"Old Reformed" views and "Escondido 2K" views of politics (vanity)

This is the full text of a post I made today on the Christian Observer forum for the United Reformed Churches in North America.

People in Reformed and Presbyterian circles who pay attention to politics need to be aware of this "Two Kingdoms" theology coming out of Westminster Theological Seminary in California and what damage it is doing in our churches. Things have gotten so bad that some professed conservative Calvinists are even trying to say that a Christian case can be made for the legalization of gay marriages.

This has also been crossposted to the Christian Observer URCNA and OPC forums, and the Puritan Board at these links.

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/co-urc/message/25367

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/presbyterians-opc/message/44925

http://www.puritanboard.com/f54/old-reformed-views-escondido-2k-views-politics-75448/

For those who want to read more, here are some additional links to discussion of the Escondido Two Kingdoms theology:

"Green Baggins, 2K, Westminster-West, gay marriage, and Calvinist politics" http://freerepublic.com/focus/f-religion/2862357/posts

"Ongoing review of Van Drunen's 'Natural Law and the Two Kingdoms' in the Puritan Board Theological Forum; Dr. Nelson Kloosterman of Mid-America Reformed Seminary has begun what promises to be a lengthy review of this book."

http://www.puritanboard.com/f54/ongoing-review-van-drunens-natural-law-two-kingdoms-63558/

Calvinism, politics, Westminster-West, and “Two Kingdoms” ping. Please re-ping to other Reformed people on Free Republic — none of you are on any formal ping list; I've simply noticed you commenting on Calvinist posts on Free Republic.

Those of us who are Calvinists and believe in political engagement need to take a close look at what is going on with this “Two Kingdoms” movement.

For those who are not familiar with the movement, it is an argument that when Christians enter the political realm, we are not to argue based on Scripture but rather using natural law or general revelation. Some of its advocates really and sincerely believe that engagement in politics runs the risk of replacing the Gospel with political compromise that leads to theological compromise. Others have far more questionable motives, and the accusation has been made (in some cases, definitely wrongly) that Two Kingdoms theology is a cover to allow liberal politics into the church.

I am not a fan of attacking academia — I am a Calvinist, after all, and I believe in a studied ministry — but this is an ivory tower movement coming predominantly out of one seminary and spreading in academic circles. This is definitely not a grassroots movement. Most theologically conservative Calvinist laymen involved in business or professional lives are also politically conservative.

It's time for elders and laymen to stand up and speak out. The stakes are simply too great to let politically uninformed pastors muddle things up for our churches. They may mean well, but they're causing major problems at a time when we need to be unified to fight against the culture wars that threaten to destroy what is left of biblical Christianity in America.

This is a quick ping to my personal list of Santorum supporters on a non-Santorum matter in my own church circles which may interest you.

For those of you who are Roman Catholic, I have a long history of commending your church for taking a stance on politicians advocating obviously anti-Christian public policy. In my own theological circles, we need to deal with the fact that our political history during the Reformation was closely intertwined with fights against Roman Catholicism. How can we cooperate with Catholics now when our history was very different?

The core issue is that we now face an even worse enemy — secularism and “enlightenment” thought stemming from the French Revolution. We can work together against a common enemy so long as we realize our differences.

The Dutch church leader Abraham Kuyper, who became the prime minister of the Netherlands a century ago as head of a Christian political party and was the founder of a Christian university, a daily newspaper and a church magazine, and of what became the nation's second-largest Protestant denomination, advocated cooperation with Roman Catholics in the sphere of the state while strongly affirming the need to maintain confessional integrity in the sphere of the church. In the modern context, Francis Schaeffer and D. James Kennedy held very similar positions.

I believe it is entirely consistent to work with Roman Catholics in the political realm to fight abortion and other evils covered by Romans 13. I believe we need to recognize that our confessions will and should keep us from ecclesiastical compromise, but Romans 13 specifies the primary purpose of the state in ways that not only allow but probably require us to work together as evangelical Protestants, traditional Roman Catholics, and Orthodox Jews.

3 posted on Fri Aug 10 2012 00:15:17 GMT-0500 (Central Daylight Time) by AnalogReigns: “Any professing conservative Calvinist teachers pressing for sodomy-marriage simply need Church discipline.”

Unfortunately, the case of Misty and Lee Irons in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church shows that “Radical Two Kingdoms” theology has given birth to bitter fruit.

I'm prepared to listen to an argument that this is an extreme view — “R2K” instead of “Escondido 2K.” I'm quite aware that many of the more mainstream Escondido 2K people have developed a “natural law” argument for why homosexual marriage and homosexual adoption violate natural law and general revelation, essentially coming to the same position as standard Christian conservatives using a different route to get there.

