The Riddle of what Mark Dever meant….

Last updated on: September 24, 2017 at 9:02 am by Adrian Warnock

The Riddle of what Mark Dever meant…. 2017-09-24T09:02:36+01:00 Adrian Warnock

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Had an email from a reader today:

“I have only been on your site a few times, but came to it again today through Google after reading something I didn’t understand on the ‘Together for the Gospel’ blog. I’m sure you are aware that this is a site where four well known pastors/theologians discuss thing of interest to each other in a public format (Al Mohler, C. J. Mahaney, Mark Dever and Ligon Duncan).

What I didn’t understand was the title of one of the discussions, ‘And it’s not just Lloyd-Jones.’ It briefly described Rick Warren’s church’s policy to baptize a person living with another person outside of marriage, but not to allow them into membership. Since you’re in Britain and, furthermore in London, and since you have a link to Westminster Chapel on your site, I’m wondering if you know why the writer may have said this? The reason I’m asking is because it sets Martyn Lloyd-Jones in a place where it doesn’t seem to me he would fit. I’m not super familiar with all he has to say, but I have read the first volume of his biography by Iain Murray, am currently in the midst of the second volume, have read his book ‘Assurance of Our Salvation,’ and am now wading through the eight-volume commentary on Ephesians. I guess I’m wondering why Mark Dever would use that title, and I think there’s probably a good chance you would know.

While I’m not real familiar with you, I ‘think’ you believe in the gifts of the Holy Spirit experientially for today? Is that where John Piper also stands? I’m only in the first chapter of the commentary on Ephesians by Lloyd-Jones, but it almost seems that’s where he stands also. This very much interests me as (apart from you) I didn’t realize there were any reformed people of stature in this camp.

I’m not looking for any lengthy answer. Just maybe saying yes or no regarding whether I’m hearing this correctly, and some insight into that post on the Together for the Gospel site.

Well there are two separate questions here – firstly the easy one – about an experiential sense of Gods Holy Spirit. It is fair to say that the modern “extreme cessationism” which turns Christianity into a purely intellectual excercise is just that modern and is itself largely a reaction to the extremes of the charismatics. It would be true to say that in the past many of the great “reformers” whilst by no means holding the charismatic belief, and indeed holding a form of cessationism quietly believed both in an experiential relationship with God AND some would even excercise what I would call prophecy or healing.

In fact extreme cessationism is not actually that common even today, and one of the many lessons I have learnt through blogging is that probably the silent majority of cessationists believe in a form of Christianity where God is alive in their experience. For a few quotes that may blow your mind, see my post entitled “assorted thoughts on baptism with the Holy Spirit“. So yes, I am a believer in gifts – would even call myself a “Reformed Charismatic” and am actually in the middle of a series on 1 Cor 12 which now I have a few weeks before I preach again I plan to get back into! In the meantime, my posts so far on the gifts can best be found by scrolling through the list of post titles from my Feburary archive page.

As far as what Mark Dever meant by his post “Its not just Lloyd-Jones“, well I don’t think I need a gift of prophecy to discern that he was almost certainly referring back to his post entitled “membership glorious membership.” in which he quotes Lloyd-Jones in support of a firm position on the importance of church membership which is interestingly shared by Warren. Incidenly, Rick Warren seems to have an interesting approach to the difference between baptism and membership which is worthy of further consideration in my humble opinion…..

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