The institutional church is unable to follow God's direction. Ask any official in the Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, or (insert your church here), if they follow 1 Corinthians 6:4 regarding any controversies in the church.
"If then ye have judgments of things pertaining to this life, set them to judge who are least esteemed in the church." (1 Corinthians 6:4)
The Apostle literally instructs that the LEAST ESTEEMED in the church sit as final judge or arbiter in matters of controversy (of course they must be an actual spiritual member of His body). What ecclesiastical body actually does that? Which forfeits their power willingly? None. This is not to say, that the pillars of the church should not have a say. I believe they should act as the experts, lawyers, prosecutors and mediators. However, the final say should rest with the least esteemed.
1 Cor. 6:4 is a bit of an interesting statement. Many older translations (and some older commenters) take the Greek to be imperative, i.e. to command the least esteemed members of the church to be set as judges. Most modern translations (and many commenters of all ages) regard it as interrogative, i.e. as asking a rhetorical question along the lines of 'dare you ask people with no standing to judge?' and as referring to unbelievers, who are disregarded because they are outside the church. Either way, the argument seems to be rhetorical: either a) even the least believer is more competent to judge than an unbeliever; or b) it is simply absurd to look to unbelievers to judge in such cases.
I don't have an opinion which translation is preferred, but I think your broad point is correct: institutional churches are not keen on the idea of relaxing power, all the more as they vaunt themselves (as Rome does) as infallible, the sole mediator of salvation/outside of which there is no salvation, necessary for common believers to know the truth, hierarchical, etc. And more than a few controversies have been handled in an unsatisfactory manner by the church: the Council of Nicea II, for example, mandated the use of icons and anathematized anyone who regarded that as unorthodox.
Tom, I appreciate your concise perspective on Begg's woefully poor advice and confronting our own difficulty of responding to Jesus' promise of persecution. But I would also argue that it is absurd to expect the level of conflict we are facing within the church, thanks to the large platforms leaders are given and the subsequent expansion of "the public square," to be even remotely sustainable. I shun social media, so perhaps my perspective is skewed, but I still perceive both mainstream and reformed evangelicalism's behavior on those platforms as defined by perpetual, nonstop outrage. I don't believe it to be holy, kind, or becoming of anyone, pagan or Christian. Yes, we are going to be hated by the world - but that needs to be on the account of the Gospel's call to repentance and faith, not our own obnoxious behavior. For the reformed community, specifically, to be characterized as cold, argumentative, and arrogant to both believers and unbelievers spits in the face of John 15:35 and Luke 10:37. We should absolutely confront false teachers more harshly than anyone else, but Begg's previous record of devotion to the Gospel should cause us to call him out in a spirit of love, not of bitterness, and for us to deal with those with a faulty understanding of why his counsel fell so short in a gentle manner. I believe your thesis statement of the inherently controversial nature of the Church is in need of 1 Timothy 6:4, which attributes the love of controversy to false teachers - controversy may seem inevitable but we should greet it with reluctance, not aching for a fight.
Well stated, and I agree on all points. To elaborate, though:
1) I avoid social media like the plague as well, so it is possible I am unaware of how uncivil some responses to the recent affair have been, or of how voluminous they have been
2) To the extent I have familiarity with it, it has been my experience that many people in the online Reformed community are in need of a heavy dose of humility and charity
3) You're exactly right that there is a big difference between engaging in controversy (where appropriate) and liking to fight, and that the latter is a mark of people we are to avoid. A love of provocation and confrontation are definitely present in some people who profess to be Reformed
4) Begg has done a lot of good over many years, and it is my hope that he has stumbled only temporarily and will repent and do better in future.
5) I think there's a good chance that you're right that the current level of digital-driven controversy is unsustainable (comp. Gal. 5:15). I only engaged with Meador here because I could not shake the feeling that it was appropriate to do so, and my doing so was certainly not intended as a complete dismissal of all he said - though he lost me when he was more interested in Kirsten Sanders' discussions of George Lindbeck rather than buttressing his argument from scripture - or of him generally.
6) I'm painfully aware that my foray here rather adds to the amount of digital controversy. Let's just say that I'm experimenting with this whole Substack thing, and am open to giving it up if it seems I am doing more harm than good; also, that it was the conscientious compulsion (as above) that seemed to justify it.
