# The Gathering Storm: A Split in the Reformed World



## scottmaciver (Jun 21, 2018)

Does anyone know much about what Todd Friel refers to here?


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## Pilgrim (Jun 21, 2018)

I would think that it involves some if not all of the following:

1. A push for gender egalitarianism in the wake of #MeToo

2. Things like the Revoice conference with evangelicals arguing that same-sex attraction is morally neutral if not actually a positive good so long as you remain celibate.

3. What appears to be an uncritical acceptance of things like Critical Race Theory on the part of some, including a move from calling for racial reconciliation to advocacy of reparations.

If current trends continue, with the crackup of the New Calvinism/YRR, I wonder if evangelicalism in general will actually be worse off than it was before.


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## Dachaser (Jun 22, 2018)

Pilgrim said:


> I would think that it involves some if not all of the following:
> 
> 1. A push for gender egalitarianism in the wake of #MeToo
> 
> ...


Would point 1 being involving the push to include women as pastors/teachers?
Point 2 sounds a lot like the left wing Christianity of someone like a Tony Campallo.
Point 3 is not where we need to go, as that seems to be going into the area of white shaming, whites having been as running everything wrongly . It ignores that the Cross of Christ has now made us one in Him.


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## Gforce9 (Jun 22, 2018)

Scott,
I listened to the whole thing and was disturbed. Todd seemed to be on point. This movement is a new liberalism, no doubt. For my part, I will continue to reject it with all vigor, as long as I'm able.......

Reactions: Like 1


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## Dachaser (Jun 22, 2018)

Gforce9 said:


> Scott,
> I listened to the whole thing and was disturbed. Todd seemed to be on point. This movement is a new liberalism, no doubt. For my part, I will continue to reject it with all vigor, as long as I'm able.......


there does seem to be a real effort to have traditional Christians viewpoints changed to reflect the cultural norms and ways now.


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## Gforce9 (Jun 22, 2018)

Dachaser said:


> there does seem to be a real effort to have traditional Christians viewpoints changed to reflect the cultural norms and ways now.



Certainly, this is true, but it is much worse. Theological liberalism is being marketed and sold by professing Christians. At some point, sessions will have to hold members to the "doctrine" part of "doctrine and life"......

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## Dachaser (Jun 22, 2018)

Gforce9 said:


> Certainly, this is true, but it is much worse. Theological liberalism is being marketed and sold by professing Christians. At some point, sessions will have to hold members to the "doctrine" part of "doctrine and life"......


The siren call to being political correct and in tune with modern morals and cultural norms is getting overwhelming.

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## RamistThomist (Jun 22, 2018)

I'm not so sure the "Woke" ministers are caving to political correctness. THat implies at least some (albeit short-lived) resistance. I think they actually believe that stuff.

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## Dachaser (Jun 22, 2018)

BayouHuguenot said:


> I'm not so sure the "Woke" ministers are caving to political correctness. THat implies at least some (albeit short-lived) resistance. I think they actually believe that stuff.


the ministers and churches who cave under the pressure would still be preferred to those who changed their views for real.


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## Ask Mr. Religion (Jun 22, 2018)

Dachaser said:


> the ministers and churches who cave under the pressure would still be preferred to those who changed their views for real.


In other words, hypocrisy is preferable?


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## Dachaser (Jun 22, 2018)

Ask Mr. Religion said:


> In other words, hypocrisy is preferable?


I would see that those who caved in to the pressure would be still true, but wavering in their walk, and need to be corrected and brought back to what they once were, but those who turned away and now really do buy into false doctrines and bad theology are in much worse state.


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## De Jager (Jun 22, 2018)

Liberals gonna be liberal.

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## Physeter (Jun 22, 2018)

Liberalism is poisoning the Church. None of this is biblical--especially the 'need to repent' of the racism of your grandparents.

After listening to this, I would class myself as classic reformed.


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## Scott Bushey (Jun 22, 2018)

Friel blows it at 8:49 calling those that hold to LBC 1689, 'Reformed'. in my opinion, the term "Classic reformed" would be proper if one were speaking of those Reformers that hold to the 1646 WCF only.


