John MacArthur: an excerpt from his new book

This link is to the Pyromaniacs blog.  Although most of these guys are dispensationalists, on issues of Truth and Gospel, they are usually dead on target.  John MacArthur is the senior pastor of Grace Community Church in California.  Phil Johnson is one of his guys and is also one of the Pyromaniacs guys.  That is why they have an affinity for MacArthur.  Incidently, Phil Johnson also runs an online archive of Charles Spurgeon, one of the more renown preachers of the nineteenth century.  That website is also worth a visit. 

Enjoy this excerpt from MacArthur's book.

--Ogre--

St. Patrick's Day thoughts

Not for the first time, our Tuesday homily was about a saint, this time about the patron saint of Ireland, St. Patrick.  We learned some very interesting facts about Patrick.  To begin, Patrick wasn't Irish.  It seems that he was abducted from England by Irish raiders while a young teen and help captive in Ireland for six years until making his escape at the age of about 20.  But I do not wish to focus on Patrick.  His parents are far more interesting.


The history of the church in the British Isles is germaine to all Anglicans, Episcopalians and Presbyterians, as we trace our roots back to those islands.  Patrick was Roman.  His parents were Romans sent to England to deal with the Pelagian heresy by the church in Rome.  This is all taking place in the fifth century.  The great debate between Augustine and Pelagius and its aftermath subsequent to Pelagius' death was burning strongly in Rome.  The fact that Patrick's parents were sent to England for this reason speaks to just how widespread this problem had become for the church.  This heresy that infests the protestant churches of our time was the reason for Patrick's presence in Ireland in the first place.  It is shameful that we have come to the point that history has erased the most important legacy of Patrick's family, that of putting down the Pelagian heresy.


Happy St. Patrick's Day.  Isn't it nice to know that God chose you?

--Ogre--

The Heretics: Rome at Trent

In 1517, the Reformation began with a German monk named Martin Luther.  The 95 thesis of Luther were the beginning of a movement that would define the sixteenth century.  Luther wanted an ecumenical council to discuss several key doctrinal issues.  The church in Rome convened these conferences, but the outcome was not exactly what Luther had anticipated.  The Council of Trent was a series of 25 sessions during the mid 16^th century in which each of the issues of the Reformation was addressed.  The sixth session dealt with the doctrine of justification.  This is the central doctrine of reformation theology and the key to understanding the break from Rome.  We will explore the reformation definition of justification, in terms of the five solas.  We will carefully spell out the key canons on justification from the sixth session of the Council of Trent.  We will contrast the two points of view.  Finally, we will discuss whether there is any room for a concordat between Rome and any reformed denomination.

According to the Reformers, justification is a forensic or legal declaration that is made concerning the individual’s right standing with God.  Justification is based upon substitutionary atonement and propitiation of the sinner with God.  The means of this transfer of righteousness from Jesus to the sinner, and the transfer of sin to Jesus, and the reconciliation of the sinner to God is the work of Jesus on the cross, by His death, resurrection and ascension.  The Holy Spirit provides the elect with faith, through the preaching of the Word, the Gospel, and the receiving of the sacraments, Baptism and the Lord’s Supper, so that the elect will believe the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  Therefore, justification is by faith alone, in the work of Christ on the cross alone, by the Grace of God through the work of the Holy Spirit alone, to the Glory of God alone as per the recorded testimony of scripture alone.  While this looks like quite a lot of information, you have probably seen it all before.  We will examine each item as we walk through the Canons of Trent on justification.

This link will show the full canons of the sixth session of Trent.

Canons I-III are the refuting of the Pelagian heresy.  In this, both Rome and Luther are in agreement.  I have recently written on this topic.  While many might at first say that they thought that Rome did believe in works righteousness, what is important to understand is that we will be dealing with some semantic issues.  Justification in the mind of Rome is a two part process that the reformed break into justification and sanctification.  Rome views justification part one as being according to faith, and part two is according to works.  Both justification and sanctification for the reformed are external acts of Grace accomplished by Jesus and given to us as a gift of the Holy Spirit.  There is the potential for confusion due to the categories used by Rome relative to the categories used by the Reformers.

In Canon III, a new term is introduced: prevenient inspiration of the Holy Spirit.  The idea here is that man cannot be justified without the intervention of Grace through the Holy Spirit.  While this sounds like the reformation position at first glance, remember that justification to Rome has two parts.  Prevenient Grace is referring specifically to part one of justification in their theological system.

