A few weeks ago there was a small chance that maybe, maybe TGE would truly get away from the net long enough to maybe regain a little balance and some perspective. Sadly, that did not end up happening, and lo and behold, “He’s baaaack.” You will note the title of the blog article below: “Theocentric vs. Anthropocentric Religion Illustrated.” It provides a documented illustration from a Roman Catholic (Jimmy Akin) taken directly from the text of Scripture. Now, Mr. Enloe decided to make a vague (yet obvious) reference to it today on his blog, prompted, it seems, by some comments on Douglas Wilson’s site. He said, “it occurs to me that if people want to avoid “man-centered” religion (see the bald guy with the goatee waving in the background? That’s me!) they need to avoid religions that treat God’s works as if they are man’s works. A Christian–especially one who claims to be Reformed–should not want a colorless, odorless faith, after all.” The link takes us to Douglas Wilson’s blog, where a glaringly false dichotomy regarding living or dead faith (James 2) is presented in a tongue-in-cheek manner (which is the common theme on that blog, I’ve noted). Given Wilson’s voluminous writings, he may well have produced a full exegesis of James 2 along the lines of the chapter I included in The God Who Justifies, but I have not found it. Be that as it may, Mr. Enloe followed this with a paragraph of what I can only call “Medievalistic Federal Visionist Historio-Babble,” stuff that has been shot through four dozen times before, but no one is home to hear the refutation. I do not want, nor do I have, a “colorless, odorless faith,” if by that Enloe is insinuating that unless one embraces his particular form of medieval sacralism (which, of course, he identifies as being truly Reformed) then one has pushed truth off into heaven to keep it safe from the liberals and has reduced the gospel to a few “intellectually-formulated sentences” that do not impact life. And in light of recent events in the life of my own fellowship (including the baptism of my son and my daughter and their joining in the life of the fellowship in the observation of the Lord’s Supper), I would like to invite Mr. Enloe to think just a little more about his empty rhetoric before he posts it publicly.
But the reason I even note this newest retread of TGE’s complaints is that it seems people in our society (and in evangelicalism) focus upon the act of complaint rather than asking if there is any merit in the complaint itself. You see, if someone wanted to actually provide a meaningful response to what I wrote in the blog entry below, would they not have to actually address the substance of the article itself? You would think so. But TGE didn’t seem to think about that. Earlier today, Alexander the Coppersmith provided another example (thirteen of them, actually) on a webboard, seeking to take pot shots at The Potter’s Freedom. And the constant element of his attempts was the same: when you are criticizing someone their original intent is irrelevant: just shoot wildly and most folks will never know the difference.
And such puts those who seek to live consistently in the light of God’s truth in a tough spot, one that requires divinely-given wisdom. We can’t do that to others. When I wrote TPF I spent a great deal of time and even money to make sure I was accurately representing Dr. Geisler’s position and views. Hence, it is truly aggravating when someone like Alexander comes along and shows me, and anyone who would read his words, deep disrespect by refusing to invest the same effort: and in the same way, when TGE rambles on and on, attributing to others beliefs they have repudiated, what does this say? The temptation exists to respond in kind: but we cannot do so. That means at times we will respond much more slowly than those who see truth as a “take it or leave it” commodity. We will often have to suffer their rejoicing over us falsely as well, knowing that only in God’s time will the truth of such things be fully known.
