Does John Piper Believe in Salvation by Works?

Attention has been called to a recent (September 26) article by John Piper, Does God Really Save Us by Faith Alone?. In this short article, Piper asserts:

• In justification, faith receives a finished work of Christ performed outside of us and counted as ours — imputed to us.
• In sanctification, faith receives an ongoing power of Christ that works inside us for practical holiness.
• In final salvation at the last judgment, faith is confirmed by the sanctifying fruit it has borne, and we are saved through that fruit and that faith. As Paul says in 2 Thessalonians 2:13, “God chose you as the firstfruits to be saved, through sanctification by the Spirit and belief in the truth.”

Piper goes on to say:

(Paul) said in Galatians 5:6, “In Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything, but only faith working through love.” The only kind of faith that counts for justification is the kind that produces love — the kind that bears the fruit of love. The faith which alone justifies is never alone, but always bearing transforming fruit.

I think what lights the fire here is Piper's contention that the five solas (Scripture alone, grace alone, Christ alone, faith alone, the glory of God alone should be understood as relating to justification and not to the whole of salvation (justification-adoption-sanctification-good works-glorification).

Only after justification can the five prepositional phrases follow and do their magnificent work to define and protect the gospel from all unbiblical dilution. We are justified by God by grace alone; on the basis of Christ’s blood and righteousness alone; through the means, or instrument, of faith alone; for the ultimate glory of God alone; as taught with final and decisive authority in Scripture alone.” All five phrases serve to modify God’s work of justification — how sinners gain a right standing with God so that he is one hundred percent for us and not against us.

I am not sure that Piper's take on the solas is entirely correct. I might quibble with him particularly on "grace alone" and "Scripture alone." But that is not the issue. The issue is, "Does Piper reject Reformed orthodoxy regarding salvation by faith alone?"

One writer has taken issue with Piper's article as evidence that he does not hold to the Reformation doctrine of salvation by faith alone. This article has itself received some push back, but another writer has come to the defense of the criticism of Piper.

Let me confess several things:

1. I am not a theologian (except in the sense of being a "student of God") nor an historian (except in the sense that I have read and know some history). Put simply, I am not qualified to teach theology or church history in a college or seminary.

2. I have read very little of John Piper. I did hear him speak quite a few years ago at the old Pensacola Theological Institute, and I found him "too mystical" for me. I felt like the student who asks, "Teacher, have I got it?" to which the teacher answers, "Not yet, my student, but don't give up."

3. While I think that Piper basically holds to the consensus of traditional evangelicalism on the matter of women, there are some things he has said that seem bizarre to me. I do not agree with him on these "fringe" views.

4. I have not been in agreement with those I term "the obedience boys." I have often said and more often thought that, if I am not saved by the work Christ did for me outside of me, and if Romans 7:14ff is not a description of the experience of a regenerate man, then I will not see glory.

5. I am an Anglican. Before I became a sincere Anglican I was a Presbyterian who took seriously covenant theology and Reformed sacramentology. That is to say: I am not a Baptist. For me the great divide between Piper and me is that he is a Baptist and I am a Reformed Anglican. 

But, with regard to Piper, I think the issue could be clarified and and perhaps resolved for those who hold to the Reformed confessions' teaching on salvation by faith alone, if Piper answered these questions:

1. Does justification received now in this world by faith declare not only God's present verdict but what shall be his final verdict regarding his people?  

2. Can justification, once declared, be revoked?

3. Will any who are justified in this age be judged as unjust before God by Christ, the Judge, at the last day? 

If Piper should answer these first of these questions in the positive and the next two in the negative, then I think that he holds to Reformed orthodoxy on the matter of salvation by faith alone through grace alone. 

After all, it is taken as almost a Protestant-Evangelical-Reformed truism that "we are saved by faith alone, but not by a faith that is alone." And, we do have to wrestle with what the Apostle meant when he wrote:

So whether we are at home or away, we make it our aim to please him. For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may receive what is due for what he has done in the body, whether good or evil.  Therefore, knowing the fear of the Lord, we persuade others.

