AN OPEN LETTER TO THE ORIGINATORS OF “OUR TESTIMONY”

I wish I didn’t have to write this letter, but it becomes necessary because my name appeared along with 43 others as a signer of “Our Testimony” in the October issue of OUTLOOK.

I counted it an honor to be included in the original mailing but, after prayerful consideration, I declined to sign it and gave my reason in a letter to the originators of the testimony. How it ended up on the list of signers is a puzzle to me.

Lest this be misinterpreted as a refusal to commit myself to the historic stands of the Chr. Ref. Church, I hope I can make clear by this open letter why I could not in good conscience sign the testimony.

1. I do have the same basic concerns as are expressed in the testimony, but find that some of the specific details as spelled out in the testimony leave me little freedom to hold personal opinions or to continue to study and reflect on the Biblical revelation as our whole church community discusses it from different points of view. I want to remain open to the wisdom of brethren with whom I presently disagree as well as to the wisdom of those whom I am in substantial agreement. 2. I do not suspect the motives of the signers of the testimony, but my conscience troubles me whether this is the proper way to protect our church from apostacy or ourselves from built for being a part of it. Matthew 18:15–17 hinds my conscience as the proper way to initiate protest and the Formula of Subscription and the Church Order spell out how to proceed if satisfaction is not gained. If the situation in our church is really that had, we do not free ourselves from corporate guilt by a testimony of disassociation from it, but are in duty bound out of love for Christ and His church to follow Matthew 18 and the Church Order. I myself have felt unnerving fear of tackling all alone what appears to be entrenched error. I have also experienced more than once the humiliation of being slapped down when I became actively involved in what I felt were proper procedures that others had initiated in combatting error. Yet I still believe that the Biblical path of discipline as outlined ill Matthew 18 followed up by the mutually agreed upon provisions of the Church Order must be followed as a matter of obedience to Christ and love for His church, even at the risk of unpopularity and more humiliating defeats. Christ never said obedience would be cheap.

3. I fear that the well–intended testimony ronte which my respected friends are taking to combat error, rather than following Matthew 18 will not be blessed by God for the healing of our church, but may rather result in further polarizing our church into several well-defined “camps,” or “parties,” which no longer are willing to listen to one another, and eventually split the church.

The first day I attended Calvin Seminary, the then Professor of Church History, George Stob, spent most of his first lecture warning against the temptingly comfortable course of alignment with “parties” in the church. I have never forgotten that lecture—in fact, it has had a profound influence on my entire ministry. Yes, it is comforting to be able to count (and count on!) a clearly defineable group of likeminded souls, but it troubles me that the Bible gives me no warrant for finding relief in identifying with such structure. It even warns against this in I Corinthians 1:10 ff. There we urged to identify with only one party—the church of Jesus Christ whose glory is only in the cross.

So brethren, I hope you will take thi~ letter in good spirit. We indeed have a common concern. I hope yom method of pursuing that concern may bear only good fruits in the C.R.C. we love. Yet the present state of my conscience will not permit me to allow my name on that list. Simply stated, I believe it the wrong way to pursue a right goal.

Affectionately, JOHN H. ELENBAAS Wellsburg, Iowa

 

Dear Mr. Editor,

Thank you for bringing to my attention the correspondence received from our brother Elenbaas. The “error” of including his name in the list is without doubt mine, for which I apologize both to him and to you.

His brief response came while I was hospitalized for a full month; his and other material gone over during a period of recuperation on bed for at least another month. In his brief letter he expressed appreciation for the contents of “Our Testimony” but mentioned he had some reservations. He did not spell these out at all. Had he in any way mentioned what is found in the letter received by yourself, I would never have included his name.

However, wholehearted agreement with “Our Testimony” never was intended to mean that no improvement in presentation or argumentation of the material was possible. Hence I—“mistakenly” in the light of what he wrote you—felt that his basic agreement with the material presented, indicated a willingness to have his name appended. I trust he as well as yourself and the readers of THE OUTLOOK will accept this apology in nil good grace.

Very cordially, PETER Y. DE JONG

Editor’s Note:

I trust that Dr. Peter Y. De Jong’s letter accounts for the evident misunderstanding that arose in Rev. John Elenbaas’ correspondence with him.

