# The Southern Presbyterian Journal/Volume 13/Number 42/Christian Liberty

For other articles in this series, see Articles on the Westminster Confession of Faith.
Articles on the Westminster Confession by Gordon H. Clark The Word of God (WCF 1) Creeds Knowledge and Ignorance The Trinity (WCF 2) A Hard Saying (WCF 3) Providence (WCF 5) Creation (WCF 4) Healthy, Sick, or Dead? (WCF 6) The Covenant (WCF 7) Christ the Mediator (WCF 8) Justification (WCF 11) Sanctification (WCF 13) Free Will (WCF 9) Effectual Calling (WCF 10) Adoption (WCF 12) The Law of God (WCF 19) Assurance (WCF 18) Saving Faith (WCF 14) Repentance (WCF 15) Good Works (WCF 16) Christian Liberty (WCF 20) Perseverance (WCF 17) Worship and Vows (WCF 21, 22) The Sacraments (WCF 27) Baptism (WCF 28) The Church (WCF 25) The Civil Magistrate (WCF 23) The Lord's Supper (WCF 29) Censures and Councils (WCF 30, 31) Resurrection and Judgment (WCF 32, 33)
​Freedom and liberty are grand words, but if we are to talk intelligibly, our words must be unambiguously defined. In several preceding articles unscriptural meanings of the word freedom and the phrase free from the law have been pointed out. Chapter XX of the Confession enumerates the factors which comprise and define Christian liberty.
"The liberty which Christ hath purchased for believers under the gospel consists in their freedom from the guilt of sin . . . the curse of the moral law . . . bondage to Satan . . . All which were common also to believers under the law . . ." (sec. 1).
In addition to these elements of liberty, which particularly concerns us in our individual lives, Christian liberty includes the liberty of conscience in the face of tyrannical ecclesiastical ​organizations. Some years ago a young man presented himself to a Presbytery for ordination. As he was known to believe that the boards and agencies of that church were infiltrated with modernism, he was asked whether he would support the boards and agencies. He replied that he would support them insofar as they were true to the Bible. This answer did not please Presbytery, and he was asked if he would support the boards regardless of what they did. When the young man declined to make any such blind promise, the Presbytery refused to ordain him.
One of his friends remarked that the difference between modernism and Christianity might be stated thus: in modernism you believe as you please but do what the officials tell you; in true Presbyterianism you do as you please so long as you believe what the Confession says.
As the twentieth century has seen a great increase in the control that national governments exercise over their citizens, so too with ecclesiastical organizations there is a trend toward centralization, bureaucracy, and an indifference toward inalienable rights. Well publicized gatherings of Protestant prelates parade in robes, and the press reports the colorful pageantry. Impressive imitation of popery! And the same eventual results are to be expected.
"God alone is Lord of the conscience and hath left it free from the doctrines and commandments of men which are in any thing contrary to his word, or beside it in matters of faith and worship" (sec. ii).
The changing majorities of a Council or General Assembly which pushes a conjectural translation of the Bible one year and another year issues Sunday School lessons whose conjectures are still worse, may boast that their theology is not static but dynamic. A different doctrine every decade—while the orthodox fuddy-duddies keep on believing the same thing all the time!
But what moral chaos there is, when the law of God is abandoned for the latest style of unbelief. It used to be Ritschl's value-judgments; now it is paradox; next it will be—who can guess?
The law of God is stable because God is unchangeable. Those who believe God do not need to change their moral principles with the passing years. Nor will they change their worship, push the Bible to one side, put an altar in the center, pray to the saints and the Virgin, nor, as the last article recounted, engage a troupe of ballet dancers to fill an empty pulpit.