From: Darrell128@aol.com Date: Fri, 15 Nov 1996 03:43:11 -0500 (EST) NR #1996-118: Rhem to Reformed Church in America: "The Bible is a Wax Nose" "The Bible is a wax nose." That was the explanation given by the pastor of the fourth-largest church of the Reformed Church in America on why he has come to believe in salvation apart from Christ. "The question is not whether non-believers can be saved, the question is whether salvation is through Jesus Christ alone," said Rev. Richard Rhem, pastor of Christ Community Church in Spring Lake, Michigan. Delivering the keynote speech before over 200 people attending a November 9 conference hosted by the RCA's Regional Synod of the Mid-Atlantics, Rhem said part of the problem is that Scripture is unclear about the matter. "I have been hesitant to engage in biblical discussion because the biblical answer is divided," said Rhem. "The Bible speaks with more than one voice." Rhem noted that the event was the first time he had spoken publicly on the controversy surrounding his views, said he did so with trepidation, emphasized that he was not trying to be a "crusader," and said was surprised that his views had created such a controversy. "I cannot believe that this issue is of such interest that it would get on the front page of the New York Times; I think perhaps it is reflective of the church being reflexive and afraid," said Rhem. "I don't think I have said anything new; I don't think I have said anything well." NR #1996-118: For Immediate Release Rhem to Reformed Church in America: "The Bible is a Wax Nose" by Darrell Todd Maurina, Press Officer United Reformed News Service MAHWAH, NJ (November 8, 1996) URNS - "The Bible is a wax nose." That was the explanation given by the pastor of the fourth-largest church of the Reformed Church in America on why he has come to believe in salvation apart from Christ. "The question is not whether non-believers can be saved, the question is whether salvation is through Jesus Christ alone," said Rev. Richard Rhem, pastor of Christ Community Church in Spring Lake, Michigan. "When you tell me I must say it is through Jesus Christ alone I don't know what to do with the Jewish believers I have become so fond of." Delivering the keynote speech before over 200 people attending a November 9 conference hosted by the RCA's Regional Synod of the Mid-Atlantics, Rhem said part of the problem is that Scripture is unclear about the matter. "I have been hesitant to engage in biblical discussion because the biblical answer is divided," said Rhem. "The Bible speaks with more than one voice." Rhem noted that the November 9 event was the first time he had spoken publicly on the controversy surrounding his views, said he did so with trepidation, emphasized that he was not trying to be a "crusader," and said was surprised that his views had created such a controversy. "I cannot believe that this issue is of such interest that it would get on the front page of the New York Times; I think perhaps it is reflective of the church being reflexive and afraid," said Rhem. "I don't think I have said anything new; I don't think I have said anything well." "I found that in the early church there was a strong strain of universalism, of the ultimate triumph of the grace of God," said Rhem, also noting that some "high Calvinists" historically taught election to universal salvation. Rhem acknowledged that the Bible included some apparently clear teaching on salvation through Christ and that such teaching would have been expected given its context as a book of proclamation. "I don't think we should try to whitewash this book and say there is no possibility of constructing an exclusivist view of the church; the only thing I would argue is this is not the only voice," said Rhem. According to Rhem, it is inconsistent to say the Bible is clear on salvation apart from Christ when Scripture also appears to be clear on such matters as the immediacy of the return of Christ and the ordination of women. "How can we honestly say that when we realize those documents were written by those who honestly believed they were at the end, and they were not at the end?" asked Rhem. "We are not seeing the death of the great religious traditions, we are seeing their resurgence and their renaissance." Rhem proposed that the church should view the Bible as one of two "poles" for its theological reflection, the other being human experience, and proposed the RCA's earlier debate over women in office as a model for how such reflection should not be done. "No