All of which is a roundabout way of saying that if I came across as bitter or loving of the fray, it is attributable rather to poor writing on my part than to any intention to be perceived as such. We should all be praying for Begg, and the people whose scenario he dealt with involved, and people of all stripes who get ornery on the web, and all professing believers, and all people.
1 Tim. 2:1: " I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people."
Thank you for this outstanding response. I apologize if I came across as biting/presumptuous in my previous response. For the record, I have very much enjoyed your previous articles (especially concerning the controversy around Wheaton College) - please don't take my critique as any discouragement. We need more sane, Biblical, longer-form, thoughtful content as opposed to the purely reactionary content we see on social media. As a young man I seek to guard my heart and tongue from temptation, so thank you for encouraging me in this regard. Take care, brother.
Ephesians 4:29 - "Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear."
I thought your response was pristinely civil and reasonable. As for the other, well, you do well in such a thing: "Keep your heart with all vigilance, for from it flow the springs of life" (Prov. 4:23) and "Whoever guards his mouth preserves his life; he who opens wide his lips comes to ruin" (13:3).
Tom - commendations on presenting a thoughtful, fair and honest message. This is a good message for a generation of believers that are confused over what speaking the truth in love actually means. Does it not include (along with 'compassion' and 'courage') also "speaking"? After decades in ministry I fear the American Reformed Church has lost it's salt and influence in modern culture here and abroad by our silence. As I look back I see the wisdom of men like Machen, Van Til and Schaeffer warning where the modern era was pushing the Church and how new leadership was influencing liberal ideas among students & congregants. They dared to declare where we need to draw the lines. Unfortunately many did not listen or courageously sound the alarms for fear of men; even though darkness will always hate the light. So today the rise of sin has embraced legal national abortion, gay marriage, transgenderism, men showering in young girls locker rooms, the state removing children from god fearing parent homes, doctors mutilating our children over confused gender identity and made up pronouns and leaders like our new supreme court justice who cannot define what a woman is! We might be tempted to blame all that on the world, yet after years of Bible College and WTS (79) I've personally known men (former professors, ministers, teachers, etc.,) who have since "transitioned" to liberal theologies, or created new perspectives or left the faith all together. I am about at the place (to quote a dear Christian woman), "I dare not quote any living Christian author" because you never know where they might land before called home!
So keep up your courageous and compassionate analysis - be encouraged - IMHO you are spot on in your assessments and use of Scripture ! And in that, you have encouraged me!
1) I'm pleased to hear you found the article encouraging, for to be encouraging while being critical is hard indeed, and I fear that I probably fall short of it most of the time.
2) I might make "I dare not quote any living Christian author" a personal rule of conduct. At the least, it is a sensible principle useful for being followed the vast majority of the time. As for its reason (that one never knows where someone might end), well, "we all stumble in many ways" (Jas. 3:2), even those that do not apostatize or give themselves to heresy. All the Jews in Antioch compromised the gospel by their behavior (Gal. 2:11-14), Paul alone excepted. Yet their stumbling notwithstanding, Peter and Barnabas yet ended well. I'm hopeful - and we should all be prayerful - that the same will be said of Begg, whose stumbling is hopefully but temporary.
3) To further consider the above example, I fear that many people in our day would have fallen all over themselves in embarrassment and gone into great gyrations to save face if they had been in Antioch when Paul confronted Peter over his hypocrisy (Gal. 2:11-14). Many would have chided him for unsettling the church's peace. There is a very real squeamishness about conflict that goes too far, just as there is a very real contentiousness that too much loves conflict. Both types are common, esp. amongst the most vocal voices in the church, and I fear that Meador, whatever his virtues in other cases, fell into that excessive love of strife avoidance in this case.
4) To be justly critical in the right time, way, amount, and relation to other things is a very hard thing, and sometimes seems a rarity in comparison to the frequency with which people vie in stumbling in the extremes of excessive timidity or contentiousness. I'm not sure I'm near the mark myself, but I am hopeful that God will both raise up people who are, as well as graciously use the faulty efforts of the rest of us to accomplish good. If 49% of us are too concerned with the church's purity, and another 49% with her peace, then maybe the 2% that have the proper balance will yet see their position hold the ascendancy.
