Evan Roberts & the Welsh Revival of 1904-1905: His "Preaching": Part 3 of 22

The content of this post is now available in the study of:

1.) Evan Roberts

2.) The Welsh Revival of 1904-1905

3.) Jessie Penn-Lewis

on the faithsaves.net website. Please click on the people above to view the study.  On the FaithSaves website the PDF files may be easiest to read.

 

You are also encouraged to learn more about Keswick theology and its errors, as well as the Biblical doctrine of salvation, at the soteriology page at Faithsaves.

Quirks of Fundamentalism Distract from Its Real Problems

My life story begins on the shores of the Wabash River in a little farming town in Western Indiana.  I don't remember hearing the word "fundamentalism" in a small independent Baptist church.  It was all God and Bible.  My term in the bowels of fundamentalism covered 1974 to 1987 after a move to Watertown, Wisconsin.

While in fundamentalism, I didn't understand it, because I was, as I say, living inside the barrel and when someone is living there, his world looks like a barrel.  I've heard another metaphor that sounds bad, but it does depict a true quality, and that's "incestuous," according to the specific meaning:  "characterized by mutual relationships that are intimate and exclusive to the detriment of outsiders."  You also hear a fishing analogy, "small pond," where a certain little fish could seem and self-identify as big.  Living in fundamentalism was Siam before foreign invasion, hindered by a lack of outside perspective.

Some current analyses of fundamentalism by former fundamentalists misdiagnose its defects.  What I read is overreaction to the extent of pendulum swing.  Those, who have ejected headlong into evangelicalism or new evangelicalism, convey their myopic impressions with focus on idiosyncratic scruples instead of biblical and theological exposition.  Fundamentalism has problems, but now, hemorrhaging its next generation, it elevates to advice the asymmetrical screeches of its most noxious detractors, conforming policy and practice to their complaints, very often eliminating vital distinctions at the same time as overlooking its essential, root problems.

As an example, both present and bygone fundamentalists dissect the escapades of a latter in now part eight of his series.  The banner of his blog, called adayinhiscourt, features a bottle of alcohol and a vinyl record spinning on a turntable, apparently two crucial components for present Christian success, foretelling a future well-done from God in His heavenly court.  Many comments discuss an era of fundamentalist aversion for the chained leather biker wallet, symptomatic of the slide toward Gomorrah.  An aversion to such association stands as the sort of issue emblematic of awfulness, supplying a caravan of refugees from fundamentalism.  The solution would be, of course, to terminate all such judgment, fueling a meteoric rise of missing authenticity.

Fundamentalism's repudiation of worldly fads that associate with ungodly philosophies had been one of its blessings.  Fundamentalism acknowledged that things really do mean things.  Appearances and sounds carry with them a message and meaning sometimes more powerful than any doctrinal statement.  If you isolate any one of these items, quirks, and treat them like they are or have been indispensable markers of true conversion, you might have something to talk about.  I've noticed this to be a constant battle in any church, because it is easier to reduce the Christian life to circumcision like the Galatians instead of fruit of the Spirit, a notable difference being that circumcision wasn't required, but, for instance, a standard of modesty is.

The real problems in fundamentalism aren't standards.  Galatians doesn't teach lowering standards.  A saved person obeys the father out of love as a son and not a slave.  He's not tutored by standards but internally impelled by the Holy Spirit.  The Holy Spirit still, however, doesn't produce the works of the flesh, those of whom do such will not inherit the kingdom of God.  The problems of fundamentalism relate first to the imprecision of its doctrines of salvation and sanctification, and those same problems, that anyone reading and watching knows, exist all over professing Christianity.  They are far worse in evangelicalism.  They just get to drink alcohol while they have those same problems.

The quirks of fundamentalists just distract from its real problems, ones never to be solved by and in fundamentalism if they won't admit them.  I'm not expecting it, especially with the focus on the quirks as the real problems.  The false doctrine and practice and growing pragmatism of fundamentalism will destroy it along with all the young people, whether they are wearing straight legged, flared, or pleated pants.  Both evangelicalism and fundamentalism are infatuated with abstractions that portend the worst for their futures.

Kay Jay Vee Potpourri

Mike Harding writes:

Most of the arguments in the KJVO debate have been adequately answered in the numerous books written by both Fundamentalists and Conservative Evangelicals.  Dr. Bill Combs has written extensive articles in the DBTS journal debunking the false theories of KJV Onlyism.

