Westminster Conference 2011 Day 2

Another excellent day rounded off an excellent conference.

1. We began with Lewis Allen on why Puritanism failed.

First there was the history - the opportunity before 1660, the upheaval from that time and the obsolence following it. We then had two concerns expressed. Firstly, with regard to ecclesiology, the Puritan's chief concern and secondly to do with heresy which came in with a vengeance the further on from the Reformation time moved. Finally, the two lessons emphasised were the importance of unity and the battle for truth and integrity in the local church. It was good to hear a church planter calling for doctrinally distinct churches to be founded and yet at the same time calling for unity with all who are orthodox in their teaching.

2. We then went to the 18th century with Robert Strivens.

He very helpfully charted the descent into heresy with regard to the Trinity that marked many of the nonconformists in that century, helpfully seeking to differentiate subordinationism, unitarianism, etc. Focusing on Doddridge and Watts as the defenders he pointed out how they too were defective in their defence, the problem stemming, he suggested, from the huge but often overlooked influence of Samuel Clark (1675-1729), whose heterodox theology Doddridge was unwilling to condemn and their attitude to creeds and confessions. He helpfully finished the paper by outlining Doddridge's objections to creeds (he much preferred for a minister to write his own confession. His objections were regarding

1 Ethics - imposing someone else's words on a person.

2 Conscience - its liberty

3 Language - the insistence on one set of words when ideas can be expressed in more than one way (Aristotelian Watts called it)

4 Scripture language - surely being preferable

5 Unity - a desire for greater Christian unity

6 The Bible - a desire to let it speak for itself.

it was this subject that we spent our time debating. Most appeared to be opposed to Doddridge.

3. Finally, Hugh Collier gave us the biography of the great missionary to the native Americans or Indians, John Eliot (1604-1690) a wonderful story a real a challenge and yet an encouragement to see what one man can do and a reminder to pray for those toiling in the lonely work of pioneer mission today. I liked the way that Mather pointed out that the secret of Eliot's success is found in his name spelled backwards (toile!).

God willing we will be meeting again next year at the same place on December 4 and 5 looking at 1662, Pascal, Henry Martyn, etc.