THE CONFERENCE - Kuyperianism - Session 6 - Doug Wilson ｜ Blueprints for Christendom 2.0 2024
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Summary
Abraham Kuyperianism was a theological movement that emerged out of Calvin's Calvinism. It was based on Calvin's rejection of neutrality, which meant that there was no neutral ground where you could be neutral in presenting the gospel to the world. In fact, there is no neutrality anywhere in the Christian worldview, because Jesus Christ lays claim to absolutely everything.
Transcript
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Well, let's ask God to bless our time together.
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Our gracious God and Father, we lift this time up to you.
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I pray that we would be careful in how we think through these things.
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I probably ought to begin with the brief biographical mention of Abraham Kuyper.
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just as Calvin helped to nickname a theological position that existed long before Calvin was born
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so also Abraham Kuyper did the same thing we what we call Kuyperianism did not come into being
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with Abraham Kuyper but in the rough and tumble of human history his name got attached to a position
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that existed long before Kuyper was born Calvin exalted the sovereignty of God in salvation
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in much the same way that Augustine and the Apostle Paul had done before him,
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and in the same way, Abraham Kuyper exalted the lordship of Jesus Christ
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in every field of human endeavor in much the same way that Calvin had done centuries before him.
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So Calvin makes a distinction between the church and the kingdom,
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But that's key to understanding how Jesus Christ is Lord of mathematics and Lord of bicycle repair shops and Lord of cooks and bakers and so on.
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He was in turns a minister of the gospel, a theologian, an author,
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the founder of a political party, the founder of a university,
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the founder of a newspaper, the founder of a denomination,
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He was an amazing man, and I couldn't drag a rope after him.
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He is just amazing if you look at the things that he did, things that he wrote, all of his accomplishments.
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So, Kuyper is very famous for having said there's not one square inch in all of creation over which the Lord Jesus does not say, mine.
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The Lord Jesus lays claim, territorial claim, by the right of creation and by right of redemption, he lays claim to absolutely everything.
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If you get that down, if you understand what it means to deny neutrality,
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you're well on your way to Christian worldview thinking.
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That's the cornerstone of all Christian worldview thinking.
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We heard it in the previous talk on apologetics.
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There's no neutrality in presenting the gospel.
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There's no neutral zone where you can go and take the unbeliever by the hand
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and say, let's agree on these common facts, which are autonomously true, whether or not there's a
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God, and then reason our way to God, because there is no such place. Now, let's talk about
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Kuyperianism. A friend once commented to me, echoing a theologian that he had read, that there
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are three main currents in the Reformed River. Three main currents in the Reformed River. As it
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turns out this observation that this my friend passed on to me is something of a commonplace
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a number of people i think have observed this the first current would be the pietists the pietists
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these are those these are those people for whom personal conversion and resultant personal
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devotion sanctification are the principal thing that everything get saved and stay clean that's
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get saved stay clean go to heaven when you die that is the pietist streak keep your own nose
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clean stay out of trouble so that's the pietist stream then there are the confessionalists
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we might call them the doctrinalists to whom the precise doctrinal formula the precise
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doctrinal formulations of the canons of what's it berg are everything and they they memorize the
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confessions. They study the confessions. And what I'm saying here is no knock against the
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confessions. As will become apparent, I believe that we need to be confessional Christians.
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We need to connect ourselves, tie ourselves to the historic church, and confessions is one of
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the ways we do it. But the confessionalist is someone who has tunnel vision with regard
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to the confessions. The confessions are marvelous. The Westminster Confession of Faith is
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I think a glorious document, but it doesn't address everything. It doesn't address Darwin.
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Darwin lived long after the Westminster Confession of Faith was drafted. You can't just say I'm going
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to limit myself to this high water mark of doctrinal development in the reform world and
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as though that settles everything. So the pietists are the first group. The confessionalists are the
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second group. The third group would be the Kyperian, all right? The third group would be the Kyperians.
