by Zachary Groff | April 18, 2024
Confusion as a Instrument of the Devil
One of the most powerful instruments of chaos in the devil’s arsenal is confusion. Through the use of slick words, direct contradiction, subtle deception, false information, and emotional manipulation, the church’s great foe frequently blows infernal smoke across our sight lines. The perennial danger of confusion is so great that Paul contrasted it with one result of good and godly gospel ministry: that “we are no longer to be children, tossed here and there by waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by craftiness in deceitful scheming” (Eph. 4:14). Instead, “speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into Him who is the head, even Christ” (v. 15).
Insofar as confusion is a danger to the church’s spiritual well-being, it is paralyzing: it cuts the body of the church off from Christ our Head. What’s more, confusion stunts the church’s spiritual maturity and growth: it keeps us from growing up “in all aspects into Him who is the head, even Christ.”
This may come across as a bit of a cliché, but we undeniably live in a time of great confusion in the surrounding culture.
When the United States Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, Christians across the nation raised shouts of praise amid tears of joy. Subsequently, over a dozen states banned abortion and many facilities that offered abortions have shut down or stopped committing them. At the same time, so-called “gender transition” clinics (and procedures) for children and adolescents have proliferated, even as some States race to limit the legality of irreversible procedures that involve hacking off body parts, creating gruesome faux genitalia, and pharmacologically foiling puberty. It appears that Satan’s scheme is to mutilate children if he can’t murder them in the womb.
These are confusing times.
As individual Christians consider how to respond to the insanity of our culture and the unavoidable political challenges we face as conscientious citizens (and consumers), we know that the moral rot is spiritual at its core. Base passions set loose by a worldview of nihilistic individualism have captured the hearts and minds of several generations, and the rich Christian heritage supposedly enjoyed by our parents and grandparents is not just waning, but disappearing before our very eyes. In place of the now-uncommon decency of shared Christian cultural values, we “enjoy” an increasingly polarized, selfish, and materialistic individualism that produces profanity, vulgarity, violence, and petulance in society.
Political realities now permit almost no ground for collaboration across the aisle at any level of government. And in the church, we are increasingly at each other’s throats, having forgotten the pure teaching of the fairest of all the sons of men (Ps. 45:2). It is as though a golden apple of discord has rolled into view shining a reflection of the devil masquerading as an angel of light (2 Cor. 11:14), and all hell is breaking loose into every sphere of human activity (Rev. 9:1-12).
When the gospel and clear Bible doctrine are confounded, complicated, and compromised, what shall we do? We cry out with the desperately confused and suicidal jailer in Acts 16:30, “what must I do to be saved?”
To Counteract Confusion, God Calls Watchmen
In answer to the jailer’s question, two ministers sent by God – Paul and Silas – said, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household” (Acts 16:31). The aftermath of this apostolic gospel call is glorious. “And they spoke the word of the Lord to him together with all who were in his house. And he took them that very hour of the night and washed their wounds, and immediately he was baptized, he and all his household. And he brought them into his house and set food before them, and rejoiced greatly, having believed in God with his whole household” (Acts 16:32-34). These ministers were watchmen appointed by God to cry out against the jailer’s confusion, “Do not harm yourself” (Acts 16:28), and they fulfilled their calling with nobility and a message of grace.
Recently, noted historian and PCA pastor Dr. Sean Michael Lucas characterized “watchmen-on-the-wall” Presbyterianism as a mercilessly critical perspective on the exercise of denominational influence and processes that sees such things as nothing more than expressions of “continuing sin” in the church.[1] What he has described is certainly unworthy of anyone’s esteem. The church is Christ’s bride, and she is to be honored. The denominational and administrative functions that facilitate the church’s decent and orderly fulfillment of its mission to worship the Lord and make worshipful disciples of all nations are worthy of vigorous engagement and interested correction or reformation, not vicious and vain execration.
What Dr. Lucas has proposed in place of the “watchmen-on-the-wall” mentality is a “trust-our-brothers” approach. Rather than being a watchman, be winsome (i.e., kind, gentle, and peaceable). But this is a dangerous false dilemma. Rather, we need watchmen who are winsome. The third way here is that which incorporates the best features of both and strikes a faithfully biblical and truly Reformed balance. God Himself appoints watchmen, and it is God Himself who defines their vocation and describes what we might call their heart-profile. That profile includes zeal for truth, urgency in soul-winning, and sincere love for God and man. It absolutely excludes soul-destroying pride, pugnacity, or compromise on the eternal verities of God’s Law and Gospel.
God’s winsome watchmen on the walls do not come from a particular tribe, network, or affinity group within the Church. In the PCA, they include all ordained elders. In our Book of Church Order (BCO), elders are called, “both severally and jointly, to watch diligently over the flock committed to [their] charge, that no corruption of doctrine or of morals enter therein” (BCO 8-3). Individual members of the church will have occasion (e.g., as parents, employers, civil servants, community leaders, schoolteachers) to function as watchmen, and they must be winsome in that capacity. All those who take the Bible seriously – which should be all of us – are to be winsome watchmen in our families, various circles of influence, and communities.