Canon IV is where the fun really starts.  

CANON IV. If any one shall affirm, that man’s freewill, moved and excited by God, does not, by consenting, cooperate with God, the mover and exciter, so as to prepare and dispose itself for the attainment of justification; if moreover, anyone shall say, that the human will cannot refuse complying, if it pleases, but that it is inactive, and merely passive; let such an one be accursed"!   

This canon is a direct rebuttal of what is now known as Calvin’s Irresistible Grace.  The Calvinist believes that the elect must be caused to believe by the Holy Spirit and that this movement of an individual by the Holy Spirit is 100% effective.  Canon IV flatly affirms a synergistic position and pronounces anyone who holds to the doctrine of monergism as accursed.  Things are starting to get nasty.

Canon V is difficult to understand, as it seems to be a contradiction.  Again, remember that Rome has a two part justification and that they believe in synergism.   

CANON V.- If anyone shall affirm, that since the fall of Adam, man’s freewill is lost and extinguished; or, that it is a thing titular, yea a name, without a thing, and a fiction introduced by Satan into the Church; let such an one be accursed"!  

After affirming the doctrine of original sin, Rome turns around and says that sin is not a condition of man to the degree that free will still exists sufficiently uncorrupted to cooperate with the Holy Spirit in justification.  This canon to some degree misrepresents the reformed position of free will as I discussed in the escalator metaphor (second free will section of this post,) but there can be no mistake that the reformed are now accursed on two counts.

Canon IX is the next interesting canon.  

CANON IX.-If any one saith, that by faith alone the impious is justified; in such wise as to mean, that nothing else is required to co-operate in order to the obtaining the grace of Justification, and that it is not in any way necessary, that he be prepared and disposed by the movement of his own will; let him be anathema.  

Here we have the denial of the sola fide, faith alone, doctrine of the Reformation.  While this seems to contradict all of the canons that precede IX, remember that the usage of the word justification by Rome is different that the reformation usage.  This will help sort out the supposed incongruences.

Canon XI is the last canon I’ll discuss for now.

CANON XI.-If any one saith, that men are justified, either by the sole imputation of the justice of Christ, or by the sole remission of sins, to the exclusion of the grace and the charity which is poured forth in their hearts by the Holy Ghost, and is inherent in them; or even that the grace, whereby we are justified, is only the favour of God; let him be anathema.  

Just how many times does a person have to be declared anathema or accursed to lose their salvation?  This is a pretty good description of penal substitionary atonement, and by it, Rome makes us anathema.

As a whole, it is clear that the Council of Trent was drafted as a direct refutation of the 95 thesis of Luther and the arguments of Calvin.  There is no room for doubt as to the position of Rome on these issues.  Rome has not changed its position on Trent in 500 years.  What is interesting about the concordats that are proposed between Lutheran and other protestant denominations with the Roman Catholic Church is that these protestant denominations truly believe that Rome has moved closer to their position.  Actually, the liberal move of Protestantism has resulted in our more closely resembling Rome.  Rome isn’t going to move at all.  The sooner we all realize this, the more quickly we will realize that we are selling the farm, and the blood of the reformation martyrs for a cheap ecumenical statement that affirms nothing helpful to the dialogue and compromises severely the reformed doctrine of justification.

And so while Rome considers the reformed to be anathema, the reformed sadly acknowledge that Rome ceased to be a church at the Council of Trent.  Undoubtedly there are saved persons within the Church of Rome, but institutionally, they have ceased to be a Christian church, based upon their frank denial of NT scripture as demonstrated by the Council of Trent.  There is no avenue back to one holy Catholic and Apostolic church as long as Trent is upheld.

--Troll--

The Heretics: Pelagius

The details of the Pelagian heresy are very involved, but I will try to walk through his arguments first. Afterwards, I will present the Augustinian rebuttal. Finally, we will look at the differences between Full Pelagianism and Semi-Pelagianism, and the presence of both in the modern church. Pelagius was a fifth century monk. He had many detractors, but history records the debate between Pelagius and Augustine of Hippo. The main issues are original sin, free will and salvation.

