Mississippi Valley Presbytery has unanimously adopted this study (WARNING: PDF) of the Ad Hoc Committee on the “New Perspective on Paul”, “Federal Vision”, and Norman Shepherd.

Auburn Avenue Presbyterian Church has written up a response to the report, which the MVP notes in it’s final version of their report as adopted.

UPDATE: Joel Garver has also written up an initial response.

Personally, I think it’s pretty badly written report, if not simply for their lack of scripture or references to the Westminster Confession that these people supposedly violate. In fact, of the four references to the WCF that I counted, two of them were references in agreement with the Federal Vision folks!

Whatever future apostates receive in the covenant is fully commensurate with their membership in the visible church, which is the kingdom of Christ, and the house and family of God (WCF 25.2) nothing more, nothing less. FV advocates have strongly affirmed the distinctions made in WCF 10.3, and so do we.

The MVP folks start off on a good foot at the beginning of document, affirming that the Westminster Confession (and presumably the Larger and Shorter Catechisms as well) are the standards they are using to judge.

The issue at stake, however, is not whether there is diversity in the Reformed tradition, but whether the [Auburn Avenue Theology] is within the bounds of acceptable diversity. Furthermore, it should be noted that we do not subscribe to the “Reformed tradition,” generically, as PCA elders, rather, we subscribe specifically to the Confession of Faith.

Bully for them! However, it seems that soon after writing the above statement, they subsequently choose to ignore it! I offer as evidence the following quotes throughout the document. I hope to make some more comments later on as I read it in depth, but I’m very concerned about their reliance on the traditions of men in their condemnations… I thought that issue had been settled before.

Nevertheless, Frame (who has consistently defended [Shepherd]’s orthodoxy even though he does not personally adhere to many of [Shepherd]’s opinions and formulations relating to justification) has himself conceded that: “Shepherd has taken positions contrary to some elements of the Reformed tradition.”

With regard to these new formulations, we find… views which reject the traditional bi-covenantal theology of the Westminster Confession (that is, views which do not merely take issue with the terminology but reject the essence of the bi-covenantal, covenant of works/covenant of grace framework of God’s dealings with humanity);

Concerning the death of Christ and justification, Wright knowingly and explicitly repudiates the traditional doctrine of the imputation of Christ’s righteousness as a un-Pauline concept.

For examples of Wright’s objections to traditional understandings of Judaism, see What Saint Paul Really Said: Was Paul of Tarsus the Real Founder of Christianity (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1997), 32, 129, and “Romans,” in New Interpreter’s Bible: Acts-First Corinthians, vol 10, ed. Leander E. Keck (Nashville: Abingdon, 2002), 655.

[Norman Shepherd] believes that the Reformed have historically argued for the covenant of works as an arrangement of strict merit (they have not), and consequently rejects the traditional Reformed doctrine of the covenant of works.”

[Norman Shepherd] has failed, in print, to provide evidence that this particular regenerational model has been sanctioned or approved by any Reformed confession or tradition.

[Shepherd] is interacting with Charles Hodge on this point, but perhaps reads the views of Meredith Kline into Hodge’s account of the Mosaic economy’s residual aspects of the covenant of works. The precise relation of the Mosaic economy to the Covenant of Works, and to the rest of the Covenant of Grace is one of the more complex issues in the development of covenant theology in the Reformed tradition.

[Federal Vision] proponents deny the traditional doctrine of the covenant of works.

Coupled with this is a denial of the traditional doctrine of the visible and invisible church and a practical denial of the distinction between common and saving operations of the Spirit as distinguishing the sincere believer from the hypocrite.

[Steve] Wilkins, speaking of John 15:1-8, rejects the “distinction of ‘external’ and ‘internal’ union” that is commonplace among traditional Reformed interpreters.

We are not claiming that [Federal Vision] proponents expressly deny that the divine unity is ontological. We are simply observing both a tendency to question certain traditional formulations concerning the divine unity and predilection to express this unity in non-ontological and relational terms.

Ralph Smith has argued that the traditional language of “essence” and “substance” as it is employed in “traditional Reformed theology” is unwholesomely indebted to Aristotle, Paradox and Truth: Rethinking Van Til On The Trinity (2d ed.; Moscow, Ida.: Canon, 2002), 84.

This rejection of the traditional doctrine takes various forms. At least one proponent outrightly rejects the covenant of works.

James Jordan, after problematizing the traditional doctrine [terming a conventional expression of it “Pelagian,” “Merit Versus Maturity: What Did Jesus Do For Us?,” in The Federal Vision, 153], proposes an alternative way of construing the “Adamic covenant,” viz. “that Adam was supposed to provide, and what Jesus provided for us, is maturity,” Ibid., 155.

While Peter Leithart has made recent statements that appear favorable towards Adamic imputation (see ‘Imputation of Sin, Rom 5:13,’ 23 May 2004), he has also recently set forth arguments that undermine the traditional Reformed view of Adamic imputation.

While Mark Horne believes that he is not denying the traditional doctrine of imputation, it is clear that his positive definitions of the righteousness imputed to the believer are moving in a different track the track of reception of status (See Mark Horne, “God’s Righteousness and Our Justification;” “Some Thoughts on Wright, Righteousness, and Covenant Status;” and “Righteousness from God”).

While the existence of a body of decretally elect within the covenant community is granted, FV understandings of “covenantal election” apply universally language reserved for the invisible church to each member of the visible church, and that while rejecting such traditionally theological explanations as the judgment of charity.

[T]he committee was charged to study ‘the teachings of Norman Shepherd, N.T. Wright, and the related systems known variously as the New Perspective on Paul, which redefines Paul’s teaching on justification, and the Federal Vision, which redefines the traditional Reformed interpretation of the covenant concept.’

Interacting with NPP readings of Rom 3:21-26, Carson offers a concise defense of traditional readings of “righteousness,” “faith,” and “propitiation.”

Carson offers readings of Rom 4:4-5, 4:6-8, 3:27-31, 2 Cor 5:19-21, and 1Cor 1:30 in which he defends the traditional doctrine of imputation as Pauline.

Wright rejects the traditional Reformed teaching on the imputation of Christ’s righteousness to the believer.

[An encouraged question to a prospective pastor candidate] “Do you have any scruples concerning the traditional doctrine of the imputation of the righteousness of Jesus Christ?”

[Norman Shepherd] questions the propriety of the priority of faith to justification; he also proposes an overhaul of the ordo that would result in the loss of traditional distinctions between justification and sanctification.