded in a dozen ways–disclosures of crime syndicates, mink coats and deep freezers, basketball “fixes,” cheating at West Point, divorce scandals, widespread tax dodging, “black marketing,” “chiseling” on inflation controls, “graft” on public contracts…We are weary of being told that we must accept such things, that “everybody does it.” This also is subversive doctrine. It must be rejected….There is danger that this issue will be lost in partisanship….The demand for moral reform rises above all party lines. It must be pressed on all fronts.

Nearly all the comments, both in the daily newspapers and in the religious press, point to the fact that we are facilg a “moral battle” rather than a political one, and that “high principles” are primary, whatever we may do toward correcting the current evils. “It all comes down to the fact,” says the Western Recorder (Baptist), “that the highest value that can be fixed in the young person’s life is high character–a will and determination to be right in thought and deed. We need men and women who have learned to thing and tell and act the truth and the whole truth, even at the expense of personal loss.”

Similar in viewpoint is the editorial in Presbyterian Life on the disclosures. “The integrity of our military leaders,” says the editorial, “is a matter of life and death to the nation. So also is the integrity of private citizens like you and me….America’s number one need is for a spiritual revival that will bring about a moral regeneration. We, who by our silence in the face of terrible revelation of corruption in public life have aided in promoting it, cannot escape our own personal responsibility for it.”

In a public address at Des Moines, Iowa, Ex-president Herbert Hoover, sometimes described as our nation’s “elder statesman,” said that what we are facing is really “mostly beyond the law,” and he challenged the nation to turn to the New Testament, the Sermon on the Mount, and the Ten Commandments for guidance. “Our greatest danger,” he said, “is not from invasion by foreign armies. Our dangers are that we may commit suicide from within by complaisance  with evil; or by public tolerance of scandalous behavior; or by cynical acceptance of dishonor.”

More alarming that the revelations of crime and dishonor, says Dr. L. Nelson Bell in the Southern Presbyterian Journal, is the “reaction throughout America.” The guilt, he says, seems to lie, not in what is done, but in “getting caught.” “To solve our personal and our national problems,” he continues, “we must recognize the source of those problems and that source is sin in the human heart. The primary message of the Church is redemption through our Lord Jesus Christ. Our Saviour said: ‘Ye must be born again,’ and such a birth is a supernatural transaction, a work of the Holy Spirit, operating in the heart of repentant sinners who turn to Jesus Christ, the eternal Son of God, as their only hope of cleansing and salvation.”

A like note is sounded by a prominent New York pastor in a recent sermon. As quoted in the New York Times, Dr. Ralph B. Nesbitt, of the Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church says:

The contemporary scene is not without encouragement and not beyond repair. The very fact that so many people are concerned is a hopeful sign. This is the first condition of amelioration. The ultimate answer is not in ourselves, but what man must have is a personal relation to God, the realization that “Thou, God seest me.” My life is open like a book before Him and it is to Him that I must at last render an account of my life. It is that supremely that produces high morality.

A word spoken more that two hundred years ago by the famous statesman Edmund Burke, is as pertinent to our present situation as if it were written today: “True religion is the foundation of society, the basis on which all true government rests, and from which power derives its authority, laws their efficiency, and both their sanction. If it is once shaken by contempt, the whole fabric cannot be stable or lasting.”

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[Editor's Note: Much of this article " is as pertinent to our present situation as if it were written today." The Christian Observer expresses our gratitude to a reader in Ft. Walton Beach, Florida, for sending a copy of the October 10, 1951 issue of the Christian Observer.]

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by Penny Smith

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[Editor's Note: Northminster Reformed Presbyterian Church (RPCNA) of Suwanee, Georgia, sends several people into downtown Atlanta, Georgia, on Sunday afternoons starting at 5:00 p.m. to minister to inner city residents. On Sunday December 4, 2011, an outdoor Bible study was being led by Northminster pastor the Rev. Dr. Frank Smith, when the realities of the inner city brought the Bible study to a premature halt. Dr. Smith's wife, Penny Smith, was present at the Bible study, and in this article provides an interesting account of their unexpected adventure that afternoon. Mrs. Smith is originally from the United Kingdom, which is reflected in the use of several British word spellings in the article.]

