A couple of years ago Rev. C. Bouwman spent some months in Mt Nasura and addressed the older and younger men of the congregation about Neo (new) Calvinists such as John Piper, John MacArthur, R. C. Sproul and a number of others who have a large following through their podcasts. It was evident from a show of hands that quite a few brothers were familiar with some of these Neo-Calvinist speakers. Whilst Rev. Bouwman acknowledged that there was much to be learned from these men, he expressed concerns. In this article I’d like to pass on what Rev. Bouwman had to say about these podcasts and the lack of covenant awareness in them.
In introducing the subject, Rev. Bouwman said that he observed what appeared to be a sense of spiritual health here whereby the men, including the young, were taking the Word of God seriously. At the same time, he observed that the older men liked books and the younger liked the smart phone. And that brings some disconnect. Dad says, “Bobby, have you read this book? Bobby replies, “Is it on this [the smartphone]?
The disconnect is because the older aren’t quite as at home in this technology as the young folk are. However, Rev. Bouwman said it’s immaterial whether we read from a book or a screen. To illustrate this Rev. Bouwman reminded us of what happened some 500 years ago when the printing press was invented. There was a generation that had thrived on learning via the ear. Suddenly there were pamphlets everywhere, and the younger generation knew just what to do with them. That may not have gone down well with the older generation, but they learned to live with it.
Today we have smart phones and all that comes with it. We need to talk about that openly because some of the stuff on the smart phone is fabulous. For example, you can read your Bible on it. But other stuff is blasphemous and wicked. Rev. Bouwman encourages parents to ask the hard questions of their children: What are you reading, watching and listening to? Likewise elders at home visits need to ask: What’s your intake? Because everything—from the Bible to pornography—is available on it. Talk about it; thereby you show a son or daughter: someone cares about you.
Podcasts and Neo-Calvinism
Rev. Bouwman then spoke about podcasts of Neo (new) Calvinists such as John Piper, John MacArthur, RC Sproul of Ligonier Ministries, Sinclair Ferguson, Matt Chandler, Tim Challies, Tim Keller, Alistair Begg, Al Mohler, etc. They fit into a particular context, said Rev. Bouwman.
He said that after the Second World War there was a feeling across western civilization that God is dead. How else could so many millions of people have been killed in the concentration camps, or through the bombs that dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki? The existence of a God who could allow the sheer grossness of the war led to disbelief in God.
Into that kind of thinking, said Rev. Bouwman, came Billy Graham who emphasised that God is real and sent His Son to atone for sin. And by the grace of God, that message did gain some traction in western civilization.
“The difficulty of course was that Billy Graham preached a soft God, a gentle God, a gentleman’s God, as in: He’ll pour something down your throat. You get to open your hand and receive what he has to offer. A true gift. And of course, the response to that, if you think about it, is that if God’s soft, then why should I be serious in my service to this God because when push comes to shove, He’ll accept me as I am. I get to live my life and do my thing and on the last day I’ll be alright: good to go.”
And then these Neo-Calvinists came along in the 70s, 80s, 90s, with a corrective to that. They reached back to the time of the Great Reformation, Calvinism, and affirm the solas of the Great Reformation: by grace alone, by faith alone, in Christ alone, on Scripture alone, to the glory of God alone. And if you embrace that, you inevitably end up with TULIP: the five points of the Canons of Dort. God is sovereign. Me? I’m depraved. God chooses who is saved and sends His Son to redeem us. Rev. Bouwman expressed thankfulness for that and said he’s not surprised that many listen to the neo-Calvinists, because they’re very gifted speakers and clear thinkers.
However, he added, there’s a risk involved with these Neo-Calvinists because there are a few things lacking. During this presentation he wanted to point in particular to the covenant and the church.
Covenant lacking
Rev. Bouwman said that although the word covenant did not appear frequently in our Three Forms of Unity it is the golden thread that ties the entire Heidelberg Catechism and the entire Belgic Confession together.
“Think of Lord’s Day 1: What’s your only comfort in life and death? And the answer is: I belong with body and soul, in life and death, to my faithful Saviour Jesus Christ. I belong! What’s the point of the word belong? There God says, you’re mine. Covenant.”
The catechism, he said, was written for young people so that they would know the gospel. And the very first question that the young people were asked was: What is your only comfort? And the critical question is: Who gives a 17-year-old, who gives a 13-year-old, the permission to say: I belong? Where do you get the right to dare to claim that “I belong to Jesus Christ, the faithful Saviour”? And of course, the answer from Scripture is that God Himself has given you the right, and therefore the duty, to say that you belong.
