I found this most interesting post at Roger Olson’s site, and I’d like to discuss it here:

Would you distinguish “Christian” vs. “saved”? (Now this is not about inclusivism and universalism but about those who believe in orthodoxy and those who don’t, and if they are not orthodox then their beliefs are not Christian … but is orthodoxy denied a loss of salvation?) But this raises two questions: Can a person be Christian [in theology] but not saved? Can a person not be Christian [in theology] but still be saved?

According to the brochure [Roger Olson is talking about an evangelist], sent out to thousands of people, including many pastors, Jesus is not God and should not be worshiped as God.  And there is no Trinity.  Only the Father is God and should be worshiped.  This is a new belief the evangelist has come to hold; he apparently grew up in and for a long time belonged to a Oneness Pentecostal church.  Of course, he does not belong to it anymore.

As Christian theologian, I sometimes find myself needing to answer the question “Is this person a Christian?” I’ve been asked that about Rudolf Bultmann and Paul Tillich (in the past tense, of course) and about Hans Kung. A former colleague and I used to argue about whether Kung is a Christian or not and I insisted on keeping the decision focused on his Christology.

I have reluctantly come to the conclusion that the evangelist of the brochure is not a Christian.

Having said that, I must immediately go on to explain that my claim he is not a Christian is NOT to say he is not saved. Whether a person is saved or not is entirely God’s business and not mine or any person’s (other than God’s). [Read more...]

I was kindly asked by Tom Oord as a leader in the Word Made Fresh group of AAR/SBL to participate in a wonderous event that paid tribute to the late Clark Pinnock. The treat to this event was a presentation by Sarah Pinnock, Clark’s daughter, on her father; Linda Mercandante reflected on her experience as a student of Clark’s; John Sanders gave a presentation on the hassle he experienced with Clark in the open theism debate, mostly notably in ETS; the final paper was by Roger Olson on the place of Clark in evangelical theology. My paper, which was shortened so I had to speak from my feet at times, is below. I didn’t enter into the open theism debate as my assignment was on Clark’s use of the Bible and I had my hands full with three other of his topics — all of them hot and debated: Scripture, inclusivism and annihilationism. The highlight of the night was when the papers were all over — six in one hour — and folks in the room stood to witness to the influence of Clark in their life.

Clark Pinnock and the New Testament:

A Man on the Move

When I was asked to offer a presentation about Clark’s hermeneutics I thought back to my college days when I bought and read his 1971 book called Biblical Revelation. That book was one of the impulses that made me think of studying at Trinity because Clark taught there, though by the time I arrived Clark had moved on to Regent and then to McMaster. The invitation also made me think of Clark’s “revision” of that book on Scripture in his book The Scripture Principle, which I still think was a courageous book in its day. (In some ways his successors today are Kent Sparks and Pete Enns.) The invitation also made me think of Clark’s stuff on hell and annihilationism. What the invitation also triggered was a conversation I had with a friend when I was a student at Trinity. My friend’s name was Bill and he said he took Pinnock for a class and, if I remember this correctly, he said, “Pinnock began as a Calvinist, midway through the course he became Ariminian, and then by the end of the semester he had become Calvinist again.” Then he said something that probably each of us both knows and admires about Clark Pinnock. Bill said, “I liked Pinnock because he was man on the move. His theology was always growing.” He then said, “… unlike …” and I shall not mention the name. The other name won, Clark did call Trinity a “ghetto,” and Clark moved on. [Read more...]