Let me begin by saying that any argument that is not from scripture will be categorically dismissed by Troll. In order to understand reformed doctrine, the five solas must be considered. To refute any doctrinal position, it is most effective to do so within the hermeneutic of the system that holds the position in question. Does the doctrine stand up to its own internal hermeneutic? The corollary to this statement is that any argument that begins with the supposition that Paul’s writings do not belong in the canon as a defense of Pelagius have been categorically discarded. If the integrity of scripture is your argument against Christian doctrine, then you cannot consider yourself Christian. At least have the honesty to admit this basic assumption: to be Christian has to be based upon something, and we hold the integrity of scripture to be that something.

Original Sin. Pelagius viewed Adam in a much different light than Augustine. Pelagius contended that Adam would have died whether or not he sinned. The argument is that the natural characteristic of man is to die. Genesis does not specifically state that Adam was created immortal. Therefore, death was not the result of original sin, but a natural part of creation.

Pelagius also believed that Adam’s sin convicted only him, not all of mankind. Pelagius denied the federal headship of Adam. The argument is that the OT is full of examples of sin being unique to an individual with no inheritance of sin in any direction of the family. It is said that Jesus never mentions Adam specifically, or speaks of the fall. Therefore, the federal relationship between Adam and mankind is not specifically Biblical in Pelagius’ mind. He goes so far to say that infants are born untarnished by sin, in the same condition as Adam at creation. Therefore, mankind is essentially good, not evil. Adam becomes nothing more than a bad example.

Grace. The role of Grace in Pelagius mind was different than that of Augustine. There is a Roman Catholic term that owes its origin to this debate. This concept is called prevenient grace. The point is that man has a fallen will until God intervenes with Grace that truly frees the will of man allowing him the ability to choose to follow Jesus. This prevenient grace was bestowed on all of mankind by Jesus. This was the action of Jesus on the cross, to make man able to exercise free will in a way to follow Christ.

Free Will. Logically, then, free will begins uncorrupted by Adam. Jesus buys for mankind the ability to have uncorrupted free will once again. Therefore, all people are born with uncorrupted free will and may choose to follow Christ as they will.

Salvation. Following through to his logical conclusion, Pelagius argues that salvation is based upon the meritorious efforts of the individual. Morality and the following of the Law is the key to salvation. After bestowing prevenient grace on the free will of mankind, the role of Jesus is the example of perfection to which man is to aspire. The Law is the pathway to salvation.

Augustine and the Reformers. Going point by point through these arguments again, let’s look at the doctrine as spelled out by Augustine, and later, the reformers.

Original Sin. Pelagius’ argument from silence concerning the term original sin in Genesis is a paper tiger. As always, one needs to be careful when arguing from silence. To say that Genesis failing to specify man’s condition concerning death prior to Adam’s sin necessarily proves that man was created with a shelf life ignores the obvious. Genesis also fails to point out a shelf life for man existing prior to Adam’s sin. An argument from silence only works if the same argument cannot be used against your argument. What Genesis does say is that Adam sinned. The doctrine of original sin is spelled out through many OT and NT passages and is given the label original sin. The word Christian appears nowhere in the Bible either, and yet we accept that the Bible describes what it is to follow Christ. This is a hollow argument that ignores vast amounts of scripture (for instance Psalms 14 and 53, Isaiah 28, 53 and 59, Jeremiah 6, and Exodus 6,) which I will develop in detail in a Building Blocks post in the near future.

The federal headship of Adam is an argument heavily steeped in covenant theology. It is interesting that all groups that hold to the doctrine of original sin will accept this federal relationship of Adam to mankind, but then many will fail to follow through with the covenantal relationship of the rest of the OT to redemptive history. Nonetheless, concerning original sin and Adam’s representation of mankind, Jeremiah, Isaiah and Paul in Romans 3 are the key starting points. This is by no means an exhaustive list, but rather this is a starting point for reading about the condition of man and in particular the inner qualities of the heart of a fallen mankind.

Grace. The role of Grace in Salvation is a look at the five solas of the Reformation as well as the five points of Calvinism. The work of Jesus on the Cross has to accomplish something for mankind, or else God is a cruel and unjust God. The question is for whom did Christ die, and for whom has He risen. Once we establish this, we can discuss who gets the Grace and what does it do. The concept of Jesus’ remnant or elect runs all through the OT and NT. There is clearly an indication that not all people will be saved. So, did Christ die to give us a choice? Is Grace resistable? Or instead, is God sovereign, the Almighty, who decides who will be His. If you accept the idea of Original Sin, then all men are already dead in their sin. Therefore, God in His mercy selects a vast number, too numerous to count, to be His people. Grace is then God through the Holy Spirit opening the minds and hearts of His elect so that they will hear His call. If you are called, it is the demonstration of the Grace of God. In this perspective, Grace cannot be resisted, nor is Grace revocable. Both of those possibilities would damage the sovereignty of God. Therefore, the Resurrection was for all of Christ’s people, but not for all people.

