Hold Off on the Pitchforks (Probably) but Criticize with Force (Definitely)

The Danger of Making People Untouchable

So it is the glorious season and you may have noticed my videos have you know I think that they're the content is similar or the same as it's always been but I've been feeling a little extra charitable lately.

I'm not gonna lie. But I wanted to just talk about something that I I've been thinking a lot about actually since I think it was last week. Something I read from Toby Sumter that had got me thinking and I really like Toby's words.

I think he's a very clear Thinker and very helpful in many many different ways. I obviously like the cross-politic guys in general. But Toby man reading his stuff is so helpful a lot of the time. Anyway, um the other day on Twitter I Wrote this I wrote quote.

How dare you criticize X? Unquote unless you put Christ in that blank space you have an idol. Some to a lesser degree some to a greater degree you can usually tell by the level of vitriol. But it's true.

If you are you are actually claiming a form of blasphemy against a created thing. And then I said this in the next tweet. It's very easy to put yourself in that blank space. You don't even have to think it through it just comes naturally and we don't always know that we're doing it what I meant by that is.

Oftentimes you'll hear people say how dare you criticize so-and-so you sir. How dare you like who or who do you think you are criticizing Russell Moore or something like that? I've heard that many times.

And oftentimes like, you know, you'll get that from people. That's very respected someone who's you know Quote-unquote proven themselves a brother and stuff like that as this idea that there are certain people you don't criticize.

I actually had a friend a personal friend who I have since lost as a friend said that it is sinful if you ever Criticize a brother in Christ. I Couldn't believe when he said that I just absolutely couldn't believe he said that number one.

It's indefensible biblically and number two I know he's criticized brothers in Christ. So and obviously this Talks to you goes into how you define brother and stuff like that, but whatever so All that to say is when you say that someone is untouchable.

You can't criticize them. You can't. Even if you like them you can't quibble with them publicly. It always has to be private with their theology and their public statements that that's essentially setting up a blasphemy law.

Look, you can't criticize God, right? You can't say to him. What have you done? That's something that's true but but that is literal blasphemy criticizing something that God does or something that God says or Something that God believes or whatever it is like that's blasphemy.

But when you say that about a created thing or a person that's setting up a blasphemy law for something. That's a created thing. That's idolatry. That's an idol and we do this with ourselves all the time and we don't often think about it or enunciate it.

This way we don't say like you can't criticize me. But we often act like it right like when somebody dares. To refute something that you said or say something that you said is stupid or something like that.

We often act like how dare they how dare they. I've thought this through you know what I mean? That's that's idolatry that's idolizing yourself that's putting yourself in the position of God maybe in a low-key way.

Sometimes it's low-key. Sometimes it's not low-key, but that's idolatry. So there are no sacred cows here. It doesn't matter who it is. It doesn't matter how respected they are doesn't matter and you should respect people.

I'm not saying you shouldn't respect people. You should give honor to whom honor is owed with all due respect. That's not just a saying that we say that that's something that we should actually Try to embody when when someone that is in our elder or someone like that says something we don't agree with we should be respectful.

But criticizing them is not only Allowable, but it's necessary for us to get after truth when you when there's a certain person that can't be criticized. That's that's one way to really shut down the search for truth.

So there are no sacred cows. Everyone's words are Criticizable everything is on the table in regards to that except for gods. Okay, so we can all agree with that. But as we criticize people we have to understand and we have to really think about this because I've been guilty of this in the Past right?

I've been really guilty of this in the past. I'm gonna give you an example Toby Sumter talks about titanium theology stainless steel theology. We can't treat theologians so people and Theologies so ideas, you know systematic theologies that we kind of you know.

Want we want to systematize the the beliefs that are in the Bible. We're trying our best to be as biblical as possible. But we all know that there are probably areas where we're wrong. We all know that but we don't act like it a lot of the time.

And we we act like we expect people to have titanium theology. That is that is that is perfect and Preformed and fabricated and Toby if I'm getting this wrong this idea wrong. I'm sorry I'm not trying to misrepresent you but but this is kind of how I thought about this like.

We treat people like they have to be perfect in every way they have to think about things and And prefer wording and things like that in a perfect way and that's just really not fair. We don't treat ourselves that way.