The End Could Be Near

Aimee and Tim Agree

I wonder if it's a sign that the end is near. The Scriptures speak of mercy and truth meeting together and righteousness and peace kissing each other (Psalm 85:10). On a more limited scale Aimee Byrd and Tim Bayly have met together at Hugh Hefner's grave and exchanged the holy kiss of connecting Hugh and complementarianism. 

Both have read and disdained Ben
Domenech's Federalist piece, Hugh Hefner's Legacy Is About More Than Sex, which defends Hefner as at least celebrating the differences between the sexes that draws man and woman to one another (or, to use the pure and Biblical phraseology, "the way of a man with a maid (Proverbs 30:19). In addition Aimee has read and commends (and it's commendable) Ashleen Menchaca-Bagnulo's The Playboy and the Death of Sexual Complementarity published by the Witherspoon Institute. 

Tim is his "I told you so" self with his objection that The Federalist has reduced complemtarianism to the matching of body parts:

I’ve warned souls that The Federalist is politics and morals stripped of God and His Law and Word. A friend passes on this paean to Hugh Heffner as Exhibit A.

Here’s a eulogy that tells readers to look past Heffner’s moral degradation so we can stop and give thanks for his complementarianism. Stop and give thanks that his brand of moral degradation honors natural theology (meaning the right use of body parts). Of Heffner, The Federalist says:

…his work celebrates the sexual complementarity that has bound men and women together since the dawn of time.

This is what complementarianism has become and we have only ourselves to blame.

But for Tim it is more than the reductionist complementarianism of The Federalist piece. The problem is with complementarianism itself, the compromising complementarianism of the Biblical Council on Manhood and Womanhood, which must inevitably lead to Domenesch's celebration of Hefner's complementarity of bodies and worse:

First, we all jumped on board with the Danvers Statement and began to do something unheard of across church history. We denied that father-rule is a universal law established by God when He created Adam first, then Eve. Instead, we reassured Christians that male authority is only a private Christian thing limited to the Christian church and home. Joining the compromisers of the Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood, we too trotted out the lie that father-rule is not established by God’s order of creation—and thus father-rule has no application to the billions living without God and without hope in this world.1 

Next, we all jumped on the same-sex attracted, gay Christian bandwagon and began repeating their talking points perfectly matched to CBMW’s talking points before them. Manhood and womanhood are not callings given us by God. A gender identity contrary to the sex God made us is no sin. It’s fine to be an effeminate as long as you promise not to copulate wrongly. Godliness is not heterosexuality. Godliness is merely the avoidance of wrongful use of body parts. Some of my best friends are gay same-sex attracted Christians living out on LivingOut.org. 

So now America’s playboy Hugh Heffner has died and The Federalist is telling readers that, despite his lechery, we should celebrate the fact that his lechery celebrated “sexual complementarity.” 

Evangelical reformed men stripped the public square of any faithful witness to the Edenic meaning of man and woman, so now they’re left grasping Hugh Heffner’s “sexual complementarity.” This is their legacy.

With Tim it is easy to know how he wants to correct the deviance of complementarianism. It is a return to what he is certain the Bible teaches beginning with creation - patriarchy, father-rule of the household including wife and children and male rule of church and society.  

Aimee, no less than Tim, hates Hefner and the praise of his "legacy" of the complementarity of male and female bodies, and she joins Tim in to some extent blaming it on Christian complementarianism. But the church's complementarianism is both more subtle male domination and better mannered "hyper-masculinity" than Hefner's or Bayly's:

Most churches would never endorse Hefner’s lifestyle. We are disgusted by the sexual revolution and the damage it has done. And yet, some echo this nostalgic brand of complementarity. Menchaca-Bagnulo turns to churches promoting the same view of complementarity as Hefner, which she calls an “intellectualization of domination and dehumanization.” I’ve seen this polished, Christianized version of complementarity with all its hyper-masculine teaching for men and “complementary” femininity taught as subordination. It’s all so one-dimensional and dangerous. 

The problem with Aimee's problem with complementarianism is that it is impossible to know what she would offer as its substitute that in some fashion manages to take seriously the Scriptures and their description of the relation of man and woman in both creation and redemption, both pre-fall and post-redemption. 

