The Moscow Mood, Doug Wilson & Kevin DeYoung
Crapola Happens!
Kevin DeYoung recently offered criticisms of Doug Wilson's theology.
This is a rare discussion and criticism of someone else's theology and not just blatant deranged attacks we usually see in our church and culture.
Hopefully the following articles and videos will bring you up to speed.
My Rejoinder to Kevin De Young | Doug Wilson
Video from Blog and Mablog
"So Kevin De Young set off a national conversation with his article "On Culture War, Doug Wilson, and the Moscow Mood." When it dropped, I was in the middle of wrapping up my November posts, and so a response had to wait until today. But I did have enough time to tweet that I thought Kevin’s critique was a responsible critique from a reasonable man, and so I asked all those who thought of themselves as being “in my corner” to respond to him judiciously and in that spirit. As far as I could see, this is something they largely did—but that did not mean that the responses were not pointed, telling and forceful. I am going to try to do the same. I thank Kevin for this opportunity, and look forward to meeting him as a result of all this. This response is kind of a beast, but what are you going to do?" from video introduction
Kevin DeYoungs Article:
On Culture War, Doug Wilson, and the Moscow Mood
Each of the great world civilizations,” Christopher Dawson wrote in his classic work from the 1940s on Religion and the Rise of Western Culture, “has been faced with the problem of reconciling the aggressive ethos of the warrior with the moral ideals of a universal religion. But in none of them has the tension been so vital and intense as in medieval Christendom and nowhere have the results been more important for the history of culture.” At the heart of Dawson’s provocative thesis is the insistence that Western European culture was the coming together of two cultures, two social traditions, and two spiritual worlds. The cultural formation of Europe combined “the war society of the barbarian kingdom with its cult of heroism and aggression,” leavened by “the peace society of the Christian Church with its ideals of asceticism and renunciation and its high theological culture.”
Arguably, the Crusades expressed the best and the worst of this synthesis. There were times when the fusion of warrior-heroism and Christian virtue produced something noble and exemplary during the centuries-long effort to reclaim the Holy Land. And there were times when the fusion failed and produced something ugly and lamentable. But even the failures teach us about the aspirational ideals of Christendom. We cannot understand the rise of Western culture without the religious unity imposed by the Christian Church in the Middle Ages, and likewise, we cannot understand the flourishing of Christendom unless we understand that it grew up out of the soil of warrior kings and barbarian kingdoms.
Dawson’s thesis, though concerned with the rise of Western culture in the Middle Ages, is instructive for our own age. For many of us, it looks as if Western culture has been overrun—whether by Muslim immigration in Europe, critical theory in our universities, sexual degradation in our popular culture, violence in our streets, or plain old anti-Western vitriol in the hearts of many Westerners who have no idea how much more miserable the world would be if their deluded wishes came true. If this is the world we live in—or even something generally headed in this fearful direction—the question we in the Christian West are wrestling with (or should be wrestling with) is what to do now.
The Appeal of the Moscow Mood.." from the article: On Culture War, Doug Wilson, and the Moscow Mood
The Hole In Kevin DeYoung's Holiness | Toby Sumpter
Video from Having Two Legs
"In this episode of Having Two Legs, Pastor Toby discusses the 'Moscow Mood' and everything surrounding it.
The Hole In Kevin DeYoung's Holiness
Introduction
"I’ve appreciated Kevin DeYoung’s work. He’s taken faithful stands on homosexuality, biblical repentance, and Christian holiness. I attended a regional talk he gave one time and remember being encouraged by it. If I remember correctly it was connected to his book The Hole in our Holiness. And now DeYoung has written a thoughtful engagement with the Moscow Project, specifically trying to answer the question of what he thinks of Douglas Wilson.
Of course, I’m nothing close to an objective, outside observer. I moved to Moscow as a 17 year old punk kid, went to New St. Andrews College, slowly picked my way through Greyfriars Hall, left for two years to go to Erskine Theological Seminary, and then landed back in Moscow pastoring Trinity Reformed Church for ten years before serving alongside Pastor Wilson as an associate pastor for three years and then helping Christ Church launch a new church plant called King’s Cross Church that I continue to pastor. My ties with Pastor Wilson are deep. He still serves as a pro tem elder on my session (and I on his session), and there is only one office between his and mine, occupied by Jared Longshore. And we’re all thick as thieves..." from the article: The Hole In Kevin DeYoung's Holiness
Another point of view..
WHAT KEVIN DOESN’T UNDERSTAND
'(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..." from the article: WHAT KEVIN DOESN’T UNDERSTAND