The Qualities & Qualifications of God’s Watchmen
What are the qualities – and in the case of elders, qualifications – necessary for being faithful watchmen? In the first place, we must be committed to the truth, resolute in our convictions, and assured of our mandate to “hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful” (Heb. 10:23). The late Dr. Harry L. Reeder III was fond of – and frequent in – saying that the church must be on mission and on message to be in ministry. This is true for each and every one of us as champions of truth and lovers of God. This clarion call to biblical faithfulness scales up sky-high to our local congregations, regional presbyteries, national denomination, and even international efforts. This commitment to truth is a heart-commitment to Christ Himself, and it is the lodestone quality or qualification that brings together all that follows, including all the qualifications listed in 1 Timothy 3 and Titus 1. That being said, it is beautifully adorned by two qualities in particular that I wish to highlight below.
In the second place, faithful watchmen must be peaceable, gentle, and winsome. They are to resemble our Lord in being “slow to anger, and abounding in lovingkindness” (Exod. 34:6). In their relationships and interactions, they are not to be pugnacious, quick-tempered, or quarrelsome (2 Tim. 2:23, 24), but rather gentle and kind to all (1 Tim. 3:3; Titus 1:7). For the love of others, they must not be mealy mouthed or double-tongued (1 Tim. 3:8), but clear in their speech (1 Cor. 14:9).
These two qualities of the winsome watchman come together as the truth of God attracts (or produces) godly character. But they are sealed together by a third quality: sober-mindedness. In confusing times, there are few qualities more important than sobriety of mind. It is sober-mindedness that produces an indissoluble bond between and protective shell around a firm conviction of the truth (love for God) and Christian gentleness (love for man). God has brought these two qualities together, and no man shall put them asunder, to adapt our Lord’s famous teaching on marriage (Matt. 19:6). As my church history professor Dr. James E. McGoldrick used to exhort us future ministers under his tutelage, we must be men with “backbones of steel and hearts of tender flesh.” Sobriety of mind keeps us from the failure of nerve that so often manifests itself in the face of confusion.
The Need for Winsome Watchmen
Why do we need such watchmen? The times, the times, the times. They have changed, and they’re still a-changin’. In the parlance of cultural commentator Aaron Renn, the church (and Christians) in America left the positive world of yesteryear, passed through the neutral world of a post-WW2 consensus, and now inhabit a negative world[2] of political totalism (i.e., everything is political these days) and moral shamelessness propagated by rapid technological innovation and a consumer culture evidently hell-bent on destroying souls. But that merely describes the macabre circus around the church, circa ecclesia.
When we turn our gaze to the church itself, what do we see? There is not simply biblical illiteracy, but a widespread dismissal of the importance of biblical truth. Experiences and emotions reign supreme over the unchanging Truth that alone can stabilize (and transcend) our fragile humanity. Though information technology has boomed, so has ignorance. Valiant attempts by various churches and organizations to publish the gospel and “the pattern of sound words” (2 Tim. 1:13) can barely keep up with the proliferation of what I mentioned in the opening paragraph of this piece: slick words, direct contradiction, subtle deception, false information, and emotional manipulation, all of which are sowing confusion in the church.
The duplex problem of biblical illiteracy and willful ignorance is compounded by the fact that the church is facing a noticeable and growing ministerial deficit in our day. Pastor Armen Thomassian, a local minister friend of mine in another denomination, sagely wrote, “This trend is devastating for the future. The lack of leadership in the church seems to be contributing to the rise of megachurches, as there simply aren’t enough men entering ministry.” This development is bad news. Megachurches do not encourage biblical literacy or provide adequate pastoral care for suffering saints. Pastoral chaos reigns as charismatic personalities build their platforms and the people are left in the darkness of dimmed auditorium lights and doctrinal confusion.
In the PCA and across the Reformed church landscape, there is an encouraging – if modest and somewhat ragamuffin – renaissance of interest in watchfulness as men young and old are noticing “what time it is,” to quote Dr. Rosaria Butterfield.[3] But any advance we are making against the problems of biblical illiteracy, demographic challenges, and widespread cultural confusion in the church is painstakingly uphill on a sometimes slippery slope that threatens to send us back to the bottom of the mountain in Sisyphus-like fashion. Just one sign of our difficulties is the disturbing trend of ministerial burnouts, malfeasance, and extended pulpit vacancies in some of the most prominent churches in the denomination. We shouldn’t make too much of this, but there is certainly a shortage of visible leadership in the denomination, and that reality at the very least presents a challenge to our corporate witness as “the light of the world” (Matt. 7:14). Are we in a position to shine brightly as a city set on a hill, or are we more like a lamp under a basket? Regardless of the answer, now is not the time for cynicism or pitting imaginary factions and perspectives against one another. Now is the time for winsome watchmen to stand on the wall with sobriety of judgment, love in their hearts for the people of God, and firm conviction of the truth of God’s unassailable Word.
