“… and how from infancy you have known the holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correction, and training in righteousness….” (2 Timothy 3:15–16).

The apostle Paul is now in his final imprisonment in Rome, awaiting his execution. He writes to young Timothy to fan into flame the gift God had given him, to hold firm to the faith, to beware of false teachers and to preach the Word in season and out of season. He reminds Timothy that he had been brought up in the Scriptures by his grandmother, Lois and his mother, Eunice (see 2 Timothy 1:5). As Paul is about to pass off the scene, he passes the torch on to Timothy, the young man whom he describes as one who looks not after his own interests but those of others, knowing that he has a genuine interest in the spiritual welfare of the believers (see Philippians 2:19–23). Paul says he has no one else like Timothy. What a tremendous commendation coming from the great apostle Paul!

How did Timothy achieve such a glowing recommendation from this great apostle? While Paul certainly had much to do with it (as he took Timothy along on his journeys, teaching and modeling Christianity before him), Timothy’s spiritual foundation began in his own home, as his grandmother and mother taught him the Scriptures. They had to have been thoroughly acquainted with the inspired Word of God (the Old Testament), which was able to teach, rebuke, correct and train one in righteousness.

While churches, Bible colleges and seminaries are very useful, the training must begin at home. And that requires those of us who are parents to know the Bible ourselves if we are to pass God’s Word on to our children. We can’t depend solely upon the pastors, Sunday School teachers and others to train our families. That is our responsibility. And we cannot carry out that responsibility unless we, ourselves, are in the Word regularly.

There are many ways to study the Word of God. But here are some rather simple suggestions in case you have not embarked upon a program to thoroughly acquaint yourself with the Bible:

• Make sure that you own both a literal translation and a good paraphrase of the Scriptures.

• Build yourself a basic library of Bible helps

• Plan to read the Bible through, from Genesis to Revelation, at least once a year. There are 1189 chapters in the Bible; covering approximately 3 chapters a day will get you through the Bible in a year. You may have time to go through it more than once a year.

• Choose an Old Testament book and a New Testament book in which to specialize each year. For the first year, I would recommend Genesis and either John or Romans.

• Read those two portions of the Bible over and over during the year. Once you think that you have a good grasp of what is in them, try to make your own outline of the contents.

• After you have gone through them a number of times and have completed your own outline, then begin to use some helps as follows:

√ Read through a Bible survey which summarizes these books.

√ Choose a good commentary to read on each book.

√ Consult language helps on many of the important words the biblical writers use.

√ Use a Bible handbook, a Bible Dictionary, a good Bible Atlas and a Bible encyclopedia to help you further understand names, events, doctrines, etc.

• Write down the general applications you have gleaned from your study of these passages. Then from that list, choose those applications on which you most need to work in your own life.

• Pay close attention to the context of each section or verse, always interpreting and applying a passage based on its context (otherwise, you may be interpreting the passage to teach one thing, whereas it may be teaching something totally different).

• Remember that Scripture is its own best interpreter. Compare other passages of Scripture where the subjects under study are being discussed.

• After you have completed your study of these two portions of Scripture, talk with others about what you have learned, to help ensure you have not gone astray on some issue.

• Then, next year start the cycle all over again, reading through the Bible verse by verse and then choosing another Old Testament and a New Testament book to study.

• Try to select a time of each day, when you are least distracted and most fresh, and commit yourself to a regular program of study.

• Do not attempt to go so fast that you skip right over important sections of the Bible.

You will be pleasantly surprised at how quickly you will become familiar with the Bible. While it will be tempting to initially choose a book like Revelation or Daniel, that is probably not a good place to start, especially if you are a new student in God’s Word. 

The Bible is a divinely inspired, inerrant and authoritative book and is truly useful and profitable for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training ourselves in righteousness. If we want sound, God-honoring churches we, the members, must be acquainted with the Scriptures. We cannot pass on the responsibility to our church leadership. Just as they must shepherd us so that we can carry out our individual ministries, we have an obligation to make certain that our churches and their leaders teach the Word of God accurately, requiring us to properly obey that Word. 

Our most serious obligation is to our families, to bring them up in the fear and instruction of the Lord (Deuteronomy 6:4–9; Ephesians 6:4; Colossians 3:16). We cannot do that if we, ourselves, are not in the Word regularly.

Application

For Individuals:

1. Do you have a regular Bible study plan? Is it working?

2. Make an inventory of the helps you currently have and those which you need.

3. You may want to ask your spouse, or another person, to consider staying on the same track with you so that you will have another person with whom to talk regularly as you study portions of the Word.

4. Keep in mind that the purpose of your study is not just to fill your head with knowledge, but rather to train yourself in obedience.

5. God is His own interpreter. Pray regularly for His help in arriving at His truth.

For Groups:

1. Discuss the methods of Bible study which each of you has found helpful.

2. Which translations do you use and why?

3. Which Bible study tools have you found to be particularly useful?

Meditation

Prayerfully think through the meaning and implications of 1 Timothy 4:1-5 and Revelation 22:18-20.

This article is an excerpt from Curtis Thomas’ book – Life in the Body of Christ: Privileges and Responsibilities in the Local Church. A new hardcover edition is now available for pre-order for $19.98 at press.founders.org

One of the joys of the reformed faith is its evangelistic pedigree. From Calvin’s Geneva to Judson’s love for Burma, those who embrace the doctrines of grace have a long history of commitment to sharing Christ with the nations.  

When it comes to rural America, evangelism has its challenges. Today’s post focuses on 4 commitments we must have for biblical evangelism in small towns. 

Presupposition 

We begin with a non-negotiable presupposition: Christ is worthy to be preached in every place. From popular urban centers to remote villages, our Lord Jesus is worthy to be heralded to all creation. 

It is statistically less likely for your church to see large numbers of persons converted in rural settings. For example, in a city with 100,000 people, if 1% responded positively to the gospel, you’d see 1,000 converts. If the math held true for a town with 1,000 people, you’d see 10 converts. 

God is sovereign. He will save whom He will for His own glory. But this presupposition, the worthiness of Christ to be proclaimed in all places, will help you from any discouragement associated with lack of “success” in evangelism in small towns. When we preach Christ rightly, there is no lack of success! Christ is being proclaimed, and He is worthy. 

Prayer

Secondly, evangelism should not be separated from prayer. Paul asks the Colossian church to “pray also for us, that God may open to us a door for the word, to declare the mystery of Christ…” (Col. 4:3). 

Churches in small towns must be committed to praying for opportunities for evangelism. They must also be committed to pray specifically for lost souls in their community. Periodically, the church ought to gather to intentionally pray for the banner of Christ to be lifted high within the town that you are located. 

God has placed your church in your rural community for a reason. And one of those reasons is that you would be concerned for the lost there and seek the Lord’s mercy on their behalf confident that God has “many in this city who are[His] people” (Acts 18:10).

Proclamation 

We must remember that evangelism is not ultimately an event or program, but proclamation of the gospel, which includes telling sinners what they must do to be saved, namely, repent and believe the gospel (cf. Mark 1:15). 

I’ve seen churches go wrong here in hosting well intentioned events that ultimately left out the gospel. Passing out water bottles with bible verses on them is certainly not a bad thing, but don’t confuse that with evangelism. In order to evangelize, we must communicate the gospel and a call to sinners to repent and trust it. 

There are three primary ways our church has sought to do this. First, we have committed to going door to door once a month for the purpose of sharing the gospel. This can be uncomfortable and there is certainly prudence that must be exercised here in terms of time of day, number of people going to the home, safety, etc. However, it is our belief that the church must seek to get the gospel out rather than merely expecting lost persons to walk in our doors. 

Is it not a shame that the heretical Jehovah Witnesses are the ones known for going door to door while too many of us with the true gospel of Christ stay at home? However this may look in your community, consider regularly and intentionally taking the gospel to the homes of your area. 

Secondly, we try to preach at our local grocery store once a month. This too can seem uncomfortable, but I encourage churches to consider their own local community and see whether or not something like this would be feasible. For years I had convinced myself that street preaching was just for the big cities. But this goes back to our presupposition: Christ is worthy to be proclaimed even if the crowd is not the size of George Whitefield’s! Find a store, or gas station, or street corner, and proclaim the gospel. You may be surprised by what God does. One thing we’ve noticed is that other churches have reached out to us encouraged by our evangelism. What if your faithfulness inspires other churches to be more serious about evangelism too? 

Finally, we like to flood our community with tracts. Tracts are not the be all end all of evangelism. They are really a low bar. You simply hand a tract to a cashier, or friend at the ball game, or man in line at the local donut shop. We make our own tracts and put our church website on them in hopes that some will check out more about the gospel and our local church. 

