As I’m writing this post, someone is probably thinking about adding their name to the already 159889 other names to support the The Manhattan Declaration. But one name would be conspicuously missing—John MacArthur’s, noted pastor-teacher of Grace Community Church, Sun Valley, CA.
John MacArthur on Why he did not sign:
Although I obviously agree with the document’s opposition to same-sex marriage, abortion, and other key moral problems threatening our culture, the document falls far short of identifying the one true and ultimate remedy for all of humanity’s moral ills: the gospel. The gospel is barely mentioned in the Declaration. At one point the statement rightly acknowledges, “It is our duty to proclaim the Gospel of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ in its fullness, both in season and out of season”—and then adds an encouraging wish: “May God help us not to fail in that duty.” Yet the gospel itself is nowhere presented (much less explained) in the document or any of the accompanying literature. Indeed, that would be a practical impossibility because of the contradictory views held by the broad range of signatories regarding what the gospel teaches and what it means to be a Christian.
MacArthur continues:
Instead of acknowledging the true depth of our differences, the implicit assumption (from the start of the document until its final paragraph) is that Roman Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, Protestant Evangelicals and others all share a common faith in and a common commitment to the gospel’s essential claims. The document repeatedly employs expressions like “we [and] our fellow believers”; “As Christians, we . . .”; and “we claim the heritage of . . . Christians.” That seriously muddles the lines of demarcation between authentic biblical Christianity and various apostate traditions. (emphasis mine)
MacArthur concludes:
In short, support for The Manhattan Declaration would not only contradict the stance I have taken since long before the original “Evangelicals and Catholics Together” document was issued; it would also tacitly relegate the very essence of gospel truth to the level of a secondary issue. That is the wrong way—perhaps the very worst way—for evangelicals to address the moral and political crises of our time. Anything that silences, sidelines, or relegates the gospel to secondary status is antithetical to the principles we affirm when we call ourselves evangelicals. (full article, emphasis mine)
To me this is a serious fallout:
1. Again, we’re reminded that Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox devotees do not represent ”authentic biblical Christianity.”
2. Again, the impression is given that the Body of Christ is so divided that we can’t even agree on what the true nature of the gospel is—what are the essentials and non-essentials.
3. Again, it has become a trust issue: MacArthur says the gospel has been compromised, while Mohler maintains that it has not been compromised.
And the rest of us, well, we’re forced to choose a side.
When I read the kind of stuff that guys like John MacArthur and James White say about RC and EO Christians it just reminds me to pray for them all the more.
“What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don’t they come from your desires that battle within you? You desire but do not have, so you kill. You covet but you cannot get what you want, so you quarrel and fight. You do not have because you do not ask God. When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures.” (James 4:1-3 TNIV)
Everyone wants to make sure that they are right, and will fight each other to make sure others know that they are right. Sometimes I’m convinced people have a view of how things ought to be, then use their view of God to back it up. I for one don’t have to go around signing declarations. I have already declared my alliegence to Christ.
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Nick,
I’m with you to a degree.
John,
I’m with Nick on this one. Prayer is needed to navigate this whole thing.
I cringe when I read people say that EO is not Christianity, even if I don’t know a lot about it. Although it’s only a one person example, we all have a dear friend who is EO and we KNOW he’s an authentic Christian.
Jeff
Jeff,
When we make such statements, we’re always put ourselves in awkward positions.
MacArthur’s ignorance of Orthodoxy (and Rome really) is simply appalling! Their (EO) doctrine of the Trinity, while not without some balance problems..(subordinationism, yet the Father is the regal and always first in the Godhead) could help many Evangelical churches. While Rome burns, some fiddle it seems? Sign! – Fr. R.
Fr.R,
It’s the very nature of the gospel he says that is at stake. That’s the starting point.
T.C.,
Yes I know some of his verbiage, but the “nature” of the Gospel is God’s and supernatural (as St. John 3:8)..yes? And no Christian Body owns it, not even the Reformed or Rome. Even Rome claims the Gospel is a “Christ-Event”. Oh that we always acknowledged the mystery of God in HIS grace and glory!
Oh that we always acknowledged the mystery of God in HIS grace and glory!
Fr. R,
But I thought the basic essentials of the Gospel were clear enough, so no need to appeal to “the mystery of God”?