What did God intend to say to us by Moses' account of the creation of woman?

Then the Lord God said, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him.”  Now out of the ground the Lord God had formed every beast of the field and every bird of the heavens and brought them to the man to see what he would call them. And whatever the man called every living creature, that was its name. The man gave names to all livestock and to the birds of the heavens and to every beast of the field. But for Adam there was not found a helper fit for him. So the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and while he slept took one of his ribs and closed up its place with flesh. And the rib that the Lord God had taken from the man he made into a woman and brought her to the man. Then the man said,    

             “This at last is bone of my bones 
               and flesh of my flesh;      
         she shall be called Woman,
              because she was taken out of Man.”

Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed (Genesis 2:18-25).

 What did St. Paul mean to teach as he drew out the implications of both creation and fall for life in the community of redemption?

Let a woman learn quietly with all submissiveness. I do not permit a woman to teach or to exercise authority over a man; rather, she is to remain quiet. For Adam was formed first, then Eve; and Adam was not deceived, but the woman was deceived and became a transgressor.

Since I have quoted them recently, I will not here copy and paste them. But in 1 Corinthians 11 what does Paul mean by "head"? Does it mean only "source" or does it mean "headship"? What does Paul mean In Ephesians 5:22-33 when he describes the relationship of husband and wife in terms of both Christ's sacrificial love and the church's universal submission to him? What does St. Peter mean to teach Christian wives in 1 Peter 3:1-7 about how to live with unbelieving husbands who may be both harsh toward and lacking in understanding of their wives?

I keep getting the impression that there are some Reformed women who are not comfortable with this that I believe would not that long ago have been unobjectionable: 

Man and woman are both made in the image of God and share equally in the blessings of redemption. Consistent with this is that by both the order of creation and the nature of Christ's redemption of his church, God calls men to headship in their homes, loving their wives as reflexively as they love their own bodies and as sacrificially as Christ loved the church. He also calls wives to submit to their husbands' leadership, including deferring to their husbands in what should be the rare cases when either there is an intractable disagreement or the husband finds that he cannot out of  love defer to his wife's wishes and will. In the church the relationship between husbands and wives is the same as in the home. Moreover, God sets apart and calls some men, but only men, to serve by leading and teaching. Those men who are called to lead the church should do so with humility and gentleness, and those who are called to teach should be skilled in the handling of the Scriptures and with understanding of the sheep whom they feed, whether male or female, children or adults. At the same time the people of the church should live at peace with one another, respect their leaders, and receive the word with meekness from their teachers."

I am happy to see Tim and Aimee come together at the grave of Hugh Hefner. If, however, their substantial disagreements should turn into a beauty contest, Tim ain't got a chance. 

But, my worst nightmare is that both, one on the platform of Out of Our Minds and the other on the platform of The Mortification of Spin, will turn their big artillery pieces on me, when I hope I shall be able to count on Mrs. Smith's protection. If not, my departure is soon at hand. 

 

Who's Right? Who's Wrong? (Response to Valerie Hobbs: Pt. 3)

The one who states his case first seems right, until the other comes and examines him. 

Proverbs 18:17

There must be two sides to every story

And who's to say who's right and who is wrong

                                                    Willie Nelson 

 The Babe and the Curmudgeon

One side of a story. With Serving the Status Quo, we have come, God be praised, to the last of three posts by Dr. Valerie Hobbs regarding a woman named Jessica Fore. Ms. Fore and Dr. Hobbs believe Ms. Fore has experienced two kinds of abuse, domestic and ecclesial. Ms. Fore separated from her husband whom she considered abusive. We do not know what kind of abuse Ms. Fore believes she suffered. We know only that Dr. Hobbs has told us of Ms. Fore's allegation and what followed. 

Nor have we heard this story from other vantage points. What would be Mr. Fore's story? The Pastor of the church's story?The Session of the church's story? The Clerk of the Presbytery's story? The Shepherding Committee's story? The Presbytery's story? 