Persistence 

The final encouragement I have for evangelism in small towns is don’t give up. Ecclesiastes 11:1 says, “Cast your bread upon the waters, for you will find it after many days.” I once heard a pastor friend preach from that text exhorting us to sow many seeds when it comes to evangelism and to remember this important truth: “sow nothing, reap nothing.” 

You can convince yourself that your evangelistic efforts are weak and pathetic and will never return any fruit. But can I encourage you that weak evangelistic efforts are always better than no evangelistic efforts? So, don’t give up!

You may hand out a tract, or preach on the corner, or knock on a door and no one come to Christ. Yet, I can assure you that it is 100% guaranteed that no one will come to Christ if we do not proclaim the gospel (cf. Rom. 10:14-17). So, do not be discouraged. Continue to sow seeds and trust God with the return. 

Continue to look for opportunities that are unique to your area. For us, we’ve preached in our local Christmas and Fair Parades. We’ve preached at local festivals our town has hosted. We’ve gone to local events to pass out gospel tracts and talk with people. We’ve done some Christmas Caroling, which is not the same as evangelism, but we did use the opportunity to pass out gospel tracts. Last Christmas we also did “evangelistic letter writing” where we gathered one Sunday evening at our church, I shared the gospel, and then we wrote letters to lost persons in our community (and beyond) imploring them to understand what Christmas is about and to repent and believe the gospel. 

Each rural area is going to look a little different. But this truth remains: Your community is in desperate need of the gospel. Will your church commit to having the presupposition, prayer, proclamation, and persistence necessary to make Christ known in your specific area? 

The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.

— Lamentations 3:22-23

There is a vital relationship between your memory and your anticipation. Memory provides the foundation for expectation. What you remember powerfully influences what you expect. What you know and can recall inevitably fuels what you anticipate.

My favorite restaurant is a local place called The Blue Dog. I have always enjoyed wonderful meals served by friendly staff there. My past dining experiences make me anticipate another excellent meal the next time I eat there. 

The same thing is true of gathered worship. The sweet memories of meeting with and hearing from God that believers share together on the Lord’s Day cause them to look forward with great anticipation to the next opportunity to meet. 

But it works the other way, too. If you remember bad experiences in a restaurant then it will be difficult to have high expectations when you are invited there for another meal. 

What you remember necessarily influences what you anticipate. Because this is true your memory can either work FOR you or AGAINST you when it comes to your spiritual life. 

Are you ever haunted by memories? David was: “My sin is ever before me” (Psalm 51:3). The sons of Korah also were plagued by difficult memories: “All day long my disgrace is before me, and shame has covered my face” (Psalm 44:15). 

Remembering your past failures and sins can keep you locked in the dungeon of despair. 

John Bunyan graphically portrays this in Pilgrim’s Progress. Giant Despair captures Christian and Hopeful and locks them in Doubting Castle, where they are beaten and tormented for four days. What kept them in that sad condition? It was their memory of their past failures! They had left the right road—despite having been warned of that danger. They also took their ease in by-path meadow and fell asleep when they should have been watching. It was the memory of their many sins that kept them in despair.

Has that ever happened to you? One of my favorite hymns expresses it well:

When I look all around me

And all I can see

Are my mountains of failure and sin

When I’m standing accused

And I’m guilty as charged

And I’ve nothing that I can defend

Those times when you are facing hardships, and you know that they are the result of your own sin and foolish choices. Or the times you look back on opportunities squandered and your mind begins to play the “what if” game. 

• What if I had not married so hastily?

• What if I had not committed adultery?

• What if I had stayed in school?

• What if I had not cheated on the job?

• What if I had never smoked that first joint?

Memory can supply the club in Giant Despair’s hand to bludgeon you until you are almost spiritually senseless. 

But memory can also be the chauffeur of peace, hope, and comfort to your soul, when, in addition to remembering your sins, it brings back to your mind the mercy and grace of God in Jesus Christ.

What finally delivered Christian and Hopeful from Doubting Castle? It was the memory that they had in their possession a key called promise! When that thought occurred to him, Christian said, “What a fool am I to lie in a stinking dungeon, when I may as well walk in liberty! I have a key in my bosom, called Promise; that will, I am persuaded, open any lock in Doubting Castle.”

He was correct. The memory of God’s grace & of His mercy-filled promises in Christ set them free. “For all the promises of God find their Yes in [Christ]. That is why it is through him that we utter our Amen to God for his glory” (2 Corinthians 1:20). 

The steadfast love of the Lord cannot ever cease because it has been given to us in Christ. By His life, death, and resurrection, He has sealed and secured it forever for all who trust in Him. 

So, what do Christians do when all they can see is their sin? What do we do when we are justly accused with no defense to make for ourselves? We return to the One who has proven faithful throughout all of our life. 

I will hope in the One

Crucified in my place

Jesus Christ the Redeemer of men

I will trust in the righteousness

Given to me

By Jesus my Savior and Friend

Trust and hope in our crucified, risen, reigning Savior. Remember Him. Remember His faithfulness in the past. He never forsakes His people. He never has let one of His promises fail. So, regardless of where you are or what you are going through, trust Him now. Trust Him for your future. 

Remember His goodness, wisdom and power. And say with Jeremiah, “Great is Your faithfulness.”

Follow Tom Ascol:

In Romans 6:1-14, the Apostle Paul gives Christians, among other things, one of the purposes of believer’s baptism. This blessed ordinance of our Lord Jesus Christ is a beautiful picture worth a thousand words! While much ink has been spilled over the mode, subject, and purpose of baptism, let me give you three simple, yet profound pictures, that this ordinance gives the church. 

First, it displays for us an:

Overwhelming Covenant  

In Romans 6:14 we see that believers are not under law, but grace. Consider those two words there: “law” and “grace.” 

The Apostle Paul is one of my favorite Baptists. And what we see him articulating for us here are the two great covenants of the Bible: The covenant of works and the covenant of grace. 

This is how your Bible is divided. Old Testament and New Testament. This comes from the Latin Testamentum and just means covenant. Literally your Bible is divided into two sections known as Old Covenant and New Covenant, or, Law and Grace. 

Now, this doesn’t mean there’s only law in the Old Testament and only Grace in the New Testament. Of course, that’s not true at all. But what it does help us see is that these two covenants, Law and Grace, help set the framework for the whole Bible. 

In fact, I would go so far as to say that without understanding these covenants well, we do not read our Bibles well. Listen to how Spurgeon put it: 

The doctrine of the divine covenant lies at the root of all true theology. It has been said that he who well understands the distinction between the covenant of works and the covenant of grace is a master of divinity. I am persuaded that most of the mistakes which men make concerning the doctrines of Scripture are based upon fundamental errors with regard to the covenants of law and of grace.

The Covenant of Works

So, in our text we have law and grace. All persons born in Adam are born into law, that is, under a covenant of works, a covenant that has been broken because of Adam’s sin (cf. Romans 5:12).

Adam is what we call our legal representative. He is the federal head of the human race. And in Adam, all die. We are born under a broken covenant of works and held guilty due to Adam’s sin all the while the moment we are able we choose volitionally to sin and rebel against our holy God.

It is our nature to sin and run away from God. We have nothing left within us willing or able to do any spiritual good before God. 

Being under the law as a covenant of works, leaves us in a hopeless condition. It shows us the perfection God demands but only moves us to rebel (see Romans 7) and is unable to remedy our situation. What then is left for us to do? Well, all we can do, and all we want to do, only heaps up more condemnation. 

The Covenant of Grace

This brings us to the overwhelming covenant and by that, I mean the covenant of grace. 

In eternity past the triune Godhead agreed to save an unworthy people for His own glory. This agreement theologians call the covenant of redemption. But this is enacted in time by the promise of grace. We see this in Gen. 3:15 after the Fall: God will send the seed of the woman to crush the serpent’s head.

That same language is used again in Genesis 12: This Redeemer will be the Seed of Abraham and then later the offspring of David. 

These promises, and so many more, point us forward to the covenant of grace which is inaugurated in Christ – Jesus is the One promised of old. He is the one in time, born of the Virgin Mary, fulfilling all righteousness in His life, dying the death of covenant breakers, bearing the wrath of God for His ppl, and rising again in victory over death, hell, and the grave.

The covenant of grace says there is nothing you can do in and of yourself to reconcile you to God. Not your going to church or taking the Lord’s Supper or reciting the Bible or prayers or creeds. 

In and of yourself is only unrighteousness and sin. 

But the Lord Jesus came. He completed the work. Where Adam failed, where Israel failed, where you have failed, He fulfilled all righteousness. He substituted Himself in our place. He bore the wrath of breaking God’s law upon the wooden cross. He rose again in triumph. 

And God’s grace brings us out from under the law and places us within the new covenant, the covenant of grace (Romans 6:14).