It was just after 5:30 in the evening when the first shots rang out.  The Bible study had been going very well.  It had started on time at five o’clock, and discussion on the topic of Thanksgiving had been lively.  We had a total of fourteen people in attendance, only one of which was a child.  I was sitting on the wall; Frank’s sister Gini, visiting from Richmond, Virginia, was standing at the end of the wall and, other than Frank, everyone else was sitting on the steps of the burned-out church building where we meet.  To begin with I thought little of the sound of the gunshots, as we had heard them before from at least half a block away, and on those occasions we had not been under any threat.  However, after a volley of about eight to ten of them, presumably coming from a semi-automatic weapon, it seemed prudent to slip off the wall and down onto the steps with the other folk.  Frank, still standing on the sidewalk, having seen the shooter in the intersection, shooting north up Brawley Drive, and then fleeing west on Kennedy, called the police.  When the shooting stopped I looked around and saw one person on the ground outside the convenience store, but he did not appear to have been hit.  Then the second round of shooting started.  Gini had not yet ducked down, and from her vantage point she saw another man running south on Brawley, in our direction, firing south down the road.  At this point, discretion being the better part of valour, she, along with the rest of us hit the steps again, and at this point it dawned on me that this was for real.  This time, my face was down on the concrete.  I imagine we were all praying that the Lord would protect us, and Gini was doing so out loud.  Frank was still standing on the sidewalk talking to the 911 operator who told him that she could hear the shots being fired, and Gini and I yelled to him to get down.  Some of the details are fuzzy, but at that point Gini and Billie saw a white SUV, with its windows down, come south on Brawley past our steps, with all four occupants bearing weapons.  Frank, still standing on the sidewalk, had his back to them and did not see them.  At that point they were not firing, and we are not sure which of the 12 – 15 shots that we heard just prior to this came from the car and which from the runner on foot.  Two cars, Amy’s and ours, were between us and the SUV as it went by, and at some point Frank sought the safety of the car.  Shortly afterwards a man came over and yelled us to get out of the area.  I wasn’t sure I wanted to stand up, but we all did so, and the group quickly dispersed.  The local folk just “disappeared” except for a lady and her son who have been attending for two weeks.  This lady, who lives in the neighbourhood, is actively involved in trying to bring about change in the Bluff, and appreciates our efforts every Lord’s Day.   We threw the board and easel and the cooler into the trunk in a haphazard manner and this lady, Amy and Frank backed their cars away from the intersection to Jett and, still in reverse, along Jett and around onto Griffin.  There we parked and regrouped.   There were no more gunshots.  Shortly after that, which was about five minutes from the time Frank dialed 911, the first police car arrived followed almost immediately by three more.  Blue lights, but no sirens.  The police were only mildly interested in the situation, telling us that what we had experienced was not unusual for this area.  They didn’t take a statement, taking note only of the fact that the car with the four gunmen was a white SUV.

Having lived in the Bluff prior to undergoing successful drug rehabilitation, a regular member of our group, Linda, had some valuable insights which she shared with Amy as she was being driven back to her apartment.  In fact, before Bible study began, Linda had indicated that she was not comfortable with so many people whom she didn’t recognise congregating at the intersection.  She had previously shared with us that the drug dealers and particularly the drug “kingpin” occasionally loiter in the area while the study is going on, and that if they did not give their approval to this activity they would have made sure that we would have been run off by now.  Linda also believes that if the kingpin had been there on Sunday, the gunfire would not have occurred, or that he would have made sure we were protected.  Apparently he holds an elevated status which is highly respected in the drug community.  Linda also said that, even though the police may not show much interest in black-on-black violence, there would be a lot of interest, and hence disruptions to the drug dealers’ business, if white workers were targeted or caught in crossfire.

Before we each went our separate ways, the lady who lives in the area was very encouraging to Frank, telling him that he doesn’t realise how much good he is doing.  She told him that the devil is at the intersection where we meet, and he wants to disrupt our ministry.

As Frank, Gini and I drove home, we noted the irony of the Bible study earlier, which was the second of two studies on the topic of Thanksgiving.  One of the things that Frank had been explaining to the group was God’s sovereignty, and that, even though we may not understand why certain things happen to us, we are to be grateful for all of God’s providences.  Naturally, our hearts were full of thanksgiving for the Lord’s watch-care and protection over us that evening.  We acknowledged that he had given us this experience for a reason, and that he was in complete control of every bullet.

Scripture tells us to have no anxiety about anything but to take everything to God in prayer.  Never-the-less, we need to show wisdom and discretion with regard to taking sensible precautions, and Frank, Amy and I have already discussed the possibility of some changes.  We don’t anticipate this being a regular problem, as it is the first time that gunfire this close has happened in twenty months of ministering here.  However, one thing we will do is to make sure that anyone who volunteers to join us on the steps understands the fact that issues can arise.

The real Battle of the Bluff is being fought in the spiritual realm, even as it plays out in the streets.  Nothing will happen to us that is not in accordance with the will of the real “Kingpin” of the Bluff, namely the King of kings and Lord of lords.  Please continue to pray for us as we continue the battle for the hearts and minds of the men, women and children who reside in this sad and violent area.  Psalm 34:7.

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by David Cloud

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[Editor's Note: The following article is republished with the permission of the publisher, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, and is included because of its critique of several movements within the confessional Presbyterian and Reformed community and of Calvinist theology.

Responses to this article will be considered for publication in the Christian Observer if written in the same dispassionate, objective, and respectful manner as was the article. Though the editor and presumably most Christian Observer readers are likely poles apart theologically with Mr. Cloud, his highly effective style of written communication should make him be considered a "force to be reckoned with" in the confessional Presbyterian and Reformed world.]

http://www.wayoflife.org/index_files/7003784d4efd952074e3d6b65044f458-941.html

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(First published November 3, 2009) (David Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org)

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1. The Integrated Church has often led to the downplaying of the importance of the biblical church.

This is not always true, but it is often true. Vision Forum warns about “nomadic families that flit from church to church, or renegades who refuse to place themselves under the accountability of a local church,” and adds, “God requires His people to be under biblical local churches with biblical preaching, biblical church government, biblical ordinances, and biblical discipline.”

This warning is an admission that this is a problem.

In fact, the movement is rife with this error. Many have replaced a biblical church with “home church” where the fathers are the pastors. Others have tried to start “churches” with a few home-schooling families though they aren’t qualified and divinely called to the task.

