The February 1985 Banner of Truth features a superb 7–page review of the new Inter–Varsity Press book of J.I. Packer, KEEP IN STEP WITH THE SPIRIT. The reviewer is J. Douglas MacMillan, Professor of Church History and Principles at the Free Church College in Edinburgh.
Both Dr. Packer’s many years of notable exposition and defense of the evangelical faith and the current explosion of the charismatic movement ensure that this book will gain wide attention and influence. The reviewer finds a large part of the book’s teaching on the Holy Spirit extremely valuable and helpful.
The Spirit “Floodlights” Christ
In the confusion that exists about what in the Holy Spirit’s many-sided work is to be stressed, Packer shows that the “primacy must be yielded to the Spirit’s ministry of Christ to the believer and to the church.” He proves this by centering attention on a part of the New Testament which the reviewer believes “has been far too much neglected in most works on the Holy Spirit, John, chapters 14 to 16.” Th is passage affords the “key for understanding the central thrust of the Spirit’s ministry” since Pentecost. (Dr. MacMillan finds this treatment so good that he wishes that “it might be read and deeply pondered by every Christian, and certainly, by every preacher of the Gospel.”) This means that the Spirit’s new covenant ministry is “self-effacing, directing all attention away from himself to Christ and drawing folk into . . . . communion with Christ.” This characteristic is the criterion by which supposedly spiritual movements (“ecumenical,” “charismatic,” “small-group,” “lay apostolate,” “world missionary,” etc.), as well as supposedly “spiritual” experiences may be gauged. Packer recalled walking to a church one evening to preach on the words “He shall glorify me” (John 16:14). Noticing the floodlit building, he observed that floodlighting was exactly the illustration needed to show the work of the Spirit. “When floodlighting is well done, the floodlights are so placed that you do not see them; you are not supposed to see where the light is coming from; what you are meant to see is just the building on which the floodlights are trained . . . . This perfectly illustrates the Spirit’s new covenant role. He is, so to speak, the hidden floodlight shining on the Savior.”
Because this important point is often missed, the Spirit’s work is often misunderstood and misrepresented as centering on the Christian instead of Christ, on man instead of God.
Packer also firmly rejects the common “two–level” (or “second blessing”) view of conversion, observing that each believer should experience the full ministry of the Spirit from the beginning.
The Holy Spirit “sanctifies” or makes holy. Accordingly, Dr. Packer deplores the widespread neglect of the pursuit of holy living which should characterize every Christian. The reviewer notes the valuable analysis made of various views of sanctification, and the excellent treatment of Romans 7 in an appendix.
Compromising Truth – A Bridge too Short
Despite the many excellencies of this book, the reviewer finds it marred in its treatment of the charismatic movement, because it is so gentle that it fails to state the definite conclusions one would expect from Dr. Packer. In balancing the “good” and “not so good” points of the movement, MacMillan finds that here it does not subject the charismatic claims to the clear judgment of the Bible as it should. Although Packer admits “the fact . . . that the theology most commonly professed within the movement to account for its own claimed distinctives is deeply unbiblical,” and that the peculiar charismatic doctrines (Spirit baptism, tongues and healing ministries) cannot be equated with the biblical references used to support and explain them, he is too kind to consistently apply that judgment to the various charismatic claims. The result is confusion and self-contradiction. For example, he suggests that although charismatic tongues speaking is not the “tongues” of I Corinthians, it is “for some people at any rate . . . a good gift of God,” while “for others it would be the unspirited and trivial irrelevance that some now think it to be wherever it appears.” “Apart from the startling implications that any good gift ofGod could ever be a trivial irrelevance to a biblical believer, what strikes home is the total absence of any objective criteria by which to judge whether any specific experience is one or the other” of these opposites. Thus MacMillan sees Packer at this point sliding into “a strange subjectivism.” “The chasm between biblical evangelicalism and the charismatic movement proves to be wider, one fears, than Packer has allowed for, and so, the bridge he has tried to build does not span it. The view he has advanced cannot lie securely on either side of what is really a great gulf.”
Confusion about Martyn Lloyd-Jones’ View
The same issue of the Banner of Truth contains an 8–page article by its editor, lain H. Murray, on “Martyn Lloyd–Jones on the Baptism with the Holy Spirit,” followed by a 2–page editorial on “Controversy.” In the article, Editor Murray analyzes where Lloyd-Jones stood with respect to charismatic claims. Much of Lloyd-Jones’ preaching on these matters took place long before the present charismatic movement became prominent and his views at a number of points do :10t support their claims. He finds Dr. Lloyd-Jones “coming close . . . to saying that so long as you have true assurance . . . the manner in which you obtained it does not matter. The slow drizzle and the more spectacular sudden cloud-burst achieve the same end.” Editor Murray concludes that “Dr. Lloyd-Jones may not succeed, in the judgment of some of us in proving that this experience of sensible presence (of the Spirit) is capable of being constructed into a New Testament doctrine, but we surely need his exhortations to seek an experimental knowledge of God. It would be tragic if controversy were to divert all who love Christ from prayer for the outpouring of the Spirit of God.”
Our Necessary Controversy with the Charismatic Movement
In the editorial on “Controversy” Murray observes that, “At the present time there are those who tell us that providence is summoning the charismatic and the reformed movements to a combination of their separate forces.” They argue that the reformed emphasis on thought and doctrine needs to be allied with the charismatic emphasis on warmth and life. But Murray sees this apposition between “doctrine” or orthodoxy and “life” as an error. “What really is at issue is the doctrine itself.” He sees churches learning again “that life proceeds from truth; ‘Man shall live . . . by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.’” Despite much pressure to weaken their commitment, “the widespread return to doctrinal Christianity has been a work of God and it is too strong for many to be deflected by offers of ‘life’ from a movement which, ‘powerful’ and ‘exciting’ though it may presently be, presents no convincing case from Scripture.”
Yet Murray cautions that in necessary controversy, we should (1) contend against principles rather than persons, (2) real ize that controversy may, in the providence of God, produce valuable results, as most of the church doctrines have been defined by controversy, and (3) we need to remember that our judgments are not final and that we must pray that !he necessary church judgments “will be in accord with the Word of God and therefore with the future judgment of Christ.”
In many ways we are made aware of the remarkable and growing influence of the Banner of Truth Trust, by means of both its books and its magazine, in promoting Biblical reformation and evangelism throughout the world. (A recent report told of its influence in a growing church movement among Australian aborigines!) Many church members and ministers who are looking for substantial help in the upbuilding of Christian faith and life are profiting by using its materials. In this instance we find it giving us valuable help to Biblically assess and deal with a charismatic movement that is also raising questions in many of our church circles.
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