When wolves get into church leadership, it's time to fight hard for the faith, to exert intense effort

Yes, I dabble in the Koine arts (it is a very weak and ongoing effort); but I get Bill Mounce's emails, "Mondays with Mounce," and I found this advice:

Jude writes to his church that they are to “contend for the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints.” He wanted to write to them about their common salvation, but because evil people had snuck into the church, he was forced to write a different kind of letter.

The description of these people is scathing. They were “shepherds feeding themselves” (v 12) instead of the flock, a clear allusion to the fact that they were in leadership (cf. the Pastorals). They were worldly people, causing divisions, and were “devoid of the Spirit” (v 19).

Can you imagine? Non-Christians in leadership positions in the church seeking the things of the world (perhaps like power and prestige)? I can, and so can many pastors with whom I have spoken over the last several years.

Specifically, they were teaching that sanctification did not matter, perverting “the grace of our God into sensuality,” and were in some way deficient in their Christology, denying “our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ” (ESV, v 4). In other words, they were denying some of the core doctrines of the faith “once for all delivered to the saints” (v 3).

Just as Timothy had learned in Ephesus, so also Jude’s church learned that Paul’s prophesy that “fierce wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock” (Acts 20:29) is in a real sense paradigmatic of what can happen in any church. I find myself welcoming opposition from outside the church, because the spiritual warfare that exists inside all chuches is much more insidious and much more difficult to fight.

So what are we to do? Part of the answer is found in the word “contend” (v 3). You can see the NASB and NET struggling a bit with the relatively weak “contend” (ESV, NIV, RSV) when they write “contend earnestly” (“earnestly contend,“ KJV). NLT has “defend.” TEV has “fight.” NJB has “fight hard,“ which actually is the right translation.

Buried behind the English is the strong επαγωνιζομαι, which BDAG defines as “to exert intense effort on behalf of something, contend.” But “contend” can be so weak as in “to assert something.” Louw and Nida are closer when they give us, “to exert intense effort.”

Jude is telling the church that it is time to take the kids’ gloves off and duke it out. This is not the time for caution and reserve. It is war. Whenever I read Jude I think of John Piper’s admonitions to accept a war-time life style. It is war, and the battle is both within and without the church. For Jude and many churches, the fieriest battle lie within.

It is very telling that, while we are told to fight the fiercest battles against the wolves, there are those today who not only defend the lineage of the wolves, but who want us to seek unity around that lineage.

Where are the "inconsistency detectors" on this one?

The Bryan Cross Method Alert

There is another long, long post going on at Greenbaggins. Bryan Cross and the usual gang from Called to Communion have shown up to try and to take advantage of some of the less theologically astute brothers and sisters over there.

I've made several long posts, including what follows below, in slightly edited form:

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Bryan Cross Method Alert
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I know that Bryan Cross has said that it's unkind to speak about him in the third person, and no doubt the words argumentum ad hominem will escape from his keyboard coming up here.

But for you Reformed folks who are trying to figure him out, what I'm about to say may seem unkind precisely until the moment when one of your children, or one of your church members, or even a Westminster-trained pastor that you may know, becomes enamored with and traipses off to Rome. At that point, then, ask, what is the real unkindness?

What I'm about to do is to look not at Bryan Cross the person, but rather, the method he uses.

Since I’ve written this, I see that Ron Henzel, in post #238, has provided a brilliant response to Bryan, in which he untangles all of the assumptions that Bryan throws out without an ounce of warning that he is, indeed, making assumptions. I'm convinced that Bryan's method of argumentation is inherently dishonest, and I say why below. But again, Ron Henzel in #238 has done a brilliant job of untangling Bryan's assumptions, and I’d very much encourage that everyone read that comment as an example of how really to have a discussion with Catholics.


Let me start by asking, do any of you play chess, at any serious level? If you do, and if you've come across Jeremy Silman's work, which talks about the need to look for "imbalances" in the position.

An imbalance is an opportunity within a position that one can use to create an advantage for oneself, on a particular area of the board, even though the second player may have advantages in other areas of the board. This is why a Queen sacrifice might work to enable a person to achieve a checkmate. While the opponent's Queen is off on another part of the board -- and still very powerful there -- the first player is enabled, by a sacrifice, to destroy a key defender or deflect a defensive piece away, enabling his own pieces to enjoy a temporary and in some cases, an overwhelming superiority in the more crucial part of the board, and thus, to Checkmate the King.