Where does God say that? In Genesis 17 where God makes His covenant with Abraham and adds that it applies to him and to his descendants after him. Rev. Bouwman said:
“So Abraham gets to go home and say to Sarah, his wife, guess what? God said, I belong to Him! And then, some years later, Abraham gets to put his little boy Isaac upon his lap and says: Guess what? You belong, with body and soul, in life in death, to your faithful Saviour. Really! Because God said so. A few years ago, God came to me and he said, I establish my covenant, Abraham, between Me and you and your offspring after you. Wonderful, eh? You belong! And fast forward so many more years and you can see Isaac sitting on his chair, with his little boys on his knees and he says to Esau and Jacob: My boys, you belong. God said so. I’ll tell you what God said to us. What he said was: you boys, you belong. Simple. Repeat after me. What’s your only comfort in life and death? I belong with body and soul to my faithful Saviour, Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ was and is part of it.”
Years later David writes a song, and he dares to say: the Lord is my shepherd. He had the right to say it because of the covenant, signified and sealed by circumcision. David of course heard it from his father Jesse, and Jesse got the authority from Abraham who got it from God.
How do we fit in? Rev Bouwman pointed to Romans 11 which compares Israel to a tree and shows how branches were broken off because of unbelief and we, formerly gentiles (branches of a wild olive tree), were grafted into the tree of Abraham. Paul says: that’s how you fit in, Romans.
“And that’s what the authors of the catechism could say to the young Germans 500 years ago: You belong because God in mercy grafted you into the tree of Abraham. And so the word spoken back in Genesis 17: I establish my covenant between Me and you and your descendants after you—it pertains, say Ursinus and Olevianus, to you. You’re grafted in and so you have just as much right as little Isaac to say: I belong.”
And so this is the glorious identity we may pass on to our children. Parents don’t have to bring their children to Christ because they already belong to Him by virtue of the covenant. Of course, as they grow up they’ll need to respond in faith or else the branch will be broken off. But the identity of our children is that God has said they’re His. And so it’s for the younger generation to think of themselves as His children because God said so!
“My contribution? None! What was Abraham’s? What was Isaac’s? What was Jacob’s? What was Esau’s? It was none. That’s grace!”
So why do we bring this up? Because the names mentioned in relation to Neo Calvinism—John Piper, John MacArthur, Matt Chandler, Alistair Begg, Al Mohler—these fellows are all Credo Baptists while we, Free Reformed people, are Paedo Baptists. Rev. Bouwman explains the difference as follows:
“Paedo baptism is infant baptism where baptism is the sign and the seal of the covenant. So the language in paedo baptism, which we’re used to, travels from God to us where God says: ‘You’re mine.’ So baptism is a sign and a seal of the covenant: I belong to Jesus Christ.
Credo baptism contrasts with that. The word credo comes from the Latin word for ‘to believe’. And then the point is, I’m a believer. And now I’m going to signify the reality of faith or the existence of faith in my heart with baptism. Follow? Then the language in baptism travels from me, the new believer, to whoever’s out there: I believe. So the purpose of baptism and the content of baptism, the meaning of baptism has been changed.
A credo Baptist does not work with the covenant. And these Calvinists I’m talking about are credo Baptists. Not all. Many of them. And so the Covenant doesn’t feature in their podcasts.”
Rev. Bouwman said that these men will not say to their hearers: you belong; or, you’re a believer and therefore your children belong because God said so. What they will do instead is say: If you believe, you belong.
The trouble, he added, is that one day my faith is stronger than another day and we all have our moments that we question: Do I really belong? Is my faith real? Is it strong enough? Do I really believe? And you look inside yourself to find out if you really believe. But the LORD says, don’t bother looking inside yourself, because you’re too weak. He said to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Esau, etc.: You belong! Because I said so! That’s your security.
Rev. Bouwman concluded that while we may learn from these men’s podcasts, we need to be keenly aware that this aspect of the covenant is missing. That’s a very important omission because the covenant is one of the enormous privileges that we need humbly and thankfully to embrace. God has granted it to us in our heritage.
And that heritage has travelled through the ages. It’s “a heritage that travels through the Secession of 1834, Doleantie of 1886 and the Liberation of 1944. Especially in the Secession of 1834 and the Liberation of 1944 the rediscovery of the covenant drove those reformational movements. That’s your heritage. Please let nobody take it. You belong. Your children belong. You see, the identity of the kids you put to bed every night is that they are God’s own children. He said so!”