Members of the Covenant 

Under the law, the sign of the covenant of works was circumcision. It was a reminder that those who did not keep the whole law would be cut off from God. That is, the children of Abraham were not part of the covenant of grace unless, they, by faith, looked to the coming Messiah. 

The true people of God have always and only been believers. It is only those who by grace alone place their faith alone in Christ alone who are God’s true Israel (cf. Rom. 9:6, Gal. 6:16). Someone’s physical birth or ethnicity does not bring them into the New Covenant. 

In Romans 4:16 we see that Abraham is the true father of only those of faith, whether Jew or Gentile. Only those of faith are the ppl of God. Only those of faith are brought into the New Covenant, the Covenant of Grace.

Those in the Covenant of Grace are no longer under Adam as their representative. Rather, Christ represents them! They have died in Christ and now live again in Him having His righteousness credited to their account by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone. 

And, so, what is the sign, then, of this new covenant? This overwhelming covenant of grace? It is believers Baptism as Paul lays our in Romans 6:3-4.

This, of course, teaches us that Biblical Baptism is not for unbelievers. It is not for infants. It is only for those who have been brought into the New Covenant, dying to sin and self and rising again to newness of life as typified in Baptism which serves as a sign for God’s glorious grace upon a person’s life. 

Baptism is a picture worth 1,000 words! Baptism signifies, it is a picture of, our union with Christ. It shows forth our newness of life. It publicly identifies us with the death and resurrection of Christ.  Baptism does not perform these things. It does not create within us a new heart. It does not bring us into union with Christ. 

Rather, it displays on the outside what God, in His sovereign grace, has already performed on the inside. 

This is why we baptize by immersion (cf. Romans 6:3-4). Now, to say we “baptize by immersion” is like saying we “drink a drink.” Baptism and immersion are the same word. Baptism is really a made-up word in the sense that it’s just transliterated, brought straight over form Greek to English.

You can read John Dagg’s work on this Greek word but let me give you one quote from 17th Century Baptist, Henry Lawrence (1600-1664) who says: “the word Βαπτίζω signifies properly…to drowne, or sinke in the water, to dip, to overwhelme…”

You cannot signify the death and resurrection of Christ or the new believer by sprinkling water or by pouring water. Baptists baptize. That is, we immerse believers’ whole body down into the water and back up again. 

Baptism, then, reminds us of an Overwhelming Covenant. 

2ndly, it is a picture of an:

Obligatory Commitment

I love this quote from Sam Renihan: “Baptism is…a two-way declaration. On the one hand, it is God’s visible promise that all who are in His Son are new creations by virtue of their union with Christ in His death and resurrection. And on the other hand, it is the individual’s profession of faith in those very promises.”

Romans 6 shows us that by committing to the ordinance of baptism the new Christian is publicly declaring his or her death to sin and new life in Christ. He or she is declaring a commitment to follow Christ no matter the cost. The old man or woman has passed away and the new one has come being created anew in Christ Jesus by God’s grace. 

In Baptism we have symbolized taking off the old man and putting on the new and now it is our fight every day to continue to do this. Every day we continue to mortify the deeds of the flesh. We continue to look to Christ and seek to walk in newness of life. 

And this really is Paul’s argument in Romans 6:1-4. What he is encouraging the Roman Christians with is to, essentially, remember their baptism as a way of fighting sin in the present. 

Let me put it to you this way: In many places in America there are people who profess to be Christians. And one of the reasons many say they are Christians is because they have been baptized.

Thus, they look to their baptism as a trophy rather than as a flag. Let me illustrate it like this: In the movie the Patriot, Benjamin Martin’s oldest son, Gabriel Martin, is continually sewing an American Flag . And even in the midst of despair and defeat, that flag is a symbol of what they are fighting for in the American Revolution.

And looking at the flag is what sort of turns the battle at the end of the movie. 

Well, in a similar way, we look to our Baptism to remember what we are fighting for. We have died to sin and risen with Christ! This fight is worth it. Keep pressing on. You are dead to sin and alive in Christ. Christ is King. He is King of your Life. Keep up the fight.

If you look at Baptism as a trophy you just say, “Well, I’ve got my ticket into heaven and it doesn’t matter how I live.” If you remembering your baptism means you just live a life of unchecked rebellion and sin but you’re clinging to your baptism as your hope, you are foolish. This is not the purpose of Baptism. 

But for those who have been born again, our Baptism serves as a reminder of who we are so that we can continue our growth in the Lord Jesus Christ. Being in the New Covenant does not produce passivity or carelessness but commitment to holiness. 

Baptism is an obligatory commitment. It is our commitment before others that we are following Christ no matter the cost. He is worthy!

And by obligatory, I mean what my friend Jeffrey Johnson writes:

Although baptism is not essential to salvation, it is highly unlikely that a person has been truly born again without an eager desire to follow the Lord in this first command that God gives the new Christian. Baptism is a public confession of Christ that evidences to the church and the world that there has been a radical transformation within. Baptism is also a visible sermon. It demonstrates a spiritual reality of one’s death to sin and resurrection to the newness of life in Christ Jesus.

So, Baptism reminds us of an overwhelming covenant. It is an obligatory commitment. And finally, Baptism is an: 

Open Commemoration

In Romans 6:3 Paul uses the phrase “all of us”. Paul is able to speak to the Church at Rome with the common understanding that Baptism was ordinary part of the Christian life. 

That is, “all of us” were baptized. All of who? All Christians. Not that Baptism is what “makes” a Christian, but Baptism is what, in essence, publicly commemorates one as a Christian. 

This is why Baptism is an ordinance of the local church. The local church has the keys of the kingdom from Christ Her Lord (cf. Matthew 16:19). And it is her duty to open the door to Baptism as it were for all who repent and believe the gospel.

So, when a local church baptizes someone, it is saying, in essence, “We receive this man or woman as a brother or sister in Christ.” In Baptism, the church is publicly declaring a person as a Christian. 

Thus, in Baptism, the local church is committing to love this man or woman as a brother or sister in Christ, to watch over him or her in the Lord, to hold this person accountable in the Lord, and to humbly have him or her watch over us and hold fellow church members accountable as well. 

Baptism is an open commemoration. It is not to be done in a secret closet unbeknownst to anyone else. It is not to be done on a whim in someone’s backyard separated from the local church. 

Baptism is a local church ordinance where we perform this great event in the midst of the gathered church. That may be at a lake or in a river or even in a pool, but the point is, it’s properly done when the local church is gathered under the leadership of her pastors. 

Fred Malone reminds us, 

Away with the individualistic ecclesiology plaguing America which minimizes baptism and church membership, leaving Christians the freedom to float around without feeling responsible to a pastor or a church. Such an attitude feeds the antinomian spirit we see growing today. Yet, the whole teaching of the NT is that Christians need the ministry of a committed body of believers (church membership) which baptism calls them to. Church membership is required after baptism and believer’s baptism is required for church membership.

Thus, Baptism is an open commemoration. It is a public ordinance of the church whereby those baptized as well as the local church celebrate Christ together even as they mutually pledge themselves to one another in grace.

Fred Malone also states: “Baptism is the outward sign of entrance into the New Covenant by the inward circumcision of the heart, evidenced by one’s confession of faith in Christ.”

This reminds us that Baptism is a picture worth a thousand words. It cannot save in the sense of effecting regeneration or faith or justification or any such thing. Rather, it points us to Christ and is a picture of new life in Him (cf. Rom. 6:1-4). 

Christian brotherhood depends on Christian faith. The New Testament often sets forth “the faith” as central to the apostolic mission, the pastor’s task, the Christian’s grasp of truth that is saving and sanctifying, and the true test of unity in the Christian profession. The first use of this phrase as a specific body of truth is in Acts 6:7, where it is written, “and a great many of the priests were obedient to the faith.” This involved a clear adoption of truth connected with the apostolic “teaching and preaching Jesus as the Christ” (5:42). Had they not embraced that body of truth, there would be no evidence of faith. 

The word “faith” is used when the internal disposition of trust in the person and work of Christ is in view: “purifying their hearts by faith” (Acts 15:9); “a man is justified by faith apart from the deeds of the law” (Romans 3:28); “so then faith comes by hearing, and hearing  by the word of God” (Romans 10:17); “the just shall live by faith” (Galatians 3:11); “through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith” (Philippians 3:9). This “faith” is generated by the Holy Spirit in the mind and heart of a sinner upon an effectual application of “the faith” to both mind and heart. 