There are incredible imbalances in the Catholic vs. Protestant discussions, and Bryan Cross and his allies try to take advantage of this in discussions just like this one.

Francis Turretin noticed just such an imbalance in all of these discussions of Catholic vs. Protestant. Here is how he described it:

Thus this day the Romanists (although they are anything but the true church of Christ) still boast of their having alone the name of church and do not blush to display the standard of that which they oppose. In this manner, hiding themselves under the specious title of the antiquity and infallibility of the Catholic church, they think they can, as with one blow, beat down and settle the controversy waged against them concerning the various most destructive errors introduced into the heavenly doctrine. (Vol 3 pg 2)

John Henry Newman, too, gave Catholics some advice, which is easily used in conjunction that imbalance that Turretin wrote about. At its heart, Newman's "theory of development of doctrine" is itself founded on that very assumption. As Newman says:

Till positive reasons grounded on facts are adduced to the contrary, the most natural hypotheses, the most agreeable to our mode of proceeding in parallel cases, and that which takes precedence of all others, is to consider that the society of Christians, which the Apostles left on earth, were of that religion to which the Apostles had converted them; that the external continuity of name, profession, and communion, argues a real continuity of doctrine; that, as Christianity began by manifesting itself as of a certain shape and bearing to all mankind, therefore it went on so to manifest itself; and that the more, considering that prophecy had already determined that it was to be a power visible in the world and sovereign over it, characters which are accurately fulfilled in that historical Christianity to which we commonly give the name. It is not a violent assumption, then, but rather mere abstinence from the wanton admission of a principle which would necessarily lead to the most vexatious and preposterous scepticism, to take it for granted, before proof to the contrary, that the Christianity of the second, fourth, seventh, twelfth, sixteenth, and intermediate centuries is in its substance the very religion which Christ and His Apostles taught in the first, whatever may be the modifications for good or for evil which lapse of years, or the vicissitudes of human affairs, have impressed upon it.

In short, what this long couple of sentences says, is that The Roman Catholic Church itself was the promise of the Old Testament -- itself is the fulfillment of the very promises of God to provide a kingdom -- and that it has all the power and authority that one would expect. And further, "we don't have to prove this," he says. “We merely assume continuity,” and leave it to “positive reasons grounded on facts [that] are adduced to the contrary” to be able to persuade us that our assumptions are not valid.

That very thing comes up all the time in this thread. Notice the phrase, "the Church that Christ founded," first used by Bryan in comment #42 (used again in 74 and in various places by some of the others from “Called to Communion”). Several of the Protestant writers have commented on it, but they have not provided an explanation of it.

Here is a sense of its use:

So we need a way of distinguishing confessions of the Church that Christ founded, from confessions made by the equivalent of mere theological clubs …

So when Bryan Cross uses the word "church," he intends it to mean "The Roman Catholic Church and the Visible Hierarchy." Notice how this works in Bryan Cross's statement from Comment #232:

Regarding John 16:13, the unanimous tradition of the Church has been to understand that Christ’s promise (regarding the Spirit guiding into all truth) was not limited to the Apostles but also applied (through them and their successors) to the whole Church.

There is implicit in this statement that "the Church" in this statement was, and continues to be, "The Roman Catholic Church and the Visible Hierarchy." But Bryan doesn't tell you that's his definition of "the Church". He merely assumes that to be the case.

But what's worse, Bryan doesn't care if you misunderstand. He is relying on a technique known as "mental reservation," by which he may say things in such a way that his readers may draw false conclusions from them. But if they do draw false conclusions, that's not his fault.

This principle is clearly articulated by a Roman Catholic Cardinal within the context of an offical investigation document, which shows clearly how the Roman Church dealt with sexual abuse victims. I've written about it:

Mental reservation is a concept developed and much discussed over the centuries, which permits a churchman knowingly to convey a misleading impression to another person without being guilty of lying.

Now, let me give an application of this, because Jason Stellman, a participant in that discussion, and someone that I've interacted with much in the past, has fallen hook, line, and sinker for it. It is something that I’ve noticed and written about in the past, and for it, I’ve been accused of being “uncharitable.” But take a look at what he himself has written:

Often Protestants fear that unless they can poke holes in the Catholic’s claim that Benedict XVI is a literal, historical successor of Peter, then we’ve lost the argument and have to start praying to Mary and abstaining from meat on Fridays. Now I’ll probably take some heat for this concession, but I will come out and admit that I think apostolic succession is more plausible than not. I mean, whether or not the early church invested the practice with as much significance as Catholics today do, my guess is that the church in Rome was at one time led by Peter, and it has had a leader from then to now, which means that the historical claim is actually true …

This is an incredibly naïve statement, coming especially from someone who ought to understand what he is saying here. Others, in cluding Andrew McCallum, have argued against this notion in these comments, not only from the early church, but during medieval times when the worst offenders of popes were still a part of the “official succession.”

