About The Father's Business Defining Obedience
By Al Cronkrite The Covenant News ~ March 31, 2009
"Man is not, however much he may talk of autonomy, a self sufficient creature. He is necessarily dependent upon others. Coupled with this necessary dependency is the fact that he is created in the image of God. Man is a purposive creature: he is goal directed. God created him to be his vicegerent over the earth, to exercise dominion and to develop the meaning and scope of God's reign and Kingdom. Man's life thus is colored in all things by a purpose, meaning, or goal." Dr. R. J. Rushdoony "The Sermon on the Mount"
It was 1963. Bruce Larson was head of Faith at Work and their conferences with out-of-town speakers were popular attractions at local churches. In New York, David Wilkerson's book, "The Cross and The Switchblade", was about to hit the stands and Nicky Cruz, its famous converted gang leader, was a speaker at Christian meetings. Kay Anderson and Judy Sorenson had begun their unusual ministry at Rock Harbor on Cape Cod and peripatetic King's Kid, Harold Hill, was laying hands on preachers, laypersons, alcoholics, homosexuals and anyone else that wanted to receive the Holy Spirit in regulation Charismatic fashion.
At our kitchen table in Connecticut, Bruce Larson asked me if I wanted to turn the wreckage of my life over to Jesus Christ. I was insulted by the direct confrontation and turned him down, noting that I did not believe in Jesus.
During a Faith at Work Conference in New York City a hotel maid attracted by singing, tongue speaking, and the heart melting peace of the Holy Spirit suddenly opened the door and fell on her face on the floor of the hotel room.
Oral Roberts and Kathryn Kuhlman advertised God's healing power and preached to packed houses. Bob and Judy Mumford had left Elim Bible School and Bob was ministering at Pastor Poole's church in Philadelphia. Outside the church, waiting for the meeting, some spontaneously wept with joy. An ineffable sweet peace filled and surrounded the church.
In spiritually dead New England towns, Baptists, Methodists, and staid Presbyterians began attending Pentecostal Churches where healings, prophecies, and holy rollers were common. Newly Spirit-filled mid-western Catholics were being reluctantly welcomed into the Mother Church.
At Pastor Scoville's Westminster Presbyterian Church in West Hartford, Connecticut, young Peter Marshall helped start a satellite church in Simsbury. The affluent congregation of neophyte Christians met in a barn. The Barn was pastured by John Hunn and was host to teachings by Kay and Judy.
I was persuaded to attend a retreat at Senexet House in Eastern Connecticut and again exposed to men from Faith at Work. Following a thoughtful week-end, early on a Sunday morning en route to a Giants football game in New York, I entered an empty Baptist Church and said my first real prayer, "God, if you are there, help me." Immediately, He touched me.
Pat Robertson's 700 Club led by local pastors began broadcasting from a radio station in Hartford, Connecticut. Corrie Ten Boom wandered into the United States from Holland with a thick accent, palpable Heavenly guidance and a riveting testimony. She lived for a time at the Community of Jesus with Kay and Judy.
On a duck hunting trip to Canada, before retiring for the night, a friend asked me to read the New Testament Book of First John. Again, The Touch. Henceforth I was a Christian.
There was much instruction on the Body of Christ and the gifts of the Spirit. Lay people caught up in the frenzy competed to be leaders while ministers sought the anointing of the Holy Spirit. Some new Christians ambled into spiritually dead mainline churches proclaiming the Living Lord. The status quo was upset, the boat was rocked, leaders were challenged, and congregations were pushed from ruts.
The transition was too much for our marriage. We separated and I was divorced.
In a vain effort to bring order and sanity to rampant Christian chaos, Derek Prince, Bob Mumford, Ern Baxter, Don Basham, and Charles Simpson, solid Christian men, with due consideration started the Shepherding Movement. Becoming accountable to each other they mounted an effort to bring Charismatic men under mature authority. The intent was authoritarian as was the ministry of Kay and Judy at Cape Cod.
In 1970 Hal Lindsey's bombshell book "The Late Great Planet Earth" hit the stands and became a best seller. Thousands of ecstatic Christians fell into Dispensationalism and Zionism.
