Calvinists, Would Calvin Approve Of Your Worship?

I have always been puzzled by those who loudly and proudly call themselves Calvinists, yet on an issue that he believed to be of the utmost importance and one of the great causes of the Reformation, they repudiate him. They like to talk about God's sovereignty but seem to give that no thought when it comes to how the people of God are to worship that sovereign. Many are, by all appearance's, Calvinistic in their soteriology, but everywhere else, functional charismatics at best.

John Calvin, addressing Emperor Charles the Fifth in, The Necessity of Reforming the Church, explained what acceptable worship is to God in 1554, in a way that seems almost prescient today.

...the rule which distinguishes  between pure and vitiated worship, is of universal application, in order that we not adopt any device which seems fit to ourselves, but look to the injunctions of Him who alone is entitled to prescribe. Therefore, if we would have Him approve our worship, this rule, which he every where enforces with the utmost strictness, must be carefully observed. For there is a two-fold reason why the Lord, in condemning and prohibiting all fictitious worship, requires us to give obedience only to his own voice. First, it tends greatly to establish His authority that we do not follow our own pleasure, but depend entirely on his sovereignty; and secondly, such is our folly, that when we are left at liberty, all we are able to do is to go astray. And then when once we have turned aside from the right path, there is no end to our wanderings, until we get buried under a multitude of superstitions. Justly, therefore, does the Lord, in order to assert his full right of dominion, strictly enjoin what he wishes us to do, and at once reject all human devices which are at variance with his command. Justly, too, does he, in express terms, define our limits, that we may not by fabricating perverse modes of worship, provoke His anger against us. I know how difficult it is to persuade the world that God disapproves of all modes of worship not expressly sanctioned by His Word. The opposite persuasion which cleaves to them, being seated, as it were, in their bones and marrow, is, that whatever they do, has in itself, a sufficient sanction, provided it exhibits some kind of zeal for the honour of God. But since God not only regards as fruitless, but also plainly abominates, whatever we undertake from zeal to His worship, if at variance with His command, what do we gain by a contrary course? The words of God are clear and distinct, "Obedience is better than sacrifice." "In vain do they worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men." (1 Samuel 15:22; Matt 15:9) Every addition to His word, especially in this matter, is a lie. Mere "will-worship" is vanity. This is the decision, and when once the judge has decided, it is no longer time to debate. (The Necessity of Reforming the Church, pgs 16-17)

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Man's Chief End Is Not An Electoral Victory

Most of American Protestantism, excluding NAPARC, have lost the art of catechism, though it is encouraging to note things like the New City Catechism and the growing interest in the practice of catechises. Nonetheless, the practice, as a general habit and duty of Christians toward their children and converts, has all but disappeared, leaving the Church bereft of the tools to instill into the body of Christ a basic, doctrinal lens through which to perceive the world, God and their relation to both. In other words, the loss of catechises has resulted in the confusion of the sacred and the secular, of the political and the ecclesiastical, ultimately even causing a conflation of the Great Commandment with the Great Commission. So, when your average Evangelical reads, for instance, the Westminster Shorter Catechism, or the Heidelberg Catechism, it is no wonder that often they don't recognize the usefulness of such a tool, often discounting it as something associated with Roman Catholics and therefore wrong or harmful simply by association. Or conversely, react with joy at their discovery and perhaps not without a bit of confusion as to why they weren't taught such things as children.


The Westminster Shorter Catechism, from the outset, seeks to rightly orient man to God and by extension, to the world:

Q:  What is the chief end of man?
A:  Man's chief end is to glorify God and enjoy him forever.

For American Christians, not understanding this causes a profound obfuscation as to how they should view and understand political defeats or victories. And isn't to diminish the calling we have to love our neighbors, nor the civic duty we are invested with by virtue of our citizenship. Instead, it is a stark reminder that our contentment and hope resides not with our present circumstances, but instead in our adoption as sons of the Most High God, as those in union with Christ the Son, and as those who possess the Spirit of God. Colossians 1:13-14 declares to us, "He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. (ESV)

Thomas Watson (1620-1686), in his discourse on the Westminster Shorter Catechism, A Body Of Divinity, said this in regard to man's chief in and how that informs and instructs his confrontation with distress.

