# Doug Wilson and Covenant Objectivity



## kodos (Aug 18, 2022)

An article from the Rev. Jeff Stivason (RPCNA) on Doug Wilson.
_
"Mr. Wilson, I have not read or listened to you much at all. However, I have heard that your specialty is marriage and family. I can’t comment on whether that is true or not. However, you are not a theologian. In fact, your theology is dangerous. Your rhetoric is divisive, which is ironic considering your view of covenantal objectivity. Therefore, it would be my hope that, for the welfare of the reformed churches, you would return to the drawing board, and come again, so that we may hear him further on these matters. Your current formulations are unacceptable."_









Doug Wilson and Covenant Objectivity


The Federal Vision speaks a lot about the objectivity of the covenant. What does that mean? Doug Wilson puts it somewhat crassly when he says, “It can be photographed and fingerprinted.”[1] For Wilson, the fingerprint is baptism.[2] Baptism, though an external sign, is like that of circumcision...




www.placefortruth.org

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## JH (Aug 19, 2022)

A question I have on the side that hopefully doesn't derail too much, but since this is the latest Wilson/CREC thread, does anyone happen to know the reason for the high praise Wilson and others give to authors like CS Lewis, and GK Chesterton? 

Personally I haven't read either, and knowing there are many precious works I have yet to read, and that as far as fiction goes I'm content with Pilgrim's Progress, I have no future intentions on reading them.


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## RamistThomist (Aug 19, 2022)

Jerrod Hess said:


> A question I have on the side that hopefully doesn't derail too much, but since this is the latest Wilson/CREC thread, does anyone happen to know the reason for the high praise Wilson and others give to authors like CS Lewis, and GK Chesterton?
> 
> Personally I haven't read either, and knowing there are many precious works I have yet to read, and that as far as fiction goes I'm content with Pilgrim's Progress, I have no future intentions on reading them.



I don't think there is anything unique to Wilson about his praise for Lewis and Chesterton. That is standard among all Evangelicals and many Reformed. Chesterton is overrated. He is a wordsmith with little substance. All fluff. Lewis is a genuinely good writer.

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## Mikey (Aug 19, 2022)

kodos said:


> An article from the Rev. Jeff Stivason (RPCNA) on Doug Wilson.
> 
> _"Mr. Wilson, I have not read or listened to you much at all. However, I have heard that your specialty is marriage and family. I can’t comment on whether that is true or not. However, you are not a theologian. In fact, your theology is dangerous. Your rhetoric is divisive, which is ironic considering your view of covenantal objectivity. Therefore, it would be my hope that, for the welfare of the reformed churches, you would return to the drawing board, and come again, so that we may hear him further on these matters. Your current formulations are unacceptable."_
> 
> ...


Thanks for sharing!

To be honest, I didn't find the article very helpful or informative.

For starters, I'm not sure if I would be very open to criticism addressed to me if it admitted that, "*I have not read or listened to you much at all*" but had tenacity to publicly declare "*you are not a theologian*. In fact, *your theology is dangerous.*" You haven't heard me out, but you know I'm "divisive"--and that its my fault? Further, does someone have to have good theology to be a theologian? Can't we all list _bad_ theologians--even _dangerous _theologians?

The article also lacks depth. For an example, when the author claims "The implications of this view are *obvious*. It is *clearly* not Confessional," he doesn't explain _how_ the view is unconfessional--it's just taken for granted to be obvious. Also, after explaining an "interesting implication" of the view in the same paragraph, the author just leaves it at that--he doesn't address the problem, but assumes you've picked up on the absurdity of the view.

Finally, the article lacks grace. What is the purpose of the article? Who are we trying to convince of what? The article adds no new knowledge, and it appears to have been written to the choir--not to the choir of Christ Church though.

To conclude, I think a more helpful critique would have been written by someone with a bit more awareness of Wilson's work. The critique would have more adequately explained the problematic view--with all the definitions and qualifications that would make Wilson proud--and then sought to show any error by Scripture and reason. Finally, the critique would have had a more meaningful purpose--to bring us all closer to the truth.