Why would we treat others that way? It's a biblical principle, by the way. Here's what Toby says. He says the first general point he's responding to a blog about federal vision. It's a blog that actually liked and actually shared a lot of the concerns that this Baptist had not all of them.

He says this he says the first general point is that theology and theologians are not made out of titanium. This may seem obvious, but I think Brandon's analysis suffers from assuming that theology comes in large pre fabricate Fabricated slabs of metal on their way to Boeing.

It is simply not true that someone who quibbles with the language of quote covenant of works has necessarily Redefined what justification by faith alone means now, is that possible? Sure, it's possible but a lot of careful work needs to be done before arriving at that conclusion.

Especially when a particular man is insisting that he has not denied justification by faith alone. Much less redefined it while it has been a long time since I've read Shepherd. That's who they're talking about.

They're talking about Shepherd that has said some in my opinion Confusing and controversial things right? He says since I've read Shepherd based on the quotes He listed I would want to make various and sundry Clarifications and qualifications to this Shepherd's quote and I don't recall if Shepherd made those clarifications or qualifications in other places.

But my point here is simply that I don't think it's helpful to think in terms of a stainless steel system. I certainly agree that faithful systematic theology is working towards a thoroughly consistent biblical system of thought but even a cursory reading of Church history ought to give us a bit of patience and humility in that project.

Count me among those who are very concerned to preserve the doctorate doctrine of justification by faith alone. And I'm not talking about some kind of neonate gnome Ian redefinition of these terms. I mean the straight whiskey kind of justification by faith alone that Luther would have been pouring during his table talks.

And so Here's what he means by this. We got a look at church history with with with eyes of humility. And this is actually one of the things that's very in my opinion helpful about the objectivity of the Covenant stuff that a lot Of people think is very dangerous.

I think one thing that's helpful is that it doesn't we don't have to try to put our Quote-unquote stainless steel systems of theology on top of people from the past. Because if we did that there'd be a lot of heretics back then.

I mean. Did true Christians even exist before Baptists came along? You know what? I mean, I'll tell you when I kind of realized this this is this is a true story about myself when I first heard about the Federal vision I started reading about it and I was very troubled by what I saw very troubled by what I saw.

I saw people say well, did you know that they believed in baptismal regeneration? And I'm just like wow. That's heresy. I Can't believe it and when you think and think about that, you know. Then I found out more about what people were saying what people were meaning by baptismal regeneration.

Then I found out more about you know, what the confession said about baptism, you know. Real grace is exhibited and conferred by the Holy Ghost at baptism or not necessarily at the point of baptism. But but that's what baptism is and all that kind of stuff.

Started finding out more about that and and and why people were saying these things and stuff like that. And it's not exactly the same as the baptismal regeneration that Catholics sit talk about for example.

And there's there's nuances there and things like that and I started realizing that what like what Toby said. This is not titanium like it doesn't come in preformed thing. So if somebody wants to say You know baptismal regeneration.

Well, what do they mean by this? You know what? I mean? You have to you have to do a little bit more work and and that's important. But even if they did mean what a lot of people meant in the past. Is that the test of of heresy or not?

Is that the test of whether or not you're in covenant with Christ or not? Is that what we're really going with because if you do that All of a sudden a lot of your favorite theologians people you quote a lot of your favorite Christians from the past are literal heretics.

So if it's good for the goose, it's good for the gander if it's good for people today. So if Douglas let's just say Doug Wilson believed in baptismal regeneration exactly how everyone accuses him of let's just say, okay.

He doesn't first of all, but let's just say that he did the exact same way that Roman Catholics and all is that you see a heretic a lot of people would say yeah, that's the terracy. But if you're gonna do that You got to look at all of these people from the past that also believe this that you don't treat the same way.

You don't say that they're heretics look theology is not made out of titanium. Theologians are not made out of titanium. You know what I mean? So like I Think a lot of us have to come with come to the terms with this idea.

This is we always talk about Semper Reform and I'm right always reforming right? But do we act like that's even possible? Because I love the Westminster Confession, right and everyone would agree that it's possible to improve upon the Westminster Confession.

