Pietism and Holiness – Part 2
R. J.Rushdoony,
Beginning in the early church and going on through the Middle Ages, although it was carried to allegorical extremism, nonetheless, at the heart it was a sound thing. When Christians looked at an apple, they did not see just an apple. They saw a fruit that was the work of God’s plan and creation from all eternity. They saw it as a part of a perfect creation, a marvelous order designed by God. During the Middle Ages, they would preach about the apple as symbolizing the tree in the Garden of Eden. They would also go on about the beauty of the apple, and the beauty of all things when they were taken from God and used under him, but whether it was an apple, or a tree, or a leaf, now granted, they allegorized very extensively, they always saw it as a part of a total unity with the rest of the world and God’s purpose, and whatever happened, they saw it in the same way. When they went somewhere and did something, they knew that all of creation, every act therein, came from the hand of God. Now, that’s holiness.
Granted, the most devout Catholic scholars are ready to grant they went to allegorical extremes. Granted all those things, what you have to say is, they at least saw the world as God’s world, and yet when we look out at what happens, we’re atheists. We may be Christians in the church, but when we read the paper, we read it like atheists. “So, what is the world coming to?” Well, the world is moving on track, and God’s plan is being unfolded, which will lead to the destruction of the enemies of God, and so we need to look at the world, whether it’s an apple or the events, or the daily paper, and say, “The Lord is on the throne. Let the people rejoice.” Now, that’s holiness, you see, because in holiness, we do not focus just on ourselves as pietism does. In holiness, our focus is God and his law, God and his word, and we recognize the totality of God’s purpose in all creation.
We recognize the truth of Romans 8:28, “For we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them that are the called according to his purpose,” and the Bible makes equally clear that all things work together for evil to them that hate God. It’s a marvelous purpose there. When we cultivate holiness, sanctification, we see that, and Romans 8:28 becomes a part of our being, so that we do not fear. As the Psalmist said, “Though the earth be removed, though the mountains shake with the swelling thereof, though heaven and earth are rent apart by storms, and disasters, and earthquakes, the Lord of Hosts is with us, the God of Jacob is our refuge.” We see nothing in isolation from God. The framework of all events is the Lord.
When we are pietists, we see the world from man’s perspective, but the world does not move in terms of our plans or calculations, but in terms of the Lord. It is sin, not holiness, to view the world as though it were to revolve around us. This is our Father’s world.
Are there any questions? Yes?
[Audience] When you first started this, this holiness, is a life, a new order of the kingdom, is that right? And then you said that we die more and more to sin by renewing the Holy Spirit. Can you amplify that? I mean, in an actual, you know, in practical applications?
[Rushdoony] People do not stand still. We either are growing in our depravity and sin, growing as children of the world of anti-God, of Satan, a society of Satan, or we are growing in grace. Growth is inescapable. We’re going to grow in one direction or another. Now, if the principle of life, Jesus Christ, is in us, we’re going to grow in terms of him. It’s been a fearful evil that it’s actually been developed as a theological doctrine a few times in the history of the church. I’m trying to think of the German scholar who developed it about a century ago, the most recent example of it, that there is no growth in sanctification, that your sanctification on the day of your salvation stays constant, so as far as the Lord chooses to take you, the moment he saves you is as far as you go. I recall some years ago hearing about a pastor who had an older member, a rather self-righteous character, testify that the Lord had saved him something like forty years ago, and filled the cup of his salvation to the brim, and hadn’t added a drop nor taken away a drop since them, and the minister said, “Brother, it’s pretty stagnant water by this time.” We grow, it’s inescapable, if we are alive in Christ.
[Audience] Paul said to grow in the grace and knowledge of Jesus Christ. Now that growing in grace and the knowledge, grace means something received that we don’t deserve, and knowledge of him is the word of God, isn’t it?
[Rushdoony] Yes. Right.
[Audience] So, actually, that doesn’t mean we’re getting better all the time. It means we’re growing in the concept{?} Christ coming to know him, we’ll realize everything that is of Christ.
[Rushdoony] We grow better by grace. We improve as Christian soldiers.
[Audience] And that’s grace, too. Whatever we do is by the grace of God and his enablement, and his spirit. And of course, the other thing is, we were thinking the other day, that we are new creations in Christ, as God doesn’t do this for us, that he’s asked us to obey him. So it isn’t him obeying for us. He says to obey me. “If you love me you will keep my commandments.” So, it’s our exercise of that grace which he’s given to us. To get the knowledge of him, and like you said, to go according to all his word, and whatever, “As a man thinketh in his heart, or in his mind, so is he.” Paul says I serve in my mind the law of God, in the flesh the law of sin. So, in the mind, is where having a word, if we meditate upon the word of God day and night, and I presume this is the means by which we will more obey the Lord than not obey the Lord, as we meditate by the word.
