More details (and reasons) to come…..

In His service,
Joel

Part 2:

Part 3:

Part 1. Tim Keller: Dangerously Influential

Part 2. Tim Keller’s Gutless ‘Gospel’

Part 3. Tim Keller’s False Gospel: Changing Both the Method and the Message

Part 4. Tim Keller’s False Gospel: A ‘Sandwich’ Made Without the Bread of Life

New Calvinism is a broad church, with a wide range of beliefs, doctrines and practices. The Gospel Coalition (TGC), which started in 2007 with a conference headlined by Don Carson, Tim Keller and John Piper, was a significant event, for the Coalition has become a national network for the New Calvinist movement. Theologian Don Carson wrote the original draft of the confessional statement, while Pastor Tim Keller of Redeemer Presbyterian Church,New York, wrote the theological call to ministry. The Gospel Coalition Council boasts familiar names like Tim Keller, John Piper, Matt Chandler, Mark Driscoll, Mark Dever, Al Mohler and Joshua Harris. Coalition leaders explain that they are not a ‘boundary set’, for that would mean nailing down the outer limits of who is ‘in’ and who is ‘out’, and that they do not want. As a consequence just about everyone is welcome to join the TGC Network, whatever their doctrinal beliefs.  

While there are certain characteristics around which New Calvinists are united, it is a broad movement, and not all practice their faith in the same way. While most claim to be faithful to Scripture, and to follow the essential tenets of Calvin’s theology, many are marked by a love for the ways and things of the world, which manifests itself in unbecoming conduct that is far removed from the ways and beliefs of traditional Calvinists and Puritans. Here are some of the key characteristics of New Calvinism:

Read the rest here.

[The movement known as New Calvinism is dangerous on many levels, and I dare say they all cannot be covered adequately in a single post. However, if you shine the light on a snake’s head, it’s best to assume it’s attached to a body very much alive.

Some comments are worthy posts in themselves. Here’s one of them by ‘William” who shines a light for us…. ]

Satan has just now updated himself, and put on the cloak of the Puritans and “reformed” for this generation.

“My firm belief is that New Calvinism is like the New Christianity of the rebellious 1960s, an external, popular but worldly Christianity, false Christianity, loose Christianity…Satan has just now updated himself, and put on the cloak of the Puritans and “reformed” for this generation, which began to look to history for better churches and beliefs (which is needed).  It’s almost as if Satan launched a counter-reformation, from within the church (by men who “crept in unawares”), as others were seeking to restore Calvinistic doctrine and practice.

Satan is inoculating sound doctrine with neo-Calvinism (tainted doctrine and practice, suitable to worldliness; thus it hates sanctification and the law which condemns sin)

But what we are seeing is really just a repeat of what happened in the 60′s, but tailored for and against historic doctrine.  It’s just another Blue-jeans Christianity, without the bell bottoms.  They use “grunge” instead.  This is exactly like the Hippy Christianity of the 1960s and why true Calvinistic doctrine, with genuine conversion, real sanctification to holiness, consistent with God’s law (for the gospel vindicates the law), cannot be tolerated, and must be amended (as New Calvinism does)!   It is marked by claiming to be “reformed” but practicing “will-worship” (even Paul Washer has endorsed “Christian rap”.

It was in the 60s that youth groups and rock music entered the formerly conservative churches).  Those of us older than 50 can more readily recognize it from experience (the similarity is striking to our younger years), and why we mock it, as much as the reviving of the world “cool” (such an old fashioned word, from the stupidest era in American history).  Truly, there is “nothing new under the sun”.  But this is deadly serious, not a laughing matter, because it effects souls.  It’s turning the “grace of God into lasciviousness”…while ‘the doctrines of grace’ are mentioned much, superficially.

If Christianity is “cool” it’s unchristian, because the world will never love real Christianity, but hate it, as Jesus said

Satan is inoculating sound doctrine with neo-Calvinism (tainted doctrine and practice, suitable to worldliness; thus it hates sanctification and the law which condemns sin) as a Broadway Christianity to impugn the Narrow by its majority power (which will make it politically-correct eventually).  If Christianity is “cool” it’s unchristian, because the world will never love real Christianity, but hate it, as Jesus said (“the world hates you, because it hated me”).  Now if you were an enemy, wouldn’t that be just the perfect way to deceive “even the elect, if possible”?  Anti-Christ is said in the Bible to do just that, almost deceive “even the elect”.

It talks “reformed-speak”, but shows little change in reality, and never enters in the Narrow Gate.