It's theoretically possible but how many of us act like it because the first time someone starts using a different word than maybe the the confession does or The catechism does that's when the pitchforks come out and it's like, okay.

Well, let's let's slow down here I think it's very helpful to be suspicious of. Someone who starts bringing in new words or whatever. I think it's very helpful to maybe apply a little extra scrutiny but Let's put away the pitchforks for a little bit, right?

I mean, let's put away the pitchforks for a little bit. I think that's the point because theologians and theology is not made out of titanium and keep in mind guys like like Every person that you attack in this way.

Oh, he's a heretic because he said something slightly different than the confession says, you know what I mean? Like like that kind of stuff. You gotta remember like that person has a lot of people under his care and I know that you are thinking about that.

And that's why you're you're kind of coming so hard on it. But remember like if you're gonna call that person a heretic. There's a lot of other people that you need to call a heretic as well. Do you really want to do it that way?

I know I get a lot of heat for this because I don't typically call people heretics. I don't typically say that people are unbelievers. You might be like, what are you talking about Adam? You do that all the time on your YouTube channel.

No, I don't I Really don't there's a handful of people could probably count them on one hand that claimed Christianity that I've said I just don't believe their confession a handful I know that kind of goes against some of my objectivity of the covenant stuff.

But but there's a handful and it's not based on what they're teaching typically. I mean, obviously there's exceptions, you know, Martin Luther King. He taught, you know, ridiculous things heresies about Christ clear heresies, right?

You know, but but most of the people that I've said what I don't believe their confession. It's not because they teach things that sound like critical theory to me. It's not because they teach, you know poorly on partiality.

It's not because they teach poorly on justice or the law of God. That's not why I call them heretics. I call them heretics because of their behavior because of their complete lack of Forgiveness, you know what I mean?

Like that's that's that's what I think kind of identifies someone who actually loves Christ and someone who claims to love Christ. You understand what I'm saying? And I don't pretend to make any final determinations, of course.

But it's just like I don't know I'm not saying lay your weapons down because we need to fight and Toby knows this too. We need to fight. We need to talk about this. We need to critique. Everybody agrees with that anyone that's worth their salt agrees with that.

But can we put away the pitchforks for just a little bit? It's just a just an idea just a humble suggestion. I'm not going soft. I'm not and I've taken heat for not calling people unbelievers because of what they taught.

I've taken heat for that and that's I'm okay With that. I'm okay with that because I'm committed to. You know taking that covenant seriously taking those covenant marks seriously. Anyway, I hope this was helpful.

A Further Plea for Patience in Calling Heresy

I kind of felt like it might have been a little jumbled and if I have to do a further Clarification on this I will but I hope this is helpful. God bless. Something to add real quick. I've said this many times before but I think that's worth mentioning again in this context.

This is not to say that that, you know, everyone has to draw the same lines. I do and everyone has to you know Wait as long as I would to call someone a heretic. I recognize that there are. I Listen, I can't be the standard for what is and isn't you know heresy?

I'm just asking for a little bit of Patience, I guess I could say we could we can put away the pitchforks for a time. And it's not like the pitchforks are gonna rust and we're not gonna be able to use them later.

Like we can always pick them back up. It's not that big a deal to wait a little bit and I think of this especially with like a guy like Doug Wilson because because like I Don't know. I mean call me crazy.

But but people that are literally trying to get others to believe perverse things you would think that they would own that right like it's not like like like like I would say that a lot of heretics like They they're okay with people believing that they believe certain things.

They don't try to hide it typically at least forever. I guess you could say I don't know that may not be wrong there. But but that's fine. I mean, this is just a plea or a request for a lot of us and doesn't have to be all of us because I think there are some people that this is What they like to do and this is what they're good at and it's I'm fine with that.

I'm just saying for a lot of us, especially those of us who are you know, not pastors not theologians ourselves. You know things like that. Let's just we can we don't have to join that mob. We can put the pitchforks away for a minute.

We could still be strong in our critiques. There's nothing wrong with that I'm not saying don't stop doing that. In fact, I'm saying you should do that. Let's do it in a way that you know, we can still kind of recognize our brothers for what they are and not you know.

Not not take him to the gallows right away. That's all I'm saying. Anyway, God bless.