The institutional church is unable to follow God's direction. Ask any official in the Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, or (insert your church here), if they follow 1 Corinthians 6:4 regarding any controversies in the church.
"If then ye have judgments of things pertaining to this life, set them to judge who are least esteemed in the church." (1 Corinthians 6:4)
The Apostle literally instructs that the LEAST ESTEEMED in the church sit as final judge or arbiter in matters of controversy (of course they must be an actual spiritual member of His body). What ecclesiastical body actually does that? Which forfeits their power willingly? None. This is not to say, that the pillars of the church should not have a say. I believe they should act as the experts, lawyers, prosecutors and mediators. However, the final say should rest with the least esteemed.
1 Cor. 6:4 is a bit of an interesting statement. Many older translations (and some older commenters) take the Greek to be imperative, i.e. to command the least esteemed members of the church to be set as judges. Most modern translations (and many commenters of all ages) regard it as interrogative, i.e. as asking a rhetorical question along the lines of 'dare you ask people with no standing to judge?' and as referring to unbelievers, who are disregarded because they are outside the church. Either way, the argument seems to be rhetorical: either a) even the least believer is more competent to judge than an unbeliever; or b) it is simply absurd to look to unbelievers to judge in such cases.
I don't have an opinion which translation is preferred, but I think your broad point is correct: institutional churches are not keen on the idea of relaxing power, all the more as they vaunt themselves (as Rome does) as infallible, the sole mediator of salvation/outside of which there is no salvation, necessary for common believers to know the truth, hierarchical, etc. And more than a few controversies have been handled in an unsatisfactory manner by the church: the Council of Nicea II, for example, mandated the use of icons and anathematized anyone who regarded that as unorthodox.
Tom, I appreciate your concise perspective on Begg's woefully poor advice and confronting our own difficulty of responding to Jesus' promise of persecution. But I would also argue that it is absurd to expect the level of conflict we are facing within the church, thanks to the large platforms leaders are given and the subsequent expansion of "the public square," to be even remotely sustainable. I shun social media, so perhaps my perspective is skewed, but I still perceive both mainstream and reformed evangelicalism's behavior on those platforms as defined by perpetual, nonstop outrage. I don't believe it to be holy, kind, or becoming of anyone, pagan or Christian. Yes, we are going to be hated by the world - but that needs to be on the account of the Gospel's call to repentance and faith, not our own obnoxious behavior. For the reformed community, specifically, to be characterized as cold, argumentative, and arrogant to both believers and unbelievers spits in the face of John 15:35 and Luke 10:37. We should absolutely confront false teachers more harshly than anyone else, but Begg's previous record of devotion to the Gospel should cause us to call him out in a spirit of love, not of bitterness, and for us to deal with those with a faulty understanding of why his counsel fell so short in a gentle manner. I believe your thesis statement of the inherently controversial nature of the Church is in need of 1 Timothy 6:4, which attributes the love of controversy to false teachers - controversy may seem inevitable but we should greet it with reluctance, not aching for a fight.
Well stated, and I agree on all points. To elaborate, though:
1) I avoid social media like the plague as well, so it is possible I am unaware of how uncivil some responses to the recent affair have been, or of how voluminous they have been
2) To the extent I have familiarity with it, it has been my experience that many people in the online Reformed community are in need of a heavy dose of humility and charity
3) You're exactly right that there is a big difference between engaging in controversy (where appropriate) and liking to fight, and that the latter is a mark of people we are to avoid. A love of provocation and confrontation are definitely present in some people who profess to be Reformed
4) Begg has done a lot of good over many years, and it is my hope that he has stumbled only temporarily and will repent and do better in future.
5) I think there's a good chance that you're right that the current level of digital-driven controversy is unsustainable (comp. Gal. 5:15). I only engaged with Meador here because I could not shake the feeling that it was appropriate to do so, and my doing so was certainly not intended as a complete dismissal of all he said - though he lost me when he was more interested in Kirsten Sanders' discussions of George Lindbeck rather than buttressing his argument from scripture - or of him generally.
6) I'm painfully aware that my foray here rather adds to the amount of digital controversy. Let's just say that I'm experimenting with this whole Substack thing, and am open to giving it up if it seems I am doing more harm than good; also, that it was the conscientious compulsion (as above) that seemed to justify it.