The Integrated Church movement has turned the church into a “family of families,” but the church is much more than a “family of families.” The apostle Paul wasn’t even married and he emphasized the importance of the unmarried condition (1 Corinthians 7:7-8, 25-35). The church’s main task is the Great Commission (Matthew 28:19-20; Mark 16:15; Luke 24:48; Acts 1:8), and when the gospel is preached effectively, the result is the salvation of single people and those from all sorts of broken families. If the emphasis is on the ideal family, on the church being “a family of families,” a great many are left out.

We see this in our church planting work in South Asia. One of our churches is eight years old, and a high percentage of the members are either unmarried young people or are men and women representing broken homes. Several of the women have unsaved husbands. Some of the husbands abuse them and try to hinder their faith in Christ; at least one is an abusive drunkard. The wife of one of the male church members left him after he came to Christ. We have only a handful of families so far that are composed of both husband and wife that are saved and are trying to raise their children right. In many cases the wives can’t read and the parents have only the slightest clue of how to raise their children for Christ, though we are trying to train them. If our emphasis were on “a family of families,” we would be a very discouraged group.

Our goal is definitely to produce godly Christian families, but our church is not a family of families. It is a church! We are busy teaching the people how to build godly homes and discipline their children biblically, but it is very slow and somewhat discouraging work, because it is all brand new to them. The Hindu culture knows nothing about such things. Most of our church members had never even seen a Bible until they heard the gospel through our evangelistic ministries. The vast majority are first generation Christians, saved out of endless generations of pagan darkness.

What we need are New Testament churches that seek to build strong families and that do not hinder the families by such worldly things as entertainment-focused youth departments. To that degree we agree with the Family Integrated philosophy, but only to that degree, because that is as far as the Bible allows us to go.

2. The Integrated Church lacks understanding about the danger of New Evangelicalism.

The Integrated Church is largely an evangelical movement rather than a fundamentalist movement. Popular speakers at their conferences include Ken Ham of Answers in Genesis and other New Evangelicals. You will find frequent positive references to evangelical leaders. There is little or no call for ecclesiastical separation. This is no light matter, as the Bible emphasizes the doctrine of separation from false doctrine and compromise (e.g., Romans 16:17; 2 Cor. 6:14-17; 2 Thess. 3:6; 1 Timothy 6:1-5; 2 Timothy 3:5; Titus 3:10). (See “New Evangelicalism: Its History, Characteristics, and Fruit,” which is available from Way of Life Literature in book and e-book formats.)

3. The Integrated Church neglects the Great Commission.

If you look through Integrated Church literature and web sites, there is little emphasis on the Great Commission and preaching the gospel to the ends of the earth. I am not saying there is nothing at all, but there is far more emphasis on the family and other things. Their conferences are not missions conferences or evangelism conferences but family and dominionist/reconstructionist conferences (emphasizing the building of the kingdom of God in the here and now). Preaching the gospel to the ends of the earth is not even mentioned in Vision Forum’s mission statement.

There are exceptions such as Antioch Community Church in Elon, North Carolina, which lists the following as two of their distinctives: “commitment to local and world missions” and “planting other churches.”

This church appears to be the exception rather than the rule.

The family is not an end in itself. The objective of both family and church should be the fulfillment of the Lord’s Great Commission, which He emphasized greatly after He rose from the dead and before He ascended to Heaven (Matthew 28:18-20; Mark 16:15; Luke 24:44-48; John 20:21; Acts 1:8).

The book of Acts models the working out of the Great Commission rather than the Family Integrated Church model. Though we believe in a strong emphasis on godly families, this should not be an end in itself. Paul, a single man who could not model the strong family emphasis, preached the gospel and started churches. Paul took the young Timothy away from his family and discipled him apart from his father and mother and grandmother, and there is no evidence that Timothy ever married.

4. The Integrated Church is legalistic, having gone beyond the Bible in making rules about family and church.

The Integrated Church tends to be very legalistic. There is much liberty within the biblical model for both the family and the church, and it is legalistic to make laws that go beyond the biblical bounds.

For example, there is the teaching that the church must always be “family integrated.” A lecture published by Vision Forum says, “The biblical example is that entire families are present for corporate worship. Age-segregated worship is rooted in evolutionary humanism, not biblical Christianity” (Doug Phillips, “The Role of Children in the Meeting of the Church,” 2002, Family Renewal Audio Library).

The Bible says nothing about this one way or the other. Segregation of the ages has its dangers, but there certainly can be a time and place to teach children and young people separately from the adults. This is not contrary to any Scripture. A segregated ministry has some dangers that we need to consider and avoid, but it’s not a heresy. As the pillar and ground of the truth and possessing the Lord’s commission to “teach them to observe all things whatsoever I have taught you,” the church has the authority to teach children and young people as certainly as the home has (1 Timothy 3:16; Matthew 28:19); and the church has the right to decide how to accomplish this in a practical sense. I believe there is a great benefit in having Bible classes for children and youth. The Bible nowhere says that they must always be with their parents. That is to make a law out of the Bible’s silence.

Sunday School is neither a pillar of the faith nor a heresy. It is simply a tool. The Sunday School movement began in England as a way of evangelizing children from poor families and did not meet in the church or even during normal church times. It was held in various places in the community on Sunday afternoons. The typical Sunday School today is part evangelistic and part discipleship. Each church must determine how it will fulfill Christ’s command to preach the gospel to every creature and disciple those who believe, and the Sunday School can be a helpful tool if it is conducted properly. Having or not having a Sunday School doesn’t determine whether a church is biblical.

