“Thou has Left thy First Love” by C. H. Spurgeon (Morning and Evening, February 11, Evening)

“But I have this against you, that you have abandoned the love you had at first.” (Revelation 2:4 ESV)

Ever to be remembered is that best and brightest of hours, when first we saw the Lord, lost our burden, received the roll of promise, rejoiced in full salvation, and went on our way in peace. It was spring time in the soul; the winter was past; the mutterings of Sinai’s thunders were hushed; the flashings of its lightnings were no more perceived; God was beheld as reconciled; the law threatened no vengeance, justice demanded no punishment. Then the flowers appeared in our heart; hope, love, peace, and patience sprung from the sod; the hyacinth of repentance, the snowdrop of pure holiness, the crocus of golden faith, the daffodil of early love, all decked the garden of the soul. The time of the singing of birds was come, and we rejoiced with thanksgiving; we magnified the holy name of our forgiving God, and our resolve was, “Lord, I am thine, wholly thine; all I am, and all I have, I would devote to thee. Thou hast bought me with thy blood—let me spend myself and be spent in thy service. In life and in death let me be consecrated to thee.” How have we kept this resolve? Our espousal love burned with a holy flame of devoutedness to Jesus—is it the same now? Might not Jesus well say to us, “I have somewhat against thee, because thou hast left thy first love”? Alas! it is but little we have done for our Master’s glory. Our winter has lasted all too long. We are as cold as ice when we should feel a summer’s glow and bloom with sacred flowers. We give to God pence when he deserveth pounds, nay, deserveth our heart’s blood to be coined in the service of his church and of his truth. But shall we continue thus? O Lord, after thou hast so richly blessed us, shall we be ungrateful and become indifferent to thy good cause and work? O quicken us that we may return to our first love, and do our first works! Send us a genial spring, O Sun of Righteousness.

Tuesday night marked the inaugural Legacy Church Planting event at Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. I was pleased to host a panel discussion that featured Pastors Johnny Hunt, Mark Hoover, D. A. Horton, John Mark Clifton, and Steve Dighton. Each of these men shared stories from their ministries of legacy church planting, along with fielding questions from the group of more than 100 pastors who attended the event. I trust you will find the gospel focus of these men and their ministries as encouraging as I did. You can watch the entire panel discussion below.

Recently Tim Challies produced a chart detailing the resurgence in reformed theology, or “New Calvinism,” within Evangelicalism. Challies’ chart is a taxonomy, detailing the tributaries—individuals, resources, and entities—influencing the New Calvinism.

Yet, Challies’ chart reminded me once again of two of the most often asked questions associated with New Calvinism: is it more than a mere movement that will soon pass, and how large and influential is it?

More Than a Movement

There is a difference between a movement and a reformation, and New Calvinism evidences the latter. A movement is often a response to a concern or opportunity, and benefits from cultural and promotional dynamics, not to mention hype. In time, the church’s attention span invariably moves on, the movement loses steam, and the movement’s effects are short-lived.

A reformation, be it the 16^th century version or subsequent iterations, yearns for a healthier, purer church, and goes back to the source of truth itself, the Word of God. The fruits of reformation are much longer lasting, proving to impact the church for decades, if not centuries. Since it is a return to Holy Scripture, reformation often parallels revival.

While New Calvinism has benefited from movement-like dynamics, its emphasis on Scripture and Scripture’s implications leads one to classify it as a reformation in intent, temperament, and scope.

More than Soteriology

New Calvinism’s apparent growth, as quantified by conference attendees, publications, and para-church ministries, is applauded by some and alarming to others, but both groups may overestimate its size. This is especially true if one attempts to correlate the movement as a whole with those who embrace, without qualification, the five points of Calvinism.

This is why, as a movement, New Calvinism is at once simpler and yet more complicated than usually acknowledged, and its breadth of appeal far more nuanced. There are many, myself included, who don’t quite fit into a tidy, five-point classification, nor does debating the Doctrines of Grace animate them. In fact, this is implicit within Challies’ chart, which includes, for example, Amyraldians.