All of which is a roundabout way of saying that if I came across as bitter or loving of the fray, it is attributable rather to poor writing on my part than to any intention to be perceived as such. We should all be praying for Begg, and the people whose scenario he dealt with involved, and people of all stripes who get ornery on the web, and all professing believers, and all people.
1 Tim. 2:1: " I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people."
Thank you for this outstanding response. I apologize if I came across as biting/presumptuous in my previous response. For the record, I have very much enjoyed your previous articles (especially concerning the controversy around Wheaton College) - please don't take my critique as any discouragement. We need more sane, Biblical, longer-form, thoughtful content as opposed to the purely reactionary content we see on social media. As a young man I seek to guard my heart and tongue from temptation, so thank you for encouraging me in this regard. Take care, brother.
Ephesians 4:29 - "Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear."
I thought your response was pristinely civil and reasonable. As for the other, well, you do well in such a thing: "Keep your heart with all vigilance, for from it flow the springs of life" (Prov. 4:23) and "Whoever guards his mouth preserves his life; he who opens wide his lips comes to ruin" (13:3).
Robert Totty
just now
Tom - commendations on presenting a thoughtful, fair and honest message. This is a good message for a generation of believers that are confused over what speaking the truth in love actually means. Does it not include (along with 'compassion' and 'courage') also "speaking"? After decades in ministry I fear the American Reformed Church has lost it's salt and influence in modern culture here and abroad by our silence. As I look back I see the wisdom of men like Machen, Van Til and Schaeffer warning where the modern era was pushing the Church and how new leadership was influencing liberal ideas among students & congregants. They dared to declare where we need to draw the lines. Unfortunately many did not listen or courageously sound the alarms for fear of men; even though darkness will always hate the light. So today the rise of sin has embraced legal national abortion, gay marriage, transgenderism, men showering in young girls locker rooms, the state removing children from god fearing parent homes, doctors mutilating our children over confused gender identity and made up pronouns and leaders like our new supreme court justice who cannot define what a woman is! We might be tempted to blame all that on the world, yet after years of Bible College and WTS (79) I've personally known men (former professors, ministers, teachers, etc.,) who have since "transitioned" to liberal theologies, or created new perspectives or left the faith all together. I am about at the place (to quote a dear Christian woman), "I dare not quote any living Christian author" because you never know where they might land before called home!
So keep up your courageous and compassionate analysis - be encouraged - IMHO you are spot on in your assessments and use of Scripture ! And in that, you have encouraged me!
1) I'm pleased to hear you found the article encouraging, for to be encouraging while being critical is hard indeed, and I fear that I probably fall short of it most of the time.
2) I might make "I dare not quote any living Christian author" a personal rule of conduct. At the least, it is a sensible principle useful for being followed the vast majority of the time. As for its reason (that one never knows where someone might end), well, "we all stumble in many ways" (Jas. 3:2), even those that do not apostatize or give themselves to heresy. All the Jews in Antioch compromised the gospel by their behavior (Gal. 2:11-14), Paul alone excepted. Yet their stumbling notwithstanding, Peter and Barnabas yet ended well. I'm hopeful - and we should all be prayerful - that the same will be said of Begg, whose stumbling is hopefully but temporary.
3) To further consider the above example, I fear that many people in our day would have fallen all over themselves in embarrassment and gone into great gyrations to save face if they had been in Antioch when Paul confronted Peter over his hypocrisy (Gal. 2:11-14). Many would have chided him for unsettling the church's peace. There is a very real squeamishness about conflict that goes too far, just as there is a very real contentiousness that too much loves conflict. Both types are common, esp. amongst the most vocal voices in the church, and I fear that Meador, whatever his virtues in other cases, fell into that excessive love of strife avoidance in this case.
4) To be justly critical in the right time, way, amount, and relation to other things is a very hard thing, and sometimes seems a rarity in comparison to the frequency with which people vie in stumbling in the extremes of excessive timidity or contentiousness. I'm not sure I'm near the mark myself, but I am hopeful that God will both raise up people who are, as well as graciously use the faulty efforts of the rest of us to accomplish good. If 49% of us are too concerned with the church's purity, and another 49% with her peace, then maybe the 2% that have the proper balance will yet see their position hold the ascendancy.