Nonsense Articulated Resoundingly

 

 

Nonsense articulated resoundingly

Which is NAR for short,

Is the “New Apostolic Reformation”

Which many like to exhort.

 

Reform and Reformation

Are on everybody’s lips

But what it means still puzzles me

Both in church and politics.

 

New Apostolic Reformation!

I have a problem with every word

And when the three are combined,

They are even more absurd.

 

Why New in the first place

For something that’s over 2000 years?

Is it something revealed just recently

That before had not appeared?

 

Like, these are the days of Elijah

When Elijah had left a while,

A whole lot of repackaged stuff

Has become a new fashion style.

 

The Bible is an ancient document

Thus, its revelation is not new

So be careful whom you chase after,

They may obscure your view.

 

From the New to Apostolic

In fact, New Apostolic is the term:

It’s neither Peter nor Paul nor John

And this makes me squirm.

 

If it were it couldn’t be new

The apostles are in the foundation:

The foundation of the church I say,

Meaning its early inauguration.

 

 

The apostles laid the foundation

With Jesus the chief cornerstone,

No other foundation can any man lay

In a foreign field or home.

 

You’d recalled Peter’s message

On that remarkable day of Pentecost:

A message calling all to repentance

And pointing them to the cross.

 

The central theme was Jesus

Whom the people had crucified,

This same Jesus was the risen Christ

By whom all are reconciled.

 

Reconciled to the Father-God,

Whose Son they had utterly despised,

That had come to bring them salvation

But by most he was denied.

 

Resoundingly speaks of loudness

Where there is no holding back,

No effort or cost is considered too much

In dispensing alternate facts.

 

Yes, we live in a post-modern age

In which truth is becoming recessive

And the pseudo gospel message

Is by no means abrasive.

 

A strange mixture, my friend,

Of the Word and designated pretexts

With a deletion of noted essentials

To allow for liberal flex.

 

 

A gospel that is directly opposed

To the one that's in God’s Word,

Another