If you’re asking these questions then you need to hear the latest White Horse Inn program. It’s available online (free) or on CD (extended version) and, of course, on the radio. This is a balanced, intelligent, and critical survey of the range of topics on which Tom Wright, the Anglican Bishop of Durham, has written. The WHI guys are appreciative of Wright’s gifts and contributions, as they should be, whilst rightly critical of his radical re-casting of the doctrine of justification. This is a program not to be missed.
Taking up Wright seems to not only have unmistakable ramifications for the doctrine of justification but also those categories near and dear to any two-kingdomite.
The idea THAT “Jesus–not Caesar–is Lord” without being clear as to HOW bothers. One of the ironies in Wright is his fairly clear criticisms of some current events happening in the desert (and elsewhere) and seeming to think that the HOW question is negligible. What rushes in to fill the void can only be, well, a lot of what got us here in the first place, good Bishop.
Hi Zrim,
I was impressed by how much of what NTW is saying about Lordship and Kingdom resonates with the “Christian America,” theocrat, and theonomy crowds. Here’s another connection between NTW and the FV. Though Tom’s politics differs from theirs, they can capitalize on his ecclesiology and redefinition of justification and his view of the KOG to their own theocratic/theonomic ends.
Scott,
Exactly.
Fun as they can be, sometimes the dot-to-dot books activity books in all these things can also get sort of dull…anybody have any fresh crossword puzzles they could throw into the Outhouse?
Zrim,
How about a status report. Just how many reformed confessional churches are going right now, and you have to distinguish them from their kuyperian brothers, and fv prodigals (We’ll throw the theonomists/reconstructionists in this pile just for convenience sake). I think a geographical and numerical breakdown would be interesting. Have no Idea, how you come up with it, but It would be revealing. For some reason the number 600,000.00 is sticking in my head, but I’m sure that number does not make the distinctions this status report would make. I’ll give you an FYI; In the OPC there is about a 4 maybe 5 church grouping of “klinean” sympathetic churches in Texas. We need our own Fodor’s church guide.
I used to say that there are about 500K NAPARC folks. Recently I learned that the 300K reported in the PCA is probably only 2/3 of the total PCA numbers. Turns out that about 1/3 of PCA churches don’t report membership. There may be another 100K in the PCA that are unreported, so it might be that there are 600K folks in the NAPARC congregations. Of that number there is a long list of possible classifications of which “confessional” is just one sub-group.
Dr Clark,
I knew I had that 600k number on good authority.
Man that’s a small number. Yeesh. I need to start redirecting my funds out west.
So you’re saying you could fit them all into, say, an Outhouse?
Sure!
Someone, who probably should be an Outhouse Saint, but who, for the sake of what is left of his reputation, shall remain anonymous once suggested a new, comprehensive Reformed denomination:
Christian Reformed And Presbyterian
I think that denom/fed would be right at home in an Outhouse
Bring your charmin coupons
Scott, I don’t normally cackle aloud as I read (it scares people, including me), but that’s some good funny right there.
I would be careful to equate or tie together FV and Theonomy so tightly.
Ben, I would not be as careful to tie them together. They are linked based on their proponents. Since it is a matter of history that many Theonomists (or post-Theonomists) have easily become FV, their must be some hermeneutical cross-pollenation.
KBennett,
Sure, Kennedy was orthodox on justification, but I have always wondered what it may mean that Horne’s path leads back to Coral Gables. There could be nothing to it, but insofar as theonomy (in any of its variations found amidst the palm trees of Ft. Lauderdale) is Calvinism’s answer to Methodism, there could be some cross-pollenation. Given the broader history to which you correctly allude, I think there’s more to it than not.
Hi Ben,
Here’s my response.
Thanks Dr. Clark