Yet, many appreciate aspects of the broader movement because of shared concerns about the state of the church and contemporary Christianity as a whole, and sympathize with the ministerial emphases that typify New Calvinism. These convictions and passions may be indigenous within New Calvinism, but they also resonate far beyond those who are self-consciously reformed.

For example, New Calvinism’s emphasis on doctrine and confessional integrity appeals to a generation who came of age in churches often marked by shallowness and in a culture altogether suspicious of truth claims. A recovered pulpit and the reassertion of biblical exposition naturally flows from a recovery of Holy Scripture and theological fidelity.  The sense of gravity that biblical exposition brings invites rich hymnody to accompany it, whether Watts and Wesley or contemporary musicians like the Gettys.

Within the local church, the renewed emphasis on a robust ecclesiology is especially needed. Regenerate church membership, church discipline, I Timothy 3 qualifications for pastors and elders, and recovering the church as a covenantal, communal body are all needed correctives to meaningless church membership.

Furthermore, undertaking the Christian life with a sense of gravity, as encouraged by John Piper, is an antidote to a generation marked by entertainment and self fulfillment, and pursuing discipleship as a comprehensive life vision, worth dying for and ordering one’s life by, is more compelling than more minimalistic versions of Christianity.

For many, these aforementioned artifacts—and many others—far outstrip reformed soteriology in interest or appeal, and have proven to be congealing and compelling features of the movement, perhaps making a commitment to the five points of Calvinism appear larger than it truly is.

In other words, my wife shops at Hy-vee because she believes it to be the most appealing place to purchase groceries, not because the name on the building. So it is with New Calvinism. Many look to authors, events, and resources affiliated with New Calvinism because of the content they are producing and the fact that the artifacts resonate with their ministry concerns, not so much because of a deep commitment to the Doctrines of Grace.

The SBC, for Example

This dynamic proves true in my own denominational context, the Southern Baptist Convention. While the movement’s artifacts—confessional integrity, biblical exposition, regenerate church membership, etc.—resonate broadly in the post-Conservative Resurgence SBC, a healthy sense of Baptist identity, a more qualified assessment of the Doctrines of Grace, and concern that certain strains of Calvinism might hinder evangelism prompts many to “chew on the meat and spit out the bones.”

Yet, this is not a wholesale rejection of the movement, and certainly not of the artifacts it emphasizes. After all, Stephen Olford, Adrian Rogers, and Jerry Vines were calling us to biblical exposition and Paige Patterson was calling us to regenerate, covenantal church membership long before New Calvinism’s day dawned. And many of their sons in ministry identify with John MacArthur’s insistence on biblical exposition and Mark Dever’s emphasis on the local church not in spite of their SBC heroes, but because of them.

Conclusion

If New Calvinism is a just a movement, it will go the way of the Seeker-Sensitive movement, the Emergent Church movement, the Promise Keepers movement, and countless other church fads. It will be one more shooting star in the church’s history, having shined brightly but briefly. But if it is a reformation, and I suspect it is, its effects aren’t going to dim anytime soon.

How pervasive is New Calvinism? It depends on how you ask the question, a question that is not that relevant anyway. In as much as we experience a biblical reformation, consisting of confessional integrity, biblical exposition, purity of life, a robust, Baptist ecclesiology, and Great Commission fervor—we should pray for its furtherance regardless of the label one throws at it—or us. And as we advocate these artifacts, we might just be surprised by how many brethren—Calvinist and non-Calvinist—are eager to see its continuance.

“I will yet for this be Enquired of by the House of Israel” by C. H. Spurgeon (Morning and Evening, February 19, Morning)

“Thus says the Lord God: This also I will let the house of Israel ask me to do for them: to increase their people like a flock.” (Ezekiel 36:37 ESV)