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## Logan (Aug 19, 2022)

RamistThomist said:


> Chesterton is overrated. He is a wordsmith with little substance. All fluff.



He's pretty clever and immensely enjoyable. I've read quite a few of his books and essays.


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## Reformed Covenanter (Aug 19, 2022)

Jerrod Hess said:


> A question I have on the side that hopefully doesn't derail too much, but since this is the latest Wilson/CREC thread, does anyone happen to know the reason for the high praise Wilson and others give to authors like CS Lewis, and GK Chesterton?
> 
> Personally I haven't read either, and knowing there are many precious works I have yet to read, and that as far as fiction goes I'm content with Pilgrim's Progress, I have no future intentions on reading them.



C. S. Lewis is good for apologetics and his political writings, often ignored by his evangelical fanboys, were prescient as he had a remarkable insight into human nature (see this post, for instance). I read/reread fourteen of his books at the beginning of 2021; on the whole, I view it as time well spent.

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## RamistThomist (Aug 19, 2022)

Logan said:


> He's pretty clever and immensely enjoyable. I've read quite a few of his books and essays.



Yes to both of those. Except for _The Everlasting Man_, he really wasn't that deep. I did enjoy him early on, though.


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## Imputatio (Aug 19, 2022)

@Semper Fidelis had this to say back in the day:

“I am not defending the FV approach to the problem but their form of Covenantalism is an over-reaction to a real problem that exists in many Reformed circles these days. As correctives go, men often go to the opposite extremes they come out of instead of settling into an Orthodox position.

There is a tendency to depreciate the importance of the Covenant among some Reformed to assume that nothing real is conferred in the Sacrament. There is also a bit of fatalism with respect to God electing children that doesn't deal with the real sin of neglect where parents fail to train their childrn in the way the Scriptures command.

Of course the Standards and Puritan causistry have practical theological wisdom to how the precepts (what we are commanded) work themselves together with the decree of God (what God only knows) but many Reformed get caught in the abstraction of the Invisible Kingdom forgetting that where we labor is in the Visible.

Thus, I find the FV complaints about the Reformed Confessions to be hollow because they're always aiming their criticisms at the wrong thing - some modern expressions of Reformed theology that are variously anti-nomian or forget the injunctions in the Confessions about "improving our baptisms" and the like. They act as if the only alternative to their mono-Covenantalism is anti-nomianism and a Zwinglian view of the Sacraments.

I've said this before but I believe one of the things that made many FV proponents so recalcitrant is that they couldn't stand the idea of being lectured about the Confession from people that had huge logs in their eyes concerning the Confession. In other words, if the Scriptures tell us to raise our kids in the fear and admonition of the Lord then its hard to receive criticism from a fellow who thinks that any third use of the Law violates his exclusive "BT-only" rule that you should never enjoin from the Word but only exhort about what Christ has done. The attitude might be: "Well, I might be doing too much but I'd rather err on the side of thinking too much about where my kids stand in the Covenant than not at all...." As with so many apparently "Either-Or" choices, the solution was not either or but the Confessional understanding all along, which neither group is faithful to.”

https://www.puritanboard.com/posts/641845/react?reaction_id=1

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## retroGRAD3 (Aug 19, 2022)

RamistThomist said:


> Lewis is a genuinely good writer.


I started reading the space trilogy on your recommendation. It is a fascinating book.

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## RamistThomist (Aug 19, 2022)

retroGRAD3 said:


> I started reading the space trilogy on your recommendation. It is a fascinating book.



The first two are slow. The third one is a manual on how to fight the New World Order.

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## retroGRAD3 (Aug 19, 2022)

RamistThomist said:


> The first two are slow. The third one is a manual on how to fight the New World Order.


Looking forward to it. Still on the first one. Reading lots of books at once.