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These are the transformationalists. The Kyperians are the transformationalists, and this ties in
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with my talk this evening on post-millennialism. Kyperians want to see every aspect of life
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brought under the lordship of Christ in a practical, tangible way, and if that were to happen,
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it would be a great transformation right so the the Kuyperians are the transformationalists
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these are these are the reformed believers who who hold that every aspect of life needs to be
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brought under the functional authority of the Lord Jesus Christ under the functional authority
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not just the formal authority not just Jesus in the 17th dimension authority you know the difference
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So we're not just talking about Jesus is up in heaven, and he has opinions,
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and we're going to find out that those opinions were correct when we get there.
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All right, so pietists, confessionalists, and Kuyperians.
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Now, it's important to note right at the beginning
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that these do not represent three isolated emphases.
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They can be isolated, I think, wrongfully and sinfully,
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So two of these emphases frequently are isolated,
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An emphasis, for example, on personal piety frequently excludes attention to the other aspects of worldview Christianity.
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If you're focused on personal piety alone, you're not going to be absorbed by what the confessions say,
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and you're not going to be absorbed by the task of transformation.
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You're just trying to get to heaven when you die.
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An emphasis on personal piety frequently excludes attention to these other aspects.
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And a rigid confessionalism often limits itself to those topics addressed by the confessions.
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The confessions say nothing about transgenderism.
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They say nothing about the sexual revolution.
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Now, they condemn old-fashioned sins like adultery and fornication.
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But the idea that the cosmos is an amorphous lump that can be shaped into anything you want, right?
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Existentialism is the philosophy that says existence precedes essence.
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That means matter is just atoms banging around.
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And so you, to follow Jean-Paul Sartre, an existentialist philosopher, you have to choose who you're going to be, what you're going to be.
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You have to take your choice, your will, will put an imprint on the little bit of Play-Doh that is neutral, tasteless, odorless Play-Doh that is your part of this cosmos.
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And that's where we get the idea that you can be whatever you want to be.
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Do you want to be a girl? Do you want to be a boy?
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It's harder and harder to be a satirist these days.
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that's wild and crazy and that you put it out there and then someone sent you an email hey look
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what they just did so a rigid confessionalism limits itself to those topics addressed by the
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confessions and they didn't anticipate everything now of course the confessions in because they're
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so scriptural you can think in confessional terms and extend principles out to the modern issues
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But we need to be going back to the quarry from which everything comes,
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But the third, the all-encompassing worldview thinking of Kuyperianism
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does not exclude personal piety or confessional orthodoxy.
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and Jesus claims authority over the whole world,
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including devotions, including your personal commitment to Christ,
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including your walk with Christ, including the practice of confessing your sins and loving your wife
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and bringing up your children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord.
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So, Kuyperianism, pietism can exclude Kuyperianism, but Kuyperianism cannot consistently exclude piety.
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Neither can Kuyperianism exclude confessional orthodoxy.
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But it has to be grasped and held and embraced in its appropriate place.
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Everything has an appropriate place, and balance is the name of the game.
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So, if the Lordship of Christ extends over every aspect of human life,
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we must therefore recognize that our personal devotional behavior is an aspect of that human life,
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So, Kuyperianism, I would submit to you, is the total package.
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Having said that, we have to recognize that the devil is sneaky.
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The devil knows how to sneevel into anything, including Kyperianism.
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There is a movement, a group of reformed scholars calling themselves neo-Calvinists.
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And if you look up Kuyper, he'll be identified as a neo-Calvinist.
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There's an innocent way to talk about that, and there's also a suspect way to talk about that.
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And I'm going to get into what is suspect about it right now.
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So this is also important to note, and also right at the front end, right at the beginning.
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Given the kind of world we live in, the progressive left gets into everything.
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So since I'm going to be loudly praising the Kuyperian train,
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urging all of you to get your ticket and get on board,
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because not everything that goes by the name Kuyperian is Kuyperian.
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Not everything that goes by the name really is.
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So, by Kuyperianism, I am not referring to the third way above the fray approach
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Not talking about, there is no third way above the fray.