If Ms. Fore were writing a book, the title could be My Story as Told to and by Valerie Hobbs. I don't know who Ms. Fore is, of what church she is a member, who is her Pastor, of what Presbytery her church is a member, the name of the Clerk against whom she has grievances, or anything else. All I know, and most readers know, is limited to the three posts at The Aquila Report by Dr. Hobbs in which she told us of Ms. Fore and her experience.

We know one side of a many-sided story.

Judicial Process. Because of Ms. Fore's separation from her husband and her refusal to accept the church's counsel that she reconcile with her husband, her church removed her from her position as a "worship leader." In my opinion this should have been the end of the story so far as her "position" was concerned. She took an action, separating from her husband, which she had the legal right to do. The church judged this to be unacceptable conduct on the part of a "worship leader." The church, as was its ecclesial and legal right, removed her (or, as Dr. Hobbs put it, "fired her") from the position in which she had served. The church had no way to compel her to return to her husband. She had no right to try to compel the Pastor and Session to restore her to her position as "worship leader." (If one reads Dr. Hobbs's original post, it appears that at some point Ms. Fore was excluded from a small group "without due process." This is, to put it mildly, confusing, raising questions about whether participation in a small group is a church member's right and if "process" is required to remove such member.) With regard to the "worship leader position" her removal should have been the end of the story. 

But that was not the end of the story. At that point in various ways the PCA Book of Church Order kicked in. In almost every case the implementation of the procedures and processes of Book of Church Order, involving charges, testimony, trial, sanctions, and complaints means the situation is unlikely to be resolved pastorally. Relationally, it's almost bound to get worse. The Session (board of elders) disciplined her, she and the Clerk of the Presbytery clashed, and she submitted two complaints to the Presbytery. Along the way Ms. Fore has been advised by Dr. Hobbs and others. 

One thing that should be noted about the PCA and some other presbyterian churches is that they term their governing bodies "courts." There is a positive historical reason for this. They are called courts because they are not legislative bodies, but judicial bodies. They do not make law; they declare and administer the law of Christ as it is found in his Word, the authoritative interpretation of which is the denomination's Confession of Faith and Catechisms. This is supposed to restrict the authority of the church to make pronouncements and rules that limit the freedom of the consciences of its members.

However, calling the governing bodies of the church "courts" tends to put the focus on their judicial functions and in some cases to cause the body to rush to judicial procedures to resolve problems. When that happens, the possibilities of pastoral solutions greatly decrease, while the likelihood of judicial solutions greatly increases. Once problems get wrapped around the wheel of judicial procedures, they are all but impossible to untangle. 

At the last General Assembly the Presbytery was cited by the Committee on the Review of Presbytery Records as not having properly handled Ms. Fore's complaints, so presumably the Presbytery will hear the complaints again and dispose of them according to the procedures prescribed in the Presbyterian Church in America's Book of Church Order. That is about the best one can hope for now. But, so much has happened, that it is impossible to imagine, apart from an unusual work of God's grace, for the broken relationships to be restored, deep hurts to be healed, and the pastoral care (remember the "pastor" is a "shepherd" which implies both care and leadership) of Ms. Fore to be re-established in the congregation where this whole mess started.

It seems that this is not what Ms. Fore wants now. What she wants is vindication, acknowledgement that she has been wronged and is in the right. Perhaps she will get what she wants. But, it might be helpful for her to hear from some of us that sometimes, when we have thought ourselves in the right, we have been in the wrong. That sometimes, when we have thought ourselves entirely right, we have been partly in the right and partly in the wrong. And sometimes we have, so far as we can see, been entirely or substantially in the right and suffered wrongs within the church inflicted by fellow Christians, and that these show no signs of being put right in this world. The church and Christians, though redeemed by Christ, remain fallen.

What if? Not infrequently, when it comes to a woman's difficulties, the question comes, "What if she were a man?" If a woman with five children is not hired for a position, the question may come, "What if she had been a man with five children?" 

