John Owen PCA?
- Thread starter TimV
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I posted this a while back from Biblical Theology.
http://www.puritanboard.com/f25/john-owen-sectarianism-47909/
DonP
Puritan Board Junior
Well I would at least ask him if he feels there is merit in works.
If he says yes it has no relationship to Owen at all. He denies salvation by faith.
Even Owen would not let him become a deacon
DonP
Puritan Board Junior
hhahahaa
yes pride and stubbornness can make the simplest things complex
Isn't there a verse about shaking the dust off your feet and moving on?
I guess I'd like to know your sources. Owen was ordained in the Anglican Church during his time at Oxford, but later he refused to go along with William Laud's high church discipline. He left Oxford in 1637, spent a stint as a as a private chaplain for six years, became a Presbyterian and went to Fordham, Essex in 1643. He was called to a Presbyterian congregation as its pastor, and very soon thereafter introduced and advocated independent church government. He preached before the Long Parliament around 1646 clearing proclaiming his independent and Parliamentarian views. In fact he preached there in 1649 the very day following the execution of Charles I. In 1658 he took an active role in the Savoy Assembly from which came an Independent Church Confession. He became a leader of the Independents, became a pastor in 1673 of a large Independent congregation at Leadenhall Street Chapel and remained there until his death in 1683.
In 1680, toward the end of his life when he wrote his work, Union Among Protestants, he stated at one point therein: “Those who are for the Presbyterian form of an authoritative national church-state do, indeed, cut off and cast away most of those things which are the matter of contest between the present dissenting parties, and so make a nearer approach towards a firm union among all Protestants than the other do; yet such an authoritative church-state, in that form, is neither proper nor possible unto this nation, nor consistent with that pre-eminence of the crown, that liberty of the subjects, and freedom of the consciences of Christians, which are their due.”
Now, to be sure, I'm most willing to have any ignorance of mine concerning him corrected, but if he was ever persuaded back to Presbyterian polity, I know nothing of it.
DTK
On some points I consider John Owen more Presbyterian than modern presbyterianism, especially in his views of worship and discipline. Where the order is biblical I doubt he would have found difficulty in communing with a parochial church. But Owen maintained the fundamental tenet of Independency, that constant communion contains virtual approbation of the church order, so that when the order contained unbiblical elements conscience required separation. Regrettably some Presbyterian bodies have incorporated this principle to the great detriment of the church and her witness. On the other side, some larger presbyterian bodies have become so idiosyncratic that it is likely Owen would have objected to their congregational independency under a superficial union.
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As a Congregationalist (CCCC) I am amused at my Presbyterian brethren trying to claim John Owen as one of their own. Please brothers, you have so many noble saints such as Knox, Calvin, Dabney, etc. I would implore you to let us Congregationalists continue to claim Owen as one of our own.Having traveled in Presbyterian and Reformed Baptist circles, I have detected a tendency for these brethren to exempt a plurality of elders from Congregationalism. It is not so. See The Cambridge Platform, Ch. 7. "Of Ruling Elders and Deacons", Ch. 8. "Of the Election of Church Officers", Ch. 9. "Of Ordination and Imposition of Hands", and Ch.10. "Of the Power of the Church and Its Presbytery". I would point out that the term "Presbytery" here refers only to the session composed of teaching and ruling presbyters. Hence the word "Presbytery".
On the local level, there is very little difference between a Congregational church and a Presbyterian church. Each has a session composed of teaching and ruling elders. In the Congregational church, the elders have no judicial authority outside of the local congregation. Additionally, we Congregationalists tend to have more congregational meetings. Other than these distinctives, we Congregationalists share the same Calvinistic doctrines with Presbyterians, Reformed Baptists, Reformed Anglicans and Dutch/German, etc. Reformed churches.
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