The shallow, fat, tame slave voice of Satan's Kingdom

Church Christianity is shallow (and worse). Whether it's obviously shallow nonsense or it's Michael Horton Reformed churchian nonsense, it's all shallow.

Michael Horton is an academic Christian who wouldn't know (or believe in) the reality of spiritual warfare if the Devil had him by the throat, to paraphrase Goethe.

This recording:

http://www.whitehorseinn.org/blog/2012/01/29/whi-1086-faith-experience/

is pure Satanic nonsense. Actually it's worse than nonsense, but they'd take it as a compliment if I called it anything but nonsense.

What these two churchians of the worst order miss is a) the fact of regeneration, and b) the fact of spiritual battle. And while missing the fact of regeneration they hence also miss the fact that once regenerated a Christian is *able to do.*

Once regenerated you will be a soldier on the battlefield whether you like it or not. These academic fools are fully going with the current of the world and the Devil's kingdom, thus they experience no friction. So their teaching to others is, "Relax! There's no need to *do* anything! There is no battle! There is no battlefield! That is childish nonsense! Be like us! We eat ice cream all day and sit in offices in churches and at seminaries, and we can tell you there aren't any 'forces of evil' trying to get at us! Ha, ha! Come away from that silliness! And as for our so-called inner fallen nature? It's natural! Celebrate it! It's God-given! We wouldn't have such features if God didn't give them to us! Relax! It's all about ritual on Sundays! OK, baptism just once, but then eating crackers! And drinking grape juice! That's it! You're done! Relax! Oh, and read the Bible every now and then! Not too much, though! Ha, ha! Don't want to be an 'enthusiast'! You'll just get it all wrong anyway! Let us read it to you! That's easier for you anyway! Ha, ha. Relax!"

They're the shallow, fat, tame slave voice of Satan's Kingdom.

Christians must provoke their limits and extend their limits for such things as watchfulness and fearing God alone, in the moment, when most difficult, among the other practices Jesus Himself teaches in the New Testament; such teaching that is obviously beyond the church level of Christianity, and so be it.

Jesus as King

From a comment thread on a blog I am banned from:

“I think he’s [Michael Sudduth] been under some degree of occultic bondage for most of his life. Never able to shake free of that.”

How does one shake free of that?

Jesus as King takes care of that kind of bondage. When He's your King.

Bare naked saying

Look for the mystical in the orthodox.

Prophets, priests, and kings - or nothing

Think about this: if you just use the Bible itself and the demands it makes to be understood in a complete way, you have to know really a lot to get that complete understanding. You really do. There's no way of getting around that.

Now I always say - and this is what I believe - that the bar is set high by Christianity, but the Holy Spirit enables individuals to meet and exceed that bar.

Still, it has to be learned.

And the fact is, most Christians *don't* get complete understanding of the Bible, i.e. of the plan of God found in the Old and New Testaments.

So what does that mean? How should we think about that? Is it important? It seems one needs to get the understanding of a prophet, a priest, and a king to understand the Bible. I mean that seriously. That's the bar that has to be met.

Recurrence would explain it. I.e. that the drawing of individuals into the Kingdom is, from our point-of-view, slower than we tend to think, and that perhaps only a handful in each generation meet that bar. But in time, in the fullness of time, in recurrence, it plays out, and gets done.

But, for instance, without knowing the intricacies of law and Gospel and the overall plan of God then the Bible is just a book of strange events. People are Christians their entire lives and can't say why Jesus needed to be sacrificed on the cross.

The conceit of the clerical class (at least on the Protestant side, the Romanist side seems to have given up any belief that people can understand such things) is they exist to teach such things to people. But their very methods are obviously not up to the task. You can't get understanding of such things passively, sitting in a pew, listening to a sermon. Hence that just becomes a vain, indulgent show of the alpha monkey (or anti-alpha monkey, whatever the case may be) at the alter or podium.

Obviously we all learn from teachers, and if we are mature we are grateful for the efforts of those teachers. But this usually occurs from time-vetted books. But that is active study. Self-motivated as well. Inwardly-motivated, active study. Driven by the presence of the Holy Spirit within us.

But look how vain and immature the church leaders and educators are. They learn a few things and think they are thus in a higher class of Christian. The 'teaching class.' Like the Romanist Teaching Church. Magisterium, or traces of it, doesn't take long to follow in the wake of that.

Jesus specifically said - twice - that He hated such lording it over the so-called 'lay-people.' Why? Because you can't be a Christian and be a so-called lay person. The entire model is false. Christians are prophets, priests, and kings, or they are passive, outwardly-motivated (solely) fools with no understanding sitting in a pew listening to a vain fool indulging himself 'preaching' (which means anything other than actually proclaiming the *actual* word of God, which is living language and has effect alone to call God's elect, but the sermonizers are too vain and shallow and frankly to stupid to know or value that).