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While he would loudly, Tim Keller would loudly proclaim the name of Keller,
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well, he'd probably presume fly the banner of Keller too,
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He would also want to embrace all three currents that I mentioned above,
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the pietist, the confessionalist, and the transformationalist.
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But he takes those three things in a particular order with a particular emphasis.
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Remember, piety, confessions, and transformation.
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For Keller, it is transformationalism first, piety second, and doctrine third.
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Transformation first, piety second, and doctrine third.
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Now I hope you see the problem with this right off the bat.
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This is actually a photo negative of the order we find in the book of Ephesians.
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In the book of Ephesians, it is doctrine first.
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doctrine first three chapters of doctrine there's if you went hunting through the first three
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chapters of ephesians looking for something to do virtually nothing there it's just all these
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glorious truths that there's a difference between an indicative statement and an imperative an
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indicative statement is simply a statement of fact all right my the lectern is on the stage
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Ephesians 1 through 3 is just one grand indicative after another.
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Close the door, move the podium, end the talk, those sorts of things.
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The last three chapters of Ephesians are full of imperatives.
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Then we have the imperatives that are put on top of these indicatives,
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and the most critical word in the whole book of Ephesians is therefore.
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therefore, whenever you see a therefore, what's a therefore?
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all right therefore do these things so in the book of ephesians you find doctrine first
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doctrine first piety obedience second and then transformation third we begin with the doctrinal
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emphases of the first three chapters the doctrines of high calvinism and move on to the personal
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ethics enjoined in chapters four through six the end result of all of it is the bride without any
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spot a wrinkle coming down the aisle of chapter five transformed. That's what we have. So you have
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doctrine, piety, transformation. The transformation at the end of the process, at the end of the
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process, is entirely dependent on the preliminary work. If the foundation is crooked, the roof line
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is going to be crooked. If you get it wrong at the bottom, it's going to be wrong at the top.
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What happens to you if you simply, like Keller, start with an emphasis on transformation?
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I want to be in the city, I want to love the city, I want to transform the city.
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Because of the creational nature of man, all work of transformation must proceed from blueprints.
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You can't go into the workshop and just start cutting and sawing and gluing and hammering
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and have your wife come in and say, what are you doing?
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Whenever you start cutting and measuring and doing those, you have a plan from somewhere.
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So, because of this creational nature of man, all work of transformation has to proceed from blueprints.
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But if you have not self-consciously started with the biblical blueprints, i.e. doctrine,
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then you're going to find yourself surreptitiously working from unbiblical blueprints supplied to you by old slew foot.
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And this is why the third way above the fray, Neo-Calvinism, is always going to veer into the left ditch.
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Always. Unless they're already there, which they frequently are.
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But when they're doing this, when they're starting with transformation and on to piety and then minimizing doctrine,
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when they're doing this, in order to maintain the appearance of balance to the outside Christian world,
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which is oftentimes more conservative than the leaders are,
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I was talking to a Dutch Calvinist Canadian farmer once, and he said,
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you know, no denomination ever went bad because the pig farmers went liberal.
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So in order to maintain the appearance of balance, they're going to need to keep up.
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When you say, I'm in a third way above the fray, well, we're neither Republicans nor are we Democrats.
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In order to do that, you have to, remember back in the old days of the Cold War,
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where the liberals would try to maintain a moral equivalence between the Soviet Union and the United States.
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In order to do that, they had to suppress and deny things that the Soviets were doing
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and magnify bad things that we were doing.
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And there's always bad things that we were doing, but they had to amplify them,
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and they had to suppress the other in order to keep the thing looking like it was somewhat balanced.
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they're going to need to insist on a moral equivalence
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between the racism they keep hearing about on the right
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and the death cult love affair with abortion
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and every form of sexual perversion on the left.
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They will have to greatly amplify every hint of racism
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until it is an incipient holocaust, almost on top of us,
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and then minimize what's going on with all the alphabet plus people.