Following six years as a bachelor I married my second wife.
A Princeton graduate became pastor of a small Methodist Church in Northwestern Connecticut. He struggled with his own inhibitions and a tiny congregation until he began attending a Charismatic home meeting conducted by the owner of a local donut shop. Baptized by the Holy Spirit and infected with Holy enthusiasm he and his wife designed a service that was humble, powerful, orderly, and winsome. Communion accompanied by the cords of a heavenly piano brought the peace and healing of Jesus to an ever increasing audience.
We attended that little Methodist Church for eight years and cheered its growth to two overflowing Sunday services.
In the middle of the 1980s articles began to appear describing the behavior of Christian young people as almost identical to that of their secular counterparts. Immorality was being exposed among Christian leaders and Christian pastors. My twenty year dream of a loving, righteous social order had vanished. Burgeoning churches and multitudes of conversions had failed to impact the American culture which continued to plummet into increasingly disastrous sinfulness. The little Methodist Church now bursting with enthusiastic Christians had not produced the preference for one another that God seeks for His people. Growth was coming from a surfeit of new members while those who left the church were forgotten and never debriefed.
In 1987 we moved to Florida.
We had supported Bob Mumford and been blest by his ministry. In the early 1990s I wrote him a detailed letter contending the Charismatic Movement was seriously flawed producing no more fruit than the fig tree Jesus condemned to death. He ignored the letter.
Coming from deep in the cesspool I was always adverse to any hint of legalism. Grace had been amazing in my life and I sought that same Grace for others.
Christian movements resulting from the Twentieth Century revival reflected the chaos it produced. The Shepherding ministry and the cult-like fellowship Kay and Judy devised on Cape Cod were intended to bring discipline to a burgeoning Christian population which was bereft of doctrinal stability and was being nurtured by "g'me, g'me" pulpits. The objective was correct but the effort was humanistic. Righteousness does not come from sin filled human vehicles. Both efforts failed.
The Princeton educated, Spirit filled Pastor of the little Methodist Church in Western Connecticut centered his ministry on healing, counseling, and establishing the members of his congregation. The angelic sweetness his wife coaxed from the keys of the piano and the thoughtfully disciplined service provided an ethereal experience unequalled in my Christian life. However, like the Cape Cod ministry and the Shepherding effort it was humanistic, focusing on the creature rather than the Creator. It, too, failed to produce cultural change.
When I use the word humanistic I am referring to efforts that center on the creature rather than the Creator. There are times when problems with the creature need to be addressed but they must be preceded by a detailed teaching on exactly what God requires of His chosen people and how it is to be accomplished. Obedience is God's primary requirement and, it alone, will solve most personal problems.
Antinomian Charismatic Christians receive their guidance directly through the Holy Spirit. In spite of cautions to confirm pietistic guidance with other Christians, evil and spurious actions are common. When God writes His Laws on our hearts He writes them on a hopelessly sinful organ communicating with ears that are slanted toward humanism. Without God's immutable Law serious error is common.
On C-Span John Lofton publically confronted erstwhile news commentator John Chancellor. My congratulatory fax brought a recommendation to seek out the publications of Chalcedon. (At the time, John Lofton wrote a regular column in the Magazine.)
Calvinism is distinctly different from popular and pervasive Dispensational Arminianism and as I began reading the articles in "Chalcedon" I was initially dubious.
I knew that a quarter of a century of Charismatic ministries had produced hundreds of thousands of Spirit filled Christians but I also knew that the culture remained impervious. I knew that righteousness should be the object of all Christian ministries and that righteousness was nowhere to be found - not in the culture and, sadly, not in the churches!
I had been taught the Arminian doctrine of free will and during my Christian walk had led several individuals to accept Christ. Some accepted Him and others rejected Him. Since God saved me from drunkenness, I had spent many hours working with alcoholics. There were many who worked hard to achieve sobriety but failed and many died. All were confused and none was decisive. It had to be God's sovereign selection that provided the Grace for healing. He selected some but not others. I knew that I had been unable to consummate a decision for many years before becoming a Christian and that my ability to sustain abstinence was a gift from God. I knew, too, that all of my life I had defied God and the desire to obey Him was not a decision I had made but a miraculous reversal. I remembered my readings through the Bible and could not think of an instance where anyone had chosen God. Surely He had chosen me.
