A few days ago, I finally sat down with someone (an elder/evangelist) from my previous church, an OPC. The buffet lunch talk went from what's expected to be a couple of hours to a whole 6 hours. Because it's just that heated and fun! Here's my reflection:
I define the fundamentalists as those who do not think harder, do not care about the thoughts of others. They follow tradition, they believe they are the orthodox ones. Some cannot tell what is reformed and what is fundamentalist apart, some do not believe in such distinction, some believe they are reformed while holding on to some fundamentalist view. Therefore, they often make false accusations of their reformed counterparts as not being orthodoxy, being proud.
In the OPC, because of the Inerrancy of the Bible battle in the 20-30s, the OPC was formed with much support of the fundamentalists. So today, I see the OPC (and also URNCA) fusing reformed thinking with fundamentalist ideas, making some fundamentalist views that are not reformed, orthodoxy: on Sabbath, on female pastor (ordination), on the period of Creation week (Day Age problem), on submission to church leaders, etc.
This fundamentalist that I talked to was somewhat more reformed than most because I was surprised that he held to the same view on female pastor as I do. Although, how similar, I do not know. He brought up the fact that when men do not stand up, God raised Deborah. This is impressive coming from him.
However, when it comes to day age issue, he stood with the fundamentalists calling his "ordinary days" view as orthodoxy. When I referred to the report from WTS on this, he seemed to be disappointed at WTS. He alluded to how many "caved" to the Old Earth creationism because of job insecurity in the secular evolution believing world. I was not interested to follow up on that as it's diverging from serious two sided discussion - he was saying only things I already know, not things we can use to discover the root cause of our differences, such as "the ordinary day interpretation is in the Hebrew grammar" as someone else once told me, even though it's a futile attempt.
A typical issue when debating with the fundamentalists is this: They always imagine that they know more than you when they do not. They would never consider that they may know less than you especially when you're not holding some title. And if they sensed you know more than them, their go to is to accuse you of being proud, being the know-it-all without even considering what you know. So their responses become mere time filler, wasting time. So when he tried to flip my accusation of how Fundamentalists believe they are the right ones back to me, I explained the distinction: That one side already knew what the other side is talking about but not vice-versa, showing him how the relativism does not work here.
Fortunately, this is not too bad of a case with him. There's others in my current church and the former OPC who were more talkative. The reason for this more impressive behavior is perhaps of his zeal in evangelism, which results in a kind of pastoral care in willing to listen more than talk. Also, his professional interest in music, which I think is a liberating tool for the mind and heart. He shared that instead of planting new churches, he preferred to work with existing OPC (or many reformed churches) because these churches do not have strong evangelism. Something we both strongly agree on.
The point of the meeting, for him at least, I believe, is to lecture me about leaving the OPC church. Or to be fair, for just "disappearing" without any explanation. But I see no difference in this case. I brought up the Covid19 incident when a father was angered publicly after learning how they were being told it's sinful not to physically come to church and believed the "lies" of Covid19. Though I doubt this church deny the reality and impact of Covid19, they apparently held to the view that discount sensitivity to diverse view on hygiene: "To die is Christ", so who cares if you get covid, just do your best to recover, if not, you're saved anyway. Therefore, after learning from a couple of members to compare the lack of care from the church leadership, I conclude that despite some fundamentalist views from the pastors (a major one being: There should not be businesses running on Sundays), how Covid19 is handled is just going too far. I don't mind the lack of care too much, but when it cannot balance with the fundamentalist views, it can be a deal breaker. In a sense, I want to worship, I want to fellowship, but was prevented - because, it's as if they do not support virtual online means of fellowship (only broadcast, not communication). One of the elder even treated it a means of fallen men and not of God: If technology breaks down, what do you do? I never understand why the close-mindedness other than cause of pride and laziness in exploration not just in the physical but in the mental and spiritual manner as well.