Some further response would seem to be in order regarding the propriety of publicizing the “Testimony.”

There is no difference of opinion among us regarding the need for following proper channels in opposing and seeking to correct the preaching, teaching and toleration of false doctrines. Overtures and appeals have been and are being made to classes and synods regarding these matters, as almost everyone knows.

Rev. J. Elenhaas’ letter seems to imply that opposing such false teachings must be restricted (cf. Matthew 18) to private dealings with people involved and then to only official appeals to church assemblies. If these arc ignored or denied (legally or illegally), it is presumably our duty to submit and resign ourselves to the situation. It seems to me that such a position fails to do justice to the Scriptures, to our Church Order and to our Christian duty.

This view seems to he based on a misunderstanding of the Scriptures. Matthew 18:15ff. instructs us how we are to deal with personal problems—“If thy brother sin against thee . . .” It by no means determines or restricts the way in which public false teachings arc to he corrected in the church. Notice what happens if one takes it as a restriction. Taking it in the way would mean that while any heretic freely promotes any kind of false teaching he pleases in the church, anyone who is concerned about sound biblical doctrine is restricted to dealing with the matter privately first with the individual and then with church assemblies. If the different assemblies refuse to take action there is nothing he may do! The heretic is free to say and do anything he pleases, the orthodox is commanded by Matthew 18 to be silent!

Could there be a more complete perversion of the churches’ discipline procedures to protect its sound Christian doctrine than this conversion of them into guarantees of immunity to the heretic?

Matthew 18 does not direct or restrict the way in which the Bible teaches us to deal with false doctrine. Consider the way in which the Apostle Paul corrected Peter’s error when lIe was misleading the whole church by his compromise with Judaizing teachers (Gal. 2:11ff.). Did he take Peter aside and “show him his fault between ‘Paul and Peter’ alone” (cf. Matt. 18)? Not at all. This was no private misunderstanding but a public error misleading the whole church and it had to he exposed and struck down immediately and just as publicly as it was being practiced! Paul wrote, “When I saw that they walked not uprightly according to the truth of the gospel, I said unto Cephas before them all” and proceeded to show the whole church exactly what was wrong with their conduct. I Timothy 5:20 l)()ints in the same direction of public correction of public error, “Them that sin reprove in the sight of all, that the rest may be in fear.”

A somewhat similar observation is in order regarding I Corinthians 1:100. which warns against divisions in which people begin to pit one personality against anotller and follow this or that leader. This warning needs to he born in mind as we are called to seek to realize the Lord’s expressed purpose that His church may be one (John 17:21ff.). When, however, the teachings of the gospel are being attacked, as they are among us today, to take these Biblical calls for unity and warnings against divisions as forbidding any consultations or concerted efforts among brethren to seek to oppose error and stand up for God’s truth is to misdirect them to a purpose opposite from that for which they were given!

We ought to observe further that the same prayer of our Lord that stresses unity among His people stipulates that it is unity in His truth. The same word of God which warns against divisions among brethren demands that “we withdraw yourselves from every brother that walketh disorderly, and not after the tradition which they received from us” (II Thess. 3:6); the same church of Corinth which was warned against partisan following of particular leaders is also warned, “Be not equally yoked with unbelievers. Come ye out from among them and be ye separate” ( II Cor. 6:14ff.). The same apostle who so earnestly urged that we “keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace” (Eph. 4:4) when opposition to the gospel rose in the synagogue in which he had been preaching for three months, “separated the disciples” (Acts 19:9).

I wonder if the reservations about making this common public “testimony” do not reflect a rather general but somewhat “Roman Catholic” assumption about the Church, May no group of Christians or preachers or churches try to formulate such a statement of common Christian faith if the cause of the Gospel may be advanced by it? Is there anything in the Bible or Church Order which could properly be understood to forbid it? Granted that we have usually depended on our church assemblies for such common statements of position, when they become too divided or indifferent to be willing to take such action, should not believers, church officers and churches do so if the gospel cause maybe advanced by making one? Are we forgetting that both the Belgic Confession and Heidelberg Catechism were produced by individuals and only after word adopted by churches?