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## RamistThomist (Aug 19, 2022)

retroGRAD3 said:


> Looking forward to it. Still on the first one. Reading lots of books at once.



In the third book he anticipates things like remote viewing and MK-ULTRA long before the CIA and Soviets were using them.

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## Zach (Aug 19, 2022)

RamistThomist said:


> The first two are slow. The third one is a manual on how to fight the New World Order.


Perelandra is maybe a little slow, but I think it's the best, certainly the most beautiful, of the trilogy.

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## Charles Johnson (Aug 19, 2022)

I read Perelandra in high school. The books as a remember it is that a man is walking through the English countryside, stops at an inn, gets sent to Mars by some men with bad intentions, and there he observes outer space giraffe-cows being milked by the locals, the strangest of all sights.
It was definitely slow. Maybe I should give the other two a go.


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## SeanPatrickCornell (Aug 19, 2022)

Charles Johnson said:


> I read Perelandra in high school. The books as a remember it is that a man is walking through the English countryside, stops at an inn, gets sent to Mars by some men with bad intentions, and there he observes outer space giraffe-cows being milked by the locals, the strangest of all sights.
> It was definitely slow. Maybe I should give the other two a go.



That's _Out of the Silent Plant_, not _Perelandra_.

_Perelandra_ is where:



Spoiler



Mr. Ransom is sent to Venus (aka "Perelandra") and is there to basically thwart Satan's temptation of Venus's version of Eve.

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## retroGRAD3 (Aug 19, 2022)

SeanPatrickCornell said:


> That's _Out of the Silent Plant_, not _Perelandra_.
> 
> _Perelandra_ is where Mr. Ransom is sent to Venus (aka "Perelandra") and is there to basically thwart Satan's temptation of Venus's version of Eve.


SPOILERS!!!

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## Zach (Aug 19, 2022)

retroGRAD3 said:


> SPOILERS!!!


But will he succeed? Find out when you get through _Out of the Silent Planet_...

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## Taylor (Aug 19, 2022)

Is this the first time on Puritan Board an FV thread has turned into a C. S. Lewis literature review?

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## Jeri Tanner (Aug 19, 2022)

Taylor said:


> Is this the first time on Puritan Board an FV thread has turned into a C. S. Lewis literature review?


Great observation! Maybe someone start a CS Lewis dedicated thread as we return to the topic raised by the OP.


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## Zach (Aug 19, 2022)

Jeri Tanner said:


> Great observation! Maybe someone start a CS Lewis dedicated thread as we return to the topic raised by the OP.


Mea culpa!

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## RamistThomist (Aug 19, 2022)

Back to the OP: there is nothing wrong with the idea of objectivity in itself. The problem is that Wilson promoted objectivity while rejecting the internal/external distinction of the covenant. That's why his view of election, for all practical purposes, was historic Arminianism.

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## Reformed Covenanter (Aug 19, 2022)

As I do not like fiction, I cannot recommend reading C. S. Lewis's science-fiction novels ... sorry, Doug Wilson's _Southern Slavery: As it Was_.

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## Semper Reformada (Aug 23, 2022)

Mikey said:


> Thanks for sharing!
> 
> To be honest, I didn't find the article very helpful or informative.
> 
> ...


Mikey, despite the unfortunate fact that others completely hijacked this thread to run down a completely unrelated rabbit hole (are there moderators here?), I found your comments extremely helpful. Thanks

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## NaphtaliPress (Aug 23, 2022)

Semper Reformada said:


> Mikey, despite the unfortunate fact that others completely hijacked this thread to run down a completely unrelated rabbit hole (are there moderators here?), I found your comments extremely helpful. Thanks


There are but we miss things. But I did not miss that you don't have a signature with a name so folks know how to address you. Please fix one per the rules. See the link at the bottom of the page for how-to.


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## Taylor (Aug 23, 2022)

Semper Reformada said:


> Mikey, despite the unfortunate fact that others completely hijacked this thread to run down a completely unrelated rabbit hole (are there moderators here?), I found your comments extremely helpful. Thanks


Wow, first post since you became a member nearly 13 years ago.