In truth, “Apostolic Succsssion” is chock full of holes, and an honest assessment of that practice will show this to be the case. This is not only my view that this view is “incredibly naïve” – note the comment in Francis Sullivan, S.J., “From Apostles to Bishops:

Admittedly the Catholic position, that bishops are the successors of the apostles by divine institution, remains far from easy to establish. It is unfortunate, I believe, that some presentations of Catholic belief in this matter have given a very different impression… (Sullivan, 13)

Referring to the ARCIC I document, (an ecumenical dialog between Rome and the Anglican church), he said,

To speak of “an unbroken line of episcopal ordination from Christ through the apostles” suggests that Christ ordained the apostles as bishops, and that the apostles in turn ordained a bishop for each of the churches they founded, so that by the time the apostles died, each Christian church was being led by a bishop s successor to an apostle. There are serious problems with such a theory of a link between apostles and bishops.” (13)

Sullivan goes on to outline some of these “serious problems.” One of these problems was articulated very succinctly by Raymond Brown in “Priest and Bishop”:

The claims of various sees to descend from particular members of the Twelve are highly dubious. It is interesting that the most serious of these is the claim of the bishops of Rom to descend from Peter, the one member of the Twelve who was almost a missionary apostle in the Pauline sense—a confirmation of our contention that whatever succession there was from apostleship to episcopate, it was primarily in reference to the Pauline type of apostleship, not the Twelve. (Fn 53, pg 72)

In the end, the Newmanesque assumption that Sullivan makes – the “unproved assumption” where he stakes his ground, is further back but still there:

Although development of the church structure reflects sociological necessity, in the Christian self-understanding the Hoy Spirit given by the risen Christ guides the church in such a way that allows basic lstructural development to be seen as embodying Jesus Christ’s will for his church.”

This is what I meant in my comment above to Andrew McCallum, that he “leaves too much money on the table.” Bryan Cross assumes far too much. But Sullivan here articulates the official Roman Catholic fallback position.

Historical study has passed Newman by. The ground of this fight IS no longer on Roman assumptions of its own “divine institution.” I’m doing a series on Joseph Ratzinger’s “Called to Communion,” and he himself can only say that the papacy was “faithfully developed” during the first five centuries of the church. He himself yields far away from what Newman intended. I believe he has been forced to do so by the sheer weight of the historical evidence.

The Protestant/Catholic discussion IS AND MUST BE, in Newman’s words, “on positive reasons grounded on [historical] facts” that absolutely fly in the face of the pure, ungrounded assumption that Bryan Cross makes and that Jason Stellman has freely conceded to them.

We cannot yield this assumption to Bryan Cross and his gang. We must force them to argue on level ground. We must make them come out from behind their unproven assumption and stand on historical ground. As Sullivan has made clear, and as Ratzinger has made clear, Rome itself is forced to kick the “assumption” can further down the road.

Since I’ve written this, I see that Ron Henzel, in post #238, has provided a brilliant response to Bryan, in which he untangles all of the assumptions that Bryan throws out without an ounce of warning that he is, indeed, making assumptions. This method of argumentation is inherently dishonest. But again, Ron Henzel in #238 has done a brilliant job of untangling these assumptions, and I’d very much encourage that everyone read that comment.

The Shroud of Turin and evolution

Umm, right, so Pope Benedict XVI, the Vicar of Christ on Earth, has spoken out in "favor" of the Shroud of Turin, basically saying that it is authentic, that it really is the shroud in which Jesus was wrapped after His crucifixion. 
From here:

Benedict focused in his meditation on the message that the blood stains conveyed, saying the Shroud was "an icon written in blood; the blood of a man who was whipped, crowned with thorns, crucified and injured on his right side.
"The image on the Shroud is that of a dead man, but the blood speaks of his life. Each trace of blood speaks of love and life," Benedict said.
The Vatican to date had tiptoed around the issue of just what the Shroud of Turin is, calling it a powerful symbol of Christ's suffering while making no claim to its authenticity.

 I have two thoughts on this incident.


