Two New Posts on the Spirituality of the Church...

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SEAGOON

Puritan Board Freshman
Hi Guys,

Just in time for the election season, and the inevitable politicization of the American church, we have two posts on the Old School Presbyterian doctrine of the spirituality of the church, including quotes from Thornwell, Dabney, Morton Smith, and R.B. Kuiper on the subject.

Dabney on Preachers and Politics « Building Old School Churches
Morton Smith on “Christ’s Commission to the Church†« Building Old School Churches

There might be more to follow on the subject from Thomas Peck, and Robert Moffat, but that depends on whether I have time to do some scanning.

Your Servant in Christ,

Andy
 
This is an idea I have been wrestling with. How do we square these comments with Thornwell's desire for the Confederate States to acknowledge King Jesus as the head of state?

Not trying to be ornery, just trying to see how they cohese.
 
Hi Bradford,

There really is no contradiction here. Thornwell, in common with all the Old School Southern Presbyterians accepted that God had created separate authorities to govern various spheres, but that all of these authorities were subject to his Moral Law (the Decalogue) and that their authority devolved exclusively from the King of Kings, and Lord of Lords. Therefore the church had been granted authority only to govern in its sphere and in pursuing its commission, and the state likewise. The church was not to usurp the authority and commission of the magistrate and vice versa.

In writing to the Confederate States regarding the framing of their new constitution, Thornwell and his co-petitioners (see "Relation of the State to Christ" in volume 4 of his Collected Writings p. 549-556) objected that they had made the same error as the founders of the USA in the original constitution in that they had accepted the authority of the will of the people, and not the revealed will of God as supreme, and therefore opened up the possibility of the "democratic absolutism" that rides roughshod over the rights of the minority. Thornwell framed the problem with the original US constitution this way:

The Constitution of the United States was an attempt to realize the notion of popular freedom, without the checks of aristocracy and a throne, and without the alliance of a national church. The conception was a noble one, but the execution was not commensurate with the design. The fundamental error of our fathers was, that they accepted a partial for a complete statement of the truth. They saw clearly the human side -- that popular governments are the offspring of popular will; and that rulers, as the servants and not the masters of their subjects, are properly responsible to them. They failed to apprehend the Divine side -- that all just government is the ordinance of God, and that magistrates are His ministers who must answer to Him for the execution of their trust. The consequence of this failure, and of exclusive attention to a single aspect of the case, was to invest the people with a species of supremacy as insulting to God as it was injurious to them. They became a law unto themselves; there was nothing beyond them to check or control their caprices or their pleasure. All were accountable to them; they were accountable to none. This was certainly to make the people a God; and if it was not explicitly expressed that they could do no wrong, it was certainly implied that there was no tribunal to take cognizance of their acts. A foundation was thus laid for the worst of all possible forms of government -- a democratic absolutism, which, in the execution of its purposes, does not scruple to annul the most solemn compacts and to cancel the most sacred obligations. The will of majorities must become the supreme law, if the voice of the people is to be regarded as the voice of God; if they are, in fact, the only God whom rulers are bound to obey. It is enough, therefore, to look upon government as simply the institute of man. Important as this aspect of the subject unquestionably is, yet if we stop there, we shall sow the seeds of disaster and failure. We must contemplate people and rulers as alike subject to the authority of God. His will is the true supreme; and it is under Him, and as the means of expressing His sovereign pleasure, that conventions are called, constitutions are framed and governments erected. To the extent that the State is a moral person, it must needs be under moral obligation, and moral obligation without reference to a superior will is a flat contradiction in terms. If, then, the State is an ordinance of God, it should acknowledge the fact. If it exists under the conditions of a law superior to all human decrees, and to which all human decrees behoove to be conformed, that law should be distinctly recognized. Let us guard, in this new Confederacy, against the fatal delusion that our government is a mere expression of human will. It is, indeed, an expression of will, but of will regulated and measured by those eternal principles of right which stamp it at the same time as the creature and institute of God . And of all governments in the world, a confederate government, resting as it does upon plighted faith, can least afford to dispense with the Supreme Guardian of treaties.

Note, that Thornwell is merely asking that the State to acknowledge that it's power is delegated by God and rightly restrained and checked by His will. When government rules contrary to the law of God, even when the majority desires it to do so, it has taken an authority it does not rightly have and has said "we will do what is right in our own eyes" to the creator. What Thornwell was asking for, therefore, was a check on the power of the democratic state (one I, along with millions of aborted infants, wish existed). Rightly understood, this has nothing to do with granting the church any power outside of its own sphere, merely acknowledging that which was acknowledged in the declaration but not the constitution, that the freedoms of man and power of the state both devolve from and are circumscribed by their Creator. As Thornwell put it:

That, in recognizing this doctrine, the State runs no risk of trespassing upon the rights of conscience is obvious from another point of view. The will of God, as revealed in the Scriptures, is not a positive Constitution for the State; in that relation it stands only to the Church. It is rather a negative check upon its power. It does not prescribe the things to be done, but only forbids the things to be avoided. It only conditions and restrains the discretion of rulers within the bounds of the Divine law. It is, in other words, a limitation, and not a definition, of power. The formula according to which the Scriptures are accepted by the State is: Nothing shall be done which they forbid. The formula according to which they are accepted by the Church is: Nothing shall be done but what they enjoin. They are here the positive measure of power. Surely the government of no Christian people can scruple to accept the negative limitations of the Divine Word. Surely, our rulers do not desire that they shall have the liberty of being wiser than God.
 
Thank you.

I have seen some people use "spirituality of the church" in terms of "Christians shouldn't act like Christians in the public sphere" or "Don't bring your biblical values into the debate." And sadly, these were Reformed Christians.

Your post clarified a lot of this.
 
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