Fear God alone. That means don't fear man. Any man, Christian. Any man. Fear God alone. That is how you gain wisdom. They'll call you 'individualist' (as if that is a bad thing). Or 'lone ranger.' Or 'me and my Bible alone.' That is just the usual [garbage] that comes out of the mouths of the Devil's children when they are challenged. Exploit everything, yes. Your discernment that comes from the Holy Spirit needs material and influences to discern. Exploit everything (even create some of it when you are able), but join nothing. Certainly not until you have understanding that is demanded by Christianity, which is nothing short of the understanding of a prophet, priest, and king.

The relative value of books

This anecdote reminds me how valuable a single book can be when we aren't inundated with thousands of books and when we don't have ability to get any book from anywhere in the world easily:

"John Colquhoun [pron. ka-HOON, 1748-1827], former pastor New Church in South Leith, Scotland. Educated at Glasgow University. Shortly after his conversion he walked all the way from Luss to Glasgow, a distance in all of about fifty miles, to buy a copy of Thomas Boston's Fourfold State. This book had a moulding influence on his early Christian life. He came to esteem it next to his Bible. The influence of Boston's teaching was later to permeate his ministry and writings."

I see that book by Boston in the same way. I'm currently reading Colquhoun's Treatise on the Law and the Gospel and getting much from it. It's not just another theology book. The subject matter is foundational, and he's surprising in his complete understanding of it, even the knottier parts like the Mosaic Covenant.

This wasn't supposed to get out into the media

"At West Park [Presbyterian church], Rev. Brashear walked into the church for a morning service to find the 18-inch-diameter bronze basin and lid missing from the baptismal font’s 800-pound base. Holy water — straight from the River Jordan — had been poured from the missing basin insert into the base’s bowl."

Read N. Y. Post article here.

The above is a portion of a story about how Occupy Wallstreet people are stealing from and pissing in churches that are giving them shelter. Though the above quote is what caught my attention. It's a Presbyterian church. They have a concept of 'holy water'. From the Jordan even.

This is what the belief - or the fallen demand for - infant baptism leads to. It is a Romanist practice, and don't allow any paedo-baptist tell you Reformed infant baptism is any different from Romanist infant baptism. Both disdain God's sovereignty in regeneration. Actually hate it. Both exalt man and ritual over the word and the Spirit. Both believe in baptismal regeneration, and in fact demand it. And both - it too follows - have a low valuation for the Bible. Both are on the same page in pushing mutilated, corrupted versions of the Bible.

Paedo-baptism (infant baptism) is not a minor, silly, unimportant leftover from the Roman Beast church. It is where churchians who disdain God's sovereignty in grace (God is sovereign in creation, providence, and grace) make their stand against God. Regeneration is the main thing. The most important thing. The devil knows ritual doesn't effect regeneration. The Roman Beast church called people to be baptized all day and all night. Yet what did they keep away from people on penalty of torture and death? That's right, the word of God. Satan knows what regenerates God's elect, and it isn't cleric and ritual. It is the word and the Spirit.

The walking of your soul

"Since the hearts of our first parents flew out at their eyes, on the forbidden fruit, and a night of darkness was thereby brought on the world, their posterity have a natural disease which Solomon calls, "The wandering of the desire," or, as the word is, "The walking of your soul," Eccl. 6:9. This is a sort of diabolical trance, wherein the soul traverses the world; feeds itself with a thousand airy nothings; snatches at this and the other created excellency, in imagination and desire; goes here, and there, and everywhere, except where it should go. And the soul is never cured of this disease, until conquering grace brings it back to take up its everlasting rest in God through Christ—but until this be, if man were set again in paradise, the garden of the Lord, all the pleasures there would not keep him from looking, yes, and leaping over the hedge a second time." - Thomas Boston, Human Nature in its Fourfold State, pg. 75, Banner of Truth edition

The difficulty is to actually observe it in yourself. Observe it in real time. And you need a language to see it. If you fear man you will never encounter or learn such a language. You will remain shallow. Churchianity is a shallow school. Another way to say that is it is a man-fearing school. Fear God alone, and find a real school.

Pondering biblical truth and subject matter out and about in the traffic of everyday life

I've observed something over the years, here and there, but never really articulated it to myself or in writing, but here it is: I find that when I ponder biblical doctrine on my own, not in the study but out and about in everyday life, it becomes incredibly more powerful.

It's hard to explain it beyond that. I mean, something like the doctrine of providence, when pondering it - and even more than that - when reciting it to myself (usually with emotion because there is some context that starts me on it) then the meaning starts to roll and gather more meaning.

Also, the subject of protection from God, or what we think about regarding the subjects of spiritual warfare. Adoption into God's family. All doctrine. It becomes very powerful when pondering it 'out on the Way' rather than merely in the study with a book in hand.