May this procedure not increase division? It may do that. But is it better to be silent and condone compromise? If the division must come because of loyalty to the gospel of Christ, we should not seek to evade that kind of division, Those who are to blame for the real division in the church which is coming to expression are those who are betraying its gospel.

The letter suggests that the forming and publishing of such It “testimony” may be the recourse of some who might like to and “comfort” in identifying themselves with a like-minded “party” as a substitute for the proper fellowship of the church as a whole. I can see that danger. Such an effort as this is no satisfactory substitute for a church united by a common faith, but as a reformatory move toward seeking to regain a church united by a common faith it may be an important and effective first step. Let us pray that it may prove to be so.

I am thankful, John, for your common concern with us about these matters of our faith as we have discussed them over the years and as you now express it again, I respect your scruples about signing the testimony, but I do not believe that the objections to this procedure are well–founded and hope that you can in due course see your way clear to join whatever further responsible common efforts may be undertaken for our biblical, Reformed faith.

PETER DE JONG

DIFFICULT DECISIONS

Rev, Peter De Jong

Dear Sir!

May I have a few lines in your paper, OUTLOOK? This is in connection with your article, “Difficult Decisions,” and especially the last part.

1. Must we remain in the denomination to fight more, etc., or must we leave? My answer is, “Remain, but not fight, but study and debate and see if we cannot come to a clearer understanding of the Bible. History will tell us there was a lot of fighting but no clear understanding of the Word of God.

2. There was a time when no woman would enter the Church without a hat on her head. Why? The Bible forbade it, I Corinthians 11:5.

3. Women had to have long hair, Corinthians 11:13–15. 4. Women were not allowed to vote. By voting a woman expressed her opinion—not allowed, I Corinthians 14:34, 35.

Where are we now with all these prohibitions? and, Why? Because of a wrong interpretation of Scripture. And now what about women in office, and also what about women in subjection to her husband? I Timothy 2:12–14; Colossians 3:18. Do we not confess that Christ as the Second Adam, has released us from the curse, so that we are no longer under the law? Or does that only apply to men, but not to women? Who was the first to proclaim the gospel of Resurrection of Christ? Were they not the women, at the mandate of the angels and Jesus Himself? Has this no meaning? Could it be that Jesus meant to say: hereby the curse on Adam and Eve is lifted? I only ask, I always took the stand , No women in office. But at the present I don‘t know anymore, Is it yes or is it no? I tell you, Mr. Editor, I need more light. May we together study more and pray for the guidance of the Holy Spirit.

Yours in Christ, CLARENCE TUlNINGA,  Neerlandia

Editors Nate:

Your letter expresses dearly the kind of confusion that is increasing within our churches not only about the subject of women in office but also about the more fundamental matter of what (if anything) the Bible is really teaching us. and it calls for some response to the questions you raise.

1. Let’s first consider the line of argument. Your argument is that since in such matters as women’s hats, hair and voting in church we no longer let what the Apostle wrote determine our practice, we ought also to set aside what he wrote in the Bible about requirements for church office and a women being “in subjection to her husband.”

My answer would be, “Why do you stop here?” Is not what the apostle wrote in such passages about children obeying parents and people obeying their governments also outdated in our society? And are not the grounding the Apostle gave those instructions in God’s commandments (Eph. 6: Iff.) and in Christ’s dying for us (Eph. 5:25 for example) equally outdated in our time?

If the Apostle’s appeal to the commandments of the Lord and to the Lord’s works are to be “interpreted” as no longer valid for us there is absolutely no reason why we should not set aside as equally outdated what he wrote about Christ’s atonement. With this kind of argumentation one ought to realize that he is knocking the foundation from under every doctrine and every law of conduct in the Bible. And the effects of doing that will appear even sooner than one might expect.

Virginia Mollenkot popular promoter of “women’s rights” to office among evangelical Christians, has gone on to argue that churches should also recognize the right of homosexuals to practice their way of life without being criticized by Christians (and she was paid to promote her view at Calvin College in n lecture on September 19), (This is also the view defended by Rev. J. Rimzema, Gereformeerde minister in the Netherlands, in his book, The Sexual Revolution). When we set aside the Bible as our rule of faith and life, as our church is in the process of dOing, we must realize that we no longer have a standard to determine anything. The Lord condemned the Pharisees of His day for their setting aside the “commandment of God” and thereby making themselves “blind leaders of the blind” (Matt. 15: 1–14).