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## Herald (Jun 22, 2018)

Scott Bushey said:


> Friel blows it at 8:49 calling those that hold to LBC 1689, 'Reformed'. in my opinion, the term "Classic reformed" would be proper if one were speaking of those Reformers that hold to the 1646 WCF only.


It doesn't change the substance of what he was addressing on his program.

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## Susan777 (Jun 22, 2018)

Dachaser said:


> the ministers and churches who cave under the pressure would still be preferred to those who changed their views for real.


Why?

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## lynnie (Jun 22, 2018)

I watched the whole thing and thought it was brilliant.


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## Edward (Jun 22, 2018)

Dachaser said:


> the ministers and churches who cave under the pressure would still be preferred to those who changed their views for real.



I disagree. I much prefer the company of honest atheists to that of dishonest Christians.

Reactions: Like 4


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## jw (Jun 22, 2018)

These are the inevitable consequences of God’s giving over a people to their sins. These things will not _bring_ His judgment on His people. These things _are_ His judgment upon us.

Disregard His sabbath, and lax will be all understanding and holy endeavors to keep His commandments. Disregard His sabbath, and the preaching of the Word is diminished to a negligible portion of the worship service, becoming merely a lovely song of a pleasant voice (Ezekiel 33.30-32), if even that! Before too long, the Lord sends a famine -not of bread or water- but of His Word (Amos 8.11), whence cometh the “little foxes” that eat up the vineyard. So wicked we become, that the Lord would call His people Sodom’s sister, “Behold, this was the iniquity of thy sister Sodom, pride, fulness of bread, and abundance of idleness was in her and in her daughters, neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and needy,” (Ezekiel 16.49).

Rightly we decry these goings-on in our earthly Zion, but at the expense of failing to lay axes to the roots of their very sustenance. Let us confess with great shame and confusion of face the more foundational and egregious violations against God in the first table, making clearance of the log in our eyes to push out these matters which would become but specks, rightly spending our best efforts in a return to a right use of the sabbath day, hence a right use of preaching, hence a better understanding of what God requires and -by His Spirit- an endeavor faithfully to carry such out.

Reactions: Like 4 | Edifying 3 | Amen 1


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## Smeagol (Jun 23, 2018)

Aiming at sharing an encouraging word (hoping my aim is true):
Yes these things are troubling. But at the the same time the Lord will protect his true Church. Often times when I am discouraged by something i see as threatening to the visible church, I also remind myself with the fact that if I see a problem then let the solution begin with me! Has liberalism or secularism or relativism begun to take root in my own heart? As a husbands and farthers seemingly “approaching storms” should cause us to dig my heals in even more and make sure my wife and children hold to the Word. Then from there wage war on it within our local church. This storm is disheartening. The true church will continue to be further refined and sanctified. Let us all remain strong and encourage and fight for our brothers and sisters who may slip, who may wonder. This can be rightly seen as judgment... so more and more we could see persecution. Though I do not pray or desire for our US churches to be spiritually attacked. I do know (from scripture) that trials refine true faith. I do believe that the trajectory of the secularism, relativism, and liberalism will lead to reasoning of “why even go to church at all”. So maybe the FALSE churches essentially eliminate themselves.... idk? But I do know We must continue to hold fast to the words of our God who is our Bulwark. Reformed gotta act reformed. (We must wage war on ant foreseen Heresies)

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## Dachaser (Jun 23, 2018)

Grumman Tomcat said:


> Liberalism is poisoning the Church. None of this is biblical--especially the 'need to repent' of the racism of your grandparents.
> 
> After listening to this, I would class myself as classic reformed.


I think that the real solution to racism issues is not to have whites being shamed for past abuses, but to realize that all of us have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, and place the bond blacks and whites saved by grace of God now share in Christ.

