CR Ministers’ Institute

In the past sponsored by the area classes by turns, this annual June ministers’ meeting has more recently become the project of the Calvin Seminary Alumni Association.

This year daily programs began with various styles of worship, “a Praise (more or less Charismatic?) Service,” “a Healing Service” and “a Taize” (a French monastery-style) Service. Two able women recording singers took a prominent role in the first two meetings, and the “healing” amounted to people with problems joining little “huddles” on the platform for counsel and prayer.

Because the featured daily speaker, Dr. Howard Hageman, former president of the Reformed Church’s eastern seminary, was ill, his place was taken by Dr. I. John Hesselink from that church’s Western Theological Seminary in Holland, Mich. He discussed the problems of God’s sovereignty in relationship to the evil in the world, citing various current opinions about them. The speaker suggested that regarding the currently unpopular doctrine of God’s providence, people are more willing than formerly to challenge God, asking “Why?” and that there are no “simple answers” to their questions. The Biblical bases for God’s Providence are very strong in Joseph’s reply to his brothers, (Gen. 50:20), the Exodus, Habakkuk, the role of Cyrus, and especially the death of Christ—a miscarriage of justice for our salvation. God’s rule does not eliminate secondary causes, and we face mystery. The rabbi who wrote Why Bad Things Happen to Good People suggested that we forgive God when we find Him imperfect, compassionate but helpless against the evolutionary process. God took a risk in making man free. Although He persuades, He does not compel. Although expressing warm appreciation for the Heidelberg Catechism formulation on Providence, the speaker called attention to a modern trend to teach that God shares our burden and suffers with us-that He does not control everything, but is more like a wise parent who uses only persuasive power. There is a trend to consider the old (Augustinian) views as too monarchical. The speaker referred to the Dutch Hendrikus Berkhof, who holds that God submits Himself to the freedom of man, before which He is defenseless, as creation limits His power. Although this redefined power of God does not solve problems, the speaker suggested that it “sheds new light” on them, and that our traditional view of God’s power needs a complete overhaul! God’s power “is made perfect in weakness!” His power continues to be non-violent love, which will ultimately triumph over evil and death, in His “Sovereign Suffering.”

Although there may be value in knowing such current opinions, following them into inconclusive ecumenical dialog is really exchanging the Christian faith for the same old paganism from which the Gospel once delivered us. The Almighty God of the Bible, and (therefore) of our creeds, who created heaven and earth and who “works all things according to the counsel of His will” (Ephesians 1:11)—our Lord who will “break” the rebellious nations “with a rod of iron” and “dash them in pieces like a potter’s vessel” (Ps. 2; Acts 4:24–30; Rev. 2:27) is no more to be identified with the “suffering,” helpless god of this ecumenical theology than he was with the powerless Baals whom God’s prophets taught Israel to ridicule rather than worship (1 Kings 18:27; Psalm 115). There is really nothing very mystifying about the course of this present sophisticated ecumenical theology. The Apostle Paul outlined it for us long ago in Romans 1: “Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like corruptible man—and birds and four footed beasts and creeping things.” (Don’t forget their evolutionist dogmas!) The consequences are necessarily demoralizing for their churches, destroying not merely their morale, but, (soon) their morals as well, as “God gave them up” (w. 24, 26, 28) to every kind of vice that characterizes our “liberated” society.

The Institute program also highlighted an address by Calvin Seminary’s church polity professor, Dr. Henry De Moor, entitled, “Will Our Congregationalism Kill Us?” He observed that a marriage does not usually disintegrate over night, but divorce is usually preceded by estrangement, finding in that an analogy to what he saw happening in our denomination. In his view, the democratic temper of our society is degrading church officers from being servants of Christ to becoming mere servants of the people, as we forget “our denominational covenant.” Denominations are not individuals among many “flocks,” but called to represent “all of humanity as recipients of God’s grace,” in the “Holy Catholic Church” which we confess. The diversity in the church, in his view, must blend as the diverse voices must blend into one choir. He cited Acts 15 as showing how the church must face the problem of differences. What moved that assembly he saw as not powerful arguments, but the evident acts of God The resulting joy of the gentile Christians contrasts sharply with our “lobbying tactics,” many overtures and trying to bind delegates. Thus, he charges that we are denying our “denominational covenant,” in particular, by refusing to pay quotas, and congregationalism is killing us. A denomination is, in his view, not a federation of local churches but, by Christ’s grace, one holy catholic and apostolic communion.

