In 1788, shortly after the Rebels gained their autonomy, the Presbyterian synod of Philadelphia and New York met to alter the Westminster Confession of Faith. This confession was originally intended to unite the Church of England (Anglicans) with their disgruntled Puritans. The confession obviously did not work in this way, but rather it was used as a confessional standard for the Puritans, and what is now known as the Presbyterian church.
The alteration of 1788 sought to rid the Church of all relationship with the state, including the traditional protection that the state was to give the Church. This fit well with the new American declaration, which claimed “freedom of religion,” amongst other liberties. Below you will see the sections that have been taken out, as well as a small section from the Larger Catechism.
Chapter XXIII
III. The civil magistrate may not assume to himself the administration of the Word and sacraments, or the power of the keys of the kingdom of heaven:(e) yet he hath authority, and it is his duty, to take order, that unity and peace be. preserved in the Church, that the truth of God be kept pure and entire; that all blasphemies and heresies be suppressed; all corruptions and abuses in worship and discipline prevented or reformed; and all the ordinances of God duly settled, administrated, and observed.(f) For the better effecting whereof, he hath power to call synods, to be present at them, and to provide that whatsoever is transacted in them be according to the mind of God.(g)(e) II Chron. 26:18 with Matt. 18:17 and Matt. 16:19; I Cor. 12:28, 29; Eph. 4:11, 12; I Cor. 4:1, 2; Rom. 10:15; Heb. 5:4.
(f) Isa. 49:23; Ps. 122:9; Ezra 7:23, 25, 26, 27, 28; Lev. 24:16; Deut. 13:5, 6, 12; I Kings 18:4; I Chron. 13:1 to 9; II Kings 23:1 to 26; II Chron. 34:33; II Chron. 15:12, 13.
(g) II Chron. 19:8, 9, 10, 11; II Chron. 29 and 30; Matt. 2:4, 5.Chapter XXXI
II. As magistrates may lawfully call a synod of ministers, and other fit persons, to consult and advise with, about matters of religion;(b) so, if magistrates be open enemies to the Church, the ministers of Christ of themselves, by virtue of their office, or they, with other fit persons upon delegation from their Churches, may meet together in such assemblies.(c)(b) Isa. 49:23; I Tim. 2:1, 2; II Chron. 19:8, 9, 10, 11; II Chron. 29, 30 chaps.; Matt. 2:4, 5; Prov. 11:14.
(c) Acts 15:2, 4, 22, 23, 25.Westminster Larger Catechism
Question 109: What are the sins forbidden in the second commandment?Answer: The sins forbidden in the second commandment are, all devising, counseling, commanding, using, and anywise approving, any religious worship not instituted by God himself; tolerating a false religion… [this is the part of the LC that was taken out. Can you believe it?]
The Result of This Alteration
This deserves an entire book, based on an Anglican and Loyalist perspective! Please allow me to briefly touch on it, though. First, for those of us that do not believe in neutrality, that as Cornelius Van Til said, there is only “theonomy or autonomy,” we must conclude that a nation with no moral or spiritual standard/compase cannot last long (Mathew 12:25). A community of people must have a standard. And indeed, today’s America does; she does have a religion, it is called Liberalism: the Arian (anti-Trinitarian) moral relativistic and spiritually plural standard that can be found in - to use as an example of the many - the Unitarian Church. So is this our choice? We would rather our nation be Unitarian than Orthodox? Remember, we will be judged by ever idle word we say (Matthew 12:26). And since God knows our heart we cannot escape this by simply not “voicing” our beliefs.
Besides the cultural chaos that the rebel statesmen and clergymen have ignited, there is also a spiritual chaos that we are now dealing with. Because we can no longer, in right standing with the Church and Sate, publicly and dogmatically declare a religion to be false, we must now become the “Church of Didactics.”
Forced into Didactic and Rhetoric
Being a Church of didactic and rhetoric is very difficult. You cannot say with much authority that, say for instance, a church that does not practice communion and that teaches all sorts of heresy, is a false church. You cannot even say that its worship is wrong. Each church is an authority unto itself and is not bound to any of the traditional laws we once held to.
To be a didactic church means that we must imply and insinuate rather than rebuke and exhort (2 Timothy 4:2) that the other is in error. For instance, today I received a door-hanger that said, “is your view of church a community of people that is boring, that demands money, and is intolerant to modern dress?” Give me a break! This is about the third church I have seen, in my zip code alone, in the past month, that has distributed one of these fliers. This pitch is the feminist way of saying “we believe that those churches that sing hymns and Psalms are not edifying her people; that churches who pass a tithe are greedy, and that churches that teach ethics are legalists.”
We are now being forced to become professional insinuates! It is no longer tolerable for a church to say what she means (Matthew 5:27; 2 Corinthians 1:17,18). She must insinuate and manipulate the public into believing their church is orthodox. Notice that these churches that post this garbage on their web sites and fliers are not rebuked but rather they are deemed “Evangelicals.” Well, guess what, they are not Evangelicals, by original definition. Evangelicals, when they were originally organized, were creedal, liturgical, and in many ways Calvinistic.
Because of the new American and Presbyterian declarations we can no longer turn heretics over to be dealt with properly. We cannot even say they are in sin. There is no standard of biblical interpretation. There is the Bible, but no one can say what the Bible means (anti-ecclesiastical independents).
