In Light of the Gospel

My friend Wyman Richardson told me that I was being too optimistic about the John 3:16 Conference. The optimism he senses was an attempt at kindness, more or less, and a comparison of topics at this conference with some of the stuff that goes on at other SBC conferences. But Wyman is right. There are two places you can read updates from the messages at the conference. Andrew Lindsey is blogging at Challies.com. Mark Lamprecht is blogging here.

Where to begin, where to begin…

Paige Patterson redefines total depravity. In fact, there is a lot of “redefining” certain definitions that is taking place at this conference.

David Allen asserted that James White is a hyper-Calvinist according to Phil Johnson’s primer on hyper-Calvinism. Well, Phil responded to that here.

Steve Lemke is also at the conference. He is the author of this woeful article: “What is a Baptist? Nine Marks that Separate Baptists from Presbyterians.” Timmy Brister has a comprehensive review of it at his blog, and you can see all the links here. And now Justin Taylor has responded to it here.

I have been very disappointed from just reading it on the live-blogs. This is enough to cause many of my Presbyterian friends to just shake their heads at the misrepresentation that is taking place here.

I do have another observation. One of the odd things about this conference is that it seems to be, on some level, a defense of the altar call. Read through some of the posts and notice how often that issue comes up. It just goes back to the same issue that it (the altar call) is such a fundamental part of that Baptist identity that they cannot imagine worship or church without it. How very sad. It is not the world that I live in anymore, and I have no interest in it. My friend Wyman was right.