Words matter. Our faith and belief are communicated through words. However, a speaker or writer’s words have precise meanings and intentions. One of the alarming aspects of liberalism in the church was the way in which they agreed to words while denying the meanings and intentions of those who wrote them.

When liberalism was at its strongest, it was common to hear a liberal claim that he holds to the Westminster Confession of Faith while denying the deity and resurrection of Christ. You might think that this is impossible, yet it happened. The reason is that the meanings and intentions were separated from the words written under the guise of agreeing with the faith taught. This allowed individuals to claim that they adhered to the confessions while denying the truth contained within them. This insidious use of language is a death knell to the church.

An example of this is, “What it Means to Subscribe to a Statement of Faith“, in the Presbyterian Church of New Zealand (PCANZ). In 1969, the General Assembly adopted this statement, which said:

1. “For a minister or office-bearer to subscribe to a Statement of Faith means the affirmation
   of the Christian faith as expressed and preserved in the Church by the historic creeds and
   confessions.
2. It must be clearly understood that while faith can be expressed in words it can never
   wholly be defined by words.
3. Therefore where any minister or office-bearer affirms a Statement or Confession of Faith
   he is bound by the faith expressed in the Statement or Confession rather than by the precise
   words themselves.
4. It will, however, belong to the integrity of every minister or office-bearer who makes such
   an affirmation he will seek to enter as fully as he conscientiously can into the faith the words
   express.”¹

This statement, at a surface read, might seem like a good idea. However, when put under scrutiny, it is clearly a work of the deceiver to lead God’s people away from the truth. The PCANZ effectively ruled that a minister or office-bearer may subscribe to a statement of faith while denying the particular words used by the authors.

To understand the nature of separating words and faith consider just one example from the Westminster Confession of Faith, “The Son of God, the second person in the Trinity, being very and eternal God, of one substance, and equal with the Father, did, when the fulness of time was come, take upon him man’s nature, with all the essential properties and common infirmities thereof, yet without sin; being conceived by the power of the Holy Ghost, in the womb of the Virgin Mary, of her substance. So that two whole, perfect, and distinct natures, the Godhead and the manhood, were inseparably joined together in one person, without conversion, composition, or confusion. Which person is very God and very man, yet one Christ, the only Mediator between God and man.“² The intention of this paragraph is very clear and the words themselves actually mean something, viz. that Jesus Christ is truly God and truly Man. The problem with the PCANZ’s statement is that it potentially enables a minister to say, “Ahh yes I agree with the faith of WCF 8.2, that there is a saviour called Jesus Christ, however I don’t necessarily agree with the precise wording that Jesus was conceived in a virgin and was very God.”

You might be tempted to think that this is no longer a problem, that this was an issue that died out with liberalism. However, the spirit of liberalism behind this still remains, because the father of lies still remains. A day is coming when the deceiver will be cast into the lake of fire, but that day has not yet come. There is a subtleness behind denying the precise definition of words that is still very much alive and active in the church today. Though churches state that they hold to the whole system of doctrine taught in the confessions, yet ministers and elders will object to points contained within that system of doctrine.

The most common example of this is the doctrine of creation. The Westminster Divines wrote, “It pleased God the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, for the manifestation of the glory of his eternal power, wisdom, and goodness, in the beginning, to create, or make of nothing, the world, and all things therein, whether visible or invisible, in the space of six days, and all very good.“³ Though it is well known that there were a variety of positions on creation within the counsel of the Westminster Divines, they wrote that creation happened “in the space of six days”. Those words means something, and yet many men that hold to the WCF today deny a six day creation. They do this because they have subtly accepted that one can hold to a system of doctrine while denying the precise words and intentions of the creed they subscribe to.

The sad thing about this is that none of us would want anyone to do this with our own words. If you wrote me a letter and said, “I have received the $100,000 deposit for my housing project”, you would be very unimpressed if I wrote back and said, “I am glad you have raised $100,000 for MY housing project.” You had intentions in the wording and I twisted them to mean something I could agree with. Yet are ministers and churches not dangerously close to doing the same thing when they allow the actual words of confessions and creeds not to carry their intended meaning? We must beware of the spirit of liberalism that is always threatening to undermine the truth.

1. https://www.presbyterian.org.nz/sites/default/files/BOO%20Appendices.pdf (Page 10-11) ↩︎
2. Westminster Confession of Faith, 8.2. ↩︎
3. WCF, 4.1. ↩︎