I tried to warn you about Peter Bell/Sons of Patriarchy.

I and others were trying to deal with Peter's deception through church channels in mid-2024 and I published my first article nearly a year ago.

onceforalldelivered.com/p/sons-of-char…

onceforalldelivered.com/p/from-such-tu… Peter ignored and deflected from the accusations at the time. He allowed and spread doxxing and defamation against those who told the truth.

Those who worked with Peter on SOP knew about his misdeeds and have essentially admitted to covering them up.

https://x.com/ref_andrew/status/1856006847229985125

I'm noticing over the last few days a lot of attempts from within the PCA to justify DeYoung's actions in the name of "decorum" and adherence to Robert's Rules. I'm not buying it. A 🧵. 1/12

https://twitter.com/FrankCapraJr/status/1937982416255389895

The thing with assembly decorum and Robert's, they are not good ends in themselves. This might sound semi-blasphemous from a Presbyterian, but hear me out... 2/12

How to (Not) Manage a Crisis: A brief follow-up on Peter Bell and Sons of Patriarchy (@patriarchysons), a 🧵

It's been a few days since I released my article "From Such Turn Away!" which is (hopefully) the culmination of my investigation into Bell and SOP. ICYMI: 1/onceforalldelivered.com/p/from-such-tu… The article itself has been viewed nearly 2K times. I tagged Peter on X when I initially posted it (and more times since, both from my personal and the @OFADpodcast account). I've also replied with it in Peter's threads. He is yet to acknowledge it or any of its contents. 2/

It is here that some of my former fellow Escondidans might jump in and say "But it's a Venn diagram! They overlap! VanDrunen's book even has it on the cover!" But while that overlap is claimed, the political is thought about/talked about in an almost exclusively negative way. 1/

https://twitter.com/PerfInjust/status/1880631656291143794

In this camp, the church is what matters, the political doesn't. So even if someone from the camp happens to be politically positioned and active, they're more or less expected to do so in a disinterested fashion, primarily preserving the American status quo. 2/

You will see a lot of Meredith Kline sympathizers mine quotes from historic Reformed sources about things like the Covenant of Works. Going back to the sources is certainly good, but if we're going to do that, we need to go all the way back.

https://twitter.com/ref_andrew/status/1871632647606477069

You certainly can find forms of republication in the tradition. However, it's not enough to say, "republication exists therefore Kline vindicated." One must look deeper, not only into the context of quotes but into doctrines that are prior to particular covenantal formulations.

So it seems Peter Bell is gearing up to release something Wednesday to prove he didn't misrepresent his licensure to churches. I don't see what exactly this accomplishes.

https://twitter.com/ref_andrew/status/1855705798485160354

1. The major misrepresentation was not that Bell was a licentiate, but that he was a pastor. This misrepresentation was published for over a year by GGG. We determined in our investigation that Bell no longer had valid licensure, but that was secondary.

We confirmed with the Presbytery of Southern California (OPC) that Bell was not licensed to preach or approved as a stated supply. One minister said they had plans to ask the PSC to take Bell under care (a step before licensure) but to our knowledge this never occurred. I confirmed with an elder at Oceanside URC that Bell was no longer licensed or a member there. This was doubly confirmed by friends who have access to the URCNA licensed exhorter list--Bell was not on it. Licensure expires, he either gave his up or didn't maintain it.

Reposting this today for those who might have missed it, and to comment on some new developments.

Sons of Charlatantry: On Peter Bell, host of the upcoming “Sons of Patriarchy”

(1/10)onceforalldelivered.com/p/sons-of-char… A trailer for SOP released today that names many contributors to the project. Among them are many egalitarians (like Du Mez and Barr), slanderers of the brethren (Moore), proponents of CRT (Anyabwile), and various confessional P&R ministers. (2/10)

I'm going to do a living thread of various Reformed and Reformed-adjacent ministries that took federal COVID bailout money through the Paycheck Protection Plan.

Data is from here. 0/pandemicoversight.gov/ppp-simple-sea… I did a piece on Reformed seminaries doing this about a year ago. Rather than duplicate those efforts, here you go. 1/onceforalldelivered.com/publish/posts/…

I was going to write something up on this, but I have no idea when I'll have time, so here's a spreadsheet with some numbers on it.

I guess my questions are these: who ends up paying for this, and what are they paying for? This is where I got the data. studentaid.gov/data-center/st…

Since we're quoting Charles Hodge, let's quote some more Charles Hodge. (ST 3.343-344) Almost like he knew what was coming. (3.344-346)

I'm not sure this is the last speaker I would pick for a rural ministry conference but he'd definitely fall below the "if these are my options, I'm not having a rural ministry conference" threshold. Anyone within a 39 1/2 foot pole's reach of TGC probably isn't going to resonate with rural congregants, as TGC and related entities have been champions for the vision and goals of The City ™️, often at the expense of diverting attention and resources away from rural churches.

Where he says he is now, I was in my 20s.

I wanted to put politics aside and just focus more on the gospel, and in doing so to be more at comfort, peace, and rest for myself.

https://twitter.com/zugzwanged/status/1677297282415198209

Maybe for a time I needed to, there was a lot of the baggage of legalism and vain tradition in my belief and practice. But after a while, what ended up happening was that I found myself believing and running cover for many of the wicked ideologies of our age, while thinking...

Merit and Meredith

This quote from my alma mater is from Covenant Theology Under Attack--an article that was released (heavily edited in ways Kline disapproved) in New Horizons, the OPC's magazine.

Link to unedited version: (1/13) https://t.co/upnMy9Xb7Vmeredithkline.com/klines-works/a…

https://twitter.com/wscal/status/1674160911324463104

In that article, Kline gives a succinct description of his own ideas of merit and simple justice. A key contention for Kline is that Adam must have been able to do properly meritorious works in the garden, or else Christ as the second Adam could not merit our salvation. (2/13)

I haven't dealt directly with too many Rushdoonyites, but I have lived for some years adjacent to Klineanism. I prefer the terminology of "sect" to "cult" but whatever you want to call it, there's a real issue that needs to be talked about. 1/22

https://twitter.com/pastoraldoleon/status/1640293504592015361?s=20

For the purposes of this thread, when I talk about "Klinean" this or that, I'm assuming some familiarity with the issues and associations surrounding Meredith Kline I've raised before. If you need to catch up... 2/22

https://twitter.com/ref_andrew/status/1609930449807106054?s=20

Meredith G. Kline and the Trinity, Christology, and Pneumatology: A Thread

(h/t to my @OFADpodcast co-host Caleb Castro for sourcing this, though he is not on Twitter and won't see this, probably) 1/10 In 2006, Meredith Kline published God, Heaven, and Har Magedon, his last book before his death about a year later. GHHM has already appeared in this series as it was where Kline most clearly articulated his doctrine of the Sabbath, against the Westminster Standards. 2/10

Meredith Kline and creation (and flamethrower rhetoric): A thread 1/17 In his essay, "Because it Had Not Rained," Kline argues for the implausibility of creation in 6 days of ordinary length (and any linear narrative view at all). Essay here: meredithkline.com/klines-works/a… 2/17