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well what do i what do i mean by minimize okay for example james wood author i appreciate
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very much james wood in an appreciative review of a book called biblical critical theory
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promoted by keller this is 672 cinder block of a book 672 page cinder block of a book
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it's designed to help christians quote make sense of modern life and culture okay we we want to
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think biblically about modern life and culture okay amen that's what we're here for that's what
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we're that's what we're doing right this book is dedicated to making sense of modern life and
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culture and yet there's nothing in it about abortion nothing about the sexual revolution
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Now, the phrase that Turretin would have used for this kind of stratospheric theorizing is, quote, completely out of touch.
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How can you be taught how to make sense of modern life and culture when the problems you're facing in your community is how to keep Bruno out of the junior high girls' showers?
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Well, the men in charge of the big things aren't helping us.
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They're not giving us the tools that we need to fight that kind of thing.
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So how would this comport with the book's subtitle?
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How the Bible's unfolding story makes sense of modern life and culture.
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How on earth are we going to make sense of modern life and culture
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without reference to our polymorphous, orgasmic, and androgynous imperative
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where everybody can be absolutely anything they want to be?
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The wheels have come. Everything has come unstuck.
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And you can't write a big think book without addressing it
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and act like you're not completely missing the point.
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Now, I realize that Kevin DeYoung might not appreciate me quoting him with appreciation.
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Now, me and Kevin, because Kevin is right on the money here.
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Quote, Keller has often made use of George Marsden's observation
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that the Reformed tradition in America comprises three different priorities or impulses.
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The doctrinalist impulse, which emphasizes the confessions of the church and correct theology.
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The pietist impulse, which emphasizes right behavior and the internal affections of the heart.
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And the culturalist impulse, which emphasizes collective action and the external work of the church to transform society.
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Keller has acknowledged before that he is a culturalist first, then a pietist, then a doctrinalist.
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I would say that my order is just the opposite.
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it. In fact, if it's not too doctrinalist of me, I think that sound doctrine is more than an impulse.
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It is foundational and indispensable for the other two emphases, and amen to that. While I'm at it,
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I might as well say that I'm not convinced that the culture-forming agenda belongs to the church
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qua church, nor that it won't end up being co-opted by an ever-expanding list of social justice
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causes. I think that's right on the money, and when he says, I don't think the culture-transforming
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agenda belongs to the church as the church. This is exactly correct, and it goes back to my earlier
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observation about the distinction between the church and the kingdom that we're going to get
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to in a moment. And yet, do you all remember that time when Princeton gave an award to Keller
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and then revoked it because of his distinctly nuanced and muted negative stance on homosexuality?
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So Keller disapproved of homosexuality because even though doctrine was at the caboose, it was still there.
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But yes, at the end of the day, homosexuality is not conducive to human flourishing.
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So he had this prize awarded to him by Princeton.
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And then it was revoked after the outcry against someone as rabidly right-wing as Tim Keller.
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Now, the proof, and we have so many proofs of this,
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but the proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy
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is found in the fact that the award they revoked was the Kuiper Prize.
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So what is Princeton doing awarding the Kuiper Prize?
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And what are they doing taking it away from someone
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who is simply a mild shadow of what Kuiper would have said about it?
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Wow. So, because the woke hordes understand that religious commitment is a totalizing affair,
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there's absolutely no way for a Christian to remain faithful on issues surrounding the sexual
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revolution and also remain above the fray. Simply not possible. If at the end of the day you say,
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no, that's an abomination. No, it is confusion, the way the Bible says. Someone's going to put
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the Bible in front of you and says this verse says that bestiality is confusion. What do you
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say to that? You either say amen to that or you don't. And there will come a moment of decision
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where it's either going to be down that road or this one, right? And so it's not possible
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to stay faithful on the creational design of God's image carried by the human race in the fact that
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I don't want to burn too much daylight here, but a quick comment here.
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The reason in Genesis chapter 1, God embeds his image in the human race,
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and he does it, male and female created he them, right?
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Now, in the parable, pretend that the Lord Jesus is the king
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And let's say there's a bunch of peasants down in the valley
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who are in his kingdom, but they don't like the king at all.
