LAP
LAP has answered the PCA’s indictment by pleading “not guilty” to count 1 and “guilty” to count 2. Details at Green Bagginses.
Charges and Specifications
- Louisiana Presbytery has failed to understand properly (and appropriately act upon) what it means to have a “difference” with the Constitution (BCO 21-4 and 21-5 and RAO 16-3(e)(5)), and in the application of the meaning of “difference” in the examination of a presbytery member’s views. For instance, Louisiana Presbytery’s own record of TE Wilkins’s statements establish that TE Wilkins did, at the very least, have numerous and potentially significant semantic differences with the Constitution. (Record of the Case [hereafter “RoC”] 2007-8, pg. 205–206) Further, Louisiana Presbytery demonstrates its failure to exercise these duties by stating, “Thus far, no one has brought forth evidence demonstrating that TE Wilkins has actively denied the system of doctrine” (RoC 2007-8, pg. 187, emphasis added). As the Standing Judicial Commission has ruled, inconsistency with the Confessional Standards is not limited to explicit denial, but may also include formulations that subvert by less explicit means.
Louisiana Presbytery was required to investigate these differences and classify them under RAO 16-3(e)(5). Louisiana Presbytery failed to comply with this requirement.Louisiana Presbytery should have gone beyond TE Wilkins’s assertions that he did not take exceptions to the Confessional Standards (other than those delineated), that he did not consider his views as being out of accord with the Confessional Standards, that he affirmed the Confessional Standards, and that he did not deny or contradict the Confessional Standards. A fair and impartial court should have recorded and classified all of TE Wilkins’s differences. It was the duty of Louisiana Presbytery to determine what the differences with the Confessional Standards were; and whether the differences were merely semantic, more than semantic (but not out of accord with the fundamentals of our system of doctrine), out of accord and hostile to our system of doctrine or striking at the vitals of religion (BCO 21-4, 21-5, RAO 16-3(e)(5)), all of which determinations Louisiana Presbytery has failed to make.
- Louisiana Presbytery failed to find a strong presumption of guilt that some of the views of TE Wilkins were out of conformity with the Constitution, and thus was derelict in its duty under BCO 13-9, 40-4, and 40-5, and has thereby caused much unresolved pastoral confusion and harm.
TE Wilkins’s views, as articulated in the Record of the Case in 2007-8 and in the following examples, clearly constitute a strong presumption of guilt that his views are out of accord with the Constitution and require a fair and impartial court to proceed to trial. (PCA Indictment of LAP)
7 comments:
I'm a little scared now. The earth will shake with the condemnation of the FVists. "Dost thou defy our demands? Dost thou call down our wrath? O, petulant, ignorant gods of conformity. Dost thou not know your time has already come to an end? Dost thou not see yon second year seminary student drinking the living blood of Federal Vision truth from the skull of your dead orthodoxy? DOST THOU DEFY US?!? DOST THOU NOT SEE . . . THE WRITING ON THE WALL??? IT IS WRITTEN IN YOUR BLOOD!!! BY ALL THAT IS HOLY, AND ALL POWERFUL, AND SOVEREIGN OVER YOUR VERY SOULS, FROM THE SHEER HEIGHTS OF MOSCOW, IDAHO, THAT YOU FEAR MORE THAN YOU FEAR GOD (AND RIGHTLY SO) YOU WILL NOT HAVE A CHOICE IN PAYING FOR THIS ACT!!! YOUR FATE HAS BEEN SEALED!!!!! RAISE THE BAPTISMERATOR!!! RAISE IT!!! RAISE IT!!! FIRE THE HOLY FEDERAL VISION WATER!!!! FIRE!!!!! FIRE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! O, WESTMINSTER WEST WILL BE OURS!!! OURS!!!! OURS!!!!!!!!!"
If the news (which no one can seem to confirm) is true, and AAPC is leaving the PCA, please do remember this little gem from some time back:
"Perhaps the goal has just been to "make things hot" for Steve, so that he voluntarily leaves the PCA. Then they could explain the heresy in detail to various bought-and-paid-for crowds, with no theological debate necessary, and no robust interchanges in the Q&A. The problem is that Steve is a churchman, and has no plans to make it easy for them by acting the part of a radical individualist. He is going to make them prove what they are saying, and this will prove awkward for them because they can't. If they could, they would be the ones eager for debate, right?"
http://www.dougwils.com/index.asp?Action=Anchor&CategoryID=1&BlogID=3451
Killer.
Oh my, well, that is just too rich. Tsar Wilson make this comment. One year later, Ol' "Machen" Wilkins acts the part of a radical individualist & brings his church along with him, with full blessings from the Tsar himself. Not that is hasn't been seen before. This is the M.O. the Federal Vision. They play the part of the high churchman condemning the baptistic masses, then retreat to the "me and my Bible" mentality when their claims about the Reformed tradition don't bear out.
I guess then my first post above is a misreading of the Federal Vision character.
Their battle call seems to be: "Run away! Run away!!!"
Check this out:
“American Christians only know one method of fighting, which is to divide and run off to yet another splinter denomination, the presbytery of the True Flame. This, to use the military parlance, is called retreating. Moderates fraternize with evil covenant members and call it unity. A better term would be betrayal. Conservatives run from evil covenant members and call it purity. A better term would be rout.” (Douglas Wilson, “Judas Was A Bishop,” Credenda Agenda, Volume 13, Issue 2)
Maybe with this move to their own denomination the FVists will get the courage to write their own systematic theology? I mean now relieved of the burden of pretending they are in line with the soteriology of the Westminster Standards.
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