AFA’s Rusty Benson on “What Is a Christian?”

See here. His answer:

1. I Peter 1:23 – “having been born again, not of corruptible seed but incorruptible, through the word of God which lives and abides forever,”

A Christian is a person who has been “born again,” that is, radically and supernaturally changed by God. In the Old Testament (Ezekiel 36:26) this change is described like this: “I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.”

2. 2 Corinthians 5:14-15 – “For Christ’s love compels us, because we are convinced that one died for all, and therefore all died. And he died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for them and was raised again.”

A Christian is one who is so gripped by Christ’s love that he dies more and more to any other person, thing, or idea that would compete for his allegiance.

3. ?Luke 15:21– “And the [prodigal] son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and in your sight, and am no longer worthy to be called your son.’”

Romans 7:24 – “O wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death?”

When he first repents, a Christian sees himself in the words of the prodigal son. Though he progresses in the Christian life, he never outgrows his need for Christ and the gospel. In fact, a Christian’s sense of his unworthiness grows as Christ becomes greater in his eyes.

4. Matthew 21:10 – “And when He had come into Jerusalem, all the city was moved, saying, ‘Who is this?’”

??Though none can fully understand this mystery, a Christian believes that Jesus is God in the flesh and his only Savior. Like Thomas the apostle, a Christian proclaims that Jesus is “my Lord and my God!”? (John 20:28)

5. 2 Corinthians 5:21 – “For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.??”

By faith, a Christian trusts that Jesus fully paid the penalty of sin due each of us and perfectly satisfied God’s justice. It’s a transaction in which Jesus willingly takes the punishment for a Christian’s sin; the Christian gets Jesus’ perfection.

6. 1 John 3:1a – “Behold what manner of love the Father has bestowed on us, that we should be called children of God!??”

   A Christian never gets over the wonder of God’s love for him and mercy given to him through Christ. He is forever overwhelmed at the miracle of his own salvation.

This is an interesting standard that the author notes is influenced by some notable orthodox Protestant theologians. As it relates to the American Founding, the problem for the AFA (who seem very sympathetic to a “Christian America” view of the Founding) is that none of the key Founders (the first four Presidents and Ben Franklin) was, according to this standard, a “Christian.”

And Alexander Hamilton (arguably a key Founder) wasn’t a Christian until the end of his life, after his son died in a duel (and after Hamilton did his “work” as a Founder).

According to the above test, only “born again” Christians who believe in the “Incarnation” are “true Christians.” Likewise the list intimates other doctrines like Sola Fide and the Satisfaction Theory of the Atonement as part of the definitional mix.

Unitarians, by their nature deny the Incarnation, and by necessity the “satisfaction theory of the atonement.” (This is why we can say some unitarians have an “unorthodox” understanding of the “atonement,” while others just reject the atonement).

Militant unitarians J. Adams and Jefferson, for instance, rejected both the Incarnation and the Satisfaction Theory of the Atonement (Jefferson rejected the atonement and Adams may have held to an unorthodox understanding of the doctrine).

Franklin didn’t seem to accept the Incarnation when, at the very end of his life answering Ezra Stiles’ question on who Franklin thought Jesus was. Tellingly, after informing Stiles he had “Doubts as to [Jesus’] Divinity,” Franklin doesn’t identify Jesus as Savior/Messiah/or Son of God (all things compatible with and believed by various forms of then existing unitarian Christianity), but rather as someone whose “System of Morals and his Religion as he left them to us, the best the World ever saw, or is likely to see;…”

So Franklin was no “born again” or “evangelical” Christian. In fact, when, in 1752 discussing the particulars of religion with a “born again” evangelical leader, that figure, George Whitefield, recognized Franklin at that time was not “born again” and tried to convert him:

… As you have made a pretty considerable progress in the mysteries of electricity, I would now humbly recommend to your diligent unprejudiced pursuit and study the mystery of the new-birth. It is a most important, interesting study, and when mastered, will richly answer and repay you for all your pains. One at whose bar we are shortly to appear, hath solemnly declared, that without it, “we cannot enter the kingdom of heaven.”…

Likewise, George Washington and James Madison were no evangelical, “born again” Christians. Both, though they often expressed their devout belief in Providence, did not talk about Jesus or evince belief necessary to pass Rusty Benson’s biblical standards. Both may have been like Jefferson and J. Adams, unitarians. But they left little on the public record relating to belief in doctrine beyond endorsement of more general concepts like warm Providentialism.