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And let's say the king is very strong, has a very strong castle,
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mighty men defending it and the peasants are are incapable of expressing their hatred of the king
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on the castle they can't they couldn't overthrow him they can't it can't be done but they still
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want to vent their hatred what what would they do well they would riot and burn his image in effigy
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that's what they would do they'd burn the image of the king they don't like in effigy
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and that's what all this trans stuff is it is vandalism of the one they hate in heaven whom
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they can't reach that's what they're trying to do now and and anyone who gets in the way
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in any way is going to be the enemy is going to be cast as the enemy and if you're going to be
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an enemy at the end of the day and everyone who loves jesus is going to be the enemy at the end
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of the day then you need to start learning now how to be a faithful enemy of the godless
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because you don't want to be having them herd you into the cattle car and be trying to learn
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the lessons then so following calvin i therefore want to make a distinction between the church
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and the kingdom the church proper is the ministry of word and sacrament its primary functions are
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discharged on the Lord's day as the people of God gather to worship him. The church discharges
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its central obligation in the worship of God every Lord's day. The cathedral at the center of the
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town is the church. The town is the kingdom. The church, the cathedral is the church. The town is
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the kingdom. There's traffic and flow between the two, obviously. The people in the town go to church
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and then after church is over, they go back out to the town.
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But the church of God and the kingdom of God are not synonyms
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any more than the cathedral and the town itself are synonyms.
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In all of this, there necessarily must be a harmonious relationship
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between the three governments that were established directly by God.
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You'll sometimes hear in discussions of Kuyperianism,
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And the three central spheres are family, church, and state.
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Under these three governments, underneath all three of these governments,
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is the foundational government of self-control,
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which is wrought in us by the Spirit of God through the gospel.
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Without this self-governance, the balance of form and freedom in the other three governments
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As our second president, John Adams, once observed, as I mentioned last night,
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our Constitution presupposes a moral and a religious people.
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It is, he said, wholly unfit for any other.
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If you have a nation of fornicating potheads, they will not be free.
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If you have a nation of porn addicts, they will not be free.
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If you have people hooked on drugs, they're not going to be free.
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is not going to happen you have to be self-governed the holy spirit has to be work
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working in your life and heart and family such that the family hangs together because everyone
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in it is disciplined by the holy spirit that's how a family um stays together and this but this
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is true of all three governments but assuming this uh conversion by the holy spirit assuming
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this work by the holy spirit then what happens when men are forgiven and set upright again
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they find themselves functioning within the framework of these three basic governments
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now by basic governments i'm talking about these governmental arrangements established directly by
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god the the government was created by god this would not include the structure of your quilting
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club your book reading group or any hunting parties you put together you can you can structure those
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bylaws how you like right it's your club right it's you have dominion there you can you can
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structure your book reading group as a democracy or as a monarchy yeah i decide the book or we all
00:30:31.500
decide the book you can structure it however you want those governments are man-made but the three
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governments we are talking about here were created by god directly and so consequently he writes the
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bylaws the first god-ordained government is the government of the family following the order that
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god has established the husband is the head his wife is his body and the executive and together
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they shepherd their little ones so don't just as a side comment so don't treat your wife like she
00:31:04.560
was a conservative airhead and then proudly say and to her i've entrusted the education of all my
00:31:09.840
sons. She doesn't know anything. And that's why I've given that test to her. That's not right.
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So this is not a low view of women. It is a high view of women. But it is a structured and
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hierarchical view of men and women together. The man is the head. The woman is his body. And
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together they shepherd their little ones. So the family is the ministry of health, education,
00:31:37.640
and Welfare. The family is the Ministry of Health, Education, and Welfare. The second is the Civil
00:31:43.480
Magistrate, which is the Ministry of Justice. Their task is to make it possible for you to walk
00:31:49.520
across town safely at 2 a.m. in the morning. And justice here is defined by the Bible and not by
00:31:55.980
the hurt feelings of somebody. We're not talking about social justice. The phrase social justice
00:32:01.640
should hit you like the phrase bone cancer does.
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Justice, simple justice, is biblically defined.
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And then the church is the ministry of grace and peace,
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Every epistle in the New Testament says grace and peace to you
00:32:26.980
But every one of them says grace and peace to you
00:32:30.960
And you may have wondered, where's the Holy Spirit?
