When You Reject the Truth, THIS Happens

The Holy Spirit Reduced to a Genie and the Need for Careful Theology

I view the Holy Spirit like the genie from Aladdin, and he's blue.

Each one of them is a triune being by himself. If I can shock you, and maybe I should, there's nine of them.

Why “What Does the Bible Say?” Can Be a Bad Question

Here's a question we've got to quit asking. And you're going to hate me for this, but we're not done. We've got another week. What does the Bible say? What does the Bible say? What does the Bible say about that?

I mean, how many times have you asked that, heard that? I've been asked this, you know, a thousand times. What does the Bible say about that? This is a really bad question we have to quit asking. Here's why.

Because the old covenant says stone her, and the new covenant says forgive her. That's what the Bible says.

From Liberalism and Experientialism to Post-Confessionalism

It is fine if you came here unconfessional. Just don't leave that way. But this conference is built around our confession. And we live in a post-confessional age. Not an anti-confessional age, but a post-confessional age.

Let me explain what I mean by that. There was a time in the not-too-distant past when you could have accurately described our culture, and really most cultures, as anti-confessional. And people were anti-confessional for one of two main reasons.

One was liberalism. Liberalism looked at the confession and basically said, we reject those doctrines. Liberalism would look at the confession and what the confession said about the inerrancy of Scripture, and would say, we reject the inerrancy of Scripture.

Would look at what the confession says about creation and say, we reject the idea of special creation. So liberalism was anti-confessional. It looked at the confession and it said, no, we disagree. The second major reason that people were anti-confessional was experientialism.

Experientialism looked at confessions and said, we don't necessarily disagree, but we don't want to put God in a box. We don't want to be held to this confession. We don't want to be held to an idea of a confession.

We don't want to put God in a box. We don't want to say what God can't do, or can't be, or something of that sort. But it was based on experientialism. It was based on the idea of immediacy. It was based on the idea of continued revelation.

It was based on the idea that we're still waiting on God to give us more. It was based on the idea that the Scriptures essentially were not sufficient. So those were the two main streams, as I see it, of anti-confessionalism.

Why Most Christians Do Not Know What a Confession Is

But what we're experiencing now is post-confessionalism. And what I mean by that is anti-confessionalism, whether it was from liberalism or experientialism, at least it acknowledged the confession. And it knew what was in the confessions.

It just didn't agree with the confessions. Now we're in an era where most Christians don't know what a confession is. If you can't say amen, you ought to say ouch. I get emails from a lot of people who've read, for example, they've read my book Family Shepherds, and I talk about confessions and catechisms.

And I get a lot of emails and questions from people about confessions and catechisms. And, you know, like, what's a good catechism? That's one of the questions that I get. Like, what's a good catechism?

Well, a good catechism is a catechism that teaches your confession. Because catechisms were designed to teach confessions in bite-sized pieces. And people go, oh, OK, what's a good confession? See, that's post-confessionalism.

We don't, we don't, we're so far removed from confessionalism that they don't even occupy a real space in our understanding. So now, in this era, here we are in a confessional church, having a confessional conference, recognizing that many of you may be post-confessional.

And that's OK. It is fine if you came here unconfessional. Just don't leave that way. Our confessions are really our way of communicating what we believe in a very succinct way. And a lot of people say, you know, they want to say, well, yeah, my confession is the Bible.

Great. The Bible's huge. And my confession is the Bible. So Mormons, Jehovah's Witnesses, they both say, I agree with that. And you say, well, no, no, no, now, hold on. Not, not the Bible as they understand it.

But when I say Bible, what I mean is, guess what? You just became confessional. Because now you're explaining what you mean when you say Bible. Right? No, creeds and confession, no creed but Christ. Again, Mormons and Jehovah's Witnesses could say amen to that.

And immediately you start saying, well, when I say Christ, what I mean is, guess what? You just got confessional. Because now you're explaining what you mean when you say Christ. That's all a confession is.

It's explaining what we mean when we say we believe ABC and XYZ. They do not supersede the Scriptures. The confessions start with, here's what we mean by the Scriptures. Here's the authority of the Scriptures.