Scripture alone is sufficient for our salvation, but we also know and practice that the written Scriptures alone are sufficient for our daily lives and practices as well…Advice given by worldly-wisemen may sound convincing, but if they are not found in the written word “expressly set down or necessarily contained” (explicitly or deduced from Scripture), it is to be rejected. 

In the perennial classic, The Pilgrim’s Progress, Christian comes across a man named, “Mr. Worldly-Wiseman.” Mr. Worldly-Wiseman lived in a town called “Carnal Policy,” otherwise known as Ways of the World, and it was a close neighbor of the City of Destruction (where Christian was originally from). Mr. Worldly-Wiseman was a perceptive man and recognized that Christian was in need of some help on his difficult journey. So Mr. Worldly-Wiseman asked Christian, “If I give you counsel will you take my advice?” Christian responded, “If it is good counsel, I will.” This was a great attitude for Christian to display, as he should be discerning of any advice given to him.
However, Mr. Worldly-Wiseman did not have good advice. He told Christian that his way was burdensome because of the book he read. Mr. Worldly-Wiseman reviled Christian’s book and told him another to be rid of the burden on his back. Mr. Worldly-Wiseman’s suggestion was to go to a man named Legality who lived in a village called Morality. If you’ve read the story, you know that Christian never arrives because this hill was too vast. It was also not the way that the book in his hand instructed him to go. Christian learned the hard way by not trusting what was not written in the book.
Why the Hair-Splitting?
What does the question, “Is God’s Word only found in the written Bible?” even mean?  Is the Bible truly authoritative for life? Why ask these kinds of questions to people in the pews? I do find it necessary to bring this truth to the pew, for there are many problems within Christianity. Specifically, certain denominations and Christian universities openly deny that the written word of Scripture is God’s final word of authority.
This is important for it has tremendous pastoral implications. Outside of Christianity, we see many religions that reject a written document and prefer passing down faith through other means. Some of these methods involve narratives, legends, rituals, etc. Christianity, on the other hand, is different as it is a word-based religion. Christianity also has a God who covenants with His people through His written word. We see this in Exodus 24:4, 7, “And Moses wrote down all the words of the LORD. He rose early in the morning and built an altar at the foot of the mountain, and twelve pillars, according to the twelve tribes of Israel… Then he took the Book of the Covenant and read it in the hearing of the people. And they said, “All that the LORD has spoken we will do, and we will be obedient.” We also see this in Exodus 34:27, where God commands Moses to write so that He can covenant with His people, “And the LORD said to Moses, “Write these words, for in accordance with these words I have made a covenant with you and with Israel.” Thus is also true in Isaiah when he says, “To the teaching and to the testimony! If they will not speak according to this word, it is because they have no dawn” Isaiah 8:20. So while many people take away from God’s word (some take it away entirely), do people actually add to God’s word?
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The next decade is going to be a challenging time, as we face continued cultural pressure, and as the cadre of Gen-X leaders approach retirement and will need replacing. We need to learn the lessons of mistakes made in the past, but also to continue to sustain and develop our strengths. 

