(NOTE: This article is by Pastor David Bayly of Christ the Word Church in Toledo, OH. Tim is David’s brother.)
Kevin DeYoung recently wrote a piece critical of Doug Wilson and the “mood” in Moscow, Idaho, center of Doug’s burgeoning movement. Kevin’s piece has fallen flat, leading (if Twitter responses constitute a representative sample) to more criticism of Kevin than Doug.
I suspect Kevin, essentially an irenicist and a generally reasonable guy, can’t comprehend why his criticisms of Doug and the Moscow movement have been so poorly received. For the benefit of Kevin and other would-be critics of the “Moscow mood,” I offer an explanation of why criticism of Doug so often ends up an own-goal, rather than scoring against Doug.
Doug began life as the son of an Evangelical leader, a godly and magnanimous man, a leader beloved by many—including especially his own children. Entering the pastorate, Doug was not seeking a father, but looking to be a father. He came from strength, he possessed strength. He began his life as a pastor in a little non-denominational Baptistic church in Idaho, Christ Church. He did not go to seminary. He was brilliant, self-taught, but not provincially so; an autodidact in the mold of Lloyd-Jones, Spurgeon, and Whitefield. More than self-taught, Doug was the product of a heritage of faith and fear of God. He was open to God’s Word. Convinced of its truth and power, when persuaded he was wrong, as a pastor he fearlessly changed theological positions, drawing his church along to new and richer understandings of God’s Word. The church became more Reformed. The church became paedobaptist.
As Doug was growing and changing, his church grew and changed with him. Doug was the earliest proponent of classical Christian education: he developed curriculum for homeschooling families, curriculum he and his church made available to others through Logos Press. Logos Christian school was started as a ministry to families of the church. Doug wrote practical books to help his own people. They were published by Canon Press. Others benefited.
Doug stayed in Moscow, Idaho. He’s still there today, still pastoring the same church, still living the same basic life he did forty years ago. Things have grown in Moscow. Together with Doug, the leadership of Christ Church established a college a school in which several of his children came to play a prominent role. The children love their dad. They stayed in town and helped with the work, becoming significant leaders in their own right, helping with publishing and teaching enterprises connected with Christ Church.
Doug is what he has always been, a local pastor. Around him the church has grown. To his leadership the Evangelical world has been drawn, not because Doug sold himself to achieve this. No one would write as Doug has (on slavery among other things) if they were seeking prominence in the Evangelical world. Doug remains committed to the Church and the Word, and as he has, slowly but surely the gravitational pull of his commitments has drawn others to him; and more importantly, to his church. Believe it or not, and it seems remarkable to me that it is so, Christ Church has become central to the Evangelical solar system in America. Doug has not clawed to achieve this. He has not weakened in his commitment to truth.
He remains a local pastor. He is committed to the Church. This must be understood. Doug is strong because he is a pastor, not a back-scratching Evangelical leader, not a participant in Evangelical power circles. His church remains with him. He is strong because he has been a pastor of one church for over forty years. He loves his people and his people love him. He can write and speak with honesty because he is backed by a church. Doug’s deep commitment to the authority of God’s Word has led him to an equally deep commitment to the authority and power of the Church. Doug is fundamentally not about himself. He is about Christ Church. He is about THE Church. He is not about Doug.
I differ seriously from Doug in my view of the Church’s earthly nature and power. Over the years, my brother and I have disagreed with Doug on a number of doctrinal issues—at times, strongly. But on the centrality of the Church of Jesus Christ in the world, on the power of the Church of Christ on earth, on the authority of the Church, we are with Doug.
This is what is missing in his critics. Doug’s critics are not men of the Church. Doug’s critics view the Church as a stepping stone. Committed as much to their own advancement as to the growth of the people in their churches, they seek influence. They leave churches in smaller towns for bigger cities and bigger churches. They spend years studying for advanced degrees—degrees that mean nothing to their churches and the people they shepherd, yet advance their reputations as “serious” men. They curry favor with power. With a weather eye to popularity and “influence,” they measure their criticisms of others. If it will hurt them, they leave criticisms unexpressed. They dare not oppose those more popular and famous than they are.
All this is taking place in an Evangelical world has been decimated, a world with no central leader. J.I. Packer has died. So has Sproul. So has Keller. Some are muted by defections. Many have fallen.
Doug has remained. His “project” grows. Its strength is the strength of the Church: a faithful local pastor. Not a pastor who has sought greener fields. A pastor who has remained in his out-of-the-way field for decades, growing with his church.
This is the strength Doug’s critics don’t understand. They don’t understand it because they have not sought it.
If you want to attack Doug, you can’t cavil around the edges about things like language and mood. People want a church with power. Attack him there and you hit him where he’s unassailable. If you disagree with Doug, you have to go for the heart—his understanding of Church power and its uses today.
Kevin’s critique offers nothing substantial against Doug. Doug offers the Church of Christ, the power of God, the glory of Christ’s Bride.
It’s an unequal contest. Kevin can’t win without changing his own position. He’s part of the problem Doug is offering a solution to. I oppose Doug’s solution. I don’t differ from him in acknowledging the problem Evangelicalism faces is that of an impotent, man-centered ecclesiology.