In the past, I wrote a post debunking the false assertion that Combs has refuted the presuppositions for perfect preservation of scripture, so I'm not going to repeat that -- it's still there to read.  Combs's articles weren't written for people like myself -- it's obvious they were written for his own people with their minds already made up.

Bill Hardecker in a comment section of my last two posts (here & here), wrote:

Conservative evangelicals and historic fundamentalists have no problem standing on the Scriptures alone for their apologetic on the inspiration of the Holy Bible. They got the doctrine of inspiration down pat. Inspiration is recognized, received, yea even canonized. But where may we find their doctrine of preservation? It is virtually non-existent. Many (dare I say all) modern evangelical/fundamental Systematic Theology textbooks contain next to nothing. Differing from systematic theology but nonetheless systematic in their theology, The historic confessions recognizes the preservation of Scriptures. 

I've written many pieces here, making the same point.  They ignore the historic doctrine and the biblical presupposition.  They disregard the absence of a doctrinal statement, which would undergird their position.  The critical or eclectic text position did not proceed from teaching of scripture.  All I've read in dealing with preservation of scripture, as I've pronounced multiple times here, is a criticism of the biblical and historical position.  That's all you're going to get.  You can't find a biblical eclectic or critical text presupposition, because it doesn't exist.

What does it mean that modern textual criticism and its accompanying modern versions deviates from biblical and historical doctrine?  Something that divides from orthodoxy, what is that?  I think folks like myself have been very respectful, too much so probably, to the purveyors and those acceding to this novel and different view from the stream of orthodox doctrine.  Like God in Isaiah 41:21, I say, "Produce your cause, saith the Lord; bring forth your strong reasons," and I get nothing.  Daniel Wallace refers to a journal article that he wrote, one that is now typical, that is full of errors.  I've found that nobody cares.  They are angry when one points them out.

Harding hints at a biblical proof for his position without saying that it is one.  Not only isn't it a proof, but it comes with very serious consequences if one takes his assertion to its completion.  He said:

The fact that the LXX is quoted throughout the NT by the NT authors is proof enough that the KJVO understanding of miraculous, perfect preservation in one line of manuscripts is not biblical. 

This is the only argument I have ever read as an attempt to go to scripture to provide biblical support for a critical or eclectic text position.  I could say, at least its proponents are trying, except that the implications are so very bad (I'll explain briefly, but I have already here and here).  It isn't actually a biblical position, because it's not making a point from biblical teaching or propositional statements, but based upon an assumption that scripture does not make, that is, the New Testament quotes the Septuagint.

One, for more than any other reason, the LXX is by almost everyone's estimation, a corrupt translation.  It doesn't match up with the Hebrew Masoretic.  This would be saying that Jesus quoted a known corrupt Bible and was fine with it.  I've not read any of the proponents deal with the implications of their own argument.  They throw it out as a reactive argument, not the way to do theology, I guess, because either it doesn't matter to them or they haven't thought through its ramifications to a high view of scripture.

Two, we don't have a biblical basis for Jesus' usage of the LXX, because He exclusively follows the divisions of the Hebrew Old Testament, not the LXX (cf. Luke 24:44).

Three, the usage of the Old Testament in the New is not identical to the LXX either.  Very often the usage of Jesus follows the Hebrew Masoretic.

Four, a historical and biblical position with a high view of scripture is the one taken by John Owen in his biblical theology, and men at least need to deal with Owen.   Owen didn't say, like Harding assumes, that the usage of the Old Testament was "fact" and "proof" of authentication of the LXX.

Much more could be said here about Harding's LXX statement, but it's thrown out, as I see it, for people ignorant of what's going on or what it means.  It opens a can of worms that's bigger than what these men think is a KJVO problem.  In other words, it creates a far bigger problem to deal with a perceived problem.

I can't take the time to answer every clueless statement, but I want to answer one as a representation of what I believe.  Someone named Darrell Post writes unchallenged:

Kent not only believes the 'preservation passages' refer to the written copies, he has proposed which copies are the right ones.

Scripture teaches the preservation of words and that's what I believe.  Scripture is written.  That's part of a biblical belief.  A copy is something that is written, so all the words and every one of them are available in copies.  I've never said I believe one perfect copy has made its way through all the way through history.  All those like Post, who do not believe that God preserved every and all of His words in written form, do not believe what God said He would do.  The denial of preservation is an unproven assertion.  The existence of textual variants doesn't prove God didn't do what He said He would do in preservation of scripture.