The problem is that Lee and Misty Irons are not the only people saying such things, and I remain seriously concerned about the entire movement. Time will tell whether the Irons are being consistent with the fundamental principles of the “Two Kingdoms” theology.

Here are some links to the Misty Irons controversy. Remember, she was a pastor's wife in the **ORTHODOX PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH,** for crying out loud, not the Presbyterian Church (USA) or even the PCA. "Radical Two Kingdoms" theology has put its tentacles into even some of the strictest presbyteries of the strictest of Reformed denominations.

This year, Misty spoke to the GCN (Gay Christian Network) conference. I've posted two of her videos below.

By God's grace, the OPC did the right thing by driving the Irons out of their denomination. A clearer rejection of the theology of the "Radical Two Kingdoms" movement might have been more helpful, but the end result was that the Irons were pushed out of the OPC. In 2002 and 2003, I'm not sure a stronger statement would have been possible since many people still thought that "Two Kingdoms" theology was a modern version of the old Southern Presbyterian "Spirituality of the Church" concept and wanted to protect its legitimacy under "Old School" Presbyterian principles. I'm not convinced the outcome would have been the same in every NAPARC denomination, especially if this happened in one of the less conservative presbyteries of those denominations.

http://www.upper-register.com/irons_trial/musingson/chronology_musingson.html

Key quote from Lee Irons: "The documents relating to my trial in the Presbytery and my subsequent appeal to the General Assembly in 2003 have been posted on this site for some time. But the controversy over my view of the Law was only half of our struggle in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church. My wife’s struggle to be allowed to keep up her website on homosexuality is the other half. From March 7, 2002 to April 22, 2003 she was under the threat of being formally charged and brought to trial if she did not shut down the website. In the end, charges never were filed against her and she never did shut down her website (www.musingson.com)."

Here's Misty Irons' website, entitled "Musings on Christianity: Homosexuality and the Bible": http://www.musingson.com/

Here's a video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3oFZsF1LxmU

Here's another video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5LCT5EdsiOc&feature=related

Two comments say it all: "Thank God and to the praise of His glory that people like Misty is being raised up in the mainline churches to testify that Christians can be gay just like" them" and that we gays have a standing in grace that no one and nothing can take it away. Romans 5 : 1,2." Again, "I praise the Lord for Misty's testimony to the gospel of grace in Jesus. More than through her words, her testimony shines forth in her loving actions."

Here's one of many pro-gay bloggers who like Misty Irons:

http://joemoderate.blogspot.com/2008/02/misty-irons-on-gay-lust.html

Key quote: "Remember ridiculously cool Christian blogger Misty Irons? She recently posted a thoughtful entry on her blog analyzing why mainstream Christians are unable or unwilling to consider that gay couples may actually be bound by love. Misty chastises those Christians who dismiss gay affection as nothing more than 'lust' ... Another excellent example of how Mrs. Irons really 'gets it.' She gives me hope that understanding and reconciliation between gays and Christians is a possibility."

This is not just a problem of "other people out there." It's here inside our own conservative Reformed churches, and we need to deal with it.

Here is Misty Irons current blogger website:

http://moremusingson.blogspot.com/

Key quote: "Straight, married with three kids, homeschooling, evangelical Christian of the Reformed variety. Okay, now that the scary part is out of the way, see 'More about me' to find out why I support gay marriage in society and oppose it in the church."

Here is a post with some homosexuals arguing that Misty Irons isn't affirming enough of homosexuality (i.e., she's "Side B" with Tony Campolo and similar people who view homosexuality as a result of brokenness, not "Side A" which believes homosexuality is a good creation of God and not a result of brokenness:

http://moremusingson.blogspot.com/2011/07/gcn-conference-2012.html

In her video, Misty points out that "being in the PCA has offered her more freedom to do things" like continuing her pro-gay blogger advocacy.

Key quote by Misty Irons: "It would soon became evident that the whole denomination would divide up according to which side people resonated most strongly with ... The news that an OPC pastor's wife had not only come out in favor of civil same-sex marriage but defended it publicly could not be contained. My article spread to four other internet discussion lists and, I was told, seven other Reformed denominations."

Misty points out with regard to advocates of homosexual civil unions that she "provided a service of making them look like moderates by comparison." We need to beware of the "frog in the kettle" syndrome here.

Clearly this issue is not over; the problem has moved from the OPC to the PCA.

I am a son of the Kingdom. I am not a Calvinist or any preconceived, intellectually contrived, traditions of men system.