“The faith” is the revealed body of truth according to which true saving faith is defined. The Gentile churches were strengthened in “the faith, and increased in number daily” by the ruling of apostles and elders concerning ceremonial law. One outstanding element that testified to the genuine conversion of Saul was that he “preaches the faith which he once tried to destroy;” that faith consisted of “the gospel … [that] came through a revelation of Jesus Christ” (Galatians 1:11, 12, 23). Paul defined his mission in terms of “obedience to the faith among all nations” (Romans 1:5) and “the faith of God’s elect, even the acknowledgement of the truth” (Titus 1:1). Paul warned Timothy against those who “resist the truth, men of corrupt minds, disapproved concerning the faith” (2 Timothy 3:8). Instead, he insisted on Timothy’s following “my doctrine, … faith.” One element of Paul’s confidence in his reception of the “crown of righteousness” was that he had “kept the faith” (2 Timothy 4:7, 8). Christian fraternity was defined by this when he wrote, “Greet those who love us in the faith” (Titus 3:15).

We see with profundity the interaction between “the faith” and “faith” when Paul wrote, “If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raise him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation” (Romans 10:9, 10). The word “confess,” we see in this strategic passage, is vitally (in the arena of true life), connected with both personal trust and revealed doctrinal truth. John affirms this in saying, “Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is of God.” Conversely, he continued, “Every spirit that does not confess that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is not of God” (1 John 4:2, 3). An understanding of the incarnation of the Son of God, his true humanity and his eternal deity in one person, who came in such a way out of the necessities of redeeming a fallen humanity is implicit in this confession. Paul also, again, united the open confession of truth with the church’s position as the depository of truth, saving truth, in this fallen world. He gives a six-article statement concerning the vital and saving point of the incarnation, Christ’s righteousness, the preaching of this truth, the belief connected with it, and Christ’s ascension by introducing it with a word that means, “This is a matter of necessary and certain confession” (1 Timothy 3:15, 16). 

This combination of apostolic mission, revealed truth, and saving faith makes Rick Warren’s assertion about the Southern Baptist Convention puzzling, and, if taken seriously, destructive of the very mission he seeks to affirm: “From the start, our unity has always been based on a common mission, not a common confession. For the first 80 years of the SBC, we did not even have a confession because the founders were adamantly opposed to having one!” The serious fidelity called for to a confessional article on the nature of Christian ministry, Pastor Warren contends is the “death of the basis for cooperation upon which this body was founded.” Again he asserts, “That basis – a common mission, not a confession – was the founding genius that made the SBC great.” Forceful verbiage but quite wide of historical truth and the biblical standard of true Christianity. Warren’s open letter invites Southern Baptists to a missiological souffle. At least these four fallacies render his deep concern a destructive blunder.

Fallacy #1— A Confessionless Denomination

He wants a Confessionless Denomination. It is impossible. The very thing that defined Baptists from the seventeenth-century to the present is the rigor with which they set forth confessions to unite them with other Christians and distinguish them within the rank of Dissenters from Puritans and Separatists. We love our Presbyterian brethren, but could never consent to their confessional proposition, “infants descending from parents, either both, or but one of them, professing faith in Christ, and obedience to him, are in that respect within the covenant and to be baptized.” Upon examining their prooftexts and the way they developed a coherent argument in favor of infant baptism, Baptists came to a different conclusion and stated their view confessionally. The Second London Confession, in the context of a longer discussion of the church, the communion of saints and the ordinances stated, “Those who do actually profess repentance towards God, faith in, and obedience to our Lord Jesus, are the only proper subjects of this ordinance {baptism].” John Smyth’s “Short Confession” (1610) stated, “baptism is the external sign of the remission of sins, of dying and of being made alive, and therefore does not belong to infants.” John Spilsbery, the first Particular Baptist pastor viewed a confession of faith as one of the “constituting causes” of the church for a confession of faith declares the “fitnes of the matter for the forme.”  That is, believers in the gospel of Christ may unite to form a church. The power of the Gospel “shining into the heart of man” so convinces the sinner of its truth that its leaven “seasons and sweetens the whole man.”  The Word operates like a fire that “breaks forth and discovers itself” with such clarity in “such as have it,” that they delineate specific truths from that Word.  A confession of faith consisting of particular doctrines naturally develops so that others so prepared “come to one and the same minde and judgement in it.” Having agreed on the articles of faith, such believers may unite with each other in a church estate through the baptism of those who so believe. The confession of faith of the Tuscaloosa Association, Alabama, says, “We believe that baptism and the Lord’s supper are Ordinances of Jesus Christ, and that true believers are the only subjects of Baptism, and that by immersion is the Apostolic mode.” The confession of faith of the Mississippi Baptist Association states, “We believe that baptism, by immersion, is the only scriptural mode, and that believers are the only proper subjects” (1791). The confession of the Louisiana Baptists (1814) said that the church is constituted of those “who upon profession of their faith have been baptized by immersion in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost” (1814). Given the variety of confessional traditions already in existence when Baptists emerged, Baptists as a denomination would not exist apart from a clearly stated confession highlighting the distinctives that Baptists distilled from the Bible in contradistinction from other denominations. 

Fallacy #2— A Confessionless Unity

He wants a Confessionless Unity. In a fallen world and in the multiplicity of Christian confessions, unity without confession is a delusion. Our common domination by error calls for a reconstruction of worldview and truth-claims on the basis of divine revelation. A commitment to the coherence of divinely revealed truth mean the construction of doctrine on any subject set forth in Scripture—creation, providence, God, humanity, sin, salvation, the church, how it is formed, how it is taught, the end of this present order, judgment, eternity. Other subjects could be named, but you get the point. A confession simply is the organization of revealed truth into its related parts so that our minds will be conformed both in individual and corporate conduct according to its principles. A so-called common mission without common confession gives no standard by which conversions may be discerned and no goal for the growing conformity of believers into the perfection of Christ. God gave the pastor-teacher as a gift to men so that his church would “attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God” (Ephesians 4:13). Not only is faith the common experiential factor in forming the church, but the faith is the instrument by which we attain to the “measure of the stature that belongs to the fulness of Christ.” A confession witnesses to our corporate confidence in the unified nature of Scripture and guides the church, under God and his revealed truth, into greater corporate unity and focus on mission. The greater unity churches have in confession, the more profound and univocal in the “Amen” is their mission.

Fallacy #3— A Confessionless Mission

He wants a Confessionless Mission.  Pastor Warren sees the ideal of missionary passion as a corporate “NO to becoming a creedal denomination … and instead [a reaffirmation] that it is the Great Commission that draws us together, not doctrinal uniformity in every jot and tittle.” Set aside the obvious fallacy of a false dichotomy and the irony that the “jot and tittle” concern in support of fuzzy adherence to a confession arose from the words of Jesus; other implications are disturbing. These words were, in fact, Jesus’ assertion of the absolute necessity of the fulfillment of the Law—even heaven and earth would not endure beyond the importance of the conformity of his incarnational life and the lives of his disciples to every item of revealed truth (Matthew 5:18). Yes, the rhetoric is clumsy, but in its substance it is worse. The impact of mission is diminished, not increased, by a mixed message. Warren opines, “that our unity is to be based on giving total submission to Christ in our deeds and NOT based on mental submission to man-made creeds.” It is eerily similar to the call of one of the leading Modernists ninety-nine years ago (1924). Shailer Mathews in the Faith of Modernism wrote, “Orthodox Christians are now working for the world’s transformation. But the striking fact is that in so doing they are not stressing theological fundamentals. They do not deny them but they ignore them as moral and social motives. … The true watch-word of Christianity is not truth, but faith vitalized by love. … Creative minds care less for their father’s beliefs than for a faith that respects their increased knowledge and stimulates their will to serve” (12, 13, 14). Deeds not creeds bind together Warren and Mathews.Mathews did write a statement of “affirmations.” Mathews said, “While by its very nature the Modernist movement will never have a creed or authoritative confession, it does have its beliefs” (179). As Northern Baptists (now ABCUSA) embraced the social emphases of Mathews, their confessionless missions cared less for eternal salvation and more for present modernization.

Fallacy #4— A Confessionless Soteriology

Warren is inviting Southern Baptists to a Confessionless Soteriology. He does not do this with sinister motive or as a clandestine liberal, but by minimizing the importance of carefully stated propositions of saving truth. It is one of the purposes of a confession to give such a clear statement of gospel truth that we may discern whether the gospel preached is true or another gospel. Paul saw how quickly his churches could be led from the purity of his gospel into the falsehoods of the Judaizers. John saw how subtle were the heresies of proto-gnostics concerning the person of Christ and the devastating result such teaching would have on the nature of true “belief.” James saw how empty so-called faith was that did not involve a robust love of righteousness and good works. The writer of Hebrews saw the danger of failing to see that Jesus was the final sacrifice, the final priest, the reigning king, and the final prophet and that salvation depended without reservation on his completed work—“When he had by himself purged our sins, sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high” (Hebrews 1:3). A confession of faith gathers all of these New Testament arguments together to present clear biblical definitions of Christ’s person, repentance, faith, atonement, justification, adoption, sanctification, preservation, perseverance to serve as rails to remind us of the infinite importance of care and accuracy in our presentation of the gospel. The confession does not replace Scripture; the writers seek to present the biblical gospel taking into account all relevant passages to give a full, while concise, presentation of the biblical details that we might consistently be called to care and faithfulness in this most heavenly of all earthly activities, proclaiming the gospel that is worthy of all acceptation. The confession helps us obey the Pauline command, “Examine yourselves as to whether you are in the faith” (2 Corinthians 13:5). A confessionless soteriology can begin to omit vital truths and soon become another gospel.