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## RamistThomist (Aug 23, 2022)

Not so much that we failed to address the issue. We did. Wilson ties his view of objectivity with his denial of the internal/external distinction. That means we are temporally united to Christ by baptism.

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## Semper Reformada (Aug 24, 2022)

RamistThomist said:


> Not so much that we failed to address the issue. We did. Wilson ties his view of objectivity with his denial of the internal/external distinction. That means we are temporally united to Christ by baptism.


I found this helpful. Wilson says he is describing the same people, but in more helpful terms. https://dougwils.com/the-church/s16-theology/the-visible-part-of-the-invisible-visible-church.html


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## RamistThomist (Aug 24, 2022)

Semper Reformada said:


> I found this helpful. Wilson says he is describing the same people, but in more helpful terms. https://dougwils.com/the-church/s16-theology/the-visible-part-of-the-invisible-visible-church.html



What is the tl;dr version? I really don't know what he is trying to say besides yes and no at the same time.


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## Semper Reformada (Aug 24, 2022)

RamistThomist said:


> What is the tl;dr version? I really don't know what he is trying to say besides yes and no at the same time.


He is just saying that he prefers the terms "historic" church and "eschatological" church. He finds the term "visible" church troubling because the entire visible church throughout history is actually invisible to man - it is only visible to God. If we use the term historic church, we don't have to modify it.

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## RamistThomist (Aug 24, 2022)

Semper Reformada said:


> He is just saying that he prefers the terms "historic" church and "eschatological" church. He finds the term "visible" church troubling because the entire visible church throughout history is actually invisible to man - it is only visible to God. If we use the term historic church, we don't have to modify it.



I understand that. My problem is his problem with the internal/external distinction of the covenant, which is biblical (Rom. 9).

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## PuritanCovenanter (Aug 24, 2022)

RamistThomist said:


> I understand that. My problem is his problem with the internal/external distinction of the covenant, which is biblical (Rom. 9).


Isn't Doug Wilson a Baptist theologically?


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## TylerRay (Aug 24, 2022)

RamistThomist said:


> I understand that. My problem is his problem with the internal/external distinction of the covenant, which is biblical (Rom. 9).


And 2:28-29

For he is not a Jew, which is one outwardly; neither is that circumcision, which is outward in the flesh: But he is a Jew, which is one inwardly; and circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit, and not in the letter; whose praise is not of men, but of God.

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## RamistThomist (Aug 24, 2022)

PuritanCovenanter said:


> Isn't Doug Wilson a Baptist theologically?


In terms of deep down assumptions, yes. That probably explains his commitment to paedocommunion.


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## Afterthought (Aug 24, 2022)

Where does "historical" and "eschatological" church leave room for the false professor? If I put pressure on the term "eschatological," this is a church that only exists at the end of the world. So are there no false professors in the historical church right here and now? That false professors are only a concept by the revelation of who perseveres into the eschatological church, but there is no concept of false professors in the here-and-now? That is what the words convey to my mind at the popular level.

The terms "visible" and "invisible" church capture this distinction much better, which makes sense since it arises from Scripture itself, and the terms have always been understood to consist of a part of the whole when speaking of the church at any particular moment of time, which since the church has an organic unity, is still properly a viewing of the church. You see a person's hand, you can speak of seeing their body. If you want to be more specific, you have seen part of their body, but you have seen their body. Or to use Samuel Rutherford's analogy (the ignorance of the literature of the Reformers on this is amazing, but 2007 was also a different year than 2022), if you see a part of the ocean, you have seen the ocean, though you have not seen the whole of it. How about we use terms the way they were intended to function?

On a practical level, not having a proper concept of false profession in the here-and-now will lead to self-righteousness, self-deception, formalism, and an interest in religious rituals over the Word and Spirit.