If mom and dad want to keep their children with them at all times in church, and if they don’t want their children to participate in youth activities, that is their prerogative before the Lord, but to go beyond this and make such things a law for everyone is to go beyond Scripture.

Another example of the legalism of the Integrated Church movement is its teaching that daughters must remain under the father’s roof until marriage. The following is a review of a Vision Forum book and DVD by a fundamentalist home schooling mother that investigated their materials:

“The two items I have reviewed are the book ‘So Much More,’ a book to daughters about how to have ‘vision’ for the kingdom of God. And the DVD ‘The Return of the Daughters,’ a documentary on the whole idea of daughters staying under their father’s roof until marriage. On the surface these items seemed to be very God-honoring. Yet, I had an unsettled feeling that something just wasn’t quite right. On the DVD, it seemed very touching to want to ‘protect’ your daughters in the way they suggest. What Christian father wouldn’t want to do the best for his daughter? Being a home school father, my husband wanted to have an open heart to what the Lord may be leading him to in the future. We spent all these years training her to be a keeper at home and as she becomes an adult, we do not want to just ‘throw her to the wolves.’ This is exactly what the DVD suggests you are doing if you don’t keep your daughter at home until marriage. … The book had much material that seemed on the surface to be great. It mentioned modest dress, Christian femininity, etc. Yet, it warned daughters against an independent spirit and self-sufficiency to the point of calling working for anyone other than your dad, selfish and Marxist. It also mentioned if daughters did not have families that agreed with this vision, they should find a family that would adopt them into their families so they could fulfill this role. The whole idea was the family should not be split up at church and if you wanted to be a visionary daughter you better find a family in one of their Integrated churches so you could be a part. It was such nonsense as I have led ‘bus kids’ to Christ in junior church and have wondered how they would have fit in at church without any families to adopt them. There were so many other glaring flaws, often times they used Scripture quotes that were intended to be commands for our relationship to Christ, and they twisted it to be for our relationship to earthly fathers.”

To teach that young women cannot leave their father’s roof unless they are married is going far beyond Scripture and putting man-made yokes on God’s people. Though we agree that we are not to follow the dictates and ways of today’s feministic-influenced society (Psalm 1:1; Rom. 12:3) and children are to obey their parents in the Lord (Ephesians 6:1), this does not mean that we have to submit to man-made laws that go beyond this. The Bible is our sole authority for faith and practice.

Is a young woman to be treated as a child? For a young woman to go to a godly Bible College and even to become a single missionary within the ministry restrictions of the New Testament Scripture (e.g., 1 Timothy 2:12) is not unscriptural. My wife was saved as a teenager when she was living in home broken by divorce. Her father and step father were unbeliever,s so she had no earthly father to help her spirituality. She faithfully attended the best church in her area, and after she graduated from high school she attended a godly Bible College, worked in a church, and was called to be a missionary. Before we were married, she worked as a nurse at a missionary hospital, and I do not believe that she was disobeying the Bible. A single woman can operate under the authority of the church as surely as she can under the authority of a father. Consider Phebe (Romans 16:1-2). She was sent by Paul on a ministry journey to Rome and Paul instructed the church at Rome to assist her, yet no father or husband is mentioned.

To instruct young women to leave their own fathers and put themselves under another father, because her own father is not following the Integrated Church model, is actually rebellion to God’s Word. Where does the Bible teach this? The Bible says, “Children obey your parents in the Lord for this is right” (Eph. 6:1). It doesn’t say, “Daughters obey your father in the Lord unless he refuses to follow the Integrated Church philosophy.”

Beware of Integrated Church legalism.

5. The Integrated Church will bring you into association with heresy.

As I have been examining the Integrated Church Movement, I have found many heresies that make this a dangerous movement. These are in addition to the errors that we have mentioned under the previous four points.

There is the heresy that salvation is by endurance.

Consider the following statement at a Family Integrated Church web site:

“While the dedication and discipline and athletic prowess is commendable, I fear that it may be at the expense of the child’s salvation. I know that on earth it isn’t fancy, it isn’t glorious, millions of people won’t be shouting your or your child’s name, but I want to encourage you, as a father, to daily drill the Christian fundamentals with your children. There are no medals or crowns or tiaras or sashes. But this is an endurance race and if we remain steadfast until the end, we will receive the crown of salvation that will last for eternity” (Richard Boureston, “Will Your Child Throw a 100mph Fastball in Hell?” Walk of Faith Church, Orange County’s Family Integrated Church, http://ourwalkoffaith.com/articles/orange-county-church/will-your-child-throw-a-100mph-fastball-in-hell.html).

That is work’s salvation, and it is a heresy of the first order.

There is the heresy of dominionism.

Vision Forum is devoted to dominion theology, and Vision Forum has a vast influence throughout the Integrated Church movement. They to impart a “family vision for cultural reformation.”

One of their DVD presentations is entitled “Training Dominion-Oriented Daughters.”

Vision Forum’s movie God’s Next Army presents the goal of training young people to enter the halls of government and become national leaders for kingdom reconstructionism.

