From the TeachingtheWord Bible Knowledgebase

Part 7 of a series. Read part 6.

Liberals twist Scripture to establish un-Biblical "rules" to protect heretics.

A fifth false principle of the Auburn liberals was that assemblies of the church (and, by implication, individual ministers, elders, and church sessions) cannot call error that which Scripture plainly calls error, without a formal judicial process which they could pervert to prevent heretics from being exposed and evicted from the church. This false principle derives from the preceding one, the denial that any doctrine is essential. Again, quoting the Auburn Affirmation:

The General Assembly of 1923, in asserting that "doctrines contrary to the standards of the Presbyterian Church" have been preached in the pulpit of the First Presbyterian Church of New York City, virtually pronounced a judgment against this church. The General Assembly did this with knowledge that the matter on which it so expressed itself was already under formal consideration in the Presbytery of New York, as is shown by the language of its action. The General Assembly acted in the case without giving hearing to the parties concerned. Thus the General Assembly did not conform to the procedure in such cases contemplated by our Book of Discipline, and, what is more serious, it in effect condemned a Christian minister without using the method of conference, patience and love enjoined on us by Jesus Christ. We object to the action of the General Assembly in this case, as being out of keeping with the law and spirit of our church.[1]

The Auburn liberals were referring to the case of Dr. Harry Emerson Fosdick, who preached at First Presbyterian Church in New York City in the 1920s. Fosdick denied, among other truths, the virgin birth of Christ, the inerrancy of Scripture, the propitiatory nature of the atonement, and the doctrine of justification by faith alone. Although men in other parts of the denomination spoke out against him, the Presbytery of New York under which he served had refused to take action against him or the elders of his church. In his widely-circulated sermon "Shall the Fundamentalists Win?" Fosdick called for pluralism within the PCUSA - tolerance of liberal views like his alongside orthodox positions, and the long- term development of consensus doctrinal positions.[2]

Not unexpectedly, a subsequent generation of liberals associated with the Orthodox Presbyterian Church - the body, ironically, founded in the 1930s by men who opposed the Auburn Affirmation - said that Christians must "await development of consensus" on doctrines that are clearly and forever settled in the Word of God.[3]

Today in the OPC, and elsewhere in once-sound churches that have departed from the faith, there is great resistance to the use of the term "heresy." Like their spiritual forebears who signed the Auburn Affirmation one hundred years ago, they cry foul whenever that label is applied to their false teachings. But worse yet, the critics of today's liberalism fear using the "H-word" as some of them characterize it. Directly echoing the Auburn Affirmation, Dr. James S. Gidley, writing in the June 2004 issue of the OPC's New Horizons magazine, publicly declared 21st-century liberals' heretofore unwritten rule that heresy cannot be called by its right name:

...[N]o individual elder or minister, or group of ministers and elders not constituted as a court of the church, can lawfully declare someone to be a heretic or to be guilty of censurable error.[4]

In a letter to the editor of New Horizons, Dr. John W. Robbins, founder of The Trinity Foundation and a life-long champion of Biblical orthodoxy (and not a member of the OPC), gave the Biblical answer to the liberal's false principle that was designed to protect heretics from exposure:

This rule is without Scriptural support, and Mr. Gidley, tellingly, cites no Scripture to support it. Therefore, there is no reason to accept the Gidley Rule.

Second, there are many passages of Scripture which deny this rule. Both Christ and the apostles not only expect individual officers in the church to recognize false teaching and teachers and to warn the flock of God against them, but also expect ordinary Christians to make such judgments about teachers. Far from Christ and the apostles espousing a "hermeneutic of trust," to use a phrase that the OPC's Committee on Creation has recently used, the command of Christ and the apostles to all Christians is a hermeneutic of skepticism: "Believe not every spirit," "test the spirits," do not believe even an angel from heaven or an apostle or "those who seem to be something" (Gal. 2:6), if they depart from Scripture and the Gospel.

Third, the Gidley Rule would make all discipline for doctrinal error impossible, for in order for ecclesiastical discipline to begin, some individual who, by definition, is not constituted as a court of the church must declare a teacher to be guilty of censurable error or heresy, and such a declaration must be made publicly. Mr. Gidley's Rule is a catch-22.

Fourth, Gidley's Rule condemns the actions of J. Gresham Machen and many others in the Presbyterian Church in the 1920s and 1930s who declared teachers in that church to be guilty of censurable error and heresy. Gidley's Rule implies that the OPC is founded on illegal and sinful actions.[5]

When heresy rears its ungodly head in the church, it is the duty of even the most lowly Bible-believer to speak out:

And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather expose them. For it is shameful even to speak of those things which are done by them in secret. But all things that are exposed are made manifest by the light, for whatever makes manifest is light. Therefore He says: "Awake, you who sleep, arise from the dead, and Christ will give you light."

See then that you walk circumspectly, not as fools but as wise, redeeming the time, because the days are evil. Therefore do not be unwise, but understand what the will of the Lord is. (Ephesians 5:11-17)

For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written: "I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent."

Where is the wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the disputer of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of this world? For since, in the wisdom of God, the world through wisdom did not know God, it pleased God through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe. For Jews request a sign, and Greeks seek after wisdom; but we preach Christ crucified, to the Jews a stumbling block and to the Greeks foolishness, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.

For you see your calling, brethren, that not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called. But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty; and the base things of the world and the things which are despised God has chosen, and the things which are not, to bring to nothing the things that are, that no flesh should glory in His presence.

But of Him you are in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God - and righteousness and sanctification and redemption - that, as it is written, "He who glories, let him glory in the Lord." (1 Corinthians 1:18-30)

References:

1. The full text of the Auburn Affirmation appears here.

2. Harry Emerson Fosdick, "Shall the Fundamentalists Win?" in The Riverside Preachers, Paul Sherry, ed., (New York: Pilgrim Press, 1978), 27-38.

3. As advocated on behalf of the OPC liberals by John M. Frame in the Foreword to Backbone of the Bible: Covenant in Contemporary Perspective (Nacogdoches, Texas: Covenant Media Press, 2004), page xi.

4. James S. Gidley, "Quick to Hear, Slow to Speak, Slow to Anger" in New Horizons, Volume 25, No. 6, June 2004, page 9.

5. John W. Robbins, "Declaring Error" in New Horizons, Volume 25, No. 9, October 2004, pages 21-22.

Next: Promoting Doctrinal Pluralism

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