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## PuritanCovenanter (Aug 24, 2022)

RamistThomist said:


> That probably explains his commitment to paedocommunion.


I don't think that is any truer than saying Covenantalism explains a commitment to paedocommunion. Does it? Hope this isn't rabbit trailing. But I do believe his roots of being Credo Reformed Baptist haven't moved and that would explain a lot. He isn't Reformed and He really isn't ordained.


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## RamistThomist (Aug 24, 2022)

PuritanCovenanter said:


> I don't think that is any truer than saying Covenantalism explains a commitment to paedocommunion. Does it? Hope this isn't rabbit trailing. But I do believe his roots of being Credo Reformed Baptist haven't moved and that would explain a lot. He isn't Reformed and He really isn't ordained.



He and credobaptists use the same argument for paedocommunion: if you baptize babies, then you should feed them the Supper. But yes, in older threads on credobaptists, the internal/external distinction often came up.


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## Phil D. (Aug 24, 2022)

RamistThomist said:


> He and credobaptists use the same argument for paedocommunion: if you baptize babies, then you should feed them the Supper.


I think you would be hard pressed to show that credos originated this line of thinking (historically). Rather, as one way to discredit infant baptism some credos have latched onto the rationale of certain peados' claims of that nature, based on the latter's strain of covenantalism.

I seem to recall Murray saying something along the lines that he would rather adopt paedocommunion before he would give up paedobaptism.

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## De Jager (Aug 24, 2022)

In my search to hammer out my understanding of how the covenant works I have personally found that the views of Vos, Berkhof, and Schilder to be helpful and in my opinion, accurate. They all make a distinction between those who are in the covenant in only a legal sense vs those who have the substance of the covenant promises. For example: Ishmael vs Isaac. Thus covenant is wider than election. Both were "in the covenant" so to speak and there were commanalities between them (i.e. both were holy from birth, both given the covenant sign, both given the covenant promises, both had covenant obligations), however only Isaac received the substance of the promises because he laid hold of God with a (Spirit-wrought) faith.

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## danekristjan (Aug 25, 2022)

De Jager said:


> In my search to hammer out my understanding of how the covenant works I have personally found that the views of Vos, Berkhof, and Schilder to be helpful and in my opinion, accurate. They all make a distinction between those who are in the covenant in only a legal sense vs those who have the substance of the covenant promises. For example: Ishmael vs Isaac. Thus covenant is wider than election. Both were "in the covenant" so to speak and there were commanalities between them (i.e. both were holy from birth, both given the covenant sign, both given the covenant promises, both had covenant obligations), however only Isaac received the substance of the promises because he laid hold of God with a (Spirit-wrought) faith.


Amen. My only issue is I'm having trouble seeing how anything Wilson is saying is anything different than that.


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## RamistThomist (Aug 25, 2022)

danekristjan said:


> Amen. My only issue is I'm having trouble seeing how anything Wilson is saying is anything different than that.


I love Schilder but he isn't always the clearest. I get what he means by the vital/legal distinction, but I am not sure how he can work in his "all or nothing" take on covenant membership. Nor is it clear how this is an improvement upon the actual biblical language of internal/external. And in those rare moments when Wilson is actually clear, it isn't obvious how he is affirming said distinction.


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## itsreed (Aug 25, 2022)

Semper Reformada said:


> He is just saying that he prefers the terms "historic" church and "eschatological" church. He finds the term "visible" church troubling because the entire visible church throughout history is actually invisible to man - it is only visible to God. If we use the term historic church, we don't have to modify it.


He makes this switch because it enables him to avoid the both the biblical teaching on the IC/VC and its necessary entailments. He is not saying, "we *also *need to look at the church from the historical vs. eschotalogical perspective. Instead he is saying, "we need to *ignore *(functionally deny) the IC/VC distinction and use ONLY the HC/EC distinction." He does so in order to sneak in the FV's unbiblical true-but-temporary faith position. 

In other words,, this is a standard example of equivocation.