00:32:32.640
Why is the Holy Spirit never mentioned in these letters?
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I would agree with Jonathan Edwards at following him
00:32:38.320
and say the Holy Spirit is the grace and peace.
00:32:41.400
Grace and peace to you, from the Father, Filioque, and the Son.
00:32:47.160
Now, what is the relationship of the three governments to one another?
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These are Kuyperian spheres that operate in the context of the kingdom.
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In God's order, not one of the three is permitted to domineer over the others.
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The state can't come to the church and say, you're not essential, you can't meet because of this virus.
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Each one has its assigned task, and each one needs to tend to its own knitting.
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The state does not review cases of church discipline.
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And not one of these spheres is dependent on any of the others for its existence.
00:33:28.020
The church is established directly by God, the family directly by God, and the state directly by God.
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Now, there are, this is the fallen world, in times of extreme crisis, as when Rome was threatened by the Lombards,
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one government may pick up some of the responsibilities of another.
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Say there's a failed state, and there is no civil government, but the church is still there, all right?
00:33:53.340
if the church is still present the the leading ministers might get together and make decisions
00:34:00.100
because they have to or in other unusual circumstances it may be the same way as
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when Paul prohibits Christians from filing civil suits against one another before unbelieving
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judges in first Corinthians 6 1 through 7 ordinarily the church ought not to be adjudicating
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property line disputes but we should prefer that to the scandal of asking pagans to define justice
00:34:22.720
between two believers but with that said there's definitely a hierarchy of honor in this glorious
00:34:29.900
and eschatological fulfillment right there's definitely a hierarchy of honor this is what
00:34:35.340
it looks like the church does not fill up the world and the church does not turn every day
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into sunday but the knowledge of the lord does fill up the world as the waters cover the sea
00:34:45.560
habakkuk 2 14 so how does this work in scripture remember the flow goes two directions the living
00:34:51.600
water flows from the church out to all the families and nations of men, and then all the
00:34:57.400
families and nations of men flow back to the church. The living water, the gospel, flows out
00:35:02.600
of the church to all the nations, and then all the nations stream back to the church in order to be
00:35:07.460
refreshed, renew covenant, and then go out again themselves. So they don't stream, the nations don't
00:35:15.840
stream to the church in order to live there. They don't come into the church in order to establish
00:35:20.860
permanent residency there. They come to eat from the tree of life, and then they go back out again
00:35:26.580
with a benediction and with the peace of Christ on their heads. You are commissioned. Go make a
00:35:32.020
difference. Go make a difference when you're writing code. Go make a difference when you're
00:35:36.300
changing diapers. Go make a difference when you're repairing bicycles. Go in the name of Jesus. Go
00:35:41.460
transform the world. So picture it this way. The worship of God is central to all of life,
00:35:47.720
but it does not devour all of life the worship of god is central to all of life but it does not
00:35:53.200
devour it is the axle not the wheel the sun does not burn everything up but it does give light to
00:35:59.780
everything the water does not flood the world but it does irrigate the entire world
00:36:04.400
the anchor fastens the ship the ship does not turn into a giant gigantic anchor the cathedral
00:36:11.900
is in the center of the town but it does not take over all the activities of the townspeople
00:36:16.520
their printing their auto mechanics their software designing their lawn mowing
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in one sense all of that is none of the church's business
00:36:23.560
but at the same time the church instructs the townspeople in the adverbs
00:36:27.700
how these things are to be done meaning honestly and before the lord
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with one eye always on the text and with a hard work ethic so the church is
00:36:36.540
therefore at the center of the kingdom but the church and the kingdom are still
00:36:43.140
from every part of the town so this next section of the talk is called somewhat oddly the restroom
00:36:52.080
test you'll have to wait so the authority of jesus the kind of authority that is granted
00:37:01.760
to a sacrificial king is an authority that mediates the kindness of the father and he
00:37:06.640
mediates that kindness with the center fixed and all the edges in play the church teaches you how
00:37:12.440
to be a father but does not take over the role of a father the church instructs the magistrate
00:37:17.440
but does not rival the magistrate the church teaches wives to submit to their husbands
00:37:22.520
and models that submission through dutiful and cheerful submission to the authority of christ
00:37:27.520
as found in the scriptures interestingly when churches say no only elders only men can be
00:37:34.940
elders only men can preach the word what the church is being really masculine when they do
00:37:40.660
that no the church is being the bride the church is being a submissive and obedient wife
00:37:45.280
our husband said men preach men rule no women and we're dutiful when and the church in obeying that
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by having masculine male leadership up front churches that do that churches that insist on
00:37:59.100
that are not squashing the women they are modeling for the women what submission looks like
00:38:04.300
all right this is obedience we're christians we're under orders we should do what we're told
00:38:10.660
So reflecting Christ, the church suffuses all of life,
00:38:18.180
It does not displace ordinary life the way one billiard ball displaces another.