Regarding a graspable, comprehensible translation, the vernacular argument, Andy Efting asks:  "Regarding the Defined KJV -- doesn't the fact that there is a need for this type of thing prove Mark's point?"  Mark Ward says use many translations for the purpose of understanding.  I don't know if he makes that point in his book, but he's made it multiple times in interviews about the book and articles related to the book.  The Defined King James aids in understanding, and Mark Ward implies or assumes that every translation should be compared with multiple translations.  A Defined King James (read editorial review and consider whether that Bible is doing what Ward says that he wants) seems to be right in the wheelhouse of what Mark Ward wants, definition of terms that alleviate the "false friends" to which Ward refers.

Someone said that Ward's argument for the update of the KJV, to rid it of false friends and archaic words, hasn't been answered.  I have answered it multiple occasions even before Ward made his argument (here, here, and here especially), but also after he wrote the book (here).  I'm not opposed to an update according to certain parameters based upon biblical teaching or principles.   As almost anyone knows, there are already multiple updates already done, which themselves illustrate why it is wrought with so many harmful possibilities (as one example consider the very weird and expensive update called "The Pure Word," which I have a copy and have examined).

I ask, why are critical or eclectic text men so interested in separating men from the King James Version?  They say that they want more people to understand the Bible and these people are losing out.  I have a hard time believing it.  Love wants to believe the best, and I want to, but I also know not to be gullible.  I'm more concerned that these same men don't believe the biblical and historical doctrine of the preservation of scripture.

Archaeological Evidence for the New Testament

I am working on a book dealing with archaeological, historical, and prophetic evidence for the Old Testament and the New Testament. The book is intended to be a helpful overview and introduction that can help both skeptics of Scripture see the intellectual evidence for Christianity and help normal Christians without much background in the subject understand the great evidence for God's Word.

A while ago I published on my website a version of the Old Testament evidence:  Archaeological Evidence for the Old Testament as the Word of God.  I have now added a New Testament section: Archaeological Evidence for the New Testament as the Word of God.  The book is not yet completed, but I believe there is enough useful information there to help both skeptics and the people of God.  (Much of the information in it was used in my recent debate with Shabir Ally, which is not yet live, and which went very well by the grace of and blessing of Jehovah, and in answer to the prayers and fasting of the saints.)  I have included a number of helpful and interesting pictures also, and intend to add some more of these.

If you are not sure of answers to questions such as the following, I would recommend the book to you:

1.) What evidence exists that Matthew wrote the Gospel of Matthew?

2.) What evidence exists that Mark wrote the Gospel of Mark?

3.) What evidence exists that Luke wrote the Gospel of Luke and the Book of Acts?

4.) What evidence exists that John wrote the Gospel of John?

5.) Did one or more of the synoptic Gospel writers copy from the others, as in the modern liberal idea that Mark and "Q" were the sources for Matthew and Luke, or were the synoptic Gospels independent accounts?

6.) Is there any evidence that "Q" ever existed?

7.) When were Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John written?

8.) Was there legendary, evolutionary development in the Gospels?

9.) What is the earliest manuscript evidence for the Gospels?

10.) Is there unmistakable evidence for predictive prophecy in the New Testament?

11.) What are the earliest testimonies to Christ's death and resurrection?

12.) How strong is the historical evidence that Jesus Christ rose from the dead?

13.) Are the New Testament books accurate history?

14.) How does the New Testament compare to other works, such as the Quran or Buddhist writings, that claim to be Divine revelation?

Important features of the book include its Bible-believing Baptist perspective; its acceptance of the testimony of early Christianity on the dates of the Gospels (which, sadly, one can even graduate from a supposedly evangelical or fundamentalist Bible college and be entirely ignorant of); and its acceptance of the testimony of early Christianity on synoptic independence and rejection of liberal theories that many in evangelicalism and now even in fundamentalism are willing to adopt. May it be a blessing.

TDR

The Meaning of Fideism, the Preservation of Scripture, and King James Only

Kind of Part One on Monday

When people don't believe in hell, why don't they believe in hell?  Scientific studies don't show hell exists.  There is no empirical evidence for hell.  You can't tunnel somewhere or take a ship somewhere to find it.  I don't know of any expeditions in the works or future digs to find hell.