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## De Jager (Aug 25, 2022)

RamistThomist said:


> I love Schilder but he isn't always the clearest. I get what he means by the vital/legal distinction, but I am not sure how he can work in his "all or nothing" take on covenant membership. Nor is it clear how this is an improvement upon the actual biblical language of internal/external. And in those rare moments when Wilson is actually clear, it isn't obvious how he is affirming said distinction.


I think what is presented by Berkhof in his S.T., where if I recall correctly he essentially endorses the position of Vos, and what I've read about Schilder (not directly from him, but in a pamphlet on FV by Rev. Bredenhof (@Guido's Brother) who is a member of this forum) indicate to me that they all essentially believed the same thing - they call it vital/legal, which really is the same kind of distinction as visible/invisible. I think it is helpful to keep both terminologies in mind and I believe they complement each other. I think what the Dutch formulations are trying to establish is that *all* those in the visible church or "covenant community" or whatever you want to call it really do have a relation to God, and really are "in covenant" with him. Whereas some formulations treat it as though the only people who really have any covenant relationship to God are the elect, and the others (including children) are in essence covenant appendages (or worse yet, have no relationship to God whatsoever) until proven otherwise.


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## RamistThomist (Aug 25, 2022)

De Jager said:


> I think what is presented by Berkhof in his S.T., where if I recall correctly he essentially endorses the position of Vos, and what I've read about Schilder (not directly from him, but in a pamphlet on FV by Rev. Bredenhof (@Guido's Brother) who is a member of this forum) indicate to me that they all essentially believed the same thing - they call it vital/legal, which really is the same kind of distinction as visible/invisible. I think it is helpful to keep both terminologies in mind and I believe they complement each other. I think what the Dutch formulations are trying to establish is that *all* those in the visible church or "covenant community" or whatever you want to call it really do have a relation to God, and really are "in covenant" with him. Whereas some formulations treat it as though the only people who really have any covenant relationship to God are the elect, and the others (including children) are in essence covenant appendages (or worse yet, have no relationship to God whatsoever) until proven otherwise.



I've read everything of Schilder's in English, except for two of his Trilogy. Wilson isn't simply saying that those unbelievers in the covenant don't have a real relationship with God. He is saying they have real faith but fall away.


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## Pilgrim (Aug 28, 2022)

Phil D. said:


> I think you would be hard pressed to show that credos originated this line of thinking (historically). Rather, as one way to discredit infant baptism some credos have latched onto the rationale of certain peados' claims of that nature, based on the latter's strain of covenantalism.
> 
> I seem to recall Murray saying something along the lines that he would rather adopt paedocommunion before he would give up paedobaptism.


Some baptist polemicists going back maybe at least to the 19th Century have made the argument and thus charged Presbyterians and others with inconsistency.


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## Andrew35 (Aug 28, 2022)

RamistThomist said:


> I don't think there is anything unique to Wilson about his praise for Lewis and Chesterton. That is standard among all Evangelicals and many Reformed. Chesterton is overrated. He is a wordsmith with little substance. All fluff. Lewis is a genuinely good writer.


Disagree. Chesterton is immensely (pun unintended) fun as an essayist. He uses the mundane to invite the reader to a different point of view on various matters, which is what every literary essayist should do. "What I found in my pocket," for example, was highly entertaining.

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## RamistThomist (Aug 28, 2022)

Andrew35 said:


> Disagree. Chesterton is immensely (pun unintended) fun as an essayist. He uses the mundane to invite the reader to a different point of view on various matters, which is what every literary essayist should do. "What I found in my pocket," for example, was highly entertaining.



I don't disagree with that. He is a fun wordsmith. That's not the same thing as being deep. His biography of Thomas Aquinas is a delight. You just don't learn that much about Thomas, though.


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## RamistThomist (Aug 28, 2022)

Chesterton was a journalist and a good one. I respect him in *that* role. I'll even tip my hat to him when he explores literary criticism, as in his works on Stevenson and Carlyle.

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