The Winsome Watchman’s Biblical Mandate
In Ezekiel 3:17, God called the exiled prophet to the kind of ministry which I am describing here: “Son of man, I have appointed you a watchman to the house of Israel; whenever you hear a word from My mouth, warn them from Me.” Without partiality and without prejudice, Ezekiel was to bring God’s word of warning against sin and idolatry to all those within earshot – the righteous and the wicked alike. Rebels who refused to hear God’s Word died in their iniquity, but the blood of those who did not hear due to Ezekiel’s negligence was required at Ezekiel’s hands (Ezek. 3:18, 20). Ezekiel’s divine appointment was a matter of life and death, and such is the case with the elder’s high calling today. Our vocation as watchmen should be sobering, not shrugged-off as a deplorable and cranky perspective.
The little letter of Jude sets the winsome watchman’s agenda for us in these latter days. With strong convictions and tender hearts protected by sobriety of mind, elders are to “contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all handed down to the saints” (Jude 3), urgently and insistently blasting the horn of warning against antinomianism (v. 4), rebellion (v. 8), and selfishness (v. 12). There will certainly be opposition from grumbling fault-finders (v. 16), mockers (v. 18), and worldly-minded men causing divisions in the church (v. 19). But this is the way of winsome watchmen divinely appointed to stand as overseers on the wall: “But you, beloved, building yourselves up on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in the love of God, waiting anxiously for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ to eternal life. And have mercy on some, who are doubting; save others, snatching them out of the fire; and on some have mercy with fear, hating even the garment polluted by the flesh” (vv. 20-23).
What is described here is no license to withdraw or disengage because the operations of the church are frustrating, bureaucratic, or even corrupt. Our God gives His ordained servants a life-and-death mandate to be involved in the ministry and business of His church wherever He provides opportunity. For PCA elders, there are some obvious avenues for getting involved immediately. Despite the considerable inconvenience and expense, participation in General Assembly is fairly straightforward. For about five years in a row, the denomination has benefited greatly from increased participation by men who “know what time it is.” This needs to keep up, and it looks like it will again this year.
Even more significant for the long-term spiritual health and vitality of the PCA is vigorous presbytery involvement, local church revitalization, and church-planting, in that order. Though championed by widely respected pastors and teachers such as Dr. Harry L. Reeder III and Dr. Timothy Z. Witmer, church revitalization has always been something of a lesser pursuit in the PCA. That needs to change. As much as church-planting and foreign missions are vitally important for the introduction of Reformed churches to destitute areas, there is a massive and under-realized opportunity for both experienced men and men mature beyond their years to be instruments in the hands of the Redeemer as He brings struggling churches back to life in communities that otherwise would be lacking any Reformed and Presbyterian Christian witness. Let the winsome watchmen be the frontline champions of Mission to North America’s seemingly unreachable goal of hitting 3,000 PCA churches by 2033. That will involve aggressive revitalization and church-planting efforts. We have the intellectual resources in our books and expertise, but we desperately need the Lord of the harvest to send out workers into His harvest (Matt. 9:35).
Finally, as the context of Matthew 9:35 suggests, we are to pray while on watch. By prayer, we maintain watch. And let us pray for the church as Christ the Master Watchman prayed for His disciples in John 17:17, “Sanctify them in the truth; Your word is truth.” He prayed for the sanctification and increasing holiness of His men, and He did it for love. This prayer was born of love for those whom the Father had given to Him. “I do not ask You to take them out of the world, but to keep them from the evil one” (v. 15). How Christ loved His disciples! His love was not a partial and prejudicial “trust-our-brothers” sort of love, but the selfless love of our Savior as He prepared to ascend the hill, climb the cross, exchange His life for ours in His sin-atoning death, descend into the bowels of the earth, and break the bonds of death’s curse to live and reign forever.
To borrow again from Dr. Reeder, this gospel of Jesus Christ is the foundation, the formation, and the primary motivation for the Christian life. Let us not exchange this gospel and its implications for the confused contradictions and perversity of this present evil age. We have an anchor of hope for “the soul, a hope both sure and steadfast and one which enters within the veil, where Jesus has entered as a forerunner for us” (Heb. 6:19, 20). Let us give the devil neither quarter nor foothold, but maintain vigilance to watch over the church as the heart and soul of this beautiful world which belongs to our heavenly Father.
[1] Sean Michael Lucas, “Hope-Full Presbyterianism,” Alliance for Mission & Renewal, April 9, 2024.
[2] Aaron Renn, “The Three Worlds of Evangelicalism,” First Things, February 2022, https://firstthings.com/article/2022/02/the-three-worlds-of-evangelicalism
[3] “Know What Time It Is: An Interview with Rosaria Butterfield,” Reformed Presbyterian Witness, November/December 2023, https://rpwitness.org/article/know-what-time-it-is.
Zachary Groff is a PCA Teaching Elder serving as Pastor of Antioch Presbyterian Church in Woodruff, SC.