I enjoyed listening to Kevin DeYoung, Justin Taylor and Colin Hansen reflecting on the Young, Restless and Reformed movement on Kevin’s podcast (you can find it here). They did not just have a ring-side seat watching the events that they discuss but were key participants. They set out to explain what the movement was, what it achieved, why it has fragmented and to assess the current context in the US. Although YRR was a US phenomenon, it has had a significant impact in the UK, and there are parallels with our own evangelical context.
In large measure they are positive. They regard the YRR movement as a period of revival which became institutionalised over time, as all revivals in history have done. I was especially struck by the comment that the Great Awakening only lasted 3-4 years. They point to the recovery of Calvinistic theology and a lasting publishing legacy of good books, especially by Crossway.
They acknowledge a number of weaknesses, including the fact that some leaders rose to prominence too quickly, or were accepted on the basis that they seemed to be on the right trajectory – although they also point out that the key leaders (eg Piper & Keller) were in their 50s before they came to greater prominence.
They make several astute observations, including identifying YRR as a Gen-X movement, that reacted against the Boomer-led ‘Seeker Sensitive’ movement. Some of the fragmentation has occurred as new generations (Millennials, Gen-Z) have emerged.
They also note the key role played by digital technology. YRR gained momentum because the internet has enabled sermons and resources to be widely shared, but before social media had taken centre stage. They rightly chart the subsequent difficulty of leadership in a social media age and the way in which any leader or movement that gains success is likely to be attacked and critiqued by its detractors. This has led to a growing reluctance of the younger generation to become leaders because they fear the toxic environment they will inhabit.
The YRR movement fostered a wide unity amongst reformed evangelicals from numerous streams and managed at points to maintain a broad tent, stretching from a John Macarthur to a Mark Driscoll. The unity was rooted in a Calvinistic soteriology and a commitment to complementarianism, which were perhaps key issues in the evangelical sub-culture at the time. The movement also addressed the reality of suffering, for example, in the way that it responded to Matt Chandler’s cancer diagnosis. People joined together on platforms at T4G and TGC.
There is no doubt that there has been significant fragmentation, and this is in part because of the difficulties the YRR movement has faced in dealing with new cultural and political challenges. They date the fragmentation as starting from 2015, and key issues that have caused it are the rise of Trump, race issues, Wokeism, COVID, the hyper-speed social change on eg LBGT issues and evangelical leadership scandals and implosions.
Kevin DeYoung makes the interesting observation that there was a presumption within the YRR that they were not just conservative in theology but also politically conservative and that this presumption has been shown to be false as the political divides in the US have become more sharply polarised. He refers to the way that black leaders were drawn into the YRR movement and its institutions, but did not fit because they had different political views on, for example, race. I found that incredibly sad, as it amounts to saying that the gospel unity was only superficial and that what really brought people together was an assumed political congruence. The lack of unity on culture and politics has been exposed by events.
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Written by O. Palmer Robertson |
Wednesday, September 25, 2024
At stake is the accurate record of the early proclamation of the saving gospel of salvation by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone. In terms of the progress of redemption, this speech of Paul at Antioch, delivered at the heart of the trade routes of Asia, represents the fullest record of an early proclamation of the saving gospel of Jesus Christ to the nations of the world, which therefore embodies a significant step beyond the record of Peter’s summary of the gospel as preached at Pentecost. 

God’s glory in the Gospel connects directly to the display of his righteousness when he declares righteous a sinful human being, a depraved, wrath-deserving sinner who has repeatedly violated God’s law. That he might be “just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus,” God offered his Son “as a propitiatory sacrifice through his blood” (Rom. 3:26, 25). This justification by God of the guilty sinner through the substitutionary death of Jesus, received by faith alone, openly displays the righteousness of God.
Was Paul’s letter to the Romans the first time this “Gospel” was declared that so wondrously displays the righteousness of God in the justification of the sinner through the blood of Christ?
By no means! Before any written Gospel had been published, during the twenty years in which apostolic proclamation alone defined the Christian Gospel, Paul preached the doctrine of the “rising and falling church”—justification by faith alone apart from the works of the law.
When and where did he make this proclamation?
During his first missionary journey into Asia, as he preached in the synagogue of Antioch of Pisidia.
What exactly did he say?
Let it therefore be known to you, men and brothers, that through this man, the forgiveness of sins is being proclaimed to you. From all the things from which you are not able to be justified by the law of Moses, all who believe in this man are justified (Acts 13:38, 39).
Rather remarkable is the translation of the root δικαιόω as “freed” rather than “justified” twice in this passage, as it appears in the 1952 Revised Standard Version of the Bible (RSV).
It would be impossible to discover the thinking behind the Revised Standard Version of 1952 in its rendering of “freed” rather than “justified.” The RSV, it should be remembered, was the first major effort to provide a new translation of the Bible into English that would replace the King James Version of 1611, made almost 350 years earlier. The RSV is basically a good rendering of Scripture, representing a more “literal” rather than a “dynamic” translation. It is frequently used as a helpful tool by Bible translation societies. Yet one might re-imagine the climate of the 1950’s in which the RSV originated in cooperation with the National Council of Churches. Significant resistance to the translation arose when the classic prophecy of Isaiah 7:14 read, “Behold, a ‘young woman’ (rather than a ‘virgin’) shall conceive and bear a son…” As a consequence, this version of the Bible was rejected outright by evangelicals of the day.
In the prevailing climate that produced the RSV, it can easily be imagined that its translators could have concluded that the phrasing in Luke’s report of Paul’s speech in Acts 13 was “too Pauline” to be “authentically Pauline” at this early stage in his life and ministry. To read “everyone who believes” is “justified from everything from which you could not be justified by the law of Moses” might have appeared to them as simply incorporating “too much Paul” into this early speech in the Israelite synagogue of Antioch. These statements agree so perfectly with Galatians and Romans, Paul’s later writings, that it might have been concluded that they represented a “reading back” into Paul’s earlier speech in Acts the more refined theology of his subsequent formulations of doctrine.
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