T.C.
Not for me, or Calvin I might add. He too always acknowledged the mystery of God! One cannot “can” the Gospel..ever! We could quote on and on… The issue is also, as noted elsewhere “conscience”. What is really at stake in this Manhattan statement? Doctrine, dogma.. the doctrine of God? Someone please tell me?
I would fight all day and night over the doctrine of God…Incarnation, Trinity of God, etc. But how God applies His faith & glory? It is HIS to give! Again, “faith” is “the gift of God”! (Eph. 2:8)
Sadly,but it has come down to the doctrine of the Gospel – what it really entails?
And I’m in absolute agreement.
T.C.,
It just happens that I have been reading, ‘Rereading Paul Together, Protestant and Catholic Perspectives on Justification’, David E. Aune, Editor (Baker Academic). WE must either learn to “read” together, or this postmodern world and age will finally “deconstruct” us Christians all! Even as I write this there are other “so-called” Christians, who are attacking the very center of our faith, the TEXT itself! These “neo-iconoclasts” (The Dunedin School) who post against the ESV, and the ESV Study Bible. The enemy is within “the camp”! Again, as we fiddle.. we burn!
WE must either learn to “read” together, or this postmodern world and age will finally “deconstruct” us Christians all!
Fr. R.,
So no need to be so dogmatic as a MacArthur?
I’m not aware of the “neo-iconoclasts” attacks on the ESV and so on. Do you have a link? Thanks.
T.C.
I like MacArthur overall, he is a pit-bull. But he is not the only pastor-teacher in the Church. We need the whole Church Catholic!
As to these new “neo-iconoclasts” look up the Dunedin School. Also Jim West has their site. Ms. Steph Fisher is one of them also. She is also on Jim’s blog list.
Fr. R.,
In this case, even if we do not agree with him, we must respect his decision. Thanks for the info on “neo-iconoclasts.”
T.C. here is the Dunedin School site..
http://dunedinschool.wordpress.com/
The Dunedin School (so-called), is really a modern Enlightement movement. But it has passed well beyond any truth in existentialism.
“in modern religion, after the initial adolescent iconoclasm, including the rejection of the ‘establishment’, man [came] of age.”
Lloyd Geering, precursor of the Dunedin School, former professor of OT Studies, Theological Hall, Knox College, Dunedin, NZ
“Intellect’s true concern is a negation of reification.”
Max Horkeimer and Theodor W. Adorno, ‘Dialectic of Enlightenment: Philosopical Fragments, 1947.
PS..Reif – Chiefly of Scottish meaning; Robbery; plunder. Thus their so-called “non-reified” approach to textuality, which denies the existence of “the text itself.” – Go figure? Fr. R.
Thanks for the link. I just finished reading “about” the school. But why should such a school be taken seriously? Seems too self-contradictory to me.
T.C.,
Well they are bloggers, and as you can see have written against the ESV Study Bible, and the Intro to 2 Peter therein. We should take any serious who stand in such blatant hate of the NT and Scripture revelation. And they claim to be Christians? And your “neo-iconoclast” types? These become if not checked, a modern type conscience…postmodern and deconstructionists!
Fr. R.,
Well, I guess they want to make a name for themselves. I guess the popularity of the ESV SB made it an easy target. But such is hardly warrant serious consideration, at least to me. Yes, as I was reading “postmodern” and “deconstructionism” were floating around in my head.
But such critics are often shortlived. Just ask the Jesus Seminar fellows.
T.C.
Yeah, but sadly the SBL society publishes their papers. Scholarship? Not to my mind! But, to each his own I guess. Since I just turned 60, I have seen a few things in my time also. Death to a Judeo-Christian world view before my eyes!
Well, the SBL needs to generate interests among scholars. Ha!
I wouldn’t quite say “Death to a Judeo-Christian world view.” I’d say these philosophical and world view challenges are cyclical, maybe a nuance here and there.
The Big Mac is a fundamentalist – his remarks reflect that kind of thinking, i.e., “only my understanding of what the “true nature” of the gospel is the right one and all others are flawed or wrong. His resistance to the EOC and Rome also reveal his fundie approach.
I am not sure I agree with signing the Manhattan Declaration but not for the reasons the Big Mac won’t.
A fundie forever.