Reactions: Like 1 | Amen 1


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## Dachaser (Jun 23, 2018)

Scott Bushey said:


> Friel blows it at 8:49 calling those that hold to LBC 1689, 'Reformed'. in my opinion, the term "Classic reformed" would be proper if one were speaking of those Reformers that hold to the 1646 WCF only.


It would seem to be proper to have Reformed Baptists called something like Particular Baptists instead, as know many who are Calvinistic in their theology prefer to use that designation anyways.


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## Dachaser (Jun 23, 2018)

Edward said:


> I disagree. I much prefer the company of honest atheists to that of dishonest Christians.


I view the Christians who buckle under pressure as not really dishonest, but as weak, just as Peter failed to apply what he knew when Paul confronted him.

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## RamistThomist (Jun 23, 2018)

Dachaser said:


> I view the Christians who buckle under pressure as not really dishonest, but as weak, just as Peter failed to apply what he knew when Paul confronted him.



But they are preaching the same bottom-line message as the traitors


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## Gforce9 (Jun 23, 2018)

Dachaser said:


> It would seem to be proper to have Reformed Baptists called something like Particular Baptists instead, as know many who are Calvinistic in their theology prefer to use that designation anyways.



Whatever name is employed, the distinction is one of category/definition and not of "standing". In other words, it is a term to distinguish beliefs and not to assign a "class" of citizenship. Many of the Baptists here will be far in front of the line of this wicked, vile Presbyterian in the kingdom of God........


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## Dachaser (Jun 23, 2018)

BayouHuguenot said:


> But they are preaching the same bottom-line message as the traitors


They still have right theology, unlike those who completely moved to liberal views, but really need to practice what they preach.


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## Dachaser (Jun 23, 2018)

Gforce9 said:


> Whatever name is employed, the distinction is one of category/definition and not of "standing". In other words, it is a term to distinguish beliefs and not to assign a "class" of citizenship. Many of the Baptists here will be far in front of the line of this wicked, vile Presbyterian in the kingdom of God........


I see the label change as being helpful in the sense it shows that both sides agree on the main points of the Theology, but there also remains some substantial differences.


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## Edward (Jun 23, 2018)

Dachaser said:


> I think that the real solution to racism issues is not to have whites being shamed for past abuses, but to realize that all of us have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, and place the bond blacks and whites saved by grace of God now share in Christ.



Yes, but that presumes an honest agenda on their part.

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## Edward (Jun 23, 2018)

Dachaser said:


> I view the Christians who buckle under pressure as not really dishonest, but as weak


 That's why I try to bring balancing pressure from the other side. Leave them no place to run, no place to hide. Some find the technique offensive or strident. But we have ample evidence of where "kinder and gentler" leads. 

Remember, folks who sit on the fence make easy targets for both sides.

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## De Jager (Jun 24, 2018)

Response to social justice agenda:

"_For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?_"

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## Reformed Covenanter (Jun 24, 2018)

Listening to the video now, the speaker is correct to say that the "woke" crowd are not strictly speaking Marxists (in the orthodox sense), but it is still fair to say that they are buying into aspects of Cultural Marxism and Liberation Theology. The fact that they share many of the same talking points with Democrats and the liberal leftist media is strong circumstantial evidence in favour of this proposition.

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## RamistThomist (Jun 24, 2018)

Dachaser said:


> They still have right theology, unlike those who completely moved to liberal views, but really need to practice what they preach.



It goes beyond that. It's more like they are in ranks with the enemy.


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## Pilgrim (Jun 24, 2018)

BayouHuguenot said:


> It goes beyond that. It's more like they are in ranks with the enemy.



Friel is correct (at least as far as I've seen) to say that they are more or less orthodox when it comes to theology proper. As far as I know, they aren't denying the Resurrection or the Virgin Birth. But the older liberals, and perhaps especially the neo-orthodox, were often able to hide their views until it was too late. Hopefully there isn't much of that going on yet.