Hell is eternal torment.  Even annihilation, the belief of some, is preferable.  I think most would say far preferable.  It's so horrible, hell, that the invention of a kind of holding tank for hell, purgatory, was invented as an alternative.  Except scripture doesn't teach annihilation or purgatory.  They might make sense to someone, but they aren't in the Bible.  We believe in hell, what it actually is, because of what the Bible says.  That's all we've got for it.  It's fideistic -- no empirical evidence, against human reasoning, just based on scripture alone.

The hardest things to believe require faith.  You can believe some easy things that don't seem like they are faith.  I believe sin is destructive.  That's not hard.  I can see it.  The Bible teaches it, but it's not hard to believe.  Some you just believe, even though it's hard, and that's how you know you're operating by faith.  I agree that scripture has to teach it, but you believe it anyway.  Someone can be weak in faith and believe all the easiest things to believe.  The hard things to believe are also usually where the faith is attacked the most.

God told Noah to build an ark.  He had never seen it rain.  Everyone in the world was against him.  He just built it and kept building it.  Evangelism is like that for me.  I just keep preaching the gospel.  People are not believing it.  I still talk about it like it's the greatest thing ever.  It's pretty great, maybe the greatest thing ever.  I'm basing it totally on the Bible, not my reasoning and not based upon empirical evidence.

Instead of preaching the gospel today, I see marketing, which is more empirical and makes more sense as a strategy.  It's what happens when someone moves outside of faith, fideism.  Offering small toys or a gift for coming takes almost no faith, but it's where evangelicalism and fundamentalism are at.  I can go to a local evangelical church, bring the ad, and get a free gift (not salvation)!  That's instead of evangelism.  This is what you get when people are not living by faith.  There's evidence that it works.

Everything I believe doesn't have to make sense to me.  I figure it will make more sense at some future date.  For instance, the Trinity doesn't make sense to Jehovah's Witnesses, so they reject it.  As a result, they're lost.  Sad, huh?  How hard is it to believe the Trinity?  It's something that you've got to believe with nothing to see.  Is that fideistic?  In other words, you believe it just because of God's revelation.  There isn't anything historical or archaeological to that.

I claim that the perfect preservation position is fideism.  Mike Harding said, "Fideism is not Faith."  Why not?  Fide is Latin for "faith."  In a way, I don't care if something is fideistic.  I care that it is biblical, because the Bible is the basis of faith, but I do think that reason messes people up on this one.  I'm saying that faith bypasses our lying eyes.  With God there is no shadow of turning.  It's something just dependent on scripture, and you just believe it without something in the nature of total back-up in history and observation.  I'm not saying there's nothing, because I believe there is something always in history, but it's a real test of faith.  Everyone.  Everyone who is truly a Christian practices this sort of faith to hold to a lot of what he believes.  A lot.

Here's what the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy says about "fideism."  I'm not trying to make anything up.

“What indeed has Athens to do with Jerusalem?” (246) This question of the relation between reason—here represented by Athens—and faith—represented by Jerusalem—was posed by the church father Tertullian (c.160–230 CE), and it remains a central preoccupation among contemporary philosophers of religion. 

“Fideism” is the name given to that school of thought—to which Tertullian himself is frequently said to have subscribed—which answers that faith is in some sense independent of, if not outright adversarial toward, reason. In contrast to the more rationalistic tradition of natural theology, with its arguments for the existence of God, fideism holds—or at any rate appears to hold (more on this caveat shortly)—that reason is unnecessary and inappropriate for the exercise and justification of religious belief. The term itself derives from fides, the Latin word for faith, and can be rendered literally as faith-ism. “Fideism” is thus to be understood not as a synonym for “religious belief,” but as denoting a particular philosophical account of faith’s appropriate jurisdiction vis-a-vis that of reason.

If you look at a definition of rationalism.  It seems the opposite of fideism.  Is the right view actually some combination of rationalism and fideism?  I think of a couple of verses that make the point of this post relating to faith.  Romans 4:19-21 and John 20:29. 

19 And being not weak in faith, he considered not his own body now dead, when he was about an hundred years old, neither yet the deadness of Sara's womb: 20 He staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief; but was strong in faith, giving glory to God; 21 And being fully persuaded that, what he had promised, he was able also to perform. 

29 Jesus saith unto him, Thomas, because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed: blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed. 