I would echo Brian’s sentiments. Though I am a little more inclined to sign the declaration, TC’s thoughts have helped me think through what the statement is about.
I actually don’t see it as the political right co-opting the church in America. I think the biggest reason for this declaration is to show the Church has the right in this nation to stand in the public arena and give some tough opinions. It’s possible we don’t agree on the points they picked, but they still have a right to stand in the public arena in this nation (so far).
MacArthur is one of the finest expositor’s I will probably encounter, but his theological views are so narrow it will be difficult for him to stomach seeing some Orthodox priests and friends in heaven. Maybe he will get his own room…
Apprentice,
John MacArthur and Al Mohler are really tight. I do find it interesting that they both share different views on this document.
I don’t know. But I still see it as making a political stance of some kind.
I think the biggest reason for this declaration is to show the Church has the right in this nation to stand in the public arena and give some tough opinions.
You might be right after all.
Even his expository approach is filtered through his fundie stance.
Nah, he’ll be a new MacArthur, so no solo room.
Sometimes I feel like we as believers have little faith that God changes people from the inside out and that we have to bring about His kingdom from the outside in. Rather than changing the heart and letting changed living come about, we feel that we must first change behavior on the outside and somehow this will change the heart. I think of the early believers and how radical their “one God” living seemed to their Greek/Roman culture neighbors. Even though they may have been excluded form the marketplace and political arena for their beliefs, God continued to use their example of Kingdom living to change peoples hearts. Kingdom living is truly counter cultural in any culture.
John,
How does The Manhattan Declaration fit into that?
Happy Thanksgiving to all.
I rarely agree with Mac but this is one place I think he is in the right in several respects.
First off this document calls for legal compulsion to Christian behavior. In other words it intrinsically argues that belief is irrelevant and behavior key. To the writers of this document it doesn’t matter what believe regarding marriage merely what by force of law they do. I can’t think of anything that more profoundly rejects the gospel than this. The issue of religious coercion is one of the key differences between the baptists and the catholic faiths historically. I think Mac is absolutely 100% right in arguing that religious coercion is not a ground on which Christians should stand together. While the document doesn’t sound coercive by fundamentally confusing sacramental marriage with the bureaucratic function of state marriage: right to enter into certain types of joint debts, distribution of pension/retirement benefits, inclusion on insurance plans… it confuses the realm of the state with the realm of the church. And he is absolutely 100% correct in asserting that this confusion is theologically catholic. It is part of the Dominion movement in his own branch of Christianity as well, but Mac has to the best of my knowledge never support dominionist thinking.
Secondly, the document is historically inaccurate in its preamble if one is to include all the main Christians branches in the term “Christian”, a few examples:
* In Europe, Christians challenged the divine claims of kings and successfully fought to establish the rule of law and balance of governmental powers
Far from fighting the divine right of kings it was under Christianity such a right was established. Many of the early Protestant Churches (the Anglican church being a prime example) broke with the Roman Church among other reasons because the Pope was undermining this divine right.
* And in America, Christian women stood at the vanguard of the suffrage movement.
The vanguard of the suffrage movement were generally atheists, deists and occultists. Christians by and large when the movement was emerging where on the opposite side enshrining ideas from the Napoleonic code into law. When the sufferage movement popularized it had a large Christian following, and certainly Charles Finney did a great job in moving it from the fringe into the mainstream. But “the vanguard” is simply false.
and of course:
It was Christians who combated the evil of slavery: Papal edicts in the 16th and 17th centuries decried the practice of slavery and first excommunicated anyone involved in the slave trade
Where who do they think was organizing, running the slave trade, Martians?
___
The biggest problem is of course the third claim, that the conscience of Christians should be protected intermixing with the 1st and 2nd which are designed to prohibit other’s freedoms. I happen to agree 100% that the weakening of conscience laws and the aggressive applications of anti-discriminations statues is wrong. But I don’t see how intermixing this issue with the first 2 doesn’t essentially amount to: people who agree with us have a right to conscience and those who disagree do not.
CD-Host,
Same here. Good to have you back on the blogging circuit.
It is part of the Dominion movement in his own branch of Christianity as well, but Mac has to the best of my knowledge never support dominionist thinking.
Ah.
But I don’t see how intermixing this issue with the first 2 doesn’t essentially amount to: people who agree with us have a right to conscience and those who disagree do not.