00:38:22.880
Rather, it informs and instructs ordinary life.
00:38:26.260
Wherever you are in the town, out in the kingdom,
00:38:28.480
whatever you are doing, whether changing a tire or changing a diaper,
00:38:31.980
you can turn around and look, and from that place you can see the church spire.
00:38:39.740
And whatever you do, whenever you do this, whenever you're looking like this, whatever you're doing, you are reminded that you are part of the bride, the wife of the lamb.
00:38:48.760
Now, returning to an earlier point, a problem has been caused by Abraham Kuyper's success and subsequent influence in that Kuyperian is now generally taken as a term of praise in reformed circles and not as a term of abuse.
00:39:05.380
Princeton University wants to give prizes with that name on it.
00:39:08.820
As a term of praise, this means that everybody wants it,
00:39:11.760
and this has resulted in a number of pietists and doctrinalists
00:39:15.180
who think they are Kuyperian, but who are not at all.
00:39:20.160
It's not the same thing as actually engaging the world at every point.
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True Kuyperian practice is not to go out into the world
00:39:28.060
and do pretty much what everybody else is doing,
00:39:33.540
Anything the world can do, we can do five years later and worse,
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You've got fad diets, we've got fad diets.
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Rather, it is Christians getting into the manufacture of knockoffs.
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the Christians are right there with a competing model
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00:40:01.580
In order for the Kuyperian spheres to be rightly related to one another,
00:40:05.440
it is necessary for all of them to be rightly related to worship,
00:40:13.000
In the first place, this means worship on the Lord's Day,
00:40:15.620
and in the second place, worship in other settings,
00:40:17.920
like chapel at seminary or in your family worship around the dinner table.
00:40:27.960
So as seminaries vie for the privilege of instructing the next generation
00:40:32.140
of Kuyperian ministers and a bunch of reformed instructors want to say well we we want to teach
00:40:38.860
our seminarians to be Kuyperian ministers how would you decide which one would do a good job
00:40:45.400
of it one of the things you can do if you're dubious about a restaurant is to simply walk in
00:40:50.280
and take a look at one of their restrooms depending on the conditions there you can go on to look at
00:40:55.520
other things the menu the prices the service etc but an appalling restroom ought to be a deal breaker
00:41:01.860
If you're in a strange town, should we eat there?
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Using a similar approach, take a grand tour of all the Reformed seminaries in the United States.
00:41:11.960
Do not sit in on the classes, or visit the bookstore, or examine the curriculum.
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Just make sure you hit the chapel service.
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Sit there and ask yourself if you want this to be the future of the Reformed world.
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Are they singing Jesus is my girlfriend music?
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Is the overall demeanor breezy and casual with shorts and flip-flops abounding?
00:41:41.940
Is this what reverence and godly awe mean to them?
00:41:45.500
And the chances are, if you get into a conversation with someone about this,
00:41:50.820
the defense will be to retreat to their true justification for carrying the reform mantle,
00:41:55.420
and it will either be a tight doctrinal defense.