A response to his address was assigned to Rev. Leonard Vander Zee of Grand Rapids’ Eastern Ave. Church, who argued that his church with its illegal associate women elders could not be charged with congregationalism, for, despite provocation, it had not left the fellowship. The real question was how restrictive a denomination should properly be, for “church order and synod regulations can’t be used to compel unity.” We need to make the circle as wide as we can within the bounds of confession. De Moor’s interpretation of the Acts 15 meeting was “too vertical.” That assembly recognized the “new thing” which the Holy Spirit was doing, and compromised with a few rules, which soon “faded away like all good synodical rules should.” In his view, the major fault in our churches has been with the restrictive assemblies. The women in office issue is not a matter of the Bible or creed. Taking our place as part of the Holy Catholic Church “will explode our boundaries.”

A somewhat similar response was offered by Rev. George Vander Weit, who compared the unrest in our churches with the noisy frogs in a swamp who turned out to be far fewer than the farmer expected when he drained it. He suggested that we must be ready to change our denominational covenant along the lines of Acts 15. That assembly did not listen to Bible texts, but to what God’s Spirit was doing. Thus we must overcome our traditional reluctance to admit lodge members who claim to be Christians to our fellowship, telling them that they have to “be circumcised” of their lodge membership, and we must stop denying offices to women. We have to allow what the Holy Spirit is doing instead of charging that this is somehow the devil’s movement among us. Thus we must work for unity.

The following general discussion raised questions about what differences concern Bible and creeds, about whether our denominational connection is properly called a “covenant,” about whether we are becoming lawless or heirarchical, about whether refusal to pay quotas for what is seen as contrary to the Bible and Creed is a fault or a duty, and whether the present confusion calls for developing little “churches within the church.”

The whole discussion suggests a few observations:

(1) Comparing marriage with the “denominational covenant” is grossly misleading. God established marriage, but He never established a hierarchical church structure. His Word warned against every tendency to develop the kind of Roman-style hierarchy which our denominational establishment is again diligently devising (Matt. 20:25–28; l Peter 5:14; 3 John 9–12).

(2) Conspicuous in this discussion, as in most of the controversies that increasingly divide us, is the studied evasion of the Bible or efforts to explain away its clear teachings that forbid what is being proposed.

(3) In the appeal to the confession of “a Holy Catholic Church,” we see a determined refusal to face the Bible’s warning against the false teachings which are creating division, and its commands to have no fellowship with them.

(4) When appeal is made to the Holy Spirit, to justify ignoring the Bible and creed, we forget that the Bible warns us: “Do not believe every Spirit, but test the spirits, whether they are of God; because many false prophets have gone out into the world” (1 John 4). The only way we have been given to distinguish the genuine work of the Holy Spirit from that of His imitator, the devil (2 Cor. 11:13–15) is the Bible which the Holy Spirit inspired. To put that aside in an ecumenical compromise inevitably develops an apostate church. From such a fellowship the Bible teaches us to separate (Acts 18:4–6; 19:8–10; 2 Cor. 6:14–7:10).

Someone observed that the ministers’ institute was begun as an effort to strengthen the Reformed convictions and dedication of our ministers. It would be hard to imagine a more radical reversal of direction than that which it has evidently undergone. About the only item on the program that seemed to elicit common appreciation was Rev. Jacob Eppinga’s witty evening entertainment, “To Ordination Through Emeritation.”

Banner of Truth Ministers’ Conference

Two weeks before the usual ministers’ meeting in Calvin College’s large auditorium, there occurred in the seminary chapel the tenth Banner of Truth Ministers’ Conference. The temper and spirit of this smaller meeting offered a sharp contrast in many ways to that of the CR conference, but it conformed much more closely to the original intent of the larger conference. Two of its speakers who had been seminary professors and then gone back to pastoral charges, spoke of the thrill of preaching the Gospel as “the power of God unto salvation to everyone who believes” it (Romans 1:16) and of then also seeing its transforming effects in the life of the church, amid our degenerating society.