Douglas Groothuis in Christian Apologetics: A Comprehensive Case for Biblical Faith contends (p. 72),

I will neither presuppose Christianity is true apart from the need for positive evidence (fideism, presuppositionalism or Reformed epistemology) or suppose that by amassing legions of historical facts we can convince someone of Christian truth (evidentialism). Rather, I will offer a variety of arguments that verify or confirm the Christian worldview as superior to its rivals, thus showing that Christianity alone makes the most sense of the things that matter most.

Groothius says fideism is presuppositionalism and Reformed epistemology versus evididentialism.

C. Stephen Evans in Faith Beyond Reason (pp. 17-19) classifies famed presuppositionalist Cornelius Van Til as an irrational fideist.  Then Evans also classifies Alvin Plantinga as a responsible fideist (pp. 41-47).  In a Dictionary of Christian Theology (p. 129), Alan Richardson defined it as “a pejorative term."  Even though I think people should claim fideism in a legitimate way, and it shouldn't be considered poisonous as a label, it is very often weaponized to deligitimize a biblical belief and teaching.

Fideism rests on the self-authentication of scripture.  The Bible bears evidence within itself of its own divine origins.  I've talked a lot about this on this blog (here and here and here).

I'm not saying reason is not involved.  You believe the Bible.  The Bible itself is true.  What God says is true, so you just believe it.  This is the tripping point of the rationalist and those who mock fideism.

In order to discredit fideism, I've read people who have misdefined it or given it their definition for their own purpose, to make it seem like a bad thing.  They do this at great destructive detriment to faith and to the faith.  I read an example that said that the fideism of perfect preservationism is believing that the ark is still frozen on Mount Ararat.  One can believe that, but that doesn't mean it is biblical faith.  I agree with that example, but it isn't what fideism is.  Fideism is the simple idea that we get our faith from God's revelation.  He said it, so we believe it.  That leaves the Bible as final authority for what we believe, which is unlike the critical text crowd.  They do not start with scripture.  They don't even rely on scripture for their position at all.

In a comment at SharperIron, Tyler Robbins told the world that I believe that the very words of God are found in 1598 Beza.  You will not find my having said that in any place in the world.  I've never said that.  It's close to what I believe, but what I do believe is that God's words have been preserved and available for every generation of believers.  1598 Beza, I believe, is very close.  I say that it is essentially Beza, and that should be easy to understand if you look at Scrivener's  annotated Greek New Testament.  He has all the words of all the textus receptus there.

Every word of God was available to every generation of believers before the English King James translation.  They translated from something and all five Beza editions existed before that (1556, 1565, 1582, 1589, and 1598).  Robert Stephanus had four editions before the King James Version (1546, 1549, 1550, and 1551).  My position, like the Westminster divines of the 17th century, is that the original manuscripts of the Bible are not distinct from the copies in possession.  What is an error in one copy is corrected in another.  The words are available.  You don't believe in preservation if you believe there is no settled text and that the text is in ongoing need of restoration.  You don't believe what scripture says about preservation if you believe that.  Scripture is evidence.

Not Believing God Is and Should Be A Problem in Denying Perfect Preservation of Scripture

Among interviews for his book, Authorized: The Use and Misuse of the King James Bible, Mark Ward said that the arguments from textual criticism were going nowhere in persuading people to stop using the King James Version.  He wanted to make progress, and that wasn't doing it.  So, if the Greek texts that someone used were different, that was totally fine, according to Ward, not really a big deal at all to him.  To him, you would be fine to use a contemporary translation of whichever text you think is best.  He doesn't want to fight about that, because he doesn't think the differences are very great.

I would join Ward in his unhappiness with people mangling the meaning of the Bible with whatever translation they use and if it is because they don't understand the words of the King James Version.  If you have the right words of the Bible, but you don't understand them and teach a different meaning than what they actually mean, that is really, really bad.  I hate it when it is someone reading it and messed up in his understanding and especially when someone preaches something wrong because of his misunderstanding.  I also join Ward in saying that the power of the very words of God are found in their actual meaning.  If you have the right words and the wrong meaning, it is like having the wrong words.  He's right on that.

I would not join a church that used something other than the Hebrew and Greek text behind the King James Version.  However, if I had a choice to attend a church where someone preached something wrong from the King James Version or preached something right from the English Standard Version, I would choose the latter.  Getting it right is more important.  I agree with that, enough that I would be far more chagrined -- by far -- with someone who was massacring the meaning of the King James than someone who was getting the meaning of the English Standard Version exactly right.  I believe the power is in the meaning and in the substance.

