PAPER NO. 62
THE NEXT REFORMATION
Prepare the Way of the Lord
We need a second Reformation; the first Reformation is spent.
The Church’s message is no longer being heard after 500 years: it is disregarded, if not scorned, by the immediate heirs of the first Reformation.
The Church is divided, as much as it could be, and is treated with indifference.
It is the tail of the culture; it has lost its headship and is in captivity to the unbelief of the world.
In response to centuries of empiricism and skepticism, it has sunk into fideism (belief without understanding).
In response to naturalism and secularism, it has sunk into superstitious super-naturalism and otherworldly mysticism.
In response to the relativism of political correctness and the decay of nihilism, it has sunk into legalism and pietism.
The life and culture-transforming power of the gospel is not being preached. We need a second Reformation (R2).
In short, the first Reformation is dead; long live the second Reformation!
It is clear what is needed for R2.
The Church’s foundation must be laid again, this time more deeply; it must be built upon the rock, not sand. That rock is clarity, not fideism.
Only by the clarity of general revelation can the inexcusability of unbelief be understood. The basic things about God and man and good and evil are clear to reason.
The Church must repent of its root sin of not seeking and understanding what is clear to reason.
The Church must be one, that the world might believe. It must come into the unity of the faith.
It must affirm, with understanding, the Historic Christian Faith summed up in its Creeds and Confessions.
Christ sent the Holy Spirit to lead the Church into all Truth. In response to challenges of unbelief, internal and external, the pastor-teachers, after much discussion, come to agreement expressed in its Creeds and Confessions, for the unity of the faith.
The Creeds must be understood by reason, which recognizes relevant assumptions and implications.
Laying foundation more deeply requires responding to the most explicit challenges of unbelief since the first Reformation.
Both modernity and post-modernity require a philosophical response based on the clarity of general revelation.
General revelation requires Scripture (redemptive revelation), and Scripture assumes clear general revelation.
Therefore, foundation from clear general revelation must come first, before foundation from Scripture, and enable the understanding of Scripture.
Foundation from Scripture begins with the Biblical worldview of creation–fall–redemption.
In light of challenges of modernism and post-modernism, Biblical revelation must be understood more deeply, coherently and relevantly.
Only by diligently seeking can understanding (faith) be deepened. General and specific challenges to the knowledge of God from within and outside the Church must be responded to by the illumining work of the Holy Spirit.
The theological pillars of the Christian faith must be carefully laid, again, in the lives of all penitent believers: clarity and inexcusability, sin and death, curse and promise, repentance and faith, justification and sanctification, baptism and calling, and resurrection and reward.
Philosophical and Theological Foundations (PF and TF) are completed by Historical Foundation (HF). The historically cumulative insight of HF is corporate, cumulative and communal.
HF begins with the council of Jerusalem ( ca. 51 AD) against Judaic literalism, and applies against all continuing literalist hermeneutics.
The Apostles’ Creed applies against the worldview of Greek dualism, from Plato and Aristotle, coming down through Augustine and Aquinas.
Nicea affirmed (the principle of) unity and diversity in the Trinity.
Carthage established the canon of the New Testament once and for all.
Chalcedon affirmed Christ as fully God and fully man, two whole natures everlastingly joined in one person, without conversion, composition or confusion.
Orange affirmed the effects of the fall of man and the sovereignty of divine grace against all degrees of Pelagianism.
Westminster (1648) brought the work of the first Reformation into full focus and left its effect in all the earth.
Challenges from before and after the past Reformation remain. The Church, in its spiritual war against unbelief must demolish every pretension raised up against the knowledge of God, beginning from within, with church leaders.
The Church, as the body of Christ, the Word of God (the Logos) incarnate, is the pillar and ground of the Truth, the salt and light of the world.
The Church is to worship God in spirit and in truth (not in zeal without knowledge, or by ritual without understanding), if it is to disciple its members and all peoples.
Who will lead? All who understand the need for foundation. Only with Foundation (PF, TF and HF) can the Church go on unto maturity, fruitfulness, unity and fullness.
Those who understand good and evil most consciously and consistently will naturally lead in the spiritual war of good against evil. All who share that faith will naturally join the age-long and agonizing war.
The ultimate outcome is certain; reading near Providence is less than certain. Four cycles, from four thousand years of history, now converge. A perfect storm is upon mankind. We know the times and the seasons; the day and the hour are unknown.
Both justice and mercy are unfolding; either way, the time is short.
All in and out of the Church must repent of root sin, of not seeking and not understanding what is clear about God and man and good and evil. All must bring forth fruit in keeping with repentance. All must seek the kingdom of God, through the law God, for the knowledge of God.
The way of life and death are in the nature of our being. The ancient lie denied this: “You shall not surely die.” All of history has, and will, prove otherwise.
