The word “naive” means an innocent, childlike, unsuspecting, sometimes foolish simplicity that can easily be misled. Rev. Richard E. Knodel, the pastor of an Orthodox Presbyterian Church at Lynchburg, Virginia, writing in the October 14, 1981, Presbyterian Journal, expressed some apprehensions about the prospective merger of his denomination with two other conservative Presbyterian bodies. He observed that there is “a kind of . . . naivete in the OPC . . . a kind of innocence that I have seen in those who have not experienced the battle with liberalism first hand.” He noted that some of them had been “insulated . . . from some of the more protracted struggles” for 40 years.
He followed this with an observation about some Christian Reformed people.
An illustration comes to mind from the 1977 NAPARC (National Association of Presbyterian and Reformed Churches) conference on the diaconate in Pittsburgh. Men of the CRC, ostensibly leaders in that church, were advocating a hermeneutic which was essentially no differen t from that which I had grown up with in the UPCUSA (United Presbyterian Church in the USA). It was relativistic and corrupt, and yet there they were, representing a Calvinistic church with an old and yet vital tr adition. How they attained their positions I do not know. But somewhere along the way they were aided by the naivete of others and their unwillingness to speak up.
If the Orthodox Presbyterians are, as one of their ministers thinks, somewhat handicapped in facing present problems by a naivete that has developed in the 40 years since the battles with apostasy out of which the denomination was born, he may also be correct in sensing within Christian Reformed circles a naivete that has had three times as long a time to develop since our secession birth struggles. The idea has long been common throughout our CR denomination that while all around us churches were obviously losing out under the attack of prevailing liberalism we were comfortably isolated from most of those problems by our seasoned orthodoxy. That illusion, that, “Of course, it can’t happen to us” is one of our most serious handicaps in dealing with the problem that “It is happening to us.”
Some years ago one of the Missouri Synod Lutheran church leaders, speaking in Grand Rapids about the struggle with liberalism in his denomination, called attention to a similar naivete which had to be corrected if one were to deal effectively with this problem. He told of his experience in graduate study at a German university. If one would ask his roommate whether he believed in the resurrection, the answer would have been a reassuring “yes.” Many naive conservatives, satisfied concerning the student’s orthodoxy, would let the matter go at that point. The speaker pointed out that in today’s religious world one can’t let matters rest with that kind of question. If that student were asked further, “Do you believe that the body returned out of the grave, hair, toenails and all?” the answer would have been, “Of course, I don‘t believe that!”
The experience of our last Christian Reformed synod highlighted our comparable need to get rid of our naivete and to ask such more searching questions. The man seeking candidacy was questioned in a general way about his views. Then the chairman of the advisory committee, Rev. Peter Brouwer, pointed out that the interviewer, Rev. John Vriend, was not asking the questions that he was supposed to raise. “Was there a real serpent? . . . a real tree? . . . a real voice speaking?” That kind of further questioning helped to expose Mr. Libolt’s real views, as he was not ready to affirm that these were “real” in the sense that the questioner meant.
The outcome of that matter was that one who had been strongly recommended by our seminary faculty and board was rejected by an almost 2/3 vote of the synod because of his defective views of the Bible. This case has dramatically demonstrated the rift between the views of the Bible which are held by the churches and those being considered acceptable by our seminary for training ministers of those churches.
Since the synod met the school administration has been sending delegations around the country seeking to reassure each of the church classes of its orthodoxy. It has been explained that the faculty (and board) may not have been aware of the applicant’s objectionable views because they did not conduct and hear the same examination as the synod did and therefore could not know his views. Such an excuse appears untenable when one considers that within the faculty and board objections were registered against Mr. Libolt’s views. Even after those views were exposed at the synod examination some continued to defend them. Furthermore, if neither board nor faculty majority can discover the kind of objectionable views of the Bible which were plainly demonstrated to the synod, would this not indicate a naivete about these basic matters that disqualifies one from doing battle for God’s truth in today’s unbelieving world?
Especially enlightening on this subject is the Apostle Paul’s inspired description of the role and function of “pastors and teachers” (Ephesians 4:11–16). He states that the Lord gave them “for the perfecting of the saints, unto the work of ministering, unto the building up of the body of Christ; till we all attain unto the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a full-grown man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ: that we may be no longer children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men in craftiness, after the wiles of error; but speaking truth in love, may grow up in all things unto him who is the head, even Christ. . . .” Note that the labor of the God-given pastor and teacher must be directed toward the maturing of the saints so that they are delivered from the childish naivete which makes them susceptible to being blown about by deceptive winds of doctrine and, instead, may grow up in the faith and knowledge of Christ.