Not all “Light” products are light. A consumer’s group in New York recently reported that several manufacturer’s, itchy to get their hands on the money in consumers’ pockets, have learned a magic word to bring about the desired effects: Light (as in “light” beer, “light” margarine, “light” pretzels, etc.). The only trouble is, the advocates tell us, that so-called “light” products often have identical or greater amounts of that which they’re supposed to be light in (calories, salt, sugar, cholesterol) per ounce than “regular” products. The “lightness” sometimes consisted in smaller portion sizes. The manufacturers use a word that consumers want to hear. then define it according to their purposes. The consumer group wants legislation to define and restrict the use ·of the word so that both manufacturers and consumers will know, according to an objective standard, the meaning of this important marketing term.

Church history has seen the same kind of process occur over and again. A man professing to be a Christian would arise, using the vocabulary of the faith but with his own novel meanings. The creeds and confessions of the church are simply the ecclesiastical analog of what the consumer group is calling for: careful and precise definitions of what the Church of Jesus Christ MEANS by certain concepts and words, based on the objective standard of Holy Scripture.

REQUIRED IN COVENANTS

Shared meanings form the glue which binds us together in covenant, not shared vocabulary. It is vital that we recognize this fact. A covenant is a relationship. The exact kind of relationship is determined by the type and terms of the covenant. The covenant of grace is a sovereignly administered love relationship in blood, between God and His people through Christ, Who is Himself, at the same time, the Head, the Word, and the Terms of the covenant. If one is to be rightly, graciously related to God, he is going to be so under, by, and according to Christ Himself, or not at all.

A covenant is a relationship, and a broken covenant is a broken relationship. We also speak of the breaking of relationships as a “breaking faith,” for faith is also an indispensable element of any covenant. Covenants are entered into and continue on the basis of faith. The marriage covenant, for example, is known as a betrothal. This means that each marriage partner is pledging his and her “troth,” truth, faith, to the other. Exactly what each is pledging to be faithful about is spelled out, in tradition for example, in the Ketubah, or marriage contract. All marriages, however, like ALL relationships, have explicit and implicit terms which define and regulate the PRECISE nature of the covenant, the relationship. The terms are not additions to, but constitutive elements of the covenant itself. To have no terms is to have no covenant, just as to have no rooms is to have no home. A home may have one all-purpose room (as an abandoned school bus in Coney Island serves as a “home” to several indigents), or it may have many rooms, but: no rooms, no home; no terms, no covenant.

Someone seeking to undermine a relationship, then, could accomplish this by encouraging one already in covenant to redefine the terms. This is especially the tactic employed by home-breakers seeking to seduce a “semi-unwilling” party. He will tell a weak-willed woman, for example, that “love” is all that matters, that she can continue “her relationship with her husband while having an occasional rendezvous with him. But this is to introduce an entirely different meaning of “love” than that which she swore to at marriage. If the wife succumbs to this temptation by redefinition, she has broken faith, broken the relationship and broken the covenant of God (see Proverbs 2:17). If one party of the covenant arbitrarily changes the meaning or the terms of that covenant, a breaking of the covenant has occurred, and one can expect a further disintegration of the relationship (except in the case of repentance).

ESSENTIAL IN THE CHURCH

Now what has all this got to do with the Christian Reformed Church? Plenty, I’m afraid. There are a growing number of men and women in our church whose consciences have been seared to such a degree that they see no problem in changing the meanings of any number of the terms which are found in the covenant documents that bind us together, the three Forms of Unity and the Church Order. They don’t mind using the same words we do; after all, they grew up hearing them and they’re accustomed to them. But the things which those words teach, the things which the words have historically signified, the meanings of the terms are unacceptable. It seems some want a marriage that INCLUDES adultery.

If we share vocabulary but we do not share meanings, what is it that we truly share except a sham–sound and fury signifying nothing. If the meanings of terms cannot be shared, then meaning can only be had on an individual basis. The covenant is broken—“I do my thing, you do your thing, and if by chance we meet . . . .” And thus the enemy wins.

The Belgic Confession defines the confession of the church concerning Scripture: “We receive all these books [the 66 of the Old and New Testaments, including 1 Timothy], and these only, as holy and canonical [the rule, the measure, the objective standard], for the regulation, foundation, and confirmation of our faith; believing without any doubt all things contained in them” (Article V). “It is unlawful for any one, though an apostle, to teach otherwise than we are now taught in Holy Scripture: nay, though it were an angel from heaven, as the apostle Paul says. For since it is forbidden to add unto or take away anything from the Word of God, it does thereby evidently appear that the doctrine thereof is most perfect and complete in all respects. Neither may we consider . . . custom, or the great multitude . . . as of equal value with the truth of God, since the truth is above all: for all men are of themselves liars, and more vain than vanity itself. Therefore we reject WITH ALL OUR HEARTS whatsoever does not agree with this infallible rule” (Article VII).