We glorify God, by being contented in that state in which Providence has place us. We give God the glory of his wisdom, when we rest satisfied with what he carves out to us. Thus Paul glorified God. The Lord cast him into as great variety of conditions as any man, 'in prisons more frequent, in deaths oft,' 2 Cor 11:23, yet he had learned to be content; he could be anything that God would have him; he could either want or abound. Phil 4:13. A good Christian argues thus: It is God that has put me in this condition; he could have raised me higher, if he pleased, but that might have been a snare to me: he has done it in wisdom and love; therefore I will sit down satisfied with my condition. Surely this glorifies God much; God counts himself much honoured by such a Christian. Here, says God, is one after mine own heart; let me do what I will with him, I hear no murmuring, he is content. This shows abundance of grace. When grace is crowning, it is not so much to be content; but when grace is conflicting with inconveniences, then to be content is a glorious thing indeed. For one to be content when he is in heaven is no wonder; but to be content under the cross is like a Christian. This man must needs bring glory to God; for he shows to all the world, that though he has little meal in his barrel, yet he has enough in God to make him content: he says, as David, Psalm 26:5, 'The Lord is the portion of mine inheritance; the lines are fallen to me in pleasant places.'

This is great comfort, I think, to those Christian who were or felt heavily invested in this most recent presidential election and suffered the defeat of their candidate(s) at the hands of those they morally, if not confusedly theologically oppose. America is neither the Evil Empire nor the Great Hope of humanity. We are not a nation blessed by God because of our piety any more than we are a nation cursed by our impropriety. We are simply a nation that has, in God's providence, provided a respite for his people from the hatred the world bears them, as a place that displays the common grace that the Lord imparts to both the just and the unjust alike. But let us be careful of invoking the name of Christ to justify things that have no redemptive value and point to nothing more then the genius of man made in the image of God rather then pointing to the image of God we have given to us in Christ the Son. So, it's okay to be sad in defeat, but remember that in end, we lose nothing.

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Confessions vs. Latitude or When Do Vows Mean Less?

This is sort of an inside the NFL type of topic, but it smacked me hard in the face recently, so I felt that I should give it some attention. For the modern confessionalists, at least those in the URCNA and who subscribe to the Three Forms Of Unity, Belgic Articles 28 and 29, in concert with Book of Church Order Article 64*, present a dilemma our forbearers didn't face.

When our confessions were written, the selection of identifiable, legitimate church groups were limited, the vast array of what comprises the modern Protestant arena would have been foreign. So it was simple, there was no category for those who resigned their membership but didn't deny their profession of faith, you either remained within the church universal through visible membership in a local body or you denied the faith, or at least were willfully rebellious.

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Carl Trueman On The Importance Of Historical Method

An excellent series of reminders and advice from Carl Trueman for either the experienced or budding theologian as they dive into the deep waters of historical theology, from the Patristic era to the Medieval and on into Reformed Scholasticism. Trueman begins,

The last forty years have seen a major revolution in the way in which scholars regard the intellectual development of orthodox Protestantism in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Prior to that time, much of the field was dominated by historiographical models which tended to oversimplify the intellectual landscape. Thus, some scholars isolated one or two figures and made their theological formulations normative and all those who differed with them in either content or style to be to some extent deviant and defective. Such was the infamous “Calvin against the Calvinists” hypothesis which pitted the allegedly pristine and monolithic theology of John Calvin over against that of his successors in later decades. We might also add to the mix the woefully inadequate use of the term “scholasticism” and its cognates as meaning “rationalistic,” “over logical” or simply “dull and dry.”

Read the rest here... 

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