Tag Archives: Faith

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Why are current Protestant institutions generally more degenerate than Roman and Eastern institutions?


Mainline Protestant churches have female priests and bishops, whereas Rome and the East have none. Mainline Protestants have more openly embraced LGBT immorality, the major exception being Evangelicals, but that is beginning to change. Of course, there is liberalism and degeneracy in the Roman and Eastern realm, but it doesn’t seem as bad as Protestants. This perhaps can be debated, but let’s grant the point. There are faithful Protestant remnants, but they are just that, remnants.
Two thoughts.

  1. In the Great Divorce, C. S. Lewis speaks of natural affections and natural appetites. He says that natural affection can be more easily led on to eternal love than natural appetite can. But it can also more easily stop short of that end, which can make it more dangerous. He says, “It is a stronger angel, and therefore, when it falls, a fiercer devil.” I think this can be applied to Protestantism. It is a stronger angel. God graced Protestants with First World blessings, wealth, and power, for example. Something we see as the result of covenant faithfulness in Deuteronomy 28. But we have broken covenant, and so are given over to curses, and have become fiercer devils as a result.
  2. When St. Peter sees Jesus walking on water and hears our Savior beckon him, St. Peter walks on water to the call of Jesus. He follows Christ in a miraculous moment. This, to my mind, is like Protestants, willing to follow Christ no matter what. And when St. Peter took his eyes off of Christ and gave in to fear and doubt, he began to sink into the raging sea. This is Protestantism now. Having given in to fear and unbelief, we are being overcome by the waves of the world. The rest of the disciples, representing Eastern Orthodoxy and Roman Catholicism, never pursued Christ in that manner and so remained dry and safe in the boat. St. Peter cried out to Christ to save him, and He did. If Protestants cry out to Christ once again, repent of their fear and doubt, we will once again walk on water.
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Building an Ark

Greyfriars Hall Exhortation delivered at Anselm House August 27, 2013


“By faith Noah, being warned of God of things not seen as yet, moved with fear, prepared an ark to the saving of his house; by the which he condemned the world, and became heir of the righteousness which is by faith.” (Hebrews 11:7)

We would do well to examine what transpired leading up to the flood, the preparation period. The time before the flood. The building of the Ark. Consider how overwhelming it may have been to Noah after God instructed him in the Ark’s dimensions. Think about the number of trees that needed to be cut down, moved, shaped, fastened and suitable to the Ark’s purpose. This work was long, tedious, and difficult. It took over a hundred years for Noah to build.

This expression of faith and obedience to God over an extended period of time is something we should emulate because we are all building arks. More specifically, we’re all building the Ark. Just as the Ark saved Noah and his family from a deluge of God’s judgment, Christ saves us from God’s wrath.  Christ’s body, the church, represented by the Ark continues to be built. And if you are a follower of Jesus, then you are a servant, a worker, a partaker in this massive building project.  We have a seemingly impossible task before us: books to read, papers to write, languages to learn, people to save, all peoples to be saved, all nations to be baptized, the ushering in of a kingdom. So overwhelming are these glorious prospects that it can present the temptation to be paralyzed with fear, but we have not been given a spirit of fear. We’ve been given a Spirit of power, of love, and self-control. This time is set aside for us that we may be prepared for the crushing waters. The workload at this point looks like a forest of trees that we’ve been tasked to cut down with a butter knife, but take heart. We live for a Savior who has overcome this world. He gives us better things than knives. He gives us His Holy Spirit. This same Spirit raised Christ from the dead and now lives in us. And if the Spirit living in us, helps us in our weaknesses and declares that we are more than conquerors, which it does, then we may confidently go forward in our work.