I'd like to turn the question around regarding how the church initially responded to Ms. Fore's separation from her husband. She was removed from her position of leadership in worship. What if there had been a man who led in worship? Without taking up with another woman or alleging adultery on the part of his wife, the man says he "can't take it anymore" and moves out? Soon the state of his marriage is a matter of public knowledge within the church. After consulting with the elders, the pastor goes to the man and says, "We think it is best for the church and its worship that you not to continue in your leadership role while you are separated from your wife. We want to talk with you both, understand the circumstances of your marriage from both perspectives, and, if appropriate, arrange for marriage counseling." Would anyone consider it unjust or unreasonable for the man to be removed from leadership in worship? I expect that almost anyone who has, as a Senior Pastor, been responsible for paid and volunteer staff has faced such delicate situations.

Behavior. In the evolution of the case, Ms. Fore has done some things that can only be termed bizarre. I don't mind using Dr. Hobb's word "deviant" to describe the conduct. Mrs. Fore  painted words she alleges the Presbytery Clerk had used on a dress and wore it to Presbytery. She made a sign that said "Justice Not Abuse," took it to church, and placed it in front of her. 

As I understand it, Dr. Hobbs thinks our response to such behavior should be to ask ourselves, "What kind of hurt is it - and how deep it must be - that would lead a woman to paint words and a dress and wear it to a Presbytery meeting or lead to her making a sign and placing it in front of her in worship?" 

Again, I would ask, what if the person were a male - let's say a minister? Suppose he is not guilty of any heresy, dereliction, or immorality, but he loses the approbation of some of his elders and important members of congregation. The Presbytery's shepherding committee gets involved and advises him to resign (they almost always do). Believing he has been called to that charge, he does not. But a congregational meeting is called, and by a narrow majority the congregation votes to retain him. The shepherding committee brings the matter before Presbytery and recommends that, because of the tenuousness of the  situation in the church, the pastoral relation be dissolved. The Presbytery concurs.

The minister continues on the role of Presbytery without call, and he feels wronged, aggrieved, and isolated. So he takes a white dress shirt and, using a laundry pen, writes on the shirt the slanderous things that have been said about him by elders, church members, and some fellow presbyters on the shepherding committee. He wears the shirt to Presbytery. He also starts bringing a sign to Presbytery which says "Vindication Not Condemnation for Faithful Servants"? Is it possible that he is in the right or at least substantially in the right, having not done or failed to do anything that would justify his removal? Suppose he has been ground down by congregational and presbytery politic. Suppose he and his family are deeply hurt and scarred. 

Let me ask: Does anyone consider his wearing the shirt and carrying the sign to be normal behavior? Are any, even friends, going to say of him, "How much pain he must be in"? Perhaps those who know him well and love him will sympathize, but even his friends will take him aside and sympathetically counsel that he not continue to wear the shirt and carry the sign. If they believe it could help, they might without condescension suggest he see a medical doctor and perhaps a therapist. But, it is unlikely even the most sympathetic ally will consider such behavior indication of a healthy psychological/emotional/physical state. And it is certain that such behavior will not result in redress of his grievances.  

Dr. Hobbs. Who is Dr. Valerie Hobbs and what is the perspective from which she writes and analyzes the case of Ms. Fore? As I pointed out in my response to her first post:

On her University of Sheffield page she writes: "My primary research at present focuses on the discourse of conservative evangelical Christians, particularly the ways in which members of this community talk about gender roles..."

Dr. Hobbs is an academic, teaching at both a secular university and a theological institute. Her training is in linguistic analysis from a feminist perspective. She brings this with her not only to her academic work but also to her analyses of the dynamics of conservative presbyterian church courts (which are all male bodies) and of male-female interactions within the church, particularly in light of what she perceives as the privileges and powers of males in relation to women whom she sees as marginalized and disadvantaged within conservative evangelical bodies. You may have noted how Dr. Hobbs offered her expertise to the Presbytery of which Ms. Fore's church is a member:

After it became clear that the shepherding committee would not hear Jessica’s complaint against the clerk, I suggested to Jessica that I send them an analysis of her conversation with the clerk. I hoped to impress on them the magnitude of his violation of her and the paltry nature of his response. I sent my letter and analysis in early January, 2016, after which the chair duly thanked me for my ‘unbiased opinion of the event.’ 