We worship and follow the King in spirit and in truth (Word). We overcome by the blood of the Lamb and our testimony.

Yahweh, created _all_ things, including leadership, “business, government, media, arts and entertainment, education, the family and religion”. Man has freedom to develop in these and all other spheres with the guidance of the Word. Furthermore, the apostolic call on the His people requires us to lead the world in all these efforts. The intellectuals which muzzle His guidance, thru His chosen ones is of our enemy. It is a big part of what has happened to our culture, nation and now even the whole earth: collapse.

The very Word translated into church ecclacia (or whatever) means (to) legislate. His people are His sons and this is what He called us to do.

Torah is instruction much more than it is _law_.

It would seem to me that a quick look at the Westminster Confession of Faith would solve this for any logical moral thinkers (Chapter 19 "Of the Law of God"):

2. This law, after his fall, continued to be a perfect rule of righteousness; and, as such, was delivered by God upon Mount Sinai, in ten commandments, and written in two tables: the first four commandments containing our duty towards God; and the other six, our duty to man.
(Related WLC: 98 WSC: 41)

3. Beside this law, commonly called moral, God was pleased to give to the people of Israel, as a church under age, ceremonial laws, containing several typical ordinances, partly of worship, prefiguring Christ, his graces, actions, sufferings, and benefits; and partly, holding forth divers instructions of moral duties. All which ceremonial laws are now abrogated, under the new testament.
(Related WLC: WSC: )

4. To them also, as a body politic, he gave sundry judicial laws, which expired together with the State of that people; not obliging any other now, further than the general equity thereof may require.
(Related WLC: WSC: )

5. The moral law doth forever bind all, as well justified persons as others, to the obedience thereof; and that, not only in regard of the matter contained in it, but also in respect of the authority of God the Creator, who gave it. Neither doth Christ, in the gospel, any way dissolve, but much strengthen this obligation.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"You shall not give any of your offspring to offer them to Molech, nor shall you profane the name of your God; I am the Lord. You shall not lie with a male as one lies with a female; it is an abomination. Also you shall not have intercourse with any animal to be defiled with it, nor shall any woman stand before an animal to mate with it; it is a perversion." (Leviticus 18:21-23)

(fascinating how homosexual behavior is listed right along with child sacrifice and bestiality, isn't it? Also fascinating how homosexual activists today are almost uniformly pro-abortion...and most favor other sexual perversions too.)

So, since the Moral Law--of the Old Testament--applies to everyone today (no exceptions for "secular government") how can anyone call themselves Reformed at all...let alone a conservative Presbyterian--in obedience to the Westminster standards, and deny that? I really don't see any leeway, whatsoever, on homosexuality.

An OPC PASTOR'S WIFE? What? She, or perhaps her husband, needs to be charged in his presbytery for departing from holy Scripture--and his vows to uphold the Westminster standards.

FYI: I'm a conservative Anglican, (of the J.I. Packer variety) and we rightly name ourselves as "Reformed Catholic." The Anglican "Articles of Religion" (dating to nearly 100 years before Westminster) also clearly distinguish between Ceremonial, Civil and Moral Law in the Old Testament...and bind us all to that Moral Law (and to Christ alone for justification...). From the "Articles of Religion" (or the "Thirty-nine Articles"):

VII. Of the Old Testament. The Old Testament is not contrary to the New: for both in the Old and New Testament everlasting life is offered to Mankind by Christ, who is the only Mediator between God and Man, being both God and Man. Wherefore they are not to be heard, which feign that the old Fathers did look only for transitory promises. Although the Law given from God by Moses, as touching Ceremonies and Rites, do not bind Christian men, nor the Civil precepts thereof ought of necessity to be received in any commonwealth; yet notwithstanding, no Christian man whatsoever is free from the obedience of the Commandments which are called Moral. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

14 posted on Fri Aug 10 2012 13:20:33 GMT-0500 (Central Daylight Time) by AnalogReigns: “An OPC PASTOR'S WIFE? What? She, or perhaps her husband, needs to be charged in his presbytery for departing from holy Scripture—and his vows to uphold the Westminster standards.”

It happened.

The whole case got bollixed up with the question of theonomy and Old School Presbyterian “spirituality of the church” views. The end result is that Rev. Lee Irons chose to leave the OPC, his church disbanded, and Irons eventually ended up in the PCA as a layman (I think he's now a ruling elder).

While Rev. Lee Irons and Misty Irons were personally run out of the OPC, their ideas were not, and the underlying issues did not get solved. As to persons, Lee and Misty Irons are now the PCA’s problem. However, their ideas did not leave the OPC when they left.