Mark Ward is a critical text proponent, which has different words in the text underlying the modern translations than that of the King James Version, up to 7% total difference in the underlying original language words of the New Testament.  He says he doesn't care about those differences and that there isn't enough that matters, because what does matter is the meaning of the words.

I want to focus on Mark Ward's problem as it applies to the doctrine of the preservation of scripture.  I don't care what accurate translation of the Bible one uses, he will find that it teaches the same exact doctrine on the preservation of scripture.  You can find the historical and biblical teaching on the preservation of scripture in whatever Bible you happen to use.  Let's say you were using the English Standard Version to come to your position.  What you would learn from the English Standard Version would stop you from using the English Standard Version.  You would have to believe in the perfect preservation of scripture, knowing that it is an actual doctrine of scripture.  The meaning is so important, just like Mark says.

As a church and an individual believer, I get all of my doctrine from the Bible, not from experience or feelings.  I know I'm depraved because scripture says I'm depraved. In the same way, I know I'm justified because the Bible says I'm justified.  I trust the Bible, which God says pleases Him.   This is called living by faith.

Scripture is inspired, and I know that and believe that because scripture says it's inspired.  God says His Word is inspired.  If I deny inspiration of scripture, I'm denying what God says about His Word.

Then we come to the preservation of scripture.  The historic doctrine of scripture has reflected what scripture says about itself, what it says about its own preservation.  The doctrine of preservation of scripture, like justification in the doctrine of salvation, comes from God's Word, not from experience or feelings.

So God says He preserved every Word and every Word is available to every generation.  If you are saying that God didn't do that, when He said He would, then you are, first, calling Him a liar, and, second, saying that not everything we're reading is inspired by God.  Inspiration applies to words.  If a word isn't inspired, it isn't inspired.  Third, you don't have a Bible without error if the words are changed from what God gave originally.

A lot of what the Bible says, one believes without any proof except the Bible itself is true.  I can't tell if my sins are gone.  I didn't see creation.  I didn't see the flood.  I haven't seen anything the Bible prophesies and it prophesies a lot.  It hasn't happened yet.  You believe the Bible because it is true and it has already been validated as true.  Whatever it says about anything is true.

The authority of scripture relies on its truth.  What it says is true.  If something outside of the Bible can invalidate it, then it isn't true.  This is serious.  For history, Christians believed God inspired and then preserved every word, based upon scripture.  They got their doctrine of preservation from scripture.  For them, that outdoes or trumps anything that occurs outside of scripture or that people feel or experience.  They knew about textual variations of the copies.  That didn't change what they believed.  They wouldn't allow something outside of scripture, whether it seemed like evidence or not, to stop them from believing what God said.  This is conservative theology, where the beliefs come from scripture.

Doctrine doesn't change.  If the Bible ever taught something, then it will continue to teach that.  It can't suddenly start meaning something different.  There can't be a new teaching.  When what it teaches is changed, people become in authority over the Bible, instead of the Bible over people.

It is a problem not to believe what God said He would do.  If He didn't do what He said He would do, then He is lying, and He doesn't lie.  There's more than that.  I want to illustrate.  I've talked to many Muslims through the years.  I've talked to a lot of other religions far more, but the biggest argument of Muslims against Christianity is that our Bible has errors in it.

If you were Mark Ward, you would need to say to that Muslim, you're right Mr. Muslim, the Bible has errors, but it doesn't matter!  We've got the meaning!  If he was a sharp Muslim, which they are by nature more sharp than your average professing Christian, he would bring up the problem I'm talking about.  He says his book is divine, so it doesn't have any errors.  Mark would say, my book is divine too, but it has errors.  Ooops!

There are many people turning from the faith today because they've lost trust in scripture.  I've talked about the story of the famous, atheist textual critic, Bart Ehrman, and what happened to his faith when he became convinced that God didn't preserve His words, like He said He would.  Ward doesn't want to talk about this.  He says it doesn't matter, because the meaning is all that matters.  God didn't inspire a meaning.  I'm not saying Ward believes that, but in a practical way, he does, and it's a kind of neo-orthodox position on the Bible.  Scripture puts the emphasis on words, and Ward against that emphasis, puts it on meaning, because he doesn't believe in preservation of words.

Scripture promises all the words.  I believe we have all of them.  I have no problem talking to the Muslim man.  I know my position is biblical and historical.  There is a big problem for someone like Ward though and everyone else like him.  This is where the faith itself is under attack, the faith which is actually the meaning of scripture.