How might such analysis look? I will run the risk of quoting from my first response to Dr. Hobbs's first post, where I quote myself from an earlier Blog in which I made some observations regarding Dr. Hobbs's report of her attendance at an OPC Presbytery's trial of a minister:

There is something about Dr. Hobbs' paper that I noted in my first reading and have in every reading since that gives me concern...My concern is the academic framework that seems (to me clearly) to influence both her thoughts and her vocabulary... It appears that she is influenced to some (significant) degree by feminist scholarship in the fields of language and sociology. A few quotes taken from three sections of the article will show why I have this concern. She writes: 

I am a linguist at the University of Sheffield, and so my interest was academic to some extent. For several years, I have been researching the kinds of language used by Reformed Christians to characterize women and their roles in the home, church, and society. As this trial involves not just the defendant but also his wife, I attended to observe the kinds of language used to speak about the defendant’s wife. (Emphasis added by me indicated by bold print in quotes.) 

What I aim to show in this report is that central to the trial itself and to my experiences therein are the repeated denial of a woman’s physical self and the elevation of her spiritual, domestic, idealized self. 

... this Presbyter’s questions and behavior were, in my opinion, founded on the assumption that since my physical presence was neither domestic nor docile, it was unacceptable.

It is of no little importance to remember as we read Dr. Hobbs's three posts the person who is writing, her academic training, and her life perspective. We are reading the well-intentioned report by a Christian-evangelical-reformed feminist of the experience of Ms. Fore in her marriage, her PCA church, and her church's PCA Presbytery. Furthermore, should we suppose that Dr. Hobbs is not a feminist, we are still left with the bottom line that all we know about this case of which Dr. Hobbs makes so much is what she tells us in three posts. 

But since Dr. Hobbs practises linguistic analysis and has a particular interest in the ways that "conservative evangelical Christians" talk about "gender roles," and "Reformed Christians...characterize women and their roles in the home, church, and society," it might be of interest to members of these groups to know how she analyzes the ways that Apostles spoke about gender roles and whether conservative evangelicals and the Reformed have rightly understood the ways the Apostles wrote. What of the Apostolic teaching regarding man/husband and woman/wife in the church?

For man was not made from woman, but woman from man. Neither was man created for woman, but woman for man (1 Cor. 11:9).

As in all the churches of the saints, the women should keep silent in the churches. For they are not permitted to speak, but should be in submission, as the Law also says. If there is anything they desire to learn, let them ask their husbands at home. For it is shameful for a woman to speak in church (1 Cor.14:33-35). 

Let a woman learn quietly with all submissiveness.  I do not permit a woman to teach or to exercise authority over a man; rather, she is to remain quiet.  For Adam was formed first, then Eve; and Adam was not deceived, but the woman was deceived and became a transgressor (1 Tim. 2:11-14).

What of the Apostolic teaching regarding wives in relation to their husbands?

Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands...However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband  (Eph. 5:22-24, 33).

Likewise, wives, be subject to your own husbands, so that even if some do not obey the word, they may be won without a word by the conduct of their wives, when they see your respectful and pure conduct. Do not let your adorning be external—the braiding of hair and the putting on of gold jewelry, or the clothing you wear— but let your adorning be the hidden person of the heart with the imperishable beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which in God's sight is very precious. For this is how the holy women who hoped in God used to adorn themselves, by submitting to their own husbands, as Sarah obeyed Abraham, calling him lord. And you are her children, if you do good and do not fear anything that is frightening (3:1-6).

And, since the case of Ms. Fore touches on separation and perhaps divorce, what of the teaching of our the Apostle and our Lord?

To the married I give this charge (not I, but the Lord): the wife should not separate from her husband (but if she does, she should remain unmarried or else be reconciled to her husband), and the husband should not divorce his wife. To the rest I say (I, not the Lord) that if any brother has a wife who is an unbeliever, and she consents to live with him, he should not divorce her.  If any woman has a husband who is an unbeliever, and he consents to live with her, she should not divorce him.  For the unbelieving husband is made holy because of his wife, and the unbelieving wife is made holy because of her husband. Otherwise your children would be unclean, but as it is, they are holy.  But if the unbelieving partner separates, let it be so. In such cases the brother or sister is not enslaved. God has called you to peace. For how do you know, wife, whether you will save your husband? Or how do you know, husband, whether you will save your wife? (1 Cor. 7:1-16)

And Pharisees came up to him and tested him by asking, “Is it lawful to divorce one's wife for any cause?” He answered, “Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’? So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.” They said to him, “Why then did Moses command one to give a certificate of divorce and to send her away?” He said to them, “Because of your hardness of heart Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so. And I say to you: whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another, commits adultery" (Mt. 19:3-9). 