Free Will. Free will is another term that does not appear in the Bible except in the OT context of freewill offerings. There is a large difference between that concept and the idea of free will enabling man to participate in his own salvation. Everyone recognizes that we make decisions every day. If you consider the world in which we live in a horizontal plane, and the Kingdom of God a higher horizontal plane, and interactions with God in a vertical line between them, then it is clear that we exercise free will within the horizontal plane of this world, but vertical interactions between these two planes are the issue. The tower of Babel is a good example of our vertical efforts: futile. Our attempts to fulfill the Law: futile. Our efforts at works: futile. Jesus provides the vertical connection between the planes. He condescends to our plane and He is the ladder between the planes. But only through Him can we ascend. As it turns out, Jesus has better technology in the New Covenant than Jacob. It isn’t a ladder, it is actually an escalator. We don’t even step onto the escalator. The Holy Spirit places us on the escalator. That is how effective our free will is without Grace.

Salvation. Pelagius would have man building the ladder, climbing the ladder and reaching the top, using the blue print of Moses and the example of Christ. We know the futility of building towers and ladders to God from the OT. We need Christ to provide the means, the motive, the Grace, the power, the whole enchilada. Salvation is by Faith alone, in Christ alone, by Grace alone to the Glory of God alone as testified to us in Scripture alone, the five solas of the Reformation.

Semi-Pelagianism vs Full Pelagianism.

The Semi-Pelagian viewpoint is neither Pelagian nor Augustinian on the issue of original sin.  People are born neither good nor bad, but neutral.  Adam damaged the condition of mankind, but did not corrupt it, as Augustine would argue.  The Semi-Pelagian viewpoint of salvation is different in that the resurrection provides the possibility for salvation for all of mankind. It is not an irresistible Grace as in Augustinian or Calvinist thought. There is still a synergism or cooperation between God and man, rather than the monergism of Augustine or Calvin. If man takes one step or half the steps, it is still synergism. Free will is intact in this system. Faith, rather than being a gift, actually becomes a work of man in the exercise of free will. Election, then, becomes a matter of God knowing in advance how each person is going to respond with their free will to the offer of Salvation from Christ. There are similarities between Semi-Pelagianism and Arminianism, the contribution of man being a matter of degree.

Modern Protestant Liberalism and Evangelicalism

If you have ever attended these types of churches, there is a lot of the following language. There are altar calls in which people are asked to make a decision for Christ. Ask God into your life. Make Jesus your Lord and Savior. All of these notions are Pelagian in nature, whether semi or full Pelagian depends upon the means of sanctification. It is striking just how Roman Catholic these so called Protestant denominations have become. When the addition of spirituality and mysticism is added to the brew, you have moralistic churches with leaders who invent scripture on the fly without even the scholarship and theology of the Roman Catholic church. There is no one in the church to point out the obvious to the Emperor. This is the logical outcome of this unbiblical theology. Paul, who wrote about half of the New Testament, is either discredited, disregarded or twisted. Law passages get plucked out of context without the indicatives that ground the imperatives. This is the state of the American church.

Summary. It is easy to say that Pelagius lost the battle, but won the war. Augustine, Luther and Calvin would not recognize most of our American churches today, but would consider the vast majority to be either pagan or heretical. The American culture is so rooted in individual rights, freedom and the “can do” attitude, that the Gospel is completely scandalous and offensive. Romans 3 and 9 are so completely foreign to us that we end up shouting that God is unfair. We actually believe that somewhere deep down inside of every person, there is a good and righteous person, and that God will see that goodness and the sincerity of that person’s belief. Belief is no longer in something specific, you just have to belief in something, and that’s good enough. Pelagius was a better Christian theologian than most of the modern liberal thinkers, but he still got it wrong. Pelagianism is the scourge of the American church today.