Though intimidated by the prospect of reading a theological tome, I purchased R. J. Rushdoony's "Institutes of Biblical Law". It rested on the book shelf for several months. Finally, I began to read. On each page were several new insights! I read it slowly. For the first time in my Christian walk I began to understand what God expected of His servants. It was an epiphany!
For over two decades my Christian walk had involved a plethora of objectives: to receive gifts from the Holy Spirit, to lead others to Christ, to love other Christians and to lead them to receive the Baptism of the Holy Spirit, to be obedient to the Holy Spirit, to be a leader, to be close to a leader, to be more like Christ, to grow in Christ, to have a closer walk, to be more disciplined, to fight abortion (and later the homosexual agenda), to teach, to support Christians in government, to be sanctified, to confess my sins to others, to use Christian counseling to gain a good self image, etc. etc. My accomplishment was miniscule and the little there was failed to enhance the Kingdom.
Righteousness and obedience to God's Commandments are synonymous. God's Will was no longer a pietistic message injected into my sinful mind. I no longer needed to wonder if my sinful heart had distorted God's Will. God's Will was clearly written in His Word. I learned that obedience to The Law is the highest form of human conduct and God's primary requirement. I began to understand that human shock at Capital punishment as outlined in God's Law was not a fault in the Law but a gage of the extent of human sin and that obedience to the Law was not an onerous task but a blessing God seeks for His people.
Law determines the religion of the culture. Laws codified from the opinions of men are sinful because men are sinful. A Christian society cannot be established under human law. God's Law is righteous and when the culture submits itself to His Law the culture becomes righteous. The blessings of that righteousness are peace, prosperity, and joy!
Though the ministry of Kay and Judy was questionable at several levels the intent on bringing discipline to God's children was a righteous quest. We are to participate in the harvest and evangelism is a righteous endeavor. In spite of evil spirits the infilling of the Spirit of Christ is a pristine motive. We are to love one another and if love was properly taught and understood it would not only be entirely different than what passes for love in most Christian circles but would bring steady progress to the reign of King Jesus. Teaching and leading are gifts that develop of their own accord and should not be sought. Abortion, homosexuality, and pornography should be resisted. All these endeavors are right and proper but first, before all else, Christians must be obedient. There is no substitute for obedience and no other way to please God.
Once the miracle of conversion has become a reality in a Christian life; once the sins have been forgiven through the Blood of Christ; once the congregation has been confronted with the Good News and the harvest has been brought into the church; then God's Law must be taught and obedience proclaimed as the standard of Christian behavior. It must be emphasized that the Law no longer condemns and that forgiveness has been purchased by The Lord Jesus Christ but the standard for Christian behavior has not changed, it is still and will remain obedience to the Law.
In the two score and five years that God has kept and blest me and my family I have been associated with several different ministries. Most have been plagued with the busyness of church growth and the inaccessibility and frustration that goes with it. Few have been willing to confront their congregation with the specific actions God requires of His servants. Few have been willing to confront the culture with God's legal standards. Most have preached a humanistic, seeker friendly gospel that has filled both their pews and their financial coffers.
For the past decade we have helped support the ministry of Christian Reconstruction. It is a great blessing to see Mark Rushdoony attend to his father's business. Mark is a fine preacher, teacher, and writer in his own right but rather than seek his own ministry he has devoted himself to publishing and distributing his father's books. Like Jesus he has the rare Grace of being able to humbly defer to his father. It shines like a beacon.
The quotation at the top of this article is from the latest publication Mark has released, Dr. R. J. Rushdoony's commentary "The Sermon on the Mount". It is available here.
I have been writing commentary for the past seven years and have posted hundreds of articles on the internet. Last September, by the Grace of God, my Darling Wife, Patty, and I celebrated our thirty-third year of a marriage. In spite of the serious deterioration of our cultural surroundings we have enjoyed peace, prosperity, and joy!