Just truth itself when applied to actual life.

This is also a big part of the popularity and significance of Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress. It is Christian doctrine 'on the Way.' As it plays out.

Crucial in understanding the Mosaic Covenant is...

Crucial in understanding the Mosaic Covenant is to distinguish between individual Israelites and National Israel as a unique entity. Individual Israelites were just like us, salvation by faith alone, in the (for them) coming Messiah. National Israel though is very much not like us (or not like fallen man). National Israel is prototypical of the coming Messiah. So in that sense national Israel (again, not individual Israelites!) very much *could* fulfill the Covenant of Works (*through the anti-type Jesus Christ*).

People are afraid of typology that brushes up against such central, important doctrine, for some reason.

In this sense *National Israel* was as *unique* a player in God's plan of redemption as pre-fall Adam and Jesus Christ Himself. (I believe this is why the apostle Paul struggles to explain in Romans why his fellow Jews are just like any other fallen individuals *yet* at the same time are a bit different.)

I am not a prototype of Jesus Christ, and no fallen man pre or post the Incarnation is either. National Israel *was* a prototype of Jesus Christ. National Israel was *unique* in the plan of redemption.

Jesus was *born under the law.* Had to be. The law given on Mt. Sinai was obviously the Covenant of Works in elaborated form. Jesus came to fulfill what the first Adam failed to fulfill.

The relationship of individual Israelites to that republished law was as a student/school teacher relationship. The laws also played a unique part in keeping the royal bloodline from Adam to Christ pure, and keeping the Israelites unified. They had unique responsibilities not the least of which was their very history became the substance of special revelation which had to be lived, recorded, and kept pure and whole and shepherded down through the centuries, etc.

Follow the law, stay in the land, fail to follow the law, get exiled from the land, all that is played out at the level of National Israel, mostly focused on the various kings and their behavior. The big fact is this: when the northern Kingdom and the southern Kingdom were eventually exiled *there were saved individual Israelites in those exiled populations.* They weren't kicked out because they didn't have faith in the coming Messiah, they were kicked out because their kings and the corporate *national level* of Israel failed to follow the law. But they weren't exiled forever because the fulfillment of National Israel was the incarnation of Jesus Christ who *did* follow the law and accomplish what the first Adam failed to accomplish. It was a long historical object lesson for all of fallen man, engrafted as special revelation.

There is a lot of ignorance and misguided piousness and - not a small thing - intentional false teacher confusion-sowing regarding this relatively simple doctrine of basic Federal Theology. Those who attack the central doctrine of justification by faith alone despise any notion of a Covenant of Works in the garden to begin with and demand it be done away with. Many don't see this. Much naivety (and the false teachers grin at how easy it is to muddy up the waters and sow confusion). Those false teachers currently would be people like the Federal Visionists.

Federal Theology is simple and complete (plain) and *powerful.*

Academics who are always learning and never able (or who just petulantly never want) to come to understanding of the truth also have a hand in sowing endless confusion over this simple doctrine. It's fairly maddening. Also, some of the slower thinkers in certain internet environments tend to take the lead in policing everybody on this particular subject. Again, it is basic Federal Theology, but basic Federal Theology isn't grasped in the sense of understanding the parts in relation to the whole by many people currently.

I'm not saying everybody is stupid but me, but there is definite frustration when going up against people on this subject. I think R. Scott Clark gave up trying and left the internet partially over this subject alone. You have to both take on the false teachers *and* all the people who have been severely confused by the false teachers, and it's the latter who tend to be very pious and ultimately unteachable.

The PuritanBoard is confused, allow a street Calvinist to unconfuse them

At the PuritanBoard, where anyone with a doctrinal I.Q. above 2 digits gets banned (actually anybody who doesn't fear man gets banned), a person asked if regeneration and faith occur at the same time. None of the members over there could answer the question. Here's the answer:

No, they don't. Here is why: faith requires knowledge. We have to know who or what we are to have faith in and why. So after one is regenerated by the word and the Spirit there will likely be a time when the person does not yet have the biblical, doctrinal knowledge to know what we are to have faith in or why.

But once we learn (and regeneration puts the motivation in us to learn) then faith follows.

The main thing is regeneration. Once regenerated by the word and the Spirit (not by man and ritual) everything follows in its wake.

Somebody will ask: "What if you die right after you are regenerated by the word and the Spirit and you don't yet have faith based on real understanding?" That gets into providential matters which God controls. But one can speculate also that if someone has truly been regenerated by the word and the Spirit then they have enough of a knowledge (if not systematic doctrinal knowledge) of Jesus from actually reading the Bible to have saving faith, if even somewhat still unconscious at that point. But I doubt God in His providence is going to allow you to die prior to you having real faith based on real understanding of the what and why right after He has regenerated you. That suggests chaos, and God is not a God of chaos.