If George Washington was orthodox (I don’t think he was, but don’t necessarily rule it out), it was in the Anglican tradition, which does not teach the necessity of being “born again.” Indeed, the latitudinarian tradition of the Anglican Church offered much latitude on matters of “doctrine,” even transcending orthodox Trinitarian belief.

This is a point Dr. Joseph Waligore makes on “Christian-Deism.” Waligore’s “Christian-Deists” like Dr. Gregg Frazer’s “theistic rationalists” (and those terms are arguably six and one half dozen of the other) seemed quite comfortable in the latitudinarian wing of the Anglican (then Episcopalian) Church.

Attempts to make James Madison into an orthodox or evangelical Christian invariably relate to out of context statements made while very young to William Bradford. For more on the context, see this classic article by James H. Hutson. As noted, Madison, like Washington, could be sphinx like in refusal to put his specific doctrinal beliefs (as opposed to endorsement of generic warm Providence) on the table.

But attempting to latch onto the young Madison’s letters to William Bradford as smoking gun proof is thin gruel. And there is much in Dr. Hutson’s article that provides helpful understanding of context (testimony by, among others, Bishop William Meade, James Ticknor, and Rev. Alexander Balmaine who said Madison’s political association with those of “infidel principles” either changed or made him suspicious of the “creed” of orthodox Christianity which Madison was coming out of).

Finally, Alexander Hamilton. He clearly had some kind of “born again” experience or return to the faith after his son died in a duel. When dying, after he himself was shot in a duel, he sought communion in two orthodox Churches (the Episcopalian and Presbyterian ones) and was initially denied both because of:

1. his lack of established track record as a “Christian” (he had not engaged in Christian communion* with EITHER of the churches, but when dying, these were the ones with whom he sought communion; if Hamilton were an established Christian communicant, with “imperfections,” but still one who worked it out with the church with whom he was in communion, the strange clumsy situation of asking for but being denied communion with by ministers only to have one mercifully relent and administer the holy sacrament would not have occurred); and

2. his un-Christian like conduct engaging in a duel which was condemned by the faith.

By the way, I have never given serious thought on the relation of the practice of “dueling” (which seems to exist in a much less civilized way today with things like gang shootouts and even fist fights) to “Christianity,” but note BOTH of the orthodox ministers in the churches with whom Hamilton sought communion (again, the 1. Episcopalian and 2. Presbyterian) condemned the action as sinful, made a personal issue out of it, and thus knowing Hamilton would soon meet his maker and concerned with his soul demanded he repent of this conduct which led to his death.

*On the matter of communion, we all know how central that doctrine is to Roman Catholics. The Founders, however, with rare exception, were affiliated with the Protestant Churches. And Protestantism being Protestantism, they can appear all over the place. The two churches with whom Hamilton sought communion seemed to have viewed it with fundamental import: a. as the Episcopalian Benjamin Moore who ultimately administered Hamilton communion put it, such was “one of the most solemn offices of our religion”; and b. said the Presbyterian John Mason, it was “a principle in our churches never to administer the Lord’s supper privately to any person under any circumstances.”

But to tie Hamilton’s faith to the original article, Rusty Benson intimates that Donald Trump isn’t a “real Christian,” but Trump attempts to give a fig leaf of cover to being one. Hamilton’s “Christianity,” before his son died, likewise appears such. Hamilton, very talented statesman he, had all of the prideful, arrogant, obnoxious, egotistical, narcissistic bluster, and sexual improprieties associated with Trump.