What the Thunder Said...

Thank you so much for the 15 minutes of humor! Erkel's response was great he seemed a little flustered-I enjoyed reading why "Lund" was wrong :-) I look forward to reading your response.

I believe that you already said Dude before you came to SoCal.

Well, well, aren't we the controvercial one? I'd like to offer some words of advice and some baptistic-type thoughts. But I plan on not having any stystematic presentation to them. I will flop back and forth like a Ninja, confusing my readers, er...your readers (I have no intention of taking over your blog, though I have not thought of it until now). Moreover, I may indeed resort to using Latinized words.

I've not read Horton's article; I'm not sure I need to, but maybe. Considering what else he's written, it must be good. I'm sure he did not just sit down with the Baker commentary and produce an article after too much Scotch the day before it went to print. He's a thoughtful fellow and knows his tradition probably almost as good as anyone in America other than Richard Muller. Moreover, he's a good exegete.

However, if his article sounds like the Baker commentary, he may indeed have emphasized the wrong point of the text (I'm assuming it's the text from Collosians), or misrepresented it. Now, I've not seen this done within the corpus (there's my latinized word) of good Reformed exegetes. Olivianus (sp?) and Ursiniaus (sp?) handled this text smashingly, as near as I can tell from what little I've read.
It may perhaps be helpful, and surely more ecumenical, if paedo's would say something like the following when they are exegeting this text: "covenant member parents should long to have the thing signified become real, instead of merely longing for the signification. Because this is indeed a danger." That's why I love the Reformers (both 1st and 2nd generation ones), the Reformation codifiers, and many of the Puritans/Nadere Reformatie-ers: they consistantly said stuff like that! Moreover, that statement fits *well* with Horton's warning about platonism (it makes him clarify his warning and clarify the efficacy of the sacrament and it would be a good blow to the Federal Vision for him to clarify those things). I encourage you to clarify those things in your rebuttle, if you write one. I also encourage you to find Muller's article in the Calvin Journal about pb and what it means to be Reformed and attempt to write in a softer spirit than he did, though I believe he's correct.

I'm a credo-baptist who recognizes the validity of infant baptism, I think you may agree with me. Even if you don't agree with me, let us not laugh at Erkel, esp. in "cyber-print." Granted, you could take it if people laughed at you with respect to this subject. However, if there were a matter that you did not think funny, the person who mocked you about it should be sternly rebuked. It seems rather odd that someone who is akin to a drunken, obnoxious ex-monk (such as myself) should tell you, one of the most gentle souls I know, to be nice. But just be careful. Don't let your polemic (which is a lost art BTW) outweigh the truth and your catholic spirit.

If we are going to find Erkel humorous I think it should be in the fact that he has the same name as the nerdy boy on the TV show Family Matters (though surely he's not a 13 year-old nerdy black kid who wears suspenders, like the one on the show). If he is offended by that then he needs to settle down a bit.

BTW, Jon Zens, MDiv, WTS, is not a thorn in the side of Covenant Theology. This is less than accurate. He seems to be very close to Piper, though much more "baptistic." I do not know a whole lot about him, other than (if the 3 or 4 articles I've read of his are indicative of anything) he is not a formidable opponent to the paedo position. There are many who *are* formidable, but not him. I'm sure he's probably a good man who has done good things, however.

To all the die-hard credo's: come on now! You are basically, sometimes even explicitly, telling paedo's that they have not been baptized, and they are the ones who place a greater emphasis on the sacraments (usually)! Lets just simmer down and talk about this biblically and rationally with a Christ-exulting catholic spirit. Brian, show us how!