I grew up in the liberal UMC. I know what liberal "Christianity" is. For confessional and conservative men to refer to the more "progressive" people as "liberals" without explaining why just makes them look like a flamethrowing fundy to the undecided. There are serious problems, but as far as I know, the likes of Fosdick or even Barth weren't at the last GA. The issues are more subtle. (I know that some have explained why. But many have not.) Various scandals have also resulted in a loss of credibility.

That being said, with TGC et al making their political views "Gospel issues" it appears that some are approximately halfway down the slippery slope to liberal "Christian" moralism, where working in the soup kitchen is preaching the gospel, even if you are a Hindu or whatever. But just screaming "Liberal Liberal" "Marxist Marxist" and doing little else (which is what some are in fact doing) isn't going to do much good. There probably aren't enough older people who remember what real liberalism is in the SBC and the PCA for that kind of thing to work. (I'm going with the assumption that a lot of those who sacrificed to travel to Southern Baptist Annual Meetings from 1979-1990 to vote for enough conservative Presidents in a row so that the liberals could be removed did so without a whole lot more sophistication than "Those professors don't believe the Bible. I know because Adrian Rogers says so.") Apparently many REs don't see the problem, (which I've seen cited as a reason why some strict subscriptionist TEs haven't been able to take their churches out of the PCA) much less the laypeople.

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## Edward (Jun 24, 2018)

Pilgrim said:


> Apparently many REs don't see the problem, (which I've seen cited as a reason why some strict subscriptionist TEs haven't been able to take their churches out of the PCA)



I'm not familiar with those happenings, but I'd say that reflects on the TE not fully training their REs, rather than falling on the REs themselves.


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## earl40 (Jun 24, 2018)

Edward said:


> I'm not familiar with those happenings, but I'd say that reflects on the TE not fully training their REs, rather than falling on the REs themselves.



This may be true in churches which have RE's that are in a startup church. From what I see it is the RE's who "pick" the TE, and that choice arises from the bias they have towards how strict or not they subscribe to the official teachings.


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## RamistThomist (Jun 25, 2018)

I understand that the progressives in the PCA aren't the same as Fosdick. That is to their eternal credit. Nonetheless, they adhere to "Wokism" and Critical Theory, which *is *Marxist at core. And it is so designed to be a universal acid-drip, both in metaphysics and theology. Read Marx's two critiques of Hegel.

Marx's Hegelian writings are designed to undo all foundations.

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## RamistThomist (Jun 25, 2018)

Here is Marx's sociological ideas in a nutshell. It is a universal acid-drip. If you are using language like "alienation" or similar rot, you are a sociological Marxist. This is what the Radical Orthodox guys call an ontology of violence.

Thesis: Hegel cannot escape an alienation that exists between the people and the state.

Hegel’s logic: the Idea becomes a subject; other concepts, like political sentiment, become predicates of the Idea (Marx 65). Marx will take this and de-essentialize it. The substance now is only a _Subject_. 

As demoniac Herbert Marcuse noted,

The distinction between reason (Vernunft) and understanding (Verstand) is the distinction between common sense and speculative thinking (44).

True thought is a triad (Triplizitat). A dynamic unity of opposites.

S is P.

To know what a thing really is we have to get past its immediately given state (S is S). S is S doesn’t tell us much. If we follow out the process S becomes something else, P, but still retains its own identity.

The earlier Hegelian analyses saw society as one of “ever repeated antagonisms in which all progress is but a temporary unification of opposites” (60-61). Only a universal revolution can overcome the universal negativity.

The alienation of labor creates a society split into opposing classes (289).

Division of labor: the process of separating various economic activities into specialized and delimited fields (290). 

Key argument: Since the individual, on either Hegelian or Marxian lines, is a “Universal,” then the proletariat can only exist “world-historically;” therefore, the communist revolution is necessarily a world-revolution (292).

*Summary*: as long as we are milking perceived grievances and positing alienation between power structures (or more particulary, a structure of violence between Rich Capitalist CIS male and Woke PCA Blogger), then we are engaged in Cultural Marxism.

Q.E.D.


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## Pilgrim (Jun 25, 2018)

BayouHuguenot said:


> I understand that the progressives in the PCA aren't the same as Fosdick. That is to their eternal credit.