1) So the Pope is more than happy to come out in support of the theory of evolution because "the scientists" think it's true, and yet when scientists present evidence using very similar methodologies (ie, radiocarbon dating) that the Shroud of Turin is actually only around 800 years old, he ignores it and leads his people in acts of piety that express dissent with the scientific opinion?
And don't try to play the "but there's debate within scientific circles on the Shroud" card.  There's plenty of debate in scientific circles about evolution as well, not to mention a ludicrous amount of logical argumentation against it.  The Pope went with the scientific "academy" then, why the inconsistency now?

2) These and other news articles are careful to say that Benedict "all but endorses its authenticity". 
It is mind-boggling to me that this man would do such a disingenuous thing as to hold a "meditation" in front of this object, modeling meditation on the Cross of Christ, when there's plenty of reason to doubt that it actually is the shroud that wrapped Christ's body for a time.  Further, all the reason to doubt aside, could not the Pope make a pronouncement that it either is or isn't authentic, for sure?  Why dance around the issue?  Does it matter whether the shroud actually wrapped Christ or doesn't it?  When the Pope speaks infallibly, is he right even when the contemporary "scientific establishment" disagrees or not?
It seems very comparable to the RC practice of bowing down and performing acts of religious and worshipful piety in front of and directed toward pictures of dead people.  Outside of icons of Christ Himself and a few specifically-identified elect angels, such as Gabriel and Michael, the RC worshiper has zero guarantee that the dead person to whom he's praying is actually in Heaven.  S/He might be in Hell, or s/he might be in Purgatory.  The Magisterium could clear all that up, but chooses not to, chooses not to get involved in such trivial matters as truth in worship and spiritual meditation. 
It's pathetic, really. How is this the action of a church that is the self-proclaimed "pillar and support of the truth"? 

The Pillar and Support of the Truth

One of the ongoing contentions that I will make going forward, Lord willing, is that the Roman Catholic Church is not what it says it is. (Just as a housekeeping note, I prefer to say “Roman Catholic Church” because that is the term favored by Fr. Richard John Neuhaus in his work “The Catholic Moment”. As a shorthand, I will also abbreviate “Roman Catholic Church” simply with the word “Rome” or “Roman”.)

Rome is not what it says it is. I’ve spoofed this notion here, but it’s going to be important to deconstruct each of the various things it claims for itself in order to support my initial contention.


Catholic writers often cite 1 Tim 3:15 in support of indefectibility or infallibility of the church. Of course, the Roman Catholic Church itself has made this interpretation an article of faith, most recently in Lumen Gentium 8:

This is the one Church of Christ which in the Creed is professed as one, holy, catholic and apostolic, which our Saviour, after His Resurrection, commissioned Peter to shepherd, and him and the other apostles to extend and direct with authority, which He erected for all ages as "the pillar and mainstay of the truth". This Church constituted and organized in the world as a society, subsists in the Catholic Church, which is governed by the successor of Peter and by the Bishops in communion with him…

My contention in this posting is that Rome’s official usage of this verse is wrong at best. But what’s worse is that in popular apologetics, Roman apologists are going far beyond what even Rome says in this verse.

One popular Catholic writer said this:

“As Saint Paul taught, the church is ‘the pillar and ground of the truth’ – she does not err. (1 Tim 3:15)”

But is that what Paul tried to say? Is that what he actually said?

It seems to me that for Catholics to try to force their meaning on this phrase is a fundamentally dishonest use of this language.

Daniel Wallace, a professor of New Testament Studies at Dallas Theological Seminary, has written many textbooks on the Greek language. Here’s what he said:

“Before we can know what a particular text means we must know what it says.”

(From his essay, “Laying a Foundation: New Testament Textual Criticism in the work “Interpreting the New Testament Text: Introduction to the Art and Science of Exegesis”.)


Let's look at the verse in a bit of context (ESV translation):

I hope to come to you soon, but I am writing these things to you so that, if I delay, you may know how one ought to behave in the household of God, which is the church of the living God, a pillar and buttress of the truth.

The NASB translation for this phrase is “the pillar and support of the truth.”

It’s important to note the word that gets translated by various translators as “mainstay” (the Vatican website translation), “buttress,” “support”. I’ve also seen “bulwark.”


It’s true that the phrase has the leadership of the church in mind (see Galatians 2). But they are called to “support” “the truth” not in terms of a “teaching authority,” but by their behavior (a notion that should, and does, lead directly into qualifications for elders)

Philip H. Towner, in his (2006) New International Commentary on the New Testament, says that “church of the living God” is not the key phrase, but “household” is. “The church” in Paul’s conception here is “a clarification,” a relative clause” for the truth that the universal church, all members of the church, really comprise “the household of the Living God.”