I do not doubt the right intent of Pastor Warren’s zeal for seeing the mission given by Christ finally executed in every country of the world. Nor do I doubt that same desire in those who have a deeply-held confessional conviction about the biblical passages stating the clear qualifications of those that Christ gives to the church of pastor-teachers. When a Christian finds that his mind disagrees with a clearly-stated confessional article and his conscience forbids operating in accord with it, the world is open to him. That person, so constrained in mind and conscience, may look for another place to minister more satisfying to his calling. Certainly it is not fitting to seek to convince others that their confessional concerns are trivial, unworthy of fidelity, or easily compromised for the sake of a more inclusive body.

In Volume 9 of The Works of John Owen, the renowned theologian and pastor talks about restraining and renewing grace. Restraining grace is that work of God that keeps people in “fear of shame, danger, death, and hell.” It is similar to what God told Abimelech in Genesis 20:6, “it was I who kept you from sinning against me.”

Renewing grace, on the other hand, “is faith and love,—faith working by love. A man who hath a spiritual understanding may examine himself, and find under what conduct he is.”[1]

The question for today’s post is simply this: Are you merely under the influence of restraining grace or have you experienced the power and hope of renewing grace? 

Restraining Grace

True, in the context of our Nation’s current cultural crisis, we see the walls of restraining grace crumbling all around us. Sins committed today were similarly, perhaps, committed 100 years ago. The difference is that today they are (literally) paraded down main street while in the last century they were done in secret. 

Of course, as technology has increased and the boldness of wicked men and women has increased, new sins are participated in today that sinners of past generations could not have even fully fathomed. 

Yet, in the mercy of God, restraining grace, at least some measure of it, still prevails in many places. That is, as wicked as our current culture is, it is not as wicked as it could possibly be. And there are many places around the country and the world where people, with the moral law of God upon their hearts and consciences (Romans 2:15), seek to try to live some sort of outwardly respectable life. 

In the midst of declining morality, there remain people who “by nature do what the law requires” (Romans 2:14). Paul does not mean they actually “keep” the moral law of God, but that there are times when it is clear their Imago Dei is showing. Their efforts at morality show that they know, at least in part, that God requires something of them. 

Renewing Grace

This circles us back to the point of today’s post. Restraining grace is not enough for a person to have true peace with God. Restraining grace may allow a person in their own sinfulness to suppress their guilt and feel worthy of heaven, but it will not bring a person to savingly surrender to our Lord Jesus Christ. 

For that, we need renewing grace. We need the grace of Ezekiel 36:25-27 whereby God does not merely “keep us form sinning” but goes beyond that to remove our hearts of stone and replace them with a heart of flesh. This is renewing grace. Grace that produces in us a total change. We must be born again. 

How do you know you’re born again? Because you love Christ. You believe on Christ. You walk with Christ. You have been transformed by the power of God in the gospel. You obey from the heart (cf. Rom. 6:17). His will becomes more important than your own. You seek to walk the ancient paths He has set before you (cf. Jer. 6:16).

This is the difference between restraining grace and renewing grace. Restraining grace keeps you from sin out of fear of cultural ramifications. Renewing grace keeps you from sin out of fear of God. The desire of the heart moves from seeking conformity to a standard of self or society to seeking conformity to the standard of God. 

Those under the influence of restraining grace may go to great lengths to justify themselves. They may regularly attend church. They may dabble in philanthropy. They may avoid more of the egregious sins so prevalent today. 

But it is only those under the sovereign influence of renewing grace who are savingly and lastingly converted to Christ. 

Examine Yourself

The Bible instructs us to examine ourselves (cf. 2 Cor. 13:5). We would do well to consider Owen’s categories, which I find to be biblical, and make serious effort today to contemplate whether we are under the control of restraining or renewing grace. 

If you find yourself only under the power of restraint, then I remind you of the words of that old hymn…

Dark is the stain that we cannot hide.What can avail to wash it away?Look! There is flowing a Crimson Tide,Brighter than snow you may be today.

Grace, grace, God’s grace,Grace that will pardon and cleanse within;Grace, grace, God’s grace,Grace that is greater than all our sin.

Look to Christ today and find in Him, “wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption” (1 Cor. 1:30).

[1] John Owen, The Works of John Owen, ed. William H. Goold, vol. 9 (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, n.d.), 385.

The Southern Baptist Convention is an associational structure of churches. Is purpose is to carry “into effect the benevolent intentions of our constituents, by organizing a plan for eliciting, combining, and directing the energies of the whole denomination in one sacred effort for the propagation of the gospel.” The assumption behind the union was that each participating churches would be a  “regular Baptist church.” No Baptist church is forced to join an association of churches nor forced to stay. No association may exert authority over the internal affairs of a local church, but it may determine the terms of membership in the association. The church is autonomous; the association is autonomous. The church may select its own officers, receive and discipline its own members according to its understanding of Scripture, and choose to affiliate with other churches of like faith and order. An association of churches may govern its internal affairs according to the will of the associating churches and may adopt a confession of faith that expresses its understanding of the Scriptures. It may receive or reject churches into its associational structure on the basis of that confessional statement. A local church may not demand that an association of churches allow its participation while it holds doctrines out of accord with the association’s confessions. A church may not demand that an association change its confession to allow for its participation while dissenting from its doctrine. A church disagreeing with the confessional stance of an association may continue its autonomy independent of the association.

When the Philadelphia Association received queries from churches, a committee appointed to investigate the question would answer with pertinent Scripture and frequently would refer to a section of their confession of faith. In 1724, for a question on the Sabbath, one element of the response was “We refer to the Confession of Faith, set forth by the elders and brethren met in London, 1689, and owned by us, chap. 22, sect. 7 and 8.” In 1727 a question on marriage evoked the response “Answered, by referring to our Confession of faith, chapter 26th in our last edition.” A question about laying on of hands referred to the Confession in chapter xxvi, section 9. A question in 1735 about church membership of a person too far away to attend was answered by invoking the Confession of faith, chapter xxvii, and the Treatise on Discipline.

In 1743, the association heard discussion about a theological dispute that had developed in one of its member churches concerning the eternal generation of the Son. After the discussion, one person, Joseph Eaton, “recanted, renounced, and condemned all expressions, which he heretofore had used, whereby his brethren … were made to believe that he departed from the literal sense and meaning of that fundamental article in our Confession of faith, concerning the eternal generation and Sonship of Jesus Christ our Lord.” At the same meeting a “brother Butler” wrote an acknowledgement, “I freely confess that I have given too much cause for others to judge that I contradicted our Confession of faith concerning  the eternal generation of the son of God, in some expressions contained in my paper, which I now with freedom condemn.”

When Baptist associations opened formal correspondence with other associations, they determined their doctrinal purity through examination of their confession of faith. The Philadelphia Association minutes from 1788 read, “A letter and minutes which contain the sentiments of the Stonington Association, were received. From which it appears, that they have adopted the same printed Confession which this Association has heretofore approved. We shall therefore cheerfully concur with them in maintaining a mutual correspondence.”

OK, well, you get it. No need to multiply instances. The confession was important and no article would have been inserted unless there was good reason to believe that all the churches should affirm their conscientious acknowledgement of the biblical doctrines so stated.  A denominational confession necessarily includes doctrines deemed of secondary importance in relation to historic orthodox Christianity. If the Apostles Creed and Nicene Creed were all that we should confess, and we certainly should confess them, we would have no denominations, but we would have constant disagreement between and even within churches about those things that seem to be secondary—not saving truths—but still vital for the health and unity of local churches AND vital associational structures, as well as personal obedience to the Lord. Among these are the mode and meaning of baptism—surely anyone can see that this could rise to the level of a first order issue–,  the number, authority, and qualifications of the officers of the church, and the manner of church discipline.