New Wave of Evangelism
The so-called Evangelicals are drawing millions of unbelievers into their fold, knowing that these unbelievers will not give the traditional church the time of the day. They are giving in to the modern ethics of our culture for the sake of gaining a so-called convert. This is making it very difficult for traditional churches to evangelize the lost.
Yesterday, I received a door-hanger that stated a particular church was giving away X-boxes to new coming people. Do you think Paul would have attempted this bait and switch tactic? I think it would be one thing if the “X-boxer” was expecting a traditional and reverent church, but they are not. The advertisement clearly portrays the church as an X-box style of church - videos, pop music, skits…the works.
Now, the traditional church is forced not to evangelize the streets, but to evangelize the Evangelical church. The unbeliever must first see how RIDICULOUS the Evangelical church is before he can submit to the historical Church. I suspect that this type of evangelism will increase in the near future, and the so-called Evangelicals will be in crisis.
Comments
While I fundamentally agree with your sentiment in regard to the excessively seeker-friendly churches, we do need to realize that it is not so clear-cut. I have come to know several non-traditional (liturgically-speaking) evangelical churches that do an excellent job in preaching the salvation and liberation (from sins, not suffering) found in the cross and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The greatest example of this can be found in the Passion Conferences held every year (plus numerous smaller events on college campuses throughout the year). These include music from some superb and faithful bands (e.g., David Crowder Band, Chris Tomlin) and sermons by Louis Giglio. These bands and Pastor Giglio give a consistently God-honoring and gospel-based message in the best of the evangelical tradition (e.g. Isaac Watts, the Wesley’s, William Law). They fill stadiums but manage to do so without the heresy of prosperity theology. I know lives (including mine) that have been genuinely touched by such ministries coming from the evangelical free tradition (Giglio went to Southwestern Baptist Seminary and David Crowder does the music ministry at University Baptist Church at Baylor). I say all this just to balance our perspective a little. I love traditional Anglican liturgy and spirituality, but there is much we can gain from the free church tradition. Why should it be King’s College Choir or David Crowder, and not both?
Okay, I’ll write it again.
I’m so glad I found your site, Mike. I’ve seen you around on varous comment boards (Reformed Catholicism, I believe) and appreciated your viewpoint (since it is virtually the same as mine!).
Anyway, regarding this post here, wouldn’t you agree that our national leaders from Washington till “W” have always been functionally unitarian?
Second, do you see an application of your “church of didactic and rhetoric” model to the FV controversy? On a related vein here’s an ironic piece from Principium Unitatis.
Regards,
Andrew Matthews
Kevin, I think it is fine to have Christian concerts, but not to bring those concerts into the worship service. To worship God on the Lord’s Day is to be separated from all else in life.
I do think that someone can be touched by God at an Evangelical service. Something is better than nothing, but there will come a day when that person will have to move on.
Andrew, thanks for the kind words! I think, yes, most if not all presidents have had a strong Unitarian scent to them. George Washington, in my view, did not set a good standard for the office.
As far as the FV controversy, I think that yes, the FV churches are being forced to insinuate everything, but only because they do not want to join the Anglican church. Therefore, they must hang out in the wrong camp and tolerate all the persecution. They could be much stronger as Anglicans, in my opinion.
Doctrinally, I think the FV guys would be better off in the Anglican communion. Since our confessional standards are more flexible thn the WCF or even the 3 Forms, they wouldn’t be persecuted. H
owever, I think there is significant difference between their “covenant renewal” model of worship versus BCP liturgy. So there is some incompatibility between FV and Anglican worship, though I am not all that informed as to the differences between the two.
I’d like to hear your thoughts about George Washington sometime. Do you have any initial thoughts?
I plan on posting on George within the next month. But, well, he was a rich snob, disrespectfull to his loyalist mother, and also disrespectful to the Anglican faith. I hope I don’t get in trouble for saying all that;)
Well, I’ll look forward to your post. What do you think about the compatibility between BCP and covenant renewall worship?
The Covenant model, to me, is more family-based than Covenant-based. The Covenants were established not with the heads of households but with the prophetic leadership of the Church. There is sort of a lack of authority in the Covenant model, especially regarding the Eucharist. It’s high church for modern Presbys, though.
Interesting. I have been arguing for the notion that families (& even nations) can be brought into the covenant through their covenant heads. I guess as a good Anglican I’d have to argue for these familial covenant heads coming in under the covenant headship of the bishop. What say you?
Yeah, I think both the household and the nation must pass through the Bishop (the pastor resides in his place when the Bishop is not present). Otherwise autonomy reigns. The Covenant model, I think, is not really what it seems. The household head does need to be in good standings but he is not the final say when it all comes down. And the Eucharist is an expression of it all coming down, if you knows what I’m sayin. This is why pastors and bishops have the stricter judgement.
[...] Anglicans in Africa are saying that liberal Anglicans in America are “satanic.” It seems that the stone that has been rejected is becoming the chief cornerstone??? You never know, Africa could become the new America, where “religious freedom” can be expressed. Islam would need to be destroyed there, but that can happen with the right leadership in place. Hopefully though, rather than “religious” freedom they will obtain “Christian” freedom; because Islam is a religion. This is why America is in so much trouble: although we complain about Islam and liberalism, we invited them to our party! [...]