Vision Forum is associated with Patrick Henry College, an institute of higher learning for home schoolers that is devoted to a theocratic agenda of “the transformation of American society” through preparing “Christian men and women who will lead our nation and shape our culture.”

Patrick Henry College, which has associations with Vision Forum, was founded by Michael P. Farris, who is also the head of the Home School Legal Defense Fund (HSLDA) and the founder of Joshua Generation Ministries. The latter is devoted to training young people 11-19 to “become a force in the civic and political arenas” to banish pluralism from America, a dominionist, kingdom-now agenda.

Gary Demar’s American Vision organization is another reconstructionist outfit that has influence among home schoolers and integrationist churches. American Vision’s objective is to “restore America to its Biblical Foundation–from Genesis to Revelation.” The vision is of “an America that recognizes the sovereignty of God over all of life and where Christians are engaged in every facet of society.”

This fails to recognize that America was never built solidly upon the Bible. It was always built on a mixture of Bible and humanistic philosophy. Some of the founding fathers were Bible-believing Christians, while some were not. In fact, some of the chief of America’s founders were unbelieving rationalists who despised doctrines such supernatural revelation and Christ’s atonement. These included Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson. There is no pattern in the New Testament for a “Christian nation.” There is a pattern for the church and the home and for civil government but not for a Christian nation. The kingdom of God will only work in this world at a level beyond the churches when God Himself comes to sit on the throne. There is no kingdom without a king!

In his book Ruler of the Nations, Demar describes the dominionist philosophy as follows:

“All government requires a reference point. If God is to be pleased by men, the Bible must become the foundation of all their governments, including civil government. This means that Biblical law must be made the foundation of all righteous judgment in every government: personal (self government), ecclesiastical, familial, and civil.”

When we look to the book of Acts and the New Testament Epistles we look in vain for a dominionist agenda. The apostles and preachers in the early churches didn’t have an objective of “bringing the Roman Empire back to God” or establishing the kingdom of God within the Roman Empire. Rather, they fulfilled the Commission given by Christ to preach the gospel to the ends of the earth (Acts 1:8). They preached the gospel, discipled the brethren, established churches, lived holy lives as light in a dark world, considered themselves pilgrims in a strange land, citizens of a heavenly country, and waited on the imminent return of Christ (1 Thess 1:9-10).

There is the heresy of Calvinistic sovereign election.

Vision Forum is founded upon and permeated with Reformed Calvinistic theology. The statement of faith includes the following:

“All who were chosen in Christ from eternity past are born again by the Holy Spirit, respond from their new hearts with repentance and faith in Jesus, are justified on the basis of the shed blood of Christ, become children of God, and are indwelt, sanctified, and sealed by the Holy Spirit until they are glorified at Christ’s return.”

Vision Forum books include the following: John Calvin: Man of the Millennium, The Story of the English Puritans, The World’s Greatest Reformation History Library, The Geneva Bible Calvin Legacy Edition, Children’s Stories of the Reformation, Stories of the Covenanters in Scotland, Reformation Heroes, Famous Women of the Reformed Church, Puritan Fathers Classics Library, Gill’s Body of Doctrinal Divinity (hyper, hyper Calvinism). They even sell a statue of John Calvin.

There is the heresy of Replacement Theology and the misuse of the Law of Moses.

This heresy replaces Israel with the Church. It is for this reason that the Family Integrated Church movement brings so many things from the Old Testament directly into New Testament church, which is a gross error. The Apostle Paul taught that the Law of Moses is not the Christian’s law (2 Corinthians 3:6-18). In 2 Corinthians 3:6, the “letter that killeth” is the Law of Moses. (This verse is frequently taken out of context by New Evangelicals and ecumenists and liberals to support the heresy that the Bible should not be interpreted literally or that it should not be obeyed in all points.) Those who hold to Replacement Theology teach that the “moral code” of the Law of Moses is enforce in the Church, but Paul was specifically talking about the “moral code” in 2 Corinthians 3. He was talking about the Law that “was written and engraven in stones” (verse 7). That is the Ten Commandments! Yet he calls this Law “the ministration of death” (verse 7) and “the ministration of condemnation” (verse 9). This is because the Law of Moses requires perfect obedience in ALL points (Deuteronomy 27:26; Galatians 3:10; James 2:10), and sinful, fallen man cannot live up to it. Thus, the purpose of the Law of Moses was to show us God’s holy character and righteous demands and man’s fallen condition in order to lead men to safety in Christ (Romans 3:19-24; Galatians 3:24). Once a man places his faith in Christ, he is no longer under the Law of Moses (Galatians 3:25; Romans 7:1-4). Paul said the Law of Moses, specifically the Ten Commandments written and engraven in stones, is done away for the believer (2 Cor. 3:11). The New Testament believer has a different, an even higher law, and that is the “law of the Spirit” (Romans 8:2). The believer’s law is to be conformed to the image of Christ by the power of the indwelling Holy Spirit (2 Corinthians 3:18). The Christian’s law is also called “the law of liberty” (Jam. 1:25), because while the instruction of the New Testament faith is a requirement that God places before His people, it is a law of liberty because we obey God out of gratitude for His grace in Christ and we do not have to fear eternal condemnation.

There is the heresy of denying the imminency of the return of Christ.