[Rushdoony] Psalm 119 is the classic on that kind of meditation. Yes?
[Audience] Can you give a biblical definition of pietism using the two examples that you referred to in scripture, as compared to the pietism which is prominent today?
[Rushdoony] The word piety, as it appears in the Bible, has reference to reverence and respect for those who are our elders, and also can mean worship. So, piety, in the Bible, means simply godly respect and reverence for those above us, and worship of the Lord, but pietism, as it has been historically used, is an entirely different thing. It means an emphasis on our experience to the key to our religious life, rather than an emphasis on the objective work of Jesus Christ.
[Audience] How did it develop historically?
[Rushdoony] Well, very simply this. Humanism began to creep in to the churches in the 18th century. First of all, it crept in in the form of a rationalism in theology. Both Catholic and Protestant circles began to develop a highly rationalistic kind of theology. Well, that’s humanism. Then, the reaction against that barren rationalism was more humanism, only an emotional kind of humanism, and that was pietism. So that you had first, a humanistic emphasis in the form of an undue emphasis on reason, not reason under God, but reason playing judge over God and his word. And then, you had an emphasis on feeling and emotion, not under God, but in a sense, able to commend itself to God by its pseudo-holiness, its devotion.
[Audience] With the monastics and the monasteries in the Middle Ages, was that just perversion of like, the doctrine of separation?
[Rushdoony] There were elements of neo-Platonism in the monastics, so there definitely was an element of that there. However, the monastics also were the activists of the Medieval era. They were the missionaries who evangelized a good deal of Europe, and some of them were most remarkable men, very, very remarkable men. They were also pioneers in one area after another in the development of agriculture and technology. So that we are inclined to think of monasticism as a withdrawal from the world. Actually, many of the Medieval monks were the least withdrawn of people. I find that as I go back to the early Middle Ages, I find that I can see more to feel akin to in many of those. Some of them were really remarkable men, delightful characters. They had a holy boldness and a courage that was really amazing.
[Audience] Don’t get that impression when you read the literature?
[Rushdoony] Yes. Monasticism now is, in a sense, a withdrawal from the world. Then, they were the pioneers in the early Medieval period. Any other questions? Yes?
[Audience] There were two examples of pietism that I thought might be helpful. There’s the renewal of the old Puritan pietism that we see in the old Puritan movement, the Reformed Baptist being one group.
[Rushdoony] “ The Christian in Complete Armour,” is the classic of that type of pietism.
[Audience] How Did Arminianism come into the picture?
[Rushdoony] Arminianism greatly increased the receptivity to pietism. Yes?
[Audience] Would the Pharisees of Jesus’ time be rightfully accused of pietism?
[Rushdoony] In a sense, yes. It was a related movement in that they substituted the traditions of men for the commandments of God as the way of holiness, and this is what pietism does, and it does lead to a self-righteousness. So, that’s a particularly good question. Yes?
[Audience] In the development of this humanism and pietism in the church, did the general membership realize what was happening?
[Rushdoony] Did the general membership realize in the church what was happening with pietism? Sometimes, yes. That’s a broad question and it covers a great deal of church history. There was, very often, an awareness and a resistance and many of the pietists did have very sharp critics who called attention very pointedly to their departures from the faith, which sometimes were very, very serious. However, there is an appeal to pietism. It puts the center of the faith in your own mind, and you see, that’s pleasing to the sin in all of us. It takes Christ our of the center and puts us right back in the center where the sinner wants to be.
[Audience] Also, along the same line, I’ve made comments, talking to those who were very experienced, for example, the Pentecostals, and though they believe in justification by faith, they will see experience, like a Catholic does, and stand around them instead of the objective work of Jesus Christ, and you start to talk to them and they get on a different wavelength, and you know, they’re off on their little experience again, you know. They put them in the center.
[Rushdoony] Yes. By and large, both Catholics and Protestants are saturated with pietism today, so their differences are minor. Pietism is the reigning position on both sides.
Well, if there are no further questions, let’s bow our heads for our concluding prayer.
Our Lord and our God, we thank thee that thou art our Lord, that it is the work of Jesus Christ in terms of which we stand before thee. Give us grace to take hands off our lives and to commit ourselves into thy keeping, knowing that thou doest all things well. Bless us now in our homeward journeys. Give us a blessed night’s rest and joy on the morrow and always in thy service and in thy government. In Jesus name. Amen.