one was asking are women gifted, are women spiritual, they were asking if we do this what will happen to our view of First Timothy." "If it feels so right you don't need an argument, do you?" said Rhem, noting that his background was strongly conservative and quite different from his current theological views. "I grew up feeling I had to defend God.... I lived with a monkey on my back, I had to get the world to Jesus." "Has human experience taken precedence over Scriptures?" asked Rhem. "Yes, I hope so, and that's why I am in trouble. I don't think you can understand the Bible apart from human experience, and I don't think you can understand human experience apart from the categories of Scripture." Failure to take human experience into account led to fundamentalism and bitterness, said Rhem, citing the history of J. Gresham Machen and the split of Princeton Seminary in the 1920's to begin Westminster Seminary. "Fundamentalism is giving yesterday's answers to today's problems," said Rhem. Rhem said that his new views gave him much more freedom and openness in relating to adherents of other religions. "Ironically, in the Muskegon Classis, I am the one who has baptized two Jews," said Rhem. "I almost had a bad conscience about it, I said, are you sure you want to do that?" Rhem emphasized that he did not believe in an amalgamation of religions into "some new kind of mush," but rather that people should select a religion and follow its tenets without believing that it was the only means to salvation. For people who are not believers in a particular religion or for those who do not follow its tenets, Rhem allowed for a redemptive though not a vindictive form of punishment and noted that he had spent a fair amount of time studying the early church's doctrine of purgatory. "I think that hell is the expression of separation from God; I believe in judgment, that no one will get away with anything," said Rhem. "Hell for as long as you want it, but it doesn't have as many people within it as I used to think or last as long as I used to think." Responding to a question from a seminarian who agreed with Rhem and was uncertain about being ordained in the RCA, Rhem noted that the RCA's conflict with him had been painful. "I am wounded; the church has hurt me; I should not be giving counsel to anyone for another year or two," said Rhem. "The only reason I survived this past year is my congregation has been wonderfully united and supportive. If my congregation were torn up I would be torn up, and I would be out of here because I am not a fighter." After Rhem's speech, three other panelists gave responses and reflections to Rhem's comments. Dr. Paul Fries, professor at the RCA's New Brunswick Theological Seminary, said the RCA's conflicts were caused by two different ways of looking at what unites the church. One group, mostly composed of RCA churches in the east dating back to the formation of the denomination in 1628 when New York City was still the Dutch colony of New Amsterdam, shared the seventeenth-century understanding that the RCA was a "volkskerk" that exists prior to doctrinal statements, just as the church in the Netherlands existed long before the establishment of its creeds and confessions at the time of the Reformation. Others in the RCA, however, believed in the tradition of the 1834 Afscheiding that the church is defined by and should therefore emphasize a unity based on its creeds and confessions. Fries noted that this mentality characterized the churches of the midwest, most of whose members were composed of later Dutch immigrants who came to the United States in the 1800's and 1900's. That tradition, said Fries, is that of the Christian Reformed Church in North America and its mother church in the Netherlands, not that of the Reformed Church in the Netherlands and its mother church in the Netherlands, the Hervormde Kerk. "The Bible says more, is more complex on these issues than our theology has often allowed," said Fries. "I've had secular people who know about the situation in Spring Lake who can't believe the church is still doing heresy things in this day. This is not helping our witness." Rev. Taylor Holbrooke, pastor of Middlebush Reformed Church in Somerset, NJ, noted that while he disagreed with Rhem's views he wanted to avoid splitting the denomination, as did his father and grandfather who were also conservative RCA ministers. "My grandfather ranted and raved about the liberal tendencies in the Reformed Church, but my grandfather died in the Reformed