Evan Roberts & the Welsh Revival of 1904-1905: His Education & "Preaching": Part 2 of 22

The content of this post is now available in the study of:

1.) Evan Roberts

2.) The Welsh Revival of 1904-1905

3.) Jessie Penn-Lewis

on the faithsaves.net website. Please click on the people above to view the study.  On the FaithSaves website the PDF files may be easiest to read.

 

You are also encouraged to learn more about Keswick theology and its errors, as well as the Biblical doctrine of salvation, at the soteriology page at Faithsaves.

The Destructive Instinct of Evangelicalism and Now Fundamentalism for and with Celebrity

This is an unrelated post related to the one below, but I wanted to draw attention to it here by Victor David Hansen, titled, Camouflaged Elites.  I wish evangelicals would take into consideration, and now fiundamentalists, as they mime the culture.  They should be leading, but they conform.  Sad.

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When I attended a Bible college and seminary in the 1980s, the founder and president incessantly talked about its grads going into "full time service" and touted full time service, full time service, and more full time service.  He may have been wrong on his statistics, but I heard him all the time talking about 90 plus percent going into full time service.  The words "full time service" are not in the Bible.  I would contend that every Christian is in full time service for and to the Lord, but I also get what Dr. Cedarholm, as we called him, B. Myron Cedarholm, was talking about.  He wanted the students in full time Christian service, meaning pastors, missionaries, "evangelists," Christian school teachers, and any other positions like that.

At that time in fundamentalism, at least at Maranatha Baptist Bible College, full time service was normal talk.  I don't remember any celebrity syndrome, at least in the circles I was in.  At Maranatha, we did have a gold medal wrestling coach, Ben Peterson, who was also a Maranatha seminary graduate, married to a Maranatha graduate.  While I was there, Mike Houk, one of our wrestlers, became the first world champion in United States history for Greco-Roman wrestling.  Even though we had celebrities in that sense, these men were not lauded much for those accomplishments.  You might say they were just regular dudes on campus, no different than anyone else for those accomplishments.

At Maranatha at the time, there was no push at all for people to go out into the world and work a "secular job."  That's not what Maranatha was for.  It was to produce full time Christian workers, church workers, and Dr. Cedarholm emphasized that in no uncertain terms.  It was pushed and pushed and pushed.  It wasn't whether you would go into full time service, but where and how you were going to serve.  I don't think that whole idea was proven scripturally ever to me, but it had an influence on all of us who there in that era.  I don't remember, let's call it, "celebrity-ism" being a problem in fundamentalism at that time, unless I was missing something.

Yes, there were celebrity Christians, in the sense of big-named preachers.  You could become a big fish in a small pond, but there were no "worldly" celebrities that anyone pointed up.  In my consideration, as I remember it, I would have been ashamed of myself if I didn't go into full time service.

The reasoning for going Christian and not secular, which is how it hashed itself out, was in no given order: time is short, the laborers are few, eternity is long, God is worth it, people are going to hell, nothing is more important, you only have one life, nothing is better, everything else is temporal, the church is the most important and greatest institution, Christians are different, believers judge importance differently, among many other related reasons.  All of these still apply when you start to decide what you will do with your life.

With everything I just said, in my entire Christian school class of around 40 more or less, only two of us are pastors.  I know of at least one other pastor's wife, I think, and I'm not trying to miss anybody.  I attended Maranatha Baptist Academy in Watertown, WI.

Maranatha had a sports program:  football, basketball, soccer, baseball, volleyball, softball, a little bit of track and field and cross country.  I lettered four years in football and basketball and track and field, the latter at the college wasn't taken seriously.  We didn't have a track or field.  We just ran.  I didn't practice the high jump or long jump.  I just jumped at meets to get more points.  But I remember looking over and seeing Dr. Cedarholm standing on the side of the track alone, watching us run.  No one else was there.  It did make an impression at the time.  Dr. Cedarholm was a bit of a celebrity himself.  He was a giant in the history of fundamentalism, had himself participated in the starting of hundreds of churches, but also graduated from the University of Minnesota in 1940, having lettered in football, track, baseball, tennis, and water polo.  We all knew this about him, but he never ever brought it up.  He would mention sports, but I don't remember him talking about his personal accolades.