00:41:58.440
The Heidelberg doesn't say we can't worship this way
00:42:02.880
Our students volunteer in evangelistic outreach
00:42:11.140
And this is nothing against doctrinal precision
00:43:00.600
so let's say a few things about that as I conclude.
00:43:22.820
which is the fecklessness of our cultural, political, and ecclesiastical leadership.
00:43:29.420
Kuyper is quoting from Calvin's commentary on Samuel here.
00:43:33.280
So this is Kuyper quoting Calvin, talking about Samuel.
00:43:38.160
And ye, O peoples, to whom God gave the liberty to choose your own magistrates,
00:43:43.980
see to it that ye do not forfeit this favor by electing to the positions of highest honor
00:43:58.860
One of the temptations to folly that falls out of the notion that American liberty is a unique thing in the world
00:44:05.240
is the idea that the threats to that liberty that we're currently facing are also unique.
00:44:12.120
Because of this, we don't look to God's word for wisdom on how to deal with it.
00:44:18.780
We think that this moment that we're dealing with, this clown world, Athanasius centuries ago famously said, he was told, Athanasius, don't you know the whole world is against you?
00:44:34.240
And his adversaries were meaning the whole world of bishops were against you.
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And Athanasius famously said, then let it be known that Athanasius is contra mundum, against the world.
00:44:47.680
If the world is against me, then I'm against the world.
00:44:50.500
We're in a more privileged position than Athanasius.
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We are contra mundum negosum, which is against clown world.
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Don't you know that all of clown world is against you?
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Don't you know that these guys want to make themselves perma-clowns?
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They do, but let it be known, we're against all of that.
00:45:11.540
so we think that we think this this singular situation that we're in is the first time in
00:45:19.120
human history that it's happened no no this is this is part of the life cycle of empires this
00:45:25.540
is what this is what diseased empires do this is what happens when uh when we lose our faith in
00:45:32.760
god and we wander off how many times in the book of judges alone has does this sort of thing happen
00:45:44.400
We don't look to history to see how it has been dealt with in the past,
00:45:47.560
but it has been dealt with by the Holy Spirit of God repeatedly in the past.
00:45:59.420
There's always a mountain of blessing to the right, an amount of curses to the left.
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There have always been scoundrels and fools ready to assemble in the king's court,
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and there has always been God's requirement for kings to look for good men who are ready to help
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banish the greasy climbers. This was true prior to 1776 and it has been true ever since that time.
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For century after century, many nations have experienced the heavy hand of tyranny and
00:46:24.760
mismanagement. For century after century, many other nations have been responsibly governed
00:46:29.800
and have enjoyed the blessings of liberty for a time. This is the kind of general truth
00:46:35.180
that can be described in a proverb when the righteous are in authority the people rejoice
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but when the wicked beareth rule the people mourn proverbs 29 2 this is generally true
00:46:48.300
just look around look up look down the corridors of history read a book we are in a period of
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mourning right now and we're in a period of mourning because god is chastising us with our
00:46:59.460
rulers god is chastising us with our rulers the response to chastisement is not to blame them
00:47:06.040
the response to chastisement is repentance god you are judging us with our rulers
00:47:12.360
what do we need to do we need to we need to turn back to you we need to cry out to you
00:47:18.460
so we're in a period of mourning right now and this is so because the wicked are currently in
00:47:22.580
control yates nailed it the best lack all conviction while the worst are full of passionate
00:47:27.680
intensity. But lest we blame the scoundrels inside the beltway as though that were where
00:47:32.900
the problem arose, the wicked bear rule there in a nation that holds orderly elections every two
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00:47:38.420
years. We chose these people, which means that we are ignoring to our peril the pointed warning
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that Calvin gave. What happens to a people who use this favor from God, free and untrammeled
00:47:52.000
elections in order to bestow the highest honors on skunks, graspers, thieves, grifters, blackguards,
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miscreants, villains, and stinkers. Such a people lose their liberty to choose their own leaders,
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and given how they were using that liberty, this constitutes no great loss. The United States is
00:48:13.220
only a nation, and we are experiencing no temptations except those that are common to
00:48:35.360
heaven, thank you for your goodness to us. We commit