I figure, like CCCNY, when I leave knowing that there's no point to discuss further on any disagreement, they would at least care enough to know that the burden falls upon them to initiate reaching out. Not the other way around. But that was not the case, not especially with CCCNY. This evangelist at least tried and was much better in conversation than the others, even if it's pretending, not saying that it is. The main goal of reaching out should be to find out why one leaves the church. I'm not talking about someone moving away due to job change and what not, which should be an understatement as to whether or not I need to notify the church because the departure is obviously not caused by disagreement in this case. To lack the sensitivity in seeing if a person leaves the church due to disagreement or not (regardless of who is right), is a serious problem in pastoral ministry, and then to put the burden of care on the one leaving, is even worse. It's also bad parenting.
This lead to the debate on membership: The OPC (or so I thought - only been to one OPC) and URCNA constituted membership in such a way that without which, one cannot take the Holy Communion with them. Though they do not restrict such membership to only their own church, it is still crossing too much of the dogmatic line. The only reason I can view it as positive, if it has to be, is so that this prevents nonchalant "believers" from coming to church anytime they please or consumerism. The other reason, a bad one, could be their wrong view on Hebrews 13:17 - obey your rulers (in the church). Wrong because the verse does not imply submitting one's better theological principle to another's in theory. In practice, the two parties can work out a harmonious solution, one that recognizes the differences (which I think the Fundamentalists lack the mentality and humility for) yet does not let what is paradoxical become contradictory. Unlike him, I don't limit practical theology to just pastoral ministry (apparently, according to him, but I doubt it, that WTS changed the department of practical theology to pastoral ministry because everything should already be practical - I disagree, as well as skeptical as to whether or not this was WTS' history). Practical theology should simply be about how to apply doctrine/scripture to our living. The HOW is important.
I was glad we were able to discuss all these, even though we did spend a portion of time in the beginning to reacquaint with each other.
Reflection:
One major one is how church membership should be viewed. I confessed to him I repented before the Lord for being too hasty to become member of the OPC church, though he didn't seem to get it - "Since you repent, you should reflect on why you rush into it" after I told him it was simply because of the Holy Communion and abiding the local church's rule. And I believe God used Covid19 to teach me this lesson, out of all the major reasons in the world that have nothing to do with me during this minor pandemic. Through which I saw how pastoral ministry can fail despite much studies and superficial treatment and should not be treated lightly.
Church membership is effective the moment a Christian attends a church, being visitor or not. I've explained this to him. I believe he's still struggling in this, playing the loyalty card. He insisted on membership vows, which to me were the same kind of "vows" any true Christian automatically holds to the moment they become Christian, hence the purpose of such membership vow is moot. I did distinguish to him, which he thought at first he would catch me for holding a double standard view, that ordained leaders such as pastors, preachers, are not like members, because they cannot just move from church to church. I also showed that official church membership is not useless, but the order it brings is not for one's loyalty, but one's rights in serving officially under the name of the church, such as being a deacon, elder, pastor, etc. Aside from this, it has no distinction from a visiting Christian to a church.
Fellowship, is the communion of ALL the regenerates. Not just within one church or one denomination. He agreed. However, what they are not able to do, is what R. C. Sproul did with John MacArthur, to be able to invite debate (on infant baptism), yet maintain close fellowship with each other, the paradoxical practicality of wisdom is applied. They would rather make the disagreements look as vague or as disingenuously untrue as possible, this they call their fellowship.
I am also more and more convinced that the fundamentalists encourage themselves in a tribal way under the mask of being loyal to each other in Christian love. This is detriment to true cross cultural evangelical work. They cannot express the true love, true sacrifice to those they are giving the gospel to. Though not necessarily apply to this brother, but I could tell he has bought this way of thinking in that my theory of how the extreme atheists coming from fundamentalists background made him uncomfortable. Because to him, it's a loyalty issue, it's an obedience issue. I disagreed them all, because it is an issue of love and wisdom from the saints to the wretched. It's never about loyalty, it's never about obedience, when dealing with the Gospel.