--Ogre--

The Heretics: Arius

The Arian heresy is credited to Arius, a fourth century bishop in Egypt.  Please take note that this is not the same as Hitler’s Aryan, by spelling or meaning.  The true origin of this heresy may be Lucien of Antioch, but the origin is less an issue in this century than the content of the heresy and the response of the rest of the church to it.  The importance of this whole controversy is that it lead to Emperor Constantine convening a council to address this problem at Nicaea, the result of which council was the Nicene Creed.  Some 50 years later, the Nicene Creed was finalized at the First Council of Constantinople (Second Ecumenical Council.)  The whole of the fourth century is punctuated by this debate.  This is a great outline of the events, although difficult to follow without a score card, and isn’t necessary for the discussion, but I include it for completeness.

The major issue of the Arian controversy was the substance of Christ.  Although all of Arius’ writings have been destroyed, his legacy is clear from the arguments against him.  There are two main points in his discussion.  First, the Father is eternal, but Christ is not.  Arius argued that Jesus was the Son of God, and therefore the first creation of God.  Secondly, and as a logical corollary, Jesus was neither fully God nor fully man.  The counterargument here is the doctrine of the Trinity, which was not completely spelled out until the Second Ecumenical Council.  The doctrine of the Trinity is that all three parts of the Godhead, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit are both all of the same substance and all eternal.  Let’s look at each component of this more closely.

Arius argued that belief that Jesus was both God and Man meant that there must be two Gods.  Therefore, there must have been a time when there was only one God, and Jesus was his first creation.  All the rest of creation was accomplished through Jesus.  Therefore, Jesus was not fully God, in the sense that he was a creation, and therefore less than God.  Verses sighted to confirm this belief include John 14:28 and Colossians 1:15.  

In the John selection, Jesus says, “…the Father is greater than I.” What did He mean by that statement in that context?  The argument here is in terms of authority or leadership, not of substance.  While Jesus is still on the earth and in His earthly body, in some sense He is under the authority of the Law, that is, the Word of God.  Even if Jesus is participant author of the Word with God, while He is man, He is under the Law, and therefore, for a time, under the authority of God.  Look at John 1:1-4, 10:30 and 20:28.  In the first passage, John states that the Word, or Christ, is with God from the beginning.  Even though we can say that Arius agrees with Trinitarians on creation being through Christ, it is clear that John states that Christ was always there with God.  In the second selection, Jesus clearly states, “I and the Father are One.” This cannot be stated any more clearly.  And finally, Thomas, upon his personal revelation of the arisen Christ states that Jesus is God.  It is difficult to argue, therefore, from the context of John that Jesus Christ is anything less than God, both in substance and eternity.

In the Colossians selection, Paul says that Jesus is the firstborn of creation.  The Old Testament reference for this passage is Proverbs 8, which is about wisdom.  Paul is equating Christ with wisdom, but at the same time, he is not making a statement about Christ’s order in creation as supposed by Arius.  It is the concept of wisdom that is the firstborn creation.  In verse 16, the crux of the argument is that by Him all things were created.  How can He be a created thing if all things were created by Him, through Him or in Him?  

While there is the temptation to leave the argument there, there is another issue that comes from the preceding paragraph in Colossians.  There is ample precedent in the New Testament for the notion that Jesus is the firstborn of the New Covenant, the New Creation, the Kingdom of the resurrected world.  Since all of creation will be resurrected, including the rocks, dirt and trees, the notion of Jesus being the firstborn of the New Creation of the New Covenant is certainly true.  Whether Paul is intending this sort of double entendre in Colossians is questionable, but given the order of the letters, Romans is thought to be five years older than Colossians, and the circulation of these letters throughout the ancient world, it is certainly possible that Romans should be treated as an antecedent to the Colossian epistle.  Verse 14 clearly introduces the Kingdom of the Age to Come to the debate and frames the comments in the next few verses.

In the Second Ecumenical Council, it was made clear in the amendment to the Nicene Creed that Father, Son and Holy Spirit are all of the same substance, and all three are one.  This is the doctrine of the Trinity.  Each part of the Trinity is of the same substance, that is God, and each part is only a part of the whole that is God.  As I have mentioned before, all of the Churches of the last 2000 years, whether Orthodex, Roman or Protestant, have shared this Trinitarian view of God.  Despite this, there has always been a thread of this Arian heresy in the theological debate.

There are two very visible and very prominent groups in the US today who persist with some form of the Arian heresy.  They have other issues as well, but clearly this is a part of their problem.  The first group is the Mormons.  The Mormons view Jesus as the physical son of god the father and his goddess wife.  The rest of their theology is not my intent here.  The point here is the clear difference in the idea that Jesus is of the same substance with God with both the Arian view and the Mormon view.  The second group is the Jehovah’s Witnesses.  They actually add the word “other” to the Colossians passage above to make clear that Jesus was the first creation, and then Jesus created every “other” creature.  They view Jesus as the human manifestation of the archangel Michael, that they are the same creature or being.