The Integrated Church movement largely denies an imminent Rapture, but the doctrine of the pre-tribulational Rapture is both Scriptural and important. (See “The Pre-Tribulation Rapture” at the Way of Life web site.) It is not a peripheral doctrine. Christ, Paul, James, and Peter taught that the Lord’s return is imminent and is to be expected at any time (Mat. 24:44; Phil. 4:5; Jam. 5:8-9; 1 Pet. 4:7). The early Christians lived in expectation of Christ’s return and the literal fulfillment of the prophecies. “For they themselves shew of us what manner of entering in we had unto you, and how ye turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God; And to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, even Jesus, which delivered us from the wrath to come” (1 Thessalonians 1:9-10). The doctrine of a pre-tribulational Rapture is a great motivator for purifying one’s personal Christian life. It encourages the believer in trials and persecutions (1 Thessalonians 4:17-18). It keeps the church’s focus on the Great Commission. D.L. Moody had it right when he said: “I look upon this world as a wrecked vessel. God has given me a lifeboat and said to me, ‘Moody, save all you can.’” The pre-tribulational Rapture motivates us to be busy in the Lord’s work (1 Cor. 15:58). It motivates us to live obedient lives (1 Jn. 3:1-3; 1 Th. 5:4-7). It motivates us to separate from evil (Tit. 2:13-14). It keeps believers on the outlook for heresy and apostasy (2 Timothy 4:3-4; 1 John 2:24-28).

There is the heresy of modern textual criticism.

The writings, videos, and web sites promoting the Integrated Church are filled with quotations from the modern versions, including the English Revised Version and the New International Version. There is a complete capitulation to the heresy of modern textual criticism and the smorgasbord approach to the Bible version issue. (See the following articles at the Way of Life Literature web site: “Textual Criticism Is Drawn from the Wells of Infidelity,” “Modern Textual Criticism’s Role in the Breakdown of Society,” and “The Ungodly Fruit of Modern Textual Criticism.” For a more extensive study, see the books “Modern Textual Criticism’s Hall of Shame” and “Faith vs. the Modern Bible Versions,” which are available in print and eBooks editions at the Way of Life web site.)

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CONCLUSION

The Integrated Church movement has some good points that need to be emphasized in every church today, but the good is wrapped in a theological package that has many dangers for Bible-believing fundamentalists.

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The Role of the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA) Stated Clerk and Administrative Committee in the Establishment of the Presbyterian Investors Fund (PIF) and Cornerstone Ministries Investments (CMI)

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Part Three

by Bob Wildrick

In part three as in part two, documents found on the Internet, bankruptcy court documents, CMI documents, and information given to the author by other CMI investors will be presented showing that the principals and other employees of PIF/CMI to this day  retain their connections with the PCA. The Bankruptcy Court Documents (BCD) cited in this article can be read and downloaded from the bmcgroup.com website by searching  case number 08-20355. [1] The author recommends that BCD 437 [2] and BCD 530 [3] be examined before continuing to read this article.

On December 24, 2008, the United States Trustee for the CMI bankruptcy appointed an examiner. This should have happened in July 2008, when requested by the bankruptcy trustee, but the debtor (CMI, Ottinger) as well as the Creditors Committee opposed the appointment of an examiner. Had an examiner been appointed in July 2008, there might have been more evidence of corruption found in the investigation. The examiner, Pat Huddleston, was given until March 15, 2009 to complete the examination and report his findings to the bankruptcy court. The report is contained in BCD 530. [4]

The author first scanned BCD 530 on March 18, 2009. BCD 530 details the double-dealing, self-dealing, and fraud of John Ottinger and John Wehmiller. The following day the author and his wife carefully studied BCD 530 in order that the complexity and the deviousness of what had happened at CMI could be better understood. Later that morning, the author telephoned Mr. Jamie Sickert, CMI Vice-President and Director, and asked if he had read BCD 530.  The author remembers clearly Mr. Sickert’s answer; “I read it, turned off my computer, sat down and cried.” The author asked Mr. Sickert if he or the rest of the board knew about the corrupt goings on at CMI, and Mr. Sickert replied with an emphatic “NO!”. Mr. Sickert and the board of directors were negligent in their duties which included fiscal and spending matters.

The eHow.com website “Money” section describes the role of a corporate board of directors:

A for-profit corporate board of directors must be cognizant of certain issues. Initially, the for-profit board has to keep a watchful eye on the chief executive officer (“CEO”) of the corporation. The board must assist the CEO and offer assistance to the CEO whenever necessary to achieve the board’s goals. Also, the board must determine whether to relieve the CEO from his or her duties or whether to continue with the CEO when his or her term expires. Furthermore, for publicly-held corporations, the for-profit board must have responsibility for fiscal matters and all spending issues. [5]

On June 23, 2009 on the Internet and June 24, 2009 in the paper edition of the Atlanta Journal Constitution, there was an article titled, “Cornerstone Ministries Betrayed Them by Straying from Mission, Investors Say.” [6] The following day, June 25, 2009, PCA TE the Rev. Cecil Brooks died.

Prior to Mr. Brook’s death, the author was preparing a complaint to file with the PCA’s Metro Atlanta Presbytery (MAP), asking for discipline of the Rev. Cecil Brooks and the Rev. John Ottinger. The complaint was then changed to reflect only Mr. Ottinger. Seven CMI creditors including the author filed the complaint with MAP in July 2009 citing  Scripture, applicable sections of the Westminster Confession of Faith, Chapter XXX, Section III, questions and answers from the Westminster Larger Catechism, and applicable sections from the PCA Book of Church Order.  As evidence, the author cited various sections of BCD 530.