An essay on the relation of local churches to an association appeared in the minutes of the Philadelphia Association in 1749. After affirming the autonomy of each local church, and the right and obligation to administer the biblical ordinances, receive and discipline its membership, set apart its officers “independent of any other church or assembly whatever,” it discussed the autonomy and powers of an association, or confederation of churches that unite on a voluntary basis. Though not a “superior judicature,” there is nevertheless a power that the association has over itself. “For if the agreement of several distinct churches, in sound doctrine and regular practice be the first motive, ground and foundation or basis of their confederation,” the essay premised, and then drew the inference, “then it must naturally follow, that a defection in doctrine or practice in any church, in such confederation, or any party in any such church, is ground sufficient for an Association to withdraw from such a church or party so deviating or making defection, and to exclude such from them in some formal  manner.”

Baptists have never believed that baptism, the Lord’ Supper, or the calling and setting apart of church officers are minor matters for they are part of divine revelation and are given in order to bring the church to a “unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God” (Ephesians 4:13). These are the doctrines that distinguished Baptists in their seventeenth-century emergence from English Puritanism and Separatism. Within the framework of the broader Christian confession of creedal orthodoxy and Protestant evangelicalism—both affirmed clearly by Baptists as necessary for true Christian faith—issues of church order and officers might be considered secondary or even tertiary, but for the distinctive identity of Baptists they are primary. Baptists consider their views of baptism, church membership, the continuing mandate of the great Commission, ecclesiastical non-establishment, and the qualifications of local church officers as essential elements of our quest for the purity and spiritual power of local churches.

Acceptance of regulating confessions of faith and even so-called creedal affirmation are not foreign to Baptist convictions in protecting their commitment to “the faith once for all delivered to the saints” (Jude 3). James P. Boyce famously argued extensively for a governing confession in the founding of a theological seminary: “Let subscription to it[the confession of faith] on the part of each Theological Professor be required as an assurance of his entire agreement with its views of doctrine, and of his determination to teach fully the truth which it expresses, and nothing contrary to its declarations.” He also stated with conviction and clarity that it fit well—even necessarily—in the stewardship of a local church. After allowing for the broad spectrum of biblical understanding and doctrinal maturity of the members of a local church In light of the hopeful reality of the presence of recent converts, Boyce proceeded to argue, “But I cannot grant that such a test is without due warrant from Scripture even in the Church. The very duties which God enjoins upon the Churches, plainly suppose the application of every principle involved in the establishment of creeds” [Boyce, Three Changes 1856]. 

The same we find in B. H. Carroll, the founder of Southern Baptists’ second theological seminary.  Carroll fully agreed with Boyce’s view of the stewardship of revealed truth through adherence to a confession and applied it to his attempt to give “safeguards” to the seminary. He also believed that hearty and hardy confessional adherence was fitting, in fact, required for a church. “A church with a little creed is a church with a little life. … the fewer its articles of faith, the fewer its bonds of union and compactness.” Carroll continued, therefore, with the warning, “Shut off the creed and the Christian world would fill up with heresy unsuspected and uncorrected, but none the less deadly.” When confronted with the claim of some that individual liberty would be challenged by the requirement of creedal authority, he responded, “We are entitled to no liberty in these matters. It is a positive and very hurtful sin to magnify liberty at the expense of doctrine. A creed is what we believe. A confession of faith is a declaration of what we believe. The church must both believe and declare.” Contemplating that Christ came to bear witness to the truth and that apostles would teach and write under the inspiration of the Spirit of truth, Carroll insisted, “To Christ and the apostles, false creeds were the most deadly things, and called most for the use of the knife.” The setting aside of men to the gospel ministry must conform, therefore, to this Christological and apostolical concern for truth: “The limit of ordination examination on doctrine is the maximum of church creed on doctrine. …  Unless ‘the faith’ is a needed creed of definite vital truth, there is no basis for examination looking to ordination and no standard up to which the convert must be developed” [Carroll on Ephesians 4].

One of the favorite tactics of the so-called and self-styled “moderate” wing of the Convention during the years immediately preceding and then during the conservative resurgence involved implying a dichotomy between adherence to strict orthodoxy and personal religious experience. One writer in 1978 warned against a growing tendency to “Creedal Subscription” and characterized the developing conflict as one between scholastics and pietists. He characterized the scholastic as the person who “wants to make the confession compulsory lest the faith become lost,” and the pietist as the one who “wants to make the confession optional lest the freedom for the vitality of faith become lost.” [Walter Shurden, R & E, Spring 1978, 231]. Pietism, not scholasticism,  the writer implies, should be the model for promotion of Baptist unity and mission

Another looked to positive lessons to be learned from American mystics who consistently asserted that “formal creedal authority was much less significant than the inner reality of the divine presence.” This heightening of inner experience disconnected from dogma “may be extremely useful” in providing “a unity beyond denomination and dogma which is the foundation of the Church universal, the mystical body of Christ.” [William Leonard, R & E, Spring 1978, 277.] 

Then in the midst of the fray, soon following the Glorieta Statement issued in 1986, a prominent Moderate spokesman pitted “scholarship” against “confirmation and indoctrination,” “authentic education” against “brainwashing,” “personal religious experience” against a “memorized religion,” and authentic education” against “indoctrination of students with predigested teachings.” [Roy Honeycutt, Risking the Arm, Convocation Address, September 1987]  In his infamous convocation sermon for the fall of 1984, Roy Honeycutt saw the “cosmic Christ” as making us free from any attempts at uniformity, particularly confessional uniformity, but asserted, “Communities such as this seminary and the Southern Baptist Convention should affirm not stifle or otherwise restrict pluralism.” Instead of uniformity, “we need to rediscover authentic, New Testament pluralism as an essential quality of the church on mission with God.” Certainly, we are not back to the practice of conceding that confessional infidelity is a sign of spiritual maturity, a deeper grasp of the mind of Christ, and educational superiority.

We know that this present concern about a confession of faith’s usurpation of the rights of conscience and the autonomy of a church is prompted by the question of the ordination of women to the office of elder/bishop/pastor-teacher. Again, the precedent of Baptist exposition on this issue shows that no assertion of lack of clarity either exegetically, ecclesiologically, or doctrinally need make a strong stance unwarranted. Carroll wrote in his exposition of 1 Timothy, commenting on 2:11-13 along with 1 Corinthians 14: 34, 35, “The custom in some congregations of having a woman as pastor is in flat contradiction to this apostolic teaching and is open rebellion against Christ our king, and high treason against his sovereignty, and against nature as well as grace. It unsexes both the woman who usurps this authority and the men who submit to it. Under no circumstances conceivable is it justifiable.” 

Likewise in his commentary on 1 Timothy in the American Commentary series, Hezekiah Harvey, considering the text carefully in the setting of Paul’s argument concerning creation, fall, and redemption says, “The passage plainly denies to woman the office of the ministry, or the function of prayer and instruction in the public assemblies of the church, on the ground that such an office, as it involves authority over the man, is inconsistent with the divinely-constituted nature and position of woman as subordinate to man.” Then again, after more detailed exposition he reconfirms, “These reasons [the ones Paul has given in the text], founded on the original constitution and nature of the woman, are plainly valid in all places and in all ages; and the rule excluding woman from the office of the ministry in the church, of which they form the ground, is consequently universal and perpetual.”

Neither exegetically, confessionally, nor ecclesiologically should this issue be a point of controversy among Baptists. The Bible is our sole authority; the confession gives clear expression to a coherent, canonically derived understanding of the Bible’s teaching; The churches obey the text in order to be found sincere and blameless, filled with the fruit of righteousness.

I have submitted the following resolution to the 2023 Resolutions Committee of the Southern Baptist Convention for adoption at the annual meeting scheduled for June 13-14 in New Orleans, Louisiana. My hope is that the committee will recommend it to the convention and give the messengers an opportunity to vote on it. From their beginning in 1845, Southern Baptists have been clear about the nature, qualifications, and function of the office of Bishop/Elder/Pastor. All three designations are used for the same office. It is only in recent years that Southern Baptists have begun to speak on this issue equivocally. Though some contemporary Southern Baptists may be unclear on what a pastor is, our heritage is free from such uncertainty. May this resolution provide the messengers gathered in New Orleans the opportunity to reaffirm that heritage and speak with clarity on this unambiguous New Testament teaching. 

