Saturday, April 29, 2006

Excommunication revisited

Read this post with the 24 articles of the Together for the Gospel statement and then read this comment. Is this possible?

    They also hinted during the discussion panel (both here and elsewhere) that this statement was soon going to be used somehow as a formal benchmark statement of modern orthodoxy, and whomever, ministers, ministries, or denominations that will not sign/agree with this statement will be as Paul mentioned, ultimately anathema.
Anathema. I have heard this before.

Update: The above is a comment only and does not necessarily represent the views of those who wrote the statement.

13 comments:

Dorcas (aka SingingOwl) said...

This truly is heartbreaking to me. I blogged about it--hope you don't mind that I copied your earlier post.

I can hardly believe this...can it be so? I suppose it is the logical end to the way things have been going. Lord, help us.

Suzanne McCarthy said...

You would have to read the full comment section on Tim Challies blog but I get the impression that this is the direction things are going in.

Ruud Vermeij said...

What is this Together for the Gospel thing? Is it well known? Is it influential? Or is it just an obscure club of extremes?

I never heard of it.

Michael F. Bird said...

Suzanne, do you have the exact wording for the conference registration restricting women from attending? I cannot find it on the net and I want to read it again so I can make sure that I understand exactly what they're saying.

Suzanne McCarthy said...

Michael,

I am sorry that I did not save the page. It said something like this, that they regretted that they did not have the capacity to accomdodate more people and that since the focus was to minister to teachers and pastors, they would not be able to accept registration from wives or other women. It was polite. However, this is not a direct quote. I went back later to view it and it had been removed with the simple statement that registration was full.

However, if you look at the pictures, you can see that the 3000 people who attended were all men, but not necessarily all teachers or pastors.

Registration for the next conference will open soon. I will have a look to see what is said then.

So one can only say for now, that in fact only men attended this conference. I think that information could be confirmed in desriptions of the conference elsewhere.

I think this might be acceptable if it was a 'men's' conference, but as a leaders conference where doctrine is being decided, it seems unusual that wives at least were not able to observe, and then discuss with their husbands after. That would be a more traditional fundamentalist approach, that women should observe at least when important business was carried out.

Suzanne McCarthy said...

Here is a description of the conference from Tim Challies. I think the only thing to do is to watch for the next registration. I don't know quite what to make of this, since certainly men only or women only conferences do exist. I have never attended one, but I have heard of them.

But read the first few lines of this description with the emphasis on being 'brothers in Christ'. Challies records the whole confernece.

Michael F. Bird said...

I am not happy about this.

Matthew Celestine said...

There does seem a strong exclusiveness in a lot of these Reformed types that travel in those circles.

God Bless

Matthew

Suzanne McCarthy said...

Matthew,

Happpily I jumped straight from the Brethren into the Anglican church without stopping to try out anything in between.

BTW, thanks for your tip about Lang. I will look him up.

Ruud,

For more about this group visit Adrian Warnock's UK Evangelical blog. He is quite excited about the Together for the Gospel group. So there teaching seems to be quite influential.

Michael,

I read your post. Bravo.

Matthew Celestine said...

They seem to big fans of John Piper and John F MacArthur. Yuck. Definitely not my scene.

God Bless

Matthew

Suzanne McCarthy said...

Matthew,

Here are a few things I don't like about this teaching. I have never met the guys so I won't make too much of that.

1. A lot of talk about our sexual differences, etc, etc, sex and hierarchy together as metahor for something, I don't know quite what.

2. Emphasis on the preacher instead of on the word. The centrality of the word rather than the speaker is the main similarity for me between the Brethren and the Anglicans.

3. Emotion, hype, praise, etc, etc.

4. Systematic theology reather than Biblical theology.

5. Emphasis on authority of elders, rather than on the whole body of Christ and priesthood of believers.

6. Lot of other theological differenes with Brethren teaching.

So what is it that you see that makes you say yuck?

Matthew Celestine said...

Their Calvinism.

John F MacArthur in particular preaches a false gospel. He effectively makes obdediance and self-sacrifice a condition of receiving eternal life.

I stand with Zane Hodges in maintaining that eternal life is a free gift that is received purely by simple faith and is not conditional upon repentance, obdediance, devotedness or perserverance as MacArthur maintains it is.

Every Blessing in Christ

Matthew

Suzanne McCarthy said...

Thanks, I see now. That is what I was alluding to with their systematic theology. I was shocked a few months ago when I read this about the order of salvation in Grudem's systematic theology.

Also the idea that the Son is in eternal subordination to the father. That doesn't sound right. I will post about that sometime.