Prayer is the forerunner of mercy. Turn to sacred history, and you will find that scarcely ever did a great mercy come to this world unheralded by supplication. You have found this true in your own personal experience. God has given you many an unsolicited favour, but still great prayer has always been the prelude of great mercy with you. When you first found peace through the blood of the cross, you had been praying much, and earnestly interceding with God that he would remove your doubts, and deliver you from your distresses. Your assurance was the result of prayer. When at any time you have had high and rapturous joys, you have been obliged to look upon them as answers to your prayers. When you have had great deliverances out of sore troubles, and mighty helps in great dangers, you have been able to say, “I sought the Lord, and he heard me, and delivered me from all my fears.” Prayer is always the preface to blessing. It goes before the blessing as the blessing’s shadow. When the sunlight of God’s mercies rises upon our necessities, it casts the shadow of prayer far down upon the plain. Or, to use another illustration, when God piles up a hill of mercies, he himself shines behind them, and he casts on our spirits the shadow of prayer, so that we may rest certain, if we are much in prayer, our pleadings are the shadows of mercy. Prayer is thus connected with the blessing to show us the value of it. If we had the blessings without asking for them, we should think them common things; but prayer makes our mercies more precious than diamonds. The things we ask for are precious, but we do not realize their preciousness until we have sought for them earnestly.

“Prayer makes the darken’d cloud withdraw;

Prayer climbs the ladder Jacob saw;

Gives exercise to faith and love;

Brings every blessing from above.”

One of the most celebrated hymns of the Christian faith is Martin Luther’s A Mighty Fortress is Our God. Drawing upon Psalm 46, Luther’s hymn buoys the spirit by reflecting on God’s unfailing providence, even in the midst of catastrophe and adversity. Luther’s hymn also serves as a reminder of the ongoing spiritual struggle between the kingdom of darkness and the kingdom of Christ.

A Mighty Fortress is Our God is something of a cultural and ecclesiastical mainstay. It has been sung at both royal coronations and state funerals; enjoyed as a celebratory hymn in weddings and featured at services of remembrance, such as at the National Cathedral in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. Yet, the real meaning of A Mighty Fortress is Our God is reserved for followers of the Lord Jesus Christ.

The history of the Christian church is largely a history of hardship among God’s people. Whether it be the Apostle Paul’s incarcerations, the early church’s sufferings under Nero, Luther’s flight from papal imprisonment, Baptists laboring for religious liberty, or Jim Elliott’s death at the end of a native’s spear, to follow Christ indeed is the call to take up one’s cross. For Jesus’ sake, God’s people have known ostracism, ridicule, persecution, and even martyrdom.

However, one need not look to history to find signs of gospel challenge; one simply needs to look around. Oppressive regimes abroad and secular thought at home situate the 21^st century church in the midst of daunting gospel adversity. The modern era has not alleviated gospel hardship, but in many ways has intensified it.

Full-throated secularism—as witnessed through the rejection of objective truth, sexual libertinism, the disintegration of the nuclear family, declining church attendance, and threatened religious liberty—appears to be gaining ground. The church will have to contend with it.

Yet, where one finds the persecution of Christians, one also finds ministerial courage and gospel faithfulness. This present generation of gospel ministers labors in increasingly antagonistic environments, often preaching to hardened hearts and in hostile settings.

In light of these realities, Luther’s A Mighty Fortress is Our God is all the more heartening. Far from self-affirmation or mere positive thinking, Luther’s hymn rightly points believers to strength in Christ and the hope he furnishes.

As A Mighty Fortress is Our God’s second stanza confesses, “Did we in our own strength confide, our striving would be losing, were not the right man on our side, the man of God’s own choosing. Dost ask who that may be? Christ Jesus, it is he; Lord Sabbaoth his name, from age to age the same, and he must win the battle.”

Our hope awaits an eternal consummation, but we minister with buoyancy and confidence even now. After all, Christ declared “He will build his church, and the gates of Hades will not prevail.” So we press on in this age, “until the kingdom of this world becomes the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ.”

Luther’s hymn rings true. Christ arms his servants with spiritual armor, the power of the gospel to save, the authority of the Word of God, and his unflagging promise to build his church. His servants join the battle, but Christ secures the victory.

May we find hope not in a hymn, but in Christ’s strength, to which A Mighty Fortress is Our God points. May we say “yes” and “amen” to Luther’s concluding appeal in his great hymn, “Let goods and kindred go, this mortal life also. The body they may kill, God’s truth abideth still. His kingdom is forever.”