If anything is obvious, it is that we are today engaged in a struggle with men who have sworn before God that they believe these statements, yet they manifestly DO NOT. They have redefined the doctrine of Scripture so that it conforms perfectly to what is said about APOCRYPHA in Article VI of our confession: The Church may read and take instruction from (apocryphal books) . . . but they are far from having such power and efficacy that we may from their testimony confirm any point of faith or of the Christian religion.

This is most apparent, of course, when Scripture comes into conflict with the feminist’s agenda, but it is by no means restricted to that issue. The Banner has made it clear that relativism, with it’s apocryphal reference books which we call the Holy Bible, is ready to redefine MANY things. One issue after another proceeds on the presupposition that God has NOT spoken perfectly, finally and clearly on the issues faced by modern man. Responding to the concern of a member of the denomination that evolution is being taught at Calvin College, a science professor, after expressing disdain for the question, went on for several paragraphs to redefine creation so as to INCLUDE evolution. Homosexuality, alcoholism, abortion, cannot be evaluated by Scripture alone. No, we must eagerly await each issue of The Banner to find out what we are to believe, now that our Bible has been redefined as functionally apocryphal.

Election and reprobation, deacon, elder, minister, worship, are all being retained in form, but changed in content. “Inspiration” is another favorite term on their altar. Moloch is very pleased with the new definitions they’ve given that; definitions which effectively neutralize the idea of inspiration altogether, and at the very same time, alter the idea of God Himself, rendering Him, in effect, UNABLE to communicate once-for-all in a written unchangeable form, binding in every particular of all generations till the end of the world. Such authority is obnoxious to them in the extreme. They find it “unloving,” “inhibiting the Spirit” (theirs, Yes; the Holy One’s, No!), “stifling,” etcetera. So, in dispensing with the dreaded doctrine of inspiration as we in the covenant have understood it, these “freedom fighters” have dispensed with the Christian God and exchanged Him for one much closer to the Islamic reckoning of a god who just can’t get through to us, because he is too high, too “other.” (If you smell Barth here, your nose is in good shape. He’s a patriarch of double-dealing vocabulary.)

CREED OR CHAOS

The issue we are dealing with is not adiaphorous. This is foundational. It’s either our confessional understanding of the Word of God, or, every man does that which is right in his own eyes. If we are in Covenant with Christ, dare we redefine the terms He has instituted? Jesus Christ told His ambassadors, “He who listens to you listens to me; he who rejects you rejects me; but he who rejects me rejects him who sent me” (Luke 10:16). He told the apostles, “I tell you the truth, whoever accepts anyone I send accepts me.” (John 13:20). The first words of 1 Timothy are “Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the command of God our Savior and of Christ Jesus our hope.” Paul’s authority is not original. He is not spreading his opinions. He reiterates this claim to apostolic authority in verse 12: “I thank Christ Jesus our Lord, who has given me strength, that he considered me faithful [Christ’s opinion of Paul was apparently higher than our relativists’], appointing me to his service.” In chapter 2 Paul gives Christ’s will regarding women and authority, explaining it in terms of creation. (The more you think about it, the clearer it will become that the feminists must jettison not simply inspiration, but also creation. Furthermore, abortion “rights” are an indispensable part of the agenda. They will be called for by the relativists soon.) Paul explains in chapter 3, that what he has written from 2:1 on was so that “you will know how people ought to conduct themselves in God’s household, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and foundation of the truth.” (v. 15) About which of these critical terms is there SHARED MEANING in the Christian Reformed Church? We are on the verge of becoming like pathetic Pilate, asking, “What is truth?” Those with an inerrant Word from God know the answer! Can we forever tolerate those who reject the truth as it is in Christ? Having rejected Paul’s authority, rendering it a reflection of “Judaistic and rabbinic interpretations,” the relativists have abandoned our shared meanings, embraced philosophical monism, and opened our denomination to become a haunt of demonic doctrine. Strong words? We shouldn’t be afraid of strong words. We should be scared to death of liars and re-definers. Hymenaeus and Alexander have been blaspheming long enough. It’s time we handed them over to Satan (1 Timothy 1:20). It is not a cause for wonder that the relativist covenant-breakers have “no problem” living with covenant–keepers. Cancer needs a host body.

The strength of a covenant lies in the shared understanding of its terms by the parties, who, together, profess to be in it. When those terms are redefined by those claiming to be faithful to it, who use the same words but with different meanings, the very foundation of the covenant is severely threatened. This threat cannot be dealt with by wishful thinking. It cannot be dealt with by the ostrich method. This problem won’t “go away” peacefully. No. It must rather be dealt with by the rigorous implementation of the processes and sanctions provided for in such cases, processes and sanctions which are found in the covenant documents themselves. Somebody’s gonna have to leave this body. Shouldn’t it be the cancer? Ministers, Elders, men of God—Gird up your loins; get ready for action. Be strong and courageous—and get your scalpels (Hebrews 4:12, 13)! We dare not be passive any longer!

Steve M. Schlissel is the pastor of Messiah’s Christian Reformed Church, Brooklyn, New York.