2. Hasn‘t Christ freed us from the law so that these old rules no longer apply? you ask. Christ indeed freed us from the curse of the Law, so that “there is therefore now no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus,” as the Apostle wrote in Romans 8:1, but does this mean as you and many others seem to assume that therefore all of God’s laws are no longer to govern our lives? Of course, it doesn’t. In the immediately following verses (vs. 4) he goes on to show that we are saved through Christ “that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us,” and he goes on in his later instructions to Christians to show how they are to fulfill the law” (Rom. 13:8–10). The Lord had given exactly the same kind of direction to His followers in Matthew 5:17–20, saying “Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill” and warning them against breaking even the “least commandments.” The kind of “Christianity” that to day wants to dismiss all of God’s laws as dated is not the Christianity of Christ at all but of Anti-christ who is called “the lawless one” (II Thess. 2:8 ASV).

3, Did not Christ first order women to bring the gospel of His resurrection? you ask. Of course He did, but did He therefore also commission them to be apostles and to take the lead in establishing His church? Yet know that He did not. The Apostle Paul was ordered by the Lord to bring that gospel in the world and to take a leading role in establishing the Lord’s Church among those who believed and to guide those churches in a way the Lord wanted them to be engaged in His service. He preached the freedom of that gospel and that among believers saved by faith in Christ “there can be no male and female, for ye are all one in Christ Jesus” (Gal. 3:28). But the same Apostle, when giving the Lord’s instruction for behavior “in the house of God,” restricts the leading offices of the church to men (I Timothy 2:8–3:15). In I Corinthians 14:33–38 where he faced a situation, very like that which we face today, in which people claiming the guidance of the Spirit were justifying all kinds of disorder, he had to insist that according to God‘s law women were denied the right to take the lend and speak in the Church. Anticipating the angry resentment that that kind of divine direction would receive and is receiving among us today, he went on to say, “If any man thinketh himself to be a prophet, or spiritual, let him take knowledge of the things which I write unto you that they are the commandment of the Lord.”

Has anyone the right to twist the Apostle’s teaching about the equality of believers as saved by faith in Christ into an excuse for breaking “the Lord‘s commandment” about whom He calls to lead in the church? If we reject the Lord’s commandments we must realize that we are no longer entitled to call ourselves Christians. “He that saith, ‘I know him’, and keepeth not his commandment, is a liar, and the truth is not in him” (I John 2:4).

4. You bring up the old questions about hats and hair styles and whether a change in customs docs not also make legitimate a change in rules for church government. That subject is a hit too complicated to treat in detail, but I believe the matter was handled rather well in an article by Rev. Jelle Tuininga in our last April issue on “Twisting Scripture to put Women in Office.” He pointed out (1) that God’s commands are always valid hut we need to distinguish between their application to changing conditions and their character as an unchanging norm. (2) He also recalled the observation in the 1973 Acts of Synod that Paul‘s appeal to God’s order in creation and His law are not considerations which may be dismissed as “time-conditioned” and applicable to the early church. 5. I agree with you that we all need to pray for the guidance of the Spirit and seek a common clear understanding of the Bible. But when that guidance of the Bible is plain and prolonged discussion makes it increasingly evident that many are determined not to he hound by the Bible when it interferes with their own desires or current public opinion, then it  becomes urgent that we “contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all delivered unto the saints” (Jude 3). We are commanded to“fight the good fight of the faith” (I Tim. 2:18, 6:12 ). We must act in love, but we may not reject the Lord’s orders to “Fight.” The “soldier of Jesus Christ” who will not fight (II Tim. 2:3) will he defeated.

I am saddened by the uncertainty which yon in your letter express regarding this matter. I fear that this kind of confusion is f0und more and more widely among us regarding many matters of Christian faith and life. Let us pray that the Lord may bring us out of it, as He did to our forefathers. by leading us back to faith in and obedience to His Word.

PETER DE JONG