Church," said Holbrooke. "I attended the Christian Reformed Church synod two years ago as the Christian Reformed Church decided for the third time to open the offices to women. I saw a denomination that defined itself by the knife, who is in and who is out." "That scared me," said Holbrooke, noting that the conservative Seventh Reformed Church in Grand Rapids had been expelled from the RCA only shortly before the concerns over Christ Community Church and Rev. Richard Rhem. "Now we are dealing with Dick Rhem on the left and Seventh Reformed on the right, but I'm afraid the knife is going to start moving in," said Holbrooke. "Rather than becoming the slicers who cut off, let's remember that God is still on the throne." Fries noted that the RCA had a long history of resisting those who advocate a stricter view of the church, telling a story of the president of Hope College in Holland, Michigan in the 1920's, who every Sunday on his way to Hope Reformed Church walked by the home of two CRC children waiting for their parents and had a tradition of giving them peppermints for church. One day after he passed the house, he heard the children saying to each other, "Oh's he's such a nice man, it's too bad he's going to burn eternally in hell" because he was a member of the RCA rather than the CRC. Rev. Charles Usgood, a Lutheran pastor and religion correspondent for the New York Times and the Bergen Record, urged patience in dealing with theological conflict. "Most of us taught as firmly held doctrine that women may not preach from the pulpits of our churches, and most of us now say that was wrong. What else will we come to change as we learn more?" asked Usgood. "Remember that it took 400 years to get the creeds down. It took 50, 60, 70 years to get the church to use women in all offices of the church, and some still aren't settled with that yet." However, Usgood noted that there were limits to tolerance and that denominations had the right to decide that other people, while Christians, could not be members of their particular denomination. "Because we cannot know the whole mind of God on this does not mean we cannot know anything," said Usgood. What good will be accomplished by the RCA's Regional Synod conference? Conference organized David Cole said the regional synod had never before had a roundtable on the subject but was pleased with what it has accomplished, allowing Rhem to explain his views and answer questions without having the RCA regional synod take a position for or against those views. "We think it went exceptionally well," said Cole. "The subject was covered with goodwill; we were not trying to change anyone's positions." Cross-References to Related Articles: #1996-013: Special Meeting of RCA's Muskegon Classis Discusses Homosexuality, Scripture, Salvation Apart from Christ #1996-023: Muskegon RCA Classis: No Room for Pastor Questioning Salvation Apart from Christ, Authority of Scripture #1996-086: Muskegon Classis Rebukes Rhem for "Heretical" Views, Restarts Negotiations "to Reach a Mutually Acceptable Separation Agreement" with Christ Community Church #1996-091: Rhem Conflict Leads to Homosexuality Debate in Muskegon #1996-092: Back to the Drawing Board: Muskegon Classis Tables Proposed Settlement with Pastor of RCA's Fourth-Largest Church #1996-093: Dr. Jonathan Gerstner on Rhem: "Tragedy is the Only Word" #1996-094: Second RCA Minister Faces Discipline for Theological Views #1996-103: Classis Muskegon Averts Heresy Trial, Completes Separation Agreement with Richard Rhem, Christ Community Church #1996-110: Appeal Stalls Settlement Agreement on Rev. Richard Rhem; Protests Greet Upcoming Rhem Keynote Speech for RCA Regional Synod of the Mid-Atlantics on "The Church in Conflict... Can Non-Believers be Saved?" Contact List: David Cole, Symposium Organizer 1202 Hilltop Rd., Mahwah, NJ 07430 O: (201) 818-8575 Dr. Paul Fries, Professor, New Brunswick Theological Seminary 17 Seminary Place, New Brunswick, NJ 08901 O: (908) 247-5241 * H: (908) 236-0900 Rev. Taylor Holbrook, Pastor, Middlebush Reformed Church 1 S Middlebush Rd., Somerset, NJ 08873 O: (908) 873-2776 * H: (908) 873-2733 Rev. Mark Kraai, President, Regional Synod of the Mid-Atlantics 100 W. Main St., Somerville, NJ 08876 O: (908) 725-4545 Rev. Richard Rhem, Senior Pastor, Christ Community Church 225 East Exchange St., Spring Lake, MI 49456 O: (616) 842-1985 * H: (616) 846-7777 * F: (616) 842-3476 ------------------------------------------------ file: /pub/resources/text/reformed: nr96-118.txt .