Things have changed today, and mostly not for the better, especially related to celebrity.  I think there is evidence for this all over.  I see it with Bob Jones University invitation to Tim Tebow to come to campus there.  In a bigger picture, cultural way, I'm a Tim Tebow fan.  He gets attacked for his faith by the public.  We should defend that aspect of and for him. However, I think it's a blatant, serious error that BJU is inviting him to campus, promoting him in a fundraiser, because of his celebrity.  Sure, they can raise more money, but there are other ways this will cause serious damage, because it sends the wrong message about what is important.  Tebow himself is a compromiser and contrary to the historic values of fundamentalism and by having him, it really doesn't matter if someone compromises like him.

Maranatha now has its celebrities with Nate Oats coaching Buffalo men's basketball and Tom Allen coaching Indiana football.  In and of themselves, there's nothing wrong with having a job in the secular world, and these are high paying jobs, which determines a certain amount of success on their part.  When I was in college, what they've done would have been discouraged for all the reasons I gave above.  Dr. Cedarholm would not have emphasized these accomplishments, because it's not what he wanted.  He wanted full time Christian servants.  You will get more of what you emphasize.  If I was good enough to have "gone on to succeed in the world," Maranatha would have seen that as a sort of failure and would have mourned the loss.  Instead of preaching, he went for the worldly success is how it would have looked and been framed at the time.  I would have agreed.  I still do.

I don't think we should promote worldly success.  I think we should be lifting up mainly those who give up their lives to preach and evangelize.  I don't think we should be pushing our Christian kids in a different direction.   I believe that Jesus had this in mind when He said on various occasions something like, "let the dead bury the dead."  Unbelievers can bury the dead.  Only believers can do the work of the Lord.  We need more Christian workers.  There is more to what I'm saying than just going on to worldly success.  It includes the temptations for these celebrities that are emulated.  How many of them stay pure in their secular roles?

I would assume that Nate Oats or Tom Allen would have benefited from their time at Maranatha.  I'm sure that the biblical teaching still helps them and comes out in what they do.  However, can they really live all of the Bible and remain in those positions?  Should this not be taken into consideration in what they do?

The #BuffaloBulls head coach Nate Oats has expressed his commitment to LGBTQ inclusion #MarchMadnesshttps://t.co/h9xKvHDeWq pic.twitter.com/Cwk3iL1xiW

— Outsports (@outsports) March 16, 2018

I'm talking about this kind of thing, now probably required to be in this position, but is it true?  As a Christian can you represent the truth as a celebrity?

Scripture doesn't exalt the tentmaking of the Apostle Paul.  When the disciples came back from evangelism in Luke 10 and they talked about the devils being subject to them in Jesus' name, the Lord said, "Notwithstanding in this rejoice not, that the spirits are subject unto you; but rather rejoice, because your names are written in heaven."  Even certain good things He did not want them to promote.  Paul's celebrity he called, "dung."  Whatever he could glorify in a secular sense, he counted as loss.  None of it was important.

If someone is a hardworking breadwinner, of good character, and a faithful husband and father, celebrity will not come from that.  As churches, we don't want to emphasize what the world sees as popular or important.  In certain instances, we want to rebuke it or repudiate it.  Celebrity should not stop us from doing that, just because we feel the glow from the celebrity or the knowledge of the celebrity.  It adds nothing to the value of Christ, His life and truth, and His institution.

I include in this essay my own son.  He graduated first in his class from a charter school and was accepted at West Point.  He served in the United States embassy in Poland.  He's a Captain in the U. S. Army, who has qualified for special forces at Fort Bragg, North Carolina.  What difference does any of that make if he's not faithful to God?  Is any of that any better than if I reported that he was a local manager at a 7-11 and in his church, evangelizing weekly and living for Jesus Christ?  I don't believe so.  All of his accomplishments should be nothing but a means to an end.  If it gets in the way of his faithfulness to God, it should not be celebrated.  Like I said above, it should be mourned.  If he can't and is not going to use it for God, then it is worthless.  It means nothing.  I see the Army as a potential threat of what is eternal and of true importance.  I tell him that all the time.  He assures me he wants to be used of God.  I will be happy if that is the case.  If I say anything on this blog about what he's doing, it's because I have people read here who know the family and would want to know what's happening.

The instinct in evangelicalism and now fundamentalism toward celebrity is a destructive one.  It won't help.  It could only hurt.  If believers reach celebrity, we should not celebrate the celebrity.  We should rejoice only that their names are written down in heaven.