And that makes it all the more dangerous since those who are attracted to it can point to their _bona fides_ on some issues. "Hey, they affirm inerrancy, unconditional election, the Huffington Post says they are still homophobes and want to put their laws on women's bodies, etc so they can't really be liberal." It's the kind of thing that caused the FV debate to go round and round. "They're nice guys. They went to the denominational seminary and believe in the resurrection, etc. Don't they have a point about revivalism? Can't we all just get along?"

This is the kind of thing that caused Martyn Lloyd-Jones to say that Catholicism was more dangerous than atheistic Communism, something that a good many evangelical and Reformed people still seem to disagree with. (My guess is that something like 2/3 of the people screaming about Russell Moore would strenuously disagree with the statement.) MLJ meant that the error in atheistic Communism was much more obvious to nominally or largely untaught Christian Westerners in the 1950s than Roman Catholicism was. The errors in the latter are much more subtle, especially to those who are largely untaught in theology.

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## Dachaser (Jun 26, 2018)

Pilgrim said:


> And that makes it all the more dangerous since those who are attracted to it can point to their _bona fides_ on some issues. "Hey, they affirm inerrancy, unconditional election, the Huffington Post says they are still homophobes and want to put their laws on women's bodies, etc so they can't really be liberal." It's the kind of thing that caused the FV debate to go round and round. "They're nice guys. They went to the denominational seminary and believe in the resurrection, etc. Don't they have a point about revivalism? Can't we all just get along?"
> 
> This is the kind of thing that caused Martyn Lloyd-Jones to say that Catholicism was more dangerous than atheistic Communism, something that a good many evangelical and Reformed people still seem to disagree with. (My guess is that something like 2/3 of the people screaming about Russell Moore would strenuously disagree with the statement.) MLJ meant that the error in atheistic Communism was much more obvious to nominally or largely untaught Christian Westerners in the 1950s than Roman Catholicism was. The errors in the latter are much more subtle, especially to those who are largely untaught in theology.


There is gaining momentum it would see a strange gathering of those who state that they maintain Conservative view on doctrines, and yet have a social agenda very liberal at same time.


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## Dachaser (Jun 26, 2018)

Pilgrim said:


> Friel is correct (at least as far as I've seen) to say that they are more or less orthodox when it comes to theology proper. As far as I know, they aren't denying the Resurrection or the Virgin Birth. But the older liberals, and perhaps especially the neo-orthodox, were often able to hide their views until it was too late. Hopefully there isn't much of that going on yet.
> 
> I grew up in the liberal UMC. I know what liberal "Christianity" is. For confessional and conservative men to refer to the more "progressive" people as "liberals" without explaining why just makes them look like a flamethrowing fundy to the undecided. There are serious problems, but as far as I know, the likes of Fosdick or even Barth weren't at the last GA. The issues are more subtle. (I know that some have explained why. But many have not.) Various scandals have also resulted in a loss of credibility.
> 
> That being said, with TGC et al making their political views "Gospel issues" it appears that some are approximately halfway down the slippery slope to liberal "Christian" moralism, where working in the soup kitchen is preaching the gospel, even if you are a Hindu or whatever. But just screaming "Liberal Liberal" "Marxist Marxist" and doing little else (which is what some are in fact doing) isn't going to do much good. There probably aren't enough older people who remember what real liberalism is in the SBC and the PCA for that kind of thing to work. (I'm going with the assumption that a lot of those who sacrificed to travel to Southern Baptist Annual Meetings from 1979-1990 to vote for enough conservative Presidents in a row so that the liberals could be removed did so without a whole lot more sophistication than "Those professors don't believe the Bible. I know because Adrian Rogers says so.") Apparently many REs don't see the problem, (which I've seen cited as a reason why some strict subscriptionist TEs haven't been able to take their churches out of the PCA) much less the laypeople.


It seems that being known as being acceptable to all peoples groups and behaviors, and to be seen as being social conscious overrides maintaining real Christianity.


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