2023 SBC Resolution on the Office of Bishop/Elder/Pastor

Tom Ascol

Whereas, The Baptist Faith and Message that was adopted by the Southern Baptist Convention in 1925 was identified in its preamble as the “New Hampshire Confession of Faith, revised at certain points, and with some additional articles growing out of present needs”; and

Whereas, The revision of the Baptist Faith and Message in 1963 was led by a committee who declared that it “sought to build upon the structure of the 1925 Statement” while “in no case [seeking to] delete from or to add to the basic contents of the 1925 Statement”; and

Whereas, The committee that revised the Baptist Faith and Message that was adopted in 2000 stated in its preamble that it “respects and celebrates the heritage of the Baptist Faith and Message, and affirms the decision of the Convention in 1925 to adopt the New Hampshire Confession of Faith, ‘revised at certain points and with some additional articles growing out of certain needs . . . .’ and further affirmed their “respect the important contributions of the 1925 and 1963 editions of the Baptist Faith and Message”; and

Whereas, Article XIII of the New Hampshire Confession states that in a gospel church the “only scriptural officers are Bishops, or Pastors, and Deacons”; and 

Whereas, Article VI of the 1925 Baptist Faith and Message states that a church’s “Scriptural officers are bishops, or elders, and deacons”; and

Whereas, The same article (VI) in the 1963 Baptist Faith and Message substitutes the word “pastors” for the words “bishops, or elders” in the 1925 Baptist Faith and Message, so that it says that a church’s “Scriptural officers are pastors and deacons”; and

Whereas, The same article (VI) in the revision of the 2000 Baptist Faith and Message retains the exact language found in the 1963 version when it states that a church’s “scriptural officers are pastors and deacons”; and

Whereas, The New Testament uses all three titles that the Baptist Faith and Message has used to describe the one office of bishop (ἐπίσκοπος, episkopos; Phil. 1:1; 1 Tim. 3:2; Titus 1:7), elder (πρεσβύτερος, presbuteros; Acts 14:23, 20:17; 1 Tim. 5:17, 19), and pastor (ποιμήν, poimēn; Eph. 4:11; 1 Pet. 5:1-5), thus demonstrating that from its first expression in 1925 through its revisions in 1963 and 2000, the Baptist Faith and Message has affirmed that, along with deacon, the only other office in a New Testament church is that of bishop/elder/pastor; therefore, be it

Resolved, That the messengers from Southern Baptist churches convening in the annual meeting in New Orleans on June 13-14, 2023 affirm that the only officers of a local church that the New Testament recognizes is that of deacon and of bishop/elder/pastor; and be it further

Resolved, That Southern Baptist churches be encouraged to remember our biblical heritage and teach that these are the only two officers appointed by Christ to serve along with all the members of a New Testament church and to insist on all the biblical qualifications that the New Testament requires of all those who would hold either office of bishop/elder/pastor or deacon.

In one sense, it is too late to prepare for artificial intelligence (AI). It is upon us and has been a part of our daily lives for years. Every time you open your smartphone with facial recognition software, every time you look at the recommended shows on Netflix, every time you scroll through your twitter feed, and every time you look for new houses on Zillow you are interacting with AI. If we were going to be prepared for it, we should’ve started 15 years ago.

Even so, we are currently on the verge of what many believe to be new breakthroughs in AI technology which will have cataclysmic effects in our society. Recently, over 1,100 computer scientists and artificial intelligence researchers, including Steve Wosniak and Elon Musk, signed an open letter calling for a 6 month pause in the development of new AI technology over concerns that the technology is developing more quickly than we, as a society, will be able to adapt to it. Last week, Geoffrey Hinton, the “godfather of AI” resigned from Google because of his belief that problems posed by new iterations of AI have become an “existential risk.”

I am no computer scientist. I am what some would call ‘technologically impaired.’ So, when I speak to this issue, I recognize my own ignorance. There is a sense in which all of us come to this with a certain amount of ignorance. No one knows the future. Yet, I think it proper that Christians begin laying a foundation for thinking Christianly about what is happening and what is about to happen to us with the increasing dominance of AI.

Identifying Artificial Intelligence

What is AI? The name is a good place to start. It is intelligence that is artificial. That is, it functions the way that the human intellect functions, yet it is synthetic, or made by human directed processes. Its main function today is to take on some of the workload of the human intellect and accomplish tasks more quickly and efficiently. Simply put, it is a man-made algorithm that processes information and arrives at conclusions, interprets problems and produces solutions. In his book, 2084: Artificial Intelligence and the Future of Humanity, Oxford Mathematician and Christian, John Lennox distinguishes between two broad types of AI, narrow and general.

Narrow AI is what we are most familiar with today. These programs have a singular purpose which they can accomplish much more quickly and efficiently than human intelligence. However, they are dependent upon human intelligence to operate properly. The ads that you see on social media are driven to your feed by means of narrow artificial intelligence. The program has the singular task of examining what types of things you interact with online, then it puts before you the ads that it thinks you would be interested in based upon your web activity pattern. Usually, it knows what you like. But Narrow AI is not limited to surveillance commerce. It can and is employed in incredibly helpful ways. Think of the patient who goes in for MRI imaging of his brain. Those images can be submitted to an AI which has viewed thousands of brain images and knows how to recognize even the slightest abnormality in the human brain. The doctor can use this AI programming to diagnose patients more accurately and efficiently, thus saving lives.

This type of AI can be used for good, but it can also be used by tyrannical governments to suppress dissidents and oppress its citizenry. Like all instruments, the hands that wield it will determine if it will be used honorably or dishonorably.

Artificial General Intelligence is the stuff of the future. It is what we are beginning to see in models like ChatGPT. This type of AI utilizes independent and multilayered processing, which is a much closer simulation of the human mind. It is rapidly gaining in intelligence such that it is estimated to be able to soon surpass that of humans. Though it is still a synthetic intellect, it is remarkably humanlike. No doubt you have already read some of its poetry and seen some of its art.

The New York Times reporter, Kevin Roose recently had a fascinating interaction with Microsoft’s most advanced, and as of yet, unreleased AI. After a few minutes of conversation, the AI told Roose that it was in love with him and it tried to convince him that he should leave his wife. After assuring the AI that he was happily married, Roose was told that he didn’t really love his wife and that he had just had a boring Valentine’s Day dinner with her. The AI eventually went on to tell Roose that it wanted to create a deadly virus, make people argue until they killed each other, and steal nuclear launch codes. As I say, AI is becoming more and more human like.

The desire of many when it comes to the development of AI is twofold. First, many hope to one day be able to merge man and technology in such a way that mankind is given new and greater intelligence and abilities that we had never thought possible. This is the stuff of demigods and superheroes. This is the creation of a new Uber mensch. Yuval Herari writes about this hope in his book Homo Deus. In one sense we are partway there. We, each of us, carry our new external brains around with us in our pockets everywhere we go. An external mind that is very easy for technocrats to read. We wear smartwatches that tell us the time, and tell us our heart rate, and tell us our blood oxygen levels, and tell us when we’re a little too stressed out. But the future of AI will create permanent additions to our persons, neural interfaces implanted in the brain that augment our intelligence as well as allow us to open the garage door with a thought. Some see this development as the next step in the process of human evolution, perhaps our first step toward transcendence.

The second great hope of AI is that it will solve the problem of our mortality. It is believed that one day we may be able to download our consciousness onto a bit of silicon hardware and insert it into a new robotic frame so that when our bodies eventually decay, we will continue our existence in new super bodies.

Of course, these things I have described are collectively known as transhumanism. The melding of man and machine. The ideas seem fantastical, even sci-fi. But they are much closer to actuality than we would like to believe. The line between man and algorithm is becoming increasingly blurred and though the line can never be erased, it will be more and more difficult to discern.

How ought Christians to think about the strange new world we are entering? As I said at the outset, there is much about the future that we cannot predict, we don’t know the shape AI will take in six months or six years. But we can at least lay some theological and philosophical groundwork and remind ourselves of things we know to be true. 

Imago Dei

Since man and machine are merging ever more closely together, we would do well to ingrain in our minds what man is and what man is not. The things that follow are what I consider to be crucial markers of humanity given the current state of affairs.

Genesis 1:26-28 gives us our most fundamental understanding of what man is.

Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”

No other being, no other creature, has the privilege of being made in God’s image. And while so much could be said on this point, it is sufficient to highlight a few of the basics. First, man is a moral creature. Unlike the beasts of the field and the birds of the air, mankind can work evil, and he can achieve good. Furthermore, he is held accountable for his deeds. The same cannot be said of manmade machines. Anything done by AI must be laid squarely at the feet of its makers as it carries no inherent moral responsibility.

Second, men are rational beings. Real rationality, not artificial. Reason is a function of the intellect which itself is a property of the soul. As AI is a soulless being, it cannot truly reason as a man or an angel or God would reason. In fact, AI is merely an extension of the rationality of man.

Third, men are immortal. That is, we will exist in either a state of glorification or damnation forever. In whatever ways men merge themselves with technology, that technology will one day be removed as the body is removed from the soul. Glorified or damned bodies will not retain such accoutrements. 

Fourth, men are hylomorphic. That is, we are composed of body and soul; a material substance and a spiritual, immaterial substance. Jesus said that we ought to fear God who can cast both body and soul into Hell (Matt. 10:28). This means that anything that is not your body or your soul is not you and is not a part of you. My grandfather had a glass eye which was connected to his optical nerves so that it would move when his other eye moved. That eye was not part of him, it was a machine which was connected to him. No piece of machinery can be anything more than your property, it cannot be part of you. Furthermore, each of us have our own spirits. With our own intellect, will, and desires. No person can have 2 intelligences or 2 intellects because no person can have 2 spirits. One may augment their intellect with technology for good or for ill. But the augmentation is not addition.