What is also abundantly clear in both of these examples is that neither group believes in the Reformation doctrine of Sola Scriptura.  This is a powerful argument for this central reformed doctrine.  The Mormons have added a second book, the Book of Mormon, to the scripture.  In fact, this second book is used to interpret the Bible.  This is clearly at odds with Christianity in general and the Protestant Reformation in particular.  It underscores the dangers of the interpretive powers of the Papacy and the manners in which that bad precedent can be corrupted.  The JWs have a second book as well, anything published by the Watch Tower Society as well as their old version of the Bible called the New World Translation.  This translation changes many key passages in the Bible to suit the JW interpretive grid.

Other movements that have some element of Arianism in their thoughts are anything written by Dan Brown and, of course, the Gnostics.  The Gnostics have a full set of beliefs that, again, is outside of this effort, but central among these beliefs is the Arian view of a first-created mediator and secondary creator.  The Gnostic Gospels are thought to be from the third century.  Scholarship that has attempted to tie them to first century Apostles has not been upheld.  The reason for these documents to carry the names of Apostles is to try to give them theological weight that they would clearly lack otherwise.  The authorship in terms of person and timeframe alone would put off inclusion in the canon, if it were not for severe breaks in Christian theology. 

Of particular interest today is the Egyptian situation concerning the Coptic Christians.  The documents found in the library at Nag Mammadi in 1945 were written in the Coptic language.  When the Coptic Christians were excommunicated in 451, it was over the issue of Arianism.  Of note, Origen, who spoke for the Trinity in the fourth century, was also Egyptian, thus it can be said that the Egyptian legacy is not all Arian.  

And finally, words that are used in liberal church circles today smack of the Arian heresy.  Jesus Christ as an example is just such a point.  The so-called Free Grace Movement asserts that a person can accept Christ as Savior, without making him lord of your life.  This notion that seems so foreign to Christian theology has gained much tread in American Evangelical circles.  The idea of Jesus as example of righteous living guts the Gospel of any real significance.  Is the resurrection really necessary to offer us a great example?  Theologically, these types of movements have only one possible endpoint, and that is a denial of Christ as divine.

In summary, the Arian heresy is alive and well today.  It is important as Christians that we recognize it when we hear it.  We need to understand that this heresy was completely refuted in the early church, and has been refuted by all truly Christian theologians since that time.  The divinity of Christ is central to Christian theology.  The denial of Christ’s divinity is equivalent to the denial of Christ’s offer of Salvation.

--Ogre--

Future series

After listening to some ideas, I’ve decided upon two series that I will probably run simultaneously.  I am doing these simultaneously because this will keep both series moving and more interesting.

The first series will be called Building Blocks.  As much as I am trying to make my words as accessible to everyone as possible, I’m still getting feedback that either implies a lack of understanding of my points, or overtly states a lack of understanding of a point.  I know that no one is replying to me on the blog, but I’ve been getting verbal and email responses about almost every post.  Thank you for those words as they sustain me and give me the belief that this effort is worth continuing.  The Building Blocks series will be taking key vocabulary words and Biblical doctrines and devoting a whole article to them with the goal being to see if I can get that one part right.  After we get enough Building Blocks, we’ll start putting them into larger pictures to see how they fit.

The second series will be called The Heretics.  The reason for this series is that it is often most instructive in figuring out what is correct to examine what is incorrect.  We will look at the views of each heretic, focusing on the particular issues that caused problems in the church.  We will also look at their modern theological reincarnations.  My point will be to show that much of what is modern and new, is actually ancient and wrong.  This will help crystallize what we can say that is correct about each issue and the Gospel.

I hope that these two series are enjoyable.  If you have ideas for other topics, Troll is always under the bridge, even if Ogre isn’t.

--Troll--  and  --Ogre--

The Heretics: Charles Finney

This article originally appeared in Modern Reformation in 1995.  It is a detailed overview of Finney's theology and what is wrong with it.  Finney remains one of the most influential people in American Evangelicalism.  This is one of the main reasons that a Modern Reformation is needed.  Enjoy.

The Legacy of Charles Finney

--Troll--