The New Antichristian church will not be Catholic, it will be Ecumenical and “reformed” in name and word (unregulated in worship, just like Rome and the 60s), and Popular, but like the Man of Sin (spiritual, political leader), “Lawless” (antinomian–New Covenant Theology), maybe even with “signs and wonders” (charismatic alliance) to “deceive many”.  It’s really the perfect deception to fool the most “conservative”, who are like Talkative in Pilgrim’s Progress. It talks “reformed-speak”, but shows little change in reality, and never enters in the Narrow Gate.

That is why New Calvinism is so dangerous and pernicious, and its elements are not just exclusive to the celebrity pastors being named either.  The same elements can be found in most reformed churches in practice, while they even hold the orthodox Calvinistic doctrines more soundly.”

- “William”

Among the immediate issues are a description of core values or doctrinal statement, logo, bringing on new members who are very ready!

We appreciate your patience as we work to get things up and running smoothly.

Continue to pray for us, as we are nearly overwhelmed with monumental tasks ahead of us.

You will see many changes, no doubt, as the weeks progress.

That has been understood for centuries. The word justify does and has always meant the same in both the biblical and secular realms throughout history, yet apparently, there is still some confusion – or should I say fusion?

John Piper:

For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. – 2 Corinthians 5:21

Thus justification has these two sides: the removal of sin because Christ bears our curse, and the imputation of righteousness because we are in Christ and His righteousness is counted as ours. (John Piper, God is the Gospel, p. 43)

No. The verse Piper quotes speaks of reconciliation, not sanctification. It is good news for the sinner who needs to be reconciled unto God, and has nothing to do with the removal of sin from the saint.

Nowhere in Scripture does justification have two sides. It only has one. It means to declare righteous. It removes nothing. To declare something removes nothing. When a person is saved, he or she is declared righteous – that’s justification – but sin is not removed from the believer in the declaration.

The tyranny of sin as a master is broken, absolutely, yet the believer still sins, thus the need for constant renewing of the mind by the reading of the Word of God; thus the need for the continuing work of the Holy Spirit in the conscience and spirit of men to convict of sin.

The work of removing sin is the work of the Holy Spirit in our sanctification, a process in which, the Christian is not passive, but active in the mortification of sin by the enabling of the Spirit of God.

“Well, all Piper is saying is that our sin is removed from our account.”

Well, that is not justification, because in justification there is no sin to be removed. If we say that our sin is removed, we are saying that it existed in the first place. In the justifying declaration of God, there is no sin to be removed!

Brethren, when God declares you justified, God is declaring that you have never sinned – a declaration of total, complete obedience to His Law – a declaration of perfect sinlessness. It is a declaration of your perfect obedience to the Law of God – in Christ.

Yet even after justification, sin remains, it is not removed as Piper says.

What John Piper is doing here, as in most of his writings and preaching and teaching, is fusing justification with sanctification. In other words, Christ obedience for your justification also applies to your sanctification – which is not true, not biblical.

While the majority of Christians would confess that the Holy Spirit works in us to help us remove sin, John Piper goes so far as to say that the Holy Spirit does not do that apart from the preaching of the Gospel – to Christians.

In a section of the book titled: The Spirit Flies in Formation Behind the Christ-Exalting Gospel he writes:

This is crucial to understand. It shows how Christ-exalting the Holy Spirit is. He will not do His sanctifying work by the use of His direct divine power. He will only do it by making the glory of Christ the immediate cause of it. This is the way He works in evangelism, and this is the way he works in sanctification. – (John Piper, God is the Gospel, p. 91).

That statement flies in the face of all New Testament teaching. Apparently, not only does John Piper not understand Justification by faith, neither does he understand fully the work of the Spirit of God in the life of the believer.

This blog will be authored by contributors who have recognized the falsehood of what is today called New Calvinism, a modern movement that has ripped families apart and done much harm to the Church at large.

This effort is one that seeks the ultimate glory of God and the defense of the Gospel, and the faith, once delivered to the saints by way of the New Testament, the ultimate law of Christianity.

There is a new reformation occurring these days, a recovering of the Gospel that was once lost, and now it is found…..

….and it is a lie.

Our prayer, goal, and hope is to point you back to the written Word of God, the old path that God prescribed for His people.

There will be many changes ahead in the near future: logos, descriptions of purpose and so forth.

For now, welcome, and pray for us. This is a serious task, and we are serious about it.

Thus says the LORD: “Stand by the roads, and look, and ask for the ancient paths, where the good way is; and walk in it, and find rest for your souls. But they said, ‘We will not walk in it.’  ~ Jeremiah 6:16