There continue to be significant numbers of Reformed people in the OPC and PCA who believe that general revelation and natural law, not Scripture, are to determine what is right and wrong in politics. Most won't go anywhere near as far as Misty Irons — as she said to the Gay Christian Network conference, her advocacy created space for less radical people to be viewed as moderates in the OPC — but the key issue of the role of the law in the civil sphere remains.

I get the point that nobody wants to say that Dabney and Thornwell were heretics, and nobody wants to co-opt the gospel with politics. I really do get it — Gardiner Spring resolutions are bad and have no place in Reformed assemblies.

However, this has to be addressed. It does us no good to be valiant in all the battles of the world except the one where our chief enemy is currently fighting.

If someone is a solid five-point Calvinist and subscribes without reservation to all the articles and points of doctrine of the Heidelberg Catechism, Belgic Confession and Canons of Dordt, or without exception to the system of doctrine contained in the Westminster Standards, but then proceeds to argue that we can ignore the culture war because it is “mere politics” and go AWOL in the middle of the homosexual assault on marriage in America, I fail to see how such a person is obeying God at this time when what is left of Christianity is under direct attack in the civil sphere.

Even if one doesn't think it right to directly apply the Law of Moses (the 10 Commandments) in civil law to non-Christians, the judgement of Sodom and Gomorrah was LONG before Moses and the giving of the Mosaic code--proving, as Bob Gagnon argues (following Jesus' example), homosexual behavior is violation of a foundational, from-the-Garden, pre-fall principle, of one man and one woman for life--applicable to all people, everywhere.

...but then proceeds to argue that we can ignore the culture war because it is “mere politics” and go AWOL in the middle of the homosexual assault on marriage in America, I fail to see how such a person is obeying God at this time when what is left of Christianity is under direct attack in the civil sphere.

My thought's exactly. The following (attributed to Luther, but apparently apocryphal) quote is (none-the-less)true:

Where the battle rages the loyalty of the soldier is proved; and to be steady on all the battle-field besides is mere flight and disgrace to him if he flinches at that one point."

Oh, by the way, that great spurious Luther quote:

"If I profess, with the loudest voice and the clearest exposition, every portion of the truth of God except precisely that little point which the world and the devil are at that moment attacking, I am not confessing Christ, however boldly I may be professing Christianity.
Where the battle rages the loyalty of the soldier is proved; and to be steady on all the battle-field besides is mere flight and disgrace to him if he flinches at that one point. "

was by, Elizabeth Rundle Charles, from the novel The Chronicles of the Schoenberg Cotta Family (Thomas Nelson, 1864.)

While it does SOUND a lot like Luther...and Mrs. Charles' fictional novel was about Lutherans, apparently Francis Schaeffer (mis)quoted it as Luther...and so has everyone since.

"How can we cooperate with Catholics now when our history was very different?"

The transgressions of the past are in the past.

"Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come." - 2 Corinthians 5:17

We are all called to forgive trespasses, both real and imaginary. If we both concentrate on cooperating with God we will be cooperating with each other. First and foremost we each have to get past the idea that the other is an evil on par with Satan and attack that with is obviously and undeniably evil in our society.

Peace be with you.

I think we agree on the need for traditional Roman Catholics and evangelical Protestants to cooperate. The question is how we justify that cooperation when the Council of Trent's anathemas against Protestant doctrine and corresponding Reformed and Lutheran condemnations of Roman Catholic doctrine have not changed.

Abraham Kuyper proposed a doctrine known as sphere sovereignty. I'm simplifying radically, but his view was that God operates through three basic spheres, that of the family, the church, and the state. The family is the most basic of the three and predates the others, and at some times in earlier history (Abraham and Moses, for example) the covenant heads in the spheres were identical.

However, under the current conditions, the government of the family, the church, and the state are and ought to be separate. That means while the confessions of the church quite properly prevent Roman Catholics and conservative Protestants from being in the same churches, that doesn't mean we can't work together to stop abortion, for instance, under the principles of Romans 13 in which the primary purpose of the state is to punish unbelievers.

If I were in an overwhelmingly Roman Catholic country (Cold War-era Poland, Franco's Spain, etc.) where patriotism and Roman Catholicism were closely linked, I would have significant problems cooperating with Roman Catholics. Roman Catholics in the Deep South had that problem a century ago as well dealing with the Bible Belt, when anti-Catholic efforts were made (wrongly) through Blaine Amendments to drive Catholicism out of the public schools which were at that point still largely Christian.

We're not in that situation today in America and we need to “hang together” whenever we can or we will most certainly be hung separately by the radical secularists.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.