A speaker featured on each days program was O. Palmer Robertson, who has taught at Westminster and Covenant Seminaries and is now pastor of a Presbyterian church at Hyattsville, MD. He introduced us to the life and career of Samson who lived in the demoralized time of Israel’s accommodation to Philistine rule. Finding little appreciation and no help in his own cowering people, he had to “go it alone,” and despite the weaknesses and inconsistencies of his own character and record, had, like David to “strengthen himself in God,” to become one of God’s instruments of deliverance, and a forerunner and an anticipation of the coming Savior God.

A second address outlined the book and career of Ezekiel dramatizing (1) the departure of God’s glory from His unfaithful people as He permitted the pagan Babylonians to sweep them away, (2) the witness of the surrounding pagan nations to that departure (so like the mockery of todays secular world), and (3) the return of that glory in the vision of a renewed temple, renewed hearts, and renewed lives, to encourage and hearten believers with the hope of that glory.

A final (Robertson) address took us back to the first chapters of Genesis. Current dismissals of this beginning revelation of God’s Word affect our whole view of life. Hebrews 11:3 underscores the fact that the world’s origin can’t be proved by scientific study. It was called into being by the Word of God, not a product of preexistent matter. How long did it take? Careful study of the passage shows that although nothing can disprove that the Genesis “days” were 24-hours, closer study of the text and events of each day suggest further questions, and that we must not stretch the testimony of this Scripture to say more than it does. Although many questions remain and have long been acknowledged by orthodox Christian scholars, we must flatly oppose evolution. We must insist that man was made in God’s image and likeness (Gen.1:25–28) in order to rule. The notion that man is a mere animal has taken over government education and public policy. God’s Word introduces Christ as the Creator and to try to reduce Him to a mere impersonal “word” or “logic” is laughable. He is the Prophet, Priest and King, by Whom and for Whom all was Created and He is the Owner which all creation must and will glorify.

A speaker new to this program, although not among us, was Dr. W. Robert Godfrey, (our CRC) Church History professor ofWestminster Seminary West. He offered quite different but equally stirring addresses, reviewing the careers of Martin Luther and J. Gresham Machen. Luther, Calvin’s predecessor, deserves more appreciation than be is sometimes given among Reformed. We were reminded of his fabulous productivity in very difficult and discouraging circumstances. His commentaries on the Psalms reflect his own experiences in that mortal struggle. Forced to stand virtually alone, he was driven to take his stand on the Word of God against the rulers of his time. The study of the Psalms, Romans, Galatians and Hebrews charted the course he had to take in the Reformation of the faith and church of the time. Although we may cite differences regarding his views at some points, we need a sympathetic appreciation of the role and way in which the Lord led and used him to lead the church in Reformation according to His Word.

J. Gresham Machen died over 50 years ago, and it is profitable in this time of loss of appreciation for the formerly dominant Calvinism which he championed, to recall his career. After his early studies and struggles amid Liberal scholarship, he came to see how two conflicting religions were in conflict in the church of his time. His 1901 book, The Origin of Paul’s Religion, highlighted the source of the Christian Faith not in mere personal experience, but in God’s Word-Revelation-a message as urgently needed now as it was a century ago. His later Christianity and Liberalism is as much an expose of our time as it was of his own. Although willing to identify himself as a Fundamentalist, he wanted no reduction of the “whole counsel of God” to just a few slogans, and he wanted to see that counsel applied to the culture of our time. His roguish sense of humor and his unflinching commitment to God’s truth were sometimes made occasions for misrepresentations of his character. (The theological deceivers in the church did not then and do not now take kindly to any exposure of their sophisticated deceptions, even if it is done with all possible courtesy.) Unflinching commitment to God’s truth led to the founding of a new seminary, then to a mission board to maintain the gospel on the mission field, instead of supporting its betrayers. The last step provoked hasty discipline against Machen and his colleagues by those supporting that betrayaL Although God has always saved His church, H e has done that not by the compromise, but only by the sturdy defense and‘ maintenance of His truth. We must rejoice in Machen’s faithful defense of the Gospel. We today share the high calling to pray, work, proclaim and fight for the same GospeL May many among today’s sadly confused ministry recover the lost sense of its calling and its high adventure.