MAP met October 9, 2009, and appointed a commission to investigate the complaint. The author received at least one email from the commission chair wanting to know if the author had more information over and above what had previously been sent.  The author suggested that the commission contact the individuals listed on BCD 530-1, which was a list of all the principals, directors, and others that had been associated with CMI.  The author additionally made himself available to meet with the commission.  On May 8, 2010, the author received a letter from the MAP Stated Clerk saying; “this commission finds insufficient grounds for Metro Atlanta Presbytery to discipline TE Ottinger for the sins of which he is accused by the complainants.”

On May 21, 2010, the author sent a letter to the MAP Stated Clerk asking for a full report of the commission.  Sometime after June 10, 2010, the author received a letter from the MAP moderator stating that MAP had received my request for a written copy of the commission report, and writing:

“For context, our presbytery received the commission’s report on May 4; it was delivered orally, and was done so in executive session.  As such, we did not distribute written copies to any of the attending elders. It is also our practice to keep confidential the details of matters we discuss in executive session. We must therefore decline your request.”

The author additionally filed a complaint against John Wehmiller with his church, First Baptist Church of Gainesville, Georgia, which was never answered.

John Ottinger was allowed to remain in charge of CMI until Sept. 25, 2009.  Beginning with that date, Glass Ratner Advisory & Capital Group LLC (GRACG) took over management of CMI. One of GRACG’s first appointments was Jason Collins of Reid Davis TSAI LLP, for the purpose of litigating and settling the claims against CMI.  Mr. Collins’ biography was on the Internet and included the following entry on the list of cases he is handling:

Recently hired as special counsel to the Plan Administrator of Cornerstone Ministries Investment Inc, to pursue claims arising out of a $140 million Ponzi scheme. [emphasis added]

The words ‘Ponzi scheme’ were later changed to ‘financial fraud’. [7]

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission defines a Ponzi Scheme as “…an investment fraud that involves the payment of purported returns to existing investors from funds contributed by new investors. Ponzi scheme organizers often solicit new investors by promising to invest funds in opportunities claimed to generate high returns with little or no risk. In many Ponzi schemes, the fraudsters focus on attracting new money to make promised payments to earlier-stage investors and to use for personal expenses, instead of engaging in any legitimate investment activity.” [8]

On July 31, 2009, Mr. and Mrs. John Ottinger bought a house at 500 Fawn Hill Place, Sanford, Florida for $937,500.00 cash. The 2011 taxes on the Florida house are $9,469.00. [9] Prior to buying the Florida property, on May 12, 2008, three months following the CMI bankruptcy, John T. Ottinger transferred ownership via a revocable trust to Julie J. Ottinger of their residence at 6020 Providence Lane, Cumming, Georgia. [10] The 2011 taxes paid on the Ottinger’s Georgia residence were $7,219.46, for a total of $16,868.46 in property taxes paid by the Ottingers in 2011. Many of the 3500 CMI creditors that lost the majority of their CMI investments in the February 2008 bankruptcy experience continual financial difficulties due to their CMI investment losses and live on far less income than what the Ottinger’s paid in property taxes in 2011.

In a previous article, the author said that more information was forthcoming on a man named John Lowery.  The author telephoned Jayme Sickert at home one night in the mid-2000’s, and during the course of our conversation Sickert said that he needed to go to bed because of an early flight the following morning. Sickert said that he was going to Dallas, Texas, for the CMI annual meeting, and that CMI had plans to make a large investment with a developer and a doctor who owned a fitness center in Dallas. The developer was John Lowery and the corporation was named Wellstone. Wellstone from 2006 to 2008 was a major sponsor of what in 2006 and 2007 was called the Wellstone Dallas White Rock Marathon. [11] [12] [13]

On 1 December 2008, Wellstone’s Craig Ranch development, an undeveloped tract of forty-two acres in the middle of a 2200 acre development in McKinney, Texas, declared Chapter 11 bankruptcy in order to force fellow bankruptee CMI to release its mortgage on the Wellstone property to which CMI had loaned $3 million. Wellstone had the Craig Ranch property under contract for sale to a rehabilitation hospital, but CMI’s refusal to release its mortgage on the property prevented its sale. The primary lender to Wellstone thus was attempting to foreclose on the property to satisfy its $5.2 million loan to Wellstone. [14]

The writer has been investigating the CMI debacle since early 2009 and believes this scandal isn’t much different than the Roman Catholic priest pedophile scandal. The reader may wonder at this point: “What is the difference between abuse of young boys by priests and the abuse of elderly senior citizens by PCA ministers?” Some might say the difference is that the pedophile scandals involved physical harm being done to the victims. Included among the 3500 defrauded CMI investors was a gentleman named Don Lebate. Don, as co-chair of the Creditors Committee, overextended himself investigating the bankruptcy, then in April 2009 suffered a massive heart attack and died. Another lawyer who had been investigating CMI told of one man that told him that he was contemplating suicide because of his losses. The author suggests that the reader examine letters that were sent to the bankruptcy judge that are filed on the BMC group web site detailing their losses and plight to get an understanding of the widespread despair and hardship suffered by so many as a result of the CMI Ponzi scheme. Two prime examples are BCD 590 [15] and BCD 667. [16]

The author additionally has contacted several of the fathers of the PCA denomination to garner support into investigating the CMI scandal.  One of the gate keepers said that the doctor would not become involved at that point in time. Another correspondent who was sent extensive documentation of the CMI scandal did not bother to respond at all. It seems that no one cares about this massive stain upon the church of Jesus Christ except the author’s pastor, a TE in another denomination, and the Christian Observer; said publication began reporting on serious financial and fiduciary irregularities with CMI’s predecessor organizations seventeen years ago in 1994.

