Contending for the Faith..
Recent conversation had aroused past memories and, thereafter, curiosity had taken me back to the Solas website to see,
perchance, if David Robertson had ever removed his controversial fleabyte No 6, but alas, it
was still there, and David was still warming to Joseph Ratzinger (the then
Pope) as a Christian brother while holding the pontiff’s new book ‘Jesus of
Nazereth’ to camera.
‘Nothing too
controversial in that’, some might respond.
‘Especially in this ecumenical day and age’, others might
readily agree.
While a few - like me, will shake their heads in utter
disbelief and thereafter seek reasonable explanation as to how and why an apparently
reformed, protestant minister can relate to the Pope as his Christian
brother????
But where do I, as one of the few, start to seek such explanation?
I can only look to God and continue to write - in faith
that an answer will come……
I’m an intelligent person - who, by the initiative of
God’s grace -and only by
that divine initiative, is a disciple of Christ, but who cannot, and never will recognise the Pope as a spiritual brother.
David Robertson on the other hand, while likewise viewing himself to be an
intelligent person and a Christian, does acknowledge the Pope as his spiritual
brother.
One of us is wrong - not partly wrong but completely
wrong – for our attitudes towards the Pope are diametric.
If I am right then David is wrong, and if I am wrong then
David is right - there is no middle ground which either of us can occupy - None.
None - but, nevertheless, we do share some commonality - because, both of us recognise
that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, and we both desire to proclaim a ‘gospel’.
But there the concord must end because, while David
thinks that he can coax, cajole, persuade and convert the lost to Christ by his
intellectual prowess, cultural sensitivity and skilful apologetics, the Spirit of Truth informs me otherwise:
And I, brethren, when I came to you, came not with excellency of speech or of wisdom, declaring unto you the testimony of God. For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified. And I was with you in weakness, and in fear, and in much trembling. And my speech and my preaching was not with enticing words of man's wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power: That your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God. 1 Corinthians 2/2-5.
“Ah but”, David might counter and continue, “What about Peter’s words as recounted in 1 Peter
3/15: ‘But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts, and always be
ready to give
a defence to everyone who asks you a reason for the
hope that is in you, with meekness and fear;’
Do these words of the apostle Peter not compel us to persuade?”
To which I would respond, “And what could that
defence be other than to give
testimony to the redeeming effect of the gospel of Christ crucified in our
their own lives?”
Christ crucified - Christ, who
knows that the spiritual re-birth
and subsequent sanctification of every true believer is a matter of the Father’s
initiative, working through His self sacrifice at Calvary and, there from and
thereafter, by the Holy Spirit’s work in empowering
every true believer to persevere as He works
providentially in each believers life to bring about the defeat of sin by dying
to the perverse will of their own natural flesh….…. Natural flesh, which
according to Jesus, can only give birth to flesh:
And, if David does not trust the words of Christ - then
let him trust the memory of His own experience - at least to confirm the first half
of Christ’s statement: ‘that which is born of flesh is flesh’.
David will recall
that his persuasive, intellectual ways (of the flesh) were eventually
responsible for the once vaunted conversion of Richard Morgan, a retired music
teacher, from Atheism (a religion of the flesh) - to his (David’s) ecumenical Christianity (a
religion of the flesh) - from which, and thereafter Richard Morgan converted to Roman Catholicism (another religion of the flesh).
Which extended conversion process proves Christ’s
assertion that flesh can only give life to flesh - can only give life to flesh –
can only give life flesh - in mortal perpetuity.
And here - right here, without contrivance, it would
appear that I have been given a ‘rational’ explanation as to why David
Robertson can view the Pope as his spiritual brother. The reason, quite simply,
is that he is the Pope’s spiritual brother - he and and the Pope are both carnal
Christians, that is, they are both Christians fathered by the same self-preserving and self-promoting ‘flesh’- the same unregenerate spirit of fallen
human intellects.
Unregenerate human intellects who, in having been
persuaded to ‘convert’ through the work of their own intellect working in
response to someone else’s intellectual persuasion, will confidently think that
they can pass that ‘conversion’ experience on to others in the same way……
And they are right - for they have succeeded in their
intellectual pursuits, they have created new Christians but, There are
Christians…… and then there are Christians or, There are Christians born of
the flesh… and then there are Christians born of the Spirit. Which are you?
Are you, like David Robertson, the Pope’s spiritual
brother or, Do you see the Pope, as I see him, as carnal and anti-Christ ? In 1 John 1/22-23 John presents an anti-Christ as one who denies that Jesus is the Christ and, furthermore, as one
who also denies the Father…..
Before continuing it would be worthwhile exploring a fuller meaning of the prefix ‘anti’. ‘Anti’, as well as meaning opposed to, can also mean to compete with, and to run alongside in an attempt to
supplant… And the Pope’s ‘office’ fulfils all of these
definitions….
Jesus is the Rock on which any true Christians faith is
built – but the Pope claims to be this ‘rock’.
Jesus is truly Emmanuel (God with us) but the Pope’s
office competes with Him by claiming that
the Pope holds on earth the place of God Almighty (Pope Leo X111). Jesus
is the mediator between God and men - but by being called ‘Pontiff’ which means
‘bridge builder’ - the Pope is attempting to usurp Christ’s position.
The Pope is called ‘Holy Father’ - but only God is our Holy
Father……
Anyway, I could go on, and on, and on but, at the end of
the day
I can only conclude that, despite all outward appearance, David Robertson, like the Pope, is a (spiritually) dead man leading……… spiritually
dead men through the cemetery of this transient life… And the real tragedy is that very few, if
any, from his church, from Solas - or indeed followers of his ‘Fleabyte’ blog
seem to have had their eyes opened to this sad, salutary situation.
Are you, perchance, one of the few?
For - strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it. Matthew 7/14.
Do you hear Christ’s voice?
And if you know His voice - are you listening?
And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? for ye are the temple of the living God; as God hath said, I will dwell in them, and walk in them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.
Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you,
And will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty. Having therefore these promises, dearly beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God. 2 Corinthians 6/14 – 7/1
It has given me no pleasure to write as I have done - I
do not seek contention - but before,
throughout and subsequent to David Robertson’s term as Moderator of the Free
Church of Scotland, I have been waiting for a Spirit led church, group - or
even an individual to speak out against the vile mixture which is David
Robertson’s carnal gospel, but I have heard nothing - which is a very sad
indictment on the spiritual state of the Free Church of Scotland - and all of
those who would call David Robertson a brother in Christ.
But, I can hear people ask, how can such a sincere, well educated man, who has dedicated his life to Christ, and
who has been Moderator of the Free
Church of Scotland - and who is Director of
Solas, the Centre for Public Christianity - and who is, judging by the
title of one of his books, obsessed with Christ - how can such a person be
accused of being a false disciple?
How indeed?
Well, consider Judas - one of Christ’s disciples.
He knew Jesus. He must have walked with Him and talked
with Him, in short he must have known Jesus exceptionally well but, close as his
relationship must have
been, it could only have been conducted
at a natural level. In other words, he was very familiar with Jesus at a human
level - but not, as the other disciples had been predestined to be, at a
spiritual level.