“Pillar” frequently describes the cloud of God’s presence (Exod 13:21-22; 14;24; 33:9; etc.), and stands metaphorically for leaders (Gal 2:9). In this case, where it combines with “foundation” and functions in respect to “the truth” (i.e. “the gospel”; see 2:3), the sense will be that of visible “support” such as the “pillar” lends to a building. The term translated “foundation” also signifies firmness and steadfastness. Together (perhaps in the sense “supporting foundation”) the two terms depict the church in the combative setting of heresy, as existing to provide a powerful and steadfast support for “the truth.”

LT Johnson, a Catholic commentator, works through the various phrases of this selection. First, of the “church of the Living God” here, the “ekklesia,” he notes that “household of God” is the prime metaphor, “not least because Paul’s instructions in 1 Timothy are directed to matters of public concern to the ekklesia, not to matters of domestic economy. That this assembly is one gathered by “the living God” is of first importance thematically (4:10, 5:6) and theologically, for it means that the church does not contain or control God, but is only in service to the one who moves always ahead of humans in surprising yet faithful ways.” Note also that the Catholic definition of "church" is not in view at all in that phrase. (Anchor Yale Bible Commentary, "The First and Second Letters to Timothy: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary", Luke Timothy Johnson, p. 231).

The phrase he gives as “a pillar and support for the truth” are the Greek words “stylos kai hedraioma,” which he says are “architectural terms for ‘supports, stays, or pillars.”

The issue for the translator is not the meaning of the terms, but their referent. Are “pillar and support” to be read as in apposition to “church of the living God” or in delayed apposition to “how it is necessary to behave”? Such a delayed appositional phrase [already] appears elsewhere in the letter (1:7). It also makes better sense of the metaphorical point: the community is the oikos, and the members should behave so as to be supports and pillars for it. Such an understanding fits Paul’s other use of stylos for leaders of the Jerusalem community in Gal 2:9. Note also Paul’s use of the adjective hedraios in a plea to his unstable readers in Corinth: “Become steady people (hedraioi ginesthe), not capable of being moved, abounding in the work of the Lord at all times, knowing that your labor in the Lord is not in vain. (1 Cor 15:58). See also the use of stylos with reference to an individual person in Rev 3:12, which functions within the Temple symbolism of that writing.” (231-232)

In his New International Greek Testament Commentary, a commentary series which examines the Greek text, George Knight says it’s not doctrine that’s in view at all, it’s conduct. “So even though building terminology is utilized, since the conduct (of the individuals) in view relates to the interaction of the members of God’s family, modern translations have opted for “household” … The standards of conduct given “are no mere rules of etiquette, they are standards for the house/household that is none other than God’s. They provide directions for conduct in his temple, where he dwells by his Spirit, and they provide directions for relationships among his people.” (180). He says further that “Timothy and the church will conduct their lives appropriately if they remember that they are the home built and owned by God and indwelt by him as the living one, and also remember that they are called on to undergird and hold aloft God’s truth in word and deed.” (182)


Individual members of the household of God “support the truth” by bearing witness to it with their behavior. This is precisely Paul’s exhortation to the church in Romans 12:1-3:

I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect. For by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned.

Paul's illustration of the "church" is first that of a "household." The Vatican usage is wrong. As for the apologist’s comment to which I referred, to suggest that this verse in any way supports the contention that "the church cannot err" is simply misusing this verse, either in total ignorance, or else to the point of dishonesty.

What the verse says is, God’s truth exists; it is the task of the entire church, by its behavior, to lift up the truth of God, to put it on display for the world to see, by their very behavior. The notion that this verse implies some form of “teaching authority” which cannot err is just plain dishonest.

For you Catholics, who are interested in claiming that Christ somehow supernaturally prevents the "teaching office" of the church from erring, stop and think about what that means for a moment. This verse doesn’t even say what you say it says, much less that it means what you say it means.

Bellisario admits he's a troll

If any of our Romanist friends should care to object, I really could care less about what any of you think about anything. I just like to post the obvious about Bellisario to yank your chains so I can watch all of you fly off the handle.
It's all about provoking Bellisario to see what dumb comment he will make next. 

 So this post is very simple.  TurretinFan says about Bellisario: 

That's the very definition of a troll.

Bellisario responds:

An (sic) your point is?

No point, man.  Just yanking your chain.