And, inasmuch as Ms. Fore is a member of a presbyterian church is it worth asking how Dr. Hobbs analyzes the language of the Confession of Faith:

Although the corruption of man be such as is apt to study arguments unduly to put asunder those whom God has joined together in marriage: yet, nothing but adultery, or such wilful desertion as can no way be remedied by the Church, or civil magistrate, is cause sufficient of dissolving the bond of marriage: wherein, a public and orderly course of proceeding is to be observed; and the persons concerned in it not left to their own wills, and discretion, in their own case.

I ask but two questions, though I acknowledge they are difficult and complicated. (1) What do these texts mean? (2) What use should the church make of them?

To Go or to Stay? Dr. Hobbs addresses both the advice given by some and the legitimate question some would ask: Why has not and why does not Ms. Fore leave and go to another church? After all this is America. Church membership is voluntary. While churches have a right to receive or reject members who wish to join, they have no power, save spiritual (which most consider to be of none effect), to retain members. Why in this five year ordeal has Ms. Fore not moved on to another church? As noted above, what is her reason for staying? Apparently, she desires vindication. But, what if in the reconsideration of her complaints, she is vindicated by the Presbytery? Does she intend to return to the congregation where all this began and place herself under the preaching and pastoral care of the Pastor and Session? Perhaps she does. But, I have trouble envisioning it. 

Perhaps she has in mind that, though she will not return and submit to that church, it will be good for the Presbytery and the church to acknowledge their wrong and make such repentance as they can. Otherwise, it is hard to see the point of it all. It begins to look like vindictiveness rather than a quest for vindication.

I have from time to time experienced hard things at the hands of the brethren and have moved on. You move past, but you don't get over those things. However, there came a point at which, not with regard to myself but another, I saw what I believed then and am certain now was a grave mal-use and injustice in the disciplinary processes of the one Presbytery of the Presbyterian Church in America. I made use of the avenues available to me for the reversal of that wrong, but, when the process came to an end and the decision was confirmed by the General Assembly, and I continued to be certain that injustice had been done, and that I could no longer trust or entrust myself to the politics and processes of that system, I availed myself of an avenue open to me. I had come to love worship according to the Book of Common Prayer. I encountered a mainline Episcopal priest who gave damn about me, while my wife received no care from the pastor of the church she attended. I made contact with my old friend from college days, the Rt. Rev. Daniel Morse, a Bishop in the Reformed Episcopal Church. He was willing to receive me - warts and all - into his Diocese. So I got two blessings for the price of one - I exchanged the chaotic worship of the Presbyterian Church in American for the Prayer Book worship of the Reformed Episcopal Church and the judicial government of the PCA for the pastoral government exercised by the Bishops of the REC. 

Thanks be to God. 


As I write I am in Europe. The other day we had an experience which allowed me

Boatman and Victim, "Honey"

the opportunity to practise Dr. Hobbs's linguistic analysis. We took a boat ride through the canals in Bruge, Belgium, and when the trip ended the boatman climbed up on the dock, and, when she was ready to get off the boat, he took my wife, Susan's, hand and said, "Take your time, honey." Here is the analysis: Taking her hand. (assuming she would need, allow, and welcome his action and in the process taking control of her as she exited the boat). "Take you time" (assuming that she might need more time than a man and that she needed his permission to take her time), "honey" (demeaning word for a woman and familiarity not based on an existing relationship between them). This stuff is not hard if you know the code. I should thank my college philosophy professor who taught language analysis courses, my seminary professors who taught me exegesis, and, Dr. Hobbs for the update.