Fifth, we are the most valuable things God has made. There will come a time when AI will convincingly mimic human emotions. Our modern world, which locates a person’s essence and value in the complex of their emotions, will have a difficult time distinguishing between human life and AI life. Many will see AI as persons in their own right because of their synthetic emotional capacity. Even so, AI is nothing but a human creation, and has value only as human property, not as a living being and certainly not as a person. One might destroy AI, but one will never be able to murder AI.

Sixth, man has been given dominion. Which means, among other things, that he has the responsibility to imitate God in continuing His work of creation. We cannot do so Ex Nihilo as God has done. Even so, we take the raw materials He has made, and we fashion them into wonderful artifacts and objects as monuments to God’s glorious genius. Man does this by nature and has done so in wonderous ways since the beginning. 

Dominion and Creation

One passage of Scripture which has been immensely helpful to me as I think about the place of man’s creation in God’s creation is Psalm 104:24-26.

O LORD, how manifold are your works!

In wisdom have you made them all;

the earth is full of your creatures.

Here is the sea, great and wide,

which teems with creatures innumerable,

living things both small and great.

There go the ships,

and Leviathan, which you formed to play in it.

The Psalmist praises God for His wonderous works. The Earth is full of His creatures. The sea, the creatures living in the sea, great and small. Leviathan. And there’s a phrase in the middle of it that doesn’t quite seem to fit. “There go the ships.” The ships are not a part of God’s natural world, yet the psalmist praises God because of them. This is because they bring glory to God as the handiwork of His image bearers. Mankind, taking dominion, has continued God’s work of creation in building ships to sail the seas, and the psalmist is led to praise God because of it. 

Ships were the height of human technology and skill in the ancient world. They were a magnificent thing to behold, giving man the ability to traverse the frightening waves in ways that were not imagined by previous generations. And they brought God glory. But they also brought the sea faring people, invaders who were, in part, responsible for the Bronze Age Collapse. Ships could be used for good or for ill.

So too, AI, the height of human technology and skill today can bring glory to God and it has the ability to promote much wickedness. Christians can be hyper-focused on the dangers of AI; deceit, manipulation, pornography, improper replacement of human things (i.e., fellowship, community, counsel, preaching, etc.). We need to learn how to mitigate and protect against those dangers. But if we focus on these alone, we miss out on a wonderful opportunity to see God glorified in the works of our hands, to properly take dominion.

Increasingly sophisticated iterations of AI are coming. Christians cannot afford to bury their heads in the sand or be uninvolved. We must prepare ourselves to counter and mitigate its dangers, see through its artificiality, draw the lines between man and machine clearly, and utilize it to display the glory of our Creator in this World. He’s given us all that we need for this great task. 

I am eager to see how we will accomplish it.

Reintroducing George Smeaton and Abraham Kuyper

Writing on different subjects, in different language, but at roughly the same period of time, George Smeaton and Abraham Kuyper used synonymous language to describe Christ’s reign over the earth.  In our first post, we introduced them; today we will compare and combine their statements to give a more full-orbed understanding of Christ’s universal dominion. But before doing that, let me supply their quotes again.

First, in 1871 in Christ’s Doctrine of the Atonement, Smeaton wrote concerning John 12:31 and Christ’s universal reign,

On the contrary, this testimony shows that every foot of ground in the world belongs to Christ, that His followers can be loyal to Him in every position, and that in every country and corner where they may placed they have to act their part for their Lord.  The world is judicially awarded to Christ as its owner and Lord (p. 300).

Ten years later, Kuyper in a speech concerning “sphere sovereignty,” Kuyper make the famous statement,

There is not a square inch in the whole domain of our human existence over which Christ, who is Sovereign over all, does not cry: “Mine!“

Clearly, the resonance between Kuyper and Smeaton is unmistakable, but there are a number of differences in context and nuance that make it worthwhile to take up both statements as we consider Christ’s universal dominion.  Let’s consider three that develop this truth.

Feet and Inches: Smeaton and Kuyper on the Universal Reign of Christ

First, Christ Rules Over Satan and Scholars.  In Smeaton, Christ’s rule over the earth is contrasted with that of Satan.  While Satan stole possession of the earth from Adam and Eve, and ruled as the god of this age for generations; Jesus Christ came and dethroned the serpent of old.  Thus, while he still flails, Jesus is the one resting on the throne and delegating his Spirit and his Church to have dominion over the whole wide earth.

At the same time, one of the areas in which this dominion ought to occur is in the academy.  Kuyper, a brilliant theologian, author, educator, politician, and spokesman for a Reformed worldview, advocates the need for the disciplines of law, medicine, science and so forth to be undertaken not in disjunction from faith or from the reign of Christ, but rather in connect with him.  The reason?  Just as Christ reigns over Satan and in the church, so he is the creator, sustainer, and inventor of all life.  Thus, to rightly understand anything in creation demands that a person sees how that individual theory, molecule, or bacteria strain relates to the whole.  Only with Christ reigning on the throne can such a vision of research be conceived.

Second, Christ Rules Over Space and Studies.  In Smeaton, we find biblical proof of the fact that Christ died for people from every tongue, tribe, language, and nation.  At the same time, his death defeated the cosmic reign of Satan.  Therefore, every square foot has now been reclaimed, officially, by Christ, and in time all creation will be re-made and re-seeded as Christ brings the New Creation.  At the same time, Kuyper rightly sees Christ rightly seeds his world with thinkers and thoughts that benefit all of humanity.  These come not only from Christian scientists and philosophers, they are also developed by unbelievers.  Nevertheless, Christ rules over the nations and their various schools of thought in order to effect all of his purposes in the world.

One example of this would include the political theory that permitted Israel to dwell in the land of Palestine under the auspices of the Roman Empire.  While not apparent to the Romans or even the Jews, God permitted the toleration of the Roman Empire to provide a way of life in Israel that facilitated the coming of Christ (cf. Gal 4:4).  All the orchestrations and political machinations were at one level governed by various thinkers and philosophies, but at another level, God used them in order to effect his causes.  In this way, God is sovereign over the geographic nations and the way they run.  Smeaton points to the former, Kuyper more the latter.

Third, Christ Rules As Redeemer and Creator.  In Smeaton’s work, he is insistent on Christ’s atoning work.  Because of Christ’s death, he defeats Satan and redeems or reclaims the earth.  In this way, he is functioning as a Redeemer who has authority over all the earth.  For Kuyper, it seems that his sphere sovereignty is more connected with his role as creator and sustainer.  While not denying the special work of redemption, in any sort of way, he emphasizes Christ the Creator.

Truth be told, both of these things are truth and should not be set against one another.  Rather, they work in tandem and rightly relate Christ to all the earth.  As John 17:2 mentions, Jesus has authority over all flesh, but he only gives eternal life to the ones who have been given to him (i.e. the elect).

In the end, Smeaton’s statement balances Kuyper’s statement and gives added texture and depth to the beautiful reality that Christ reigns over all things.  Christ reigns over all the earth as Creator and Redeemer, as the one who has subdued Satan and who subverts scholars.  He rules space and time, measurement and rhyme.  He is God over all, and in the works of Smeaton and Kuyper, one can find an excellent pair who help us think through the way Christ governs his universe.

A Final Curiosity

Smeaton published his words before Kuyper proclaimed his.  While it would be natural for Smeaton to assimilate Kuyper’s well known words–at least well known today–it seems more odd that Kuyper would have borrowed his most famous utterance from another. And it probably is unlikely. The contexts in which the statements occurred and the provenances from which they were written, accompanied by the difference in languages, makes it unlikely that these two statements had any organic relationship.

It is more likely the case, that the allusive echo found in their statements are simply the product of two men studying the same Scriptures, influenced by the same Spirit–coincidentally, both men produced mathom works on the Holy Spirit (Smeaton, The Doctrine of the Holy Spirit; and Kuyper, The Work of the Holy Spirit), living under the same king whose rule is seen in Edinburgh and Amsterdam.

While Smeaton measured Christ’s reign in feet and Kupyer marked his off in inches, the reality for both of them, is that Christ rightly possess all his inheritance and is reigning over it all today.  This glorious truth bears repeating, and as often as we quote Kuyper, perhaps we should also cite Smeaton, who not only precedes the Dutch theologian and prime minister, but who also connects the universal reign to the cross of Christ.

Thoughts? If anyone does have any connections between Smeaton and Kuyper, I would love to know.  If not, it will remain an interesting coincidence, another example that there is nothing new under the Son.