Philip Doddridge (1702-1751) was a Church of England pastor and hymn writer. Seven of Doddridge’s hymns are in the Trinity Hymnal. Doddridge’s biography contains the biblical solution for church members who seek bankruptcy:

April 2nd, 1741

After this follows a number of cases presented to the Church for suitable admonition and discipline. One entry we will quote, as deserving the attention of the Churches of Christ at the present day:—

It is the unanimous judgment of this Church, that the frequent acts of bankruptcy which have happened in Dissenting congregations, as well as elsewhere, have brought so great a dishonour on religion, and occasioned so much mischief and reproach, that we think ourselves obliged in duty to enter our public protest and caution on this head; and we do hereby declare, that if any persons in stated communion with us shall become a bankrupt, or, as it is commonly expressed, fail in the world, he must expect to be cut off from our body, unless he do within two months give to the Church, by the elders, either in word or writing, such an account of his affairs as shall convince us that his fall was owing not to his own sin and folly, but to the afflicting hand of God upon him; in which case, far from adding affliction to the afflicted, we hope that as God shall enable us we shall be ready to vindicate, comfort, and assist him, as his friends and brethren in Christ.

Signed, in the name and presence of the Church, this 1st day of May, 1741, by the pastor and deacons. [17]

Brothers and fathers of the Presbyterian Church in America, you have a responsibility to clean up the sin that remains from the 1994 General Assembly. There are 3500-plus CMI investors whose lives have been seriously altered by the corruption of PCA Teaching Elders. The Legal Audit will remain an albatross around your necks until it is uncovered, exposed, and repentance be made by those responsible for twenty-plus years of corruption and coverup, both active and passive.

The question in the title of this series of articles appears to have been clearly answered.  The Stated Clerk and Administrative Committee for 1993-1994 may very well be responsible for the existence and bankruptcy of PIF/CMI.  If so, those men may also need to be held responsible for their actions and placed under appropriate discipline.

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There is still unfinished business in the Presbyterian Church in America.

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Our Guest Editor Bob Wildrick is one of 3500 CMI investors still waiting to receive settlement proceeds from the February 2008 Chapter 11 bankruptcy of Cornerstone Ministries Investments, Inc., a.k.a. the “$140 million Ponzi scheme.”

Opening Day - 23 October 2011

The congregation of  Grace Presbyterian Church of Lexington, Virginia, held the first service in its new church building at 11:00 a.m. on Sunday 23 October 2011. The new church building is located off Greenhouse Road in Rockbridge County about three miles north of the former church building.

The call to worship was led by the church’s first official pastor, the Rev. Ed Walker, who was called to the church in in the mid-1950′s. A former Welsh missionary to Africa surnamed Ackland served the new church in an “interim” capacity from its founding in 1952 until Mr. Walker was called as pastor. Grace’s current pastor, the Rev. Paul Carter, was called in 1984 and has now served the church as pastor for twenty-seven years.

The Opening Day Congregation

Planning for the new church building began over ten years ago, when the size of the congregation grew to where the capacities of downtown on-street parking and the size of the church building became inadequate. Two Sunday morning church services were held during the school year in an interim effort to address the capacity issues.

Grace Presbyterian Church was founded in 1952 by several members of the Presbyterian Church in the United States (PCUS) who were concerned about the growth of theological liberalism in

L to R - The Rev. Paul Carter, and the Rev. and Mrs. Ed Walker

the PCUS characterized by actions such as the introduction of the Revised Standard Version of the Bible, which waters down key Christian doctrines such as the virgin birth of Jesus Christ, and by the growing movement in the PCUS questioning the historicity and infallibility of the Bible. Grace’s founders sought to build a church based upon the whole counsel of God contained in the Bible, and upon the Westminster Confession of Faith.

The denominationally-independent Grace Presbyterian Church congregation first met in the Pine Room of the Mayflower Hotel on South Main Street, now Mayflower Assisted Living, before moving to the now-former church a few hundred feet south and on the opposite side of the street from the Mayflower.

In the late 1960′s, Grace Presbyterian Church joined the Reformed Presbyterian Church, Evangelical Synod (RPCES), then became a church of the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA) when the RPCES merged with the PCA in 1982.

The second Sunday service at the new church building was held on 30 October 2011 during Parents Weekend for Lexington’s Washington & Lee University. Following the opening of the service, Pastor Paul Carter sat with the congregation as the Rev. John Talley, minister of the Reformed University Fellowship chapter at W&L, presented the sermon and presided over the remainder of the worship service attended by several W&L students and their parents.

Students from W&L and from Lexington’s Virginia Military Institute are a significant part of the Grace Presbyterian Church congregation, and are served well by the ministries provided by the church to students of Lexington’s two higher education institutions.

Bob Williams, Managing Editor

Photographs by Janis Wilbur

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