Then it’s when it comes from outside.
Thanks. Still busy at work so I’m more of an infrequent poster than really back.
CD,
Ah, well, your insighful contributions on a wide range of issues are missed.
I guess my point is that you can make declarations daily if you like, but it all comes down to telling the Gospel to people, letting God change people’s hearts, and then having them live Kingdom lives. I think the Manhatten Declaration, while not preaching the Gospel, does give a view of how the Gospel is lived out by Christians. And I think that is what those who signed it meant it to be. The declaration will not change anyone’s heart, but it does put forth a view of how they think Christians should live in society, even if it is against the pervasive culture.
The declaration will not change anyone’s heart, but it does put forth a view of how they think Christians should live in society, even if it is against the pervasive culture.
John,
Then a declaration of this nature is not needed, if you’re correct.
“Then a declaration of this nature is not needed, if you’re correct.”
I may not be correct, but it is what I believe. I think this declaration is not needed.
MacArthur is glad to have you but for different reasons.
You might also note that Alistair Begg didn’t sign either. He posted an article on why, which echoed some of MacArthur’s sentiments, but stated stronger.
http://www.truthforlife.org/resources/article/manhattan-declaration/
Jonathan,
Thanks for the link. Yes, stronger indeed.
That old ECT came up as well.
T.C.
I will say it again, this shows that the issue is not just the “evangelical” view of the Gospel, but the encroachment of postmodernism and deconstruction on our Western Judeo-Christian culture! With this more and more, all real Biblical faith based groups, Judeo to Protestant(‘s), Catholic and even the E. Orthodox, need to stand in some common ground. This is what I see at least with the MD.
Fr. R.,
Though we may not all agree with the “Fathers” of the document, I believe we must agree with the obvious threat that you outlined.
Our pastors need to be more open-minded on this. I feel that those who do not sign are either not confident in what they believe or don’t want to appear to be giving way to compromise. There are a lot of things that RCs, EOs, mainliners and evangelicals can agree on, and they don’t even have be theological issues like social issues, (ie, abortion, inspiration of scripture, etc.).
Kevin, true, but MacArthur and Beggs both see compromise in respect to the very nature of the Gospel. “To go against conscience is neither safe nor right,” ala Luther.
And yet our “conscience” must surely be Christian, and Christlike! (Heb. 4:12-13). And not our personal hobby-horse. The Word of God alone is the “discerner” (kritikos, Gk.) only here. Only God and His Word have both the skill and the capable judgment!
Fr. R.,
True, but can we fault one whose actions reflect a conscience that has been shaped by their understanding of the word, whether we agree or not?
T.C.
Yes there is the rub, we all have somewhat different elements and experiences in our shape to Scripture. For me at least Barth has been a real help in catholicity here. We must seek some form of biblical anthropology, that is always incarnational and solid in Christology. Since I am older I also got to hear Torrance (TF). The incarnation is much larger than even our best creedal definitions, and as John Paul the II wrote: “The mystery of the Church”, it’s “invisible dimension”, is “larger than the structure and organization of the Church”, which are “at the service of the mystery.” What this means to me is that there will always be some “elect” members of Christ who for whatever reason, stand outside the normal place of the Church. Only heaven and judgment will show us this reality! (Matt. 25:31-46) But we still must all as Christians continue to be that salvific people and place, in ourselves and in the whole mystery that is Christ incarnate. There are no simple and easy answers in this fallen and broken world.
T.C.
Well of course this must be measured by the depth and shape of ones conscience. If it causes one to stand outside of the biblical and theological norms, both can we say “right” or “left”, then the Church must stand and speak in the orthodox measure. But this should be done in a catholic and collective manner, so to avoid sectarian and narrow thinking. Which can be a real negative for the Church when it seeks for some kind of unity, and may I add not a uniformity. Such seems to be the MD to my mind at least.
Fr. R.,
I do agree with the “invisible dimension” of the church and its “catholicity” and the fact that “Only heaven and judgment will show us this reality.”
But for now, as we await this eschatological reality, it seems like we cannot avoid this “sectarian and narrow thinking.”
Again, our decisions are informed, at times against better judgment, from our fallen nature.
Of course I too long for the unity Jesus envisioned and you seem to be echoing. But…