On mixed race marriages and creating mixed race offspring

I'm not politically-correct, and I don't fear man's opinion of me, so turn away now before you get outraged...

I was looking at an interview of iconic German woman Heidi Klum and noticing how iconically white she is and attractive and all the rest of it, and also pondering what goes on in her little head regarding birthing babies with her black husband and so on.

From a biblical viewpoint I came up with this as a way to see it. Mixed race marriage is not a problem biblically after the incarnation of Jesus. Those laws national Israel had regarding it were to protect the royal bloodline from Adam to Christ. (Some people will say 'kind after kind' is a relevant point of Scripture against mixing races, but I don't see that as a strong argument. YET--- (hang with me)...

Yet, there is *still* an element of *rebellion* in the white girl who does it. And we all who are honest see that and know it. (The black man just seems like he's getting away with something.) So here's how I see it biblically: if the white girl *knows* her parents would really rather her not marry or produce children with a man of another race then that girl is violating the 5th commandment. She's not honoring her parents.

And we all know most white girls who do this are simply exploiting their power to have sex with anybody they want. And when they present the mixed child to their parents they are eyeing their parents *challenging* them (i.e. accusing them of racism if they don't accept the child), and in this way they are violating the 5th commandment in what amounts to really a very severe degree.

Now if the girl actually has parents who are delighted to have a half-black grandchild, then so be it. But they *really* have to not care, and the girl really has to know that.

So, biblically, the white girl is manifesting rebellion when she knowingly dishonors her parents wishes by presenting them a mixed race child. She's not honoring her parents (and she knows it). God can't trust her either. But I don't speak for God. I just go by His word.

By the way, to the racists and racism accusers: God can create a beautiful master race from the very stones on the ground if He wants to. And this post can be re-written in reverse obviously, but I'll let a non-white person do that. The subject of this post is rebellion against God, ultimately, by the violation of His fifth commandment.

Classical Covenant - Federal - Theology

Christians, intellectually-oriented ones especially, are ever learning and never able to come to understanding of the truth. Or they are petulant in not wanting to come to terminal understanding of biblical doctrine.

Covenant Theology is a good example of this. Some new pious soul always wants to reorder it or accuse it or make it the servant of some specially-preferred doctrine. It is just basic, powerful Federal Theology. When you understand regeneration by the word and the Spirit (rather than ritual and man), when you see the types and the fulfillment of the types, when you have the whole and can see the parts in relation to the whole, you don't argue endlessly over a detail or eternally wring your hands that every last detail isn't as you demand it to be. It is complete. It's there. It's simple. It's elegant. Demanding unbiblical doctrine is what messes it up and complicates it and defiles it. But you should get there, in full understanding of it, if you are an elect of God, in time. If you desire more to squabble eternally and defile everything then that's another matter.

With Covenant Theology it is best to keep it simple. The outlines are set. The mechanics are fixed. Everything is framed in biblical warrant.

The Covenant of Redemption from eternity, the Covenant of Works in the Garden, the Covenant of Grace in history. The two Adams mechanics of fall and salvation. The distinctives of Federal Theology: five solas, doctrines of grace, all that is classical apostolic/Reformation era systematic theology.

Having this foundation is what is necessary. Operating upon this foundation. Standing upon the Covenant of Redemption (the Pactum Salutis) as the Magna Carta, the very constitution of the Kingdom of God, and our legal standing in the Kingdom of God. Standing upon this against all devils and all men. Fearing God alone and not fearing man.

The practice of spiritual warfare and of holiness (Christ formed in us) take place upon this foundation, in the Kingdom of God now.

Christians who walk from book-lined studies to pulpits and back to book-lined studies don't value the concrete, the terminal understanding of biblical doctrine, and they communicate that lack of valuation to those they lead and teach. The same with Christians in the academy. In fact the very way they teach, their sermonizing, to a passive audience, their impractical commenting on Bible verses and passages (like reciting a phone book), they know this is self-indulgent and doesn't deliver understanding, but they don't value delivering real understanding.

Education happens when the Holy Spirit is in us. We desire understanding. It will get done because real Christians are self-motivated and active in getting it done. But real Christianity occurs on the street. You're just screwing around until you are a Christian on the street.

The precious Christianity of the pulpit and the pew, and the shallow Christianity of the ivory tower are only worthy of mocking from where real Christianity and real Christians reside which is the street, the Way, the King's Highway, the spiritual battlefield, everyday practice of the faith.

Kingdom, warfare, holiness. The gratitude of being in God's Kingdom now, and the ability to fight the spiritual battle in Christ's army and to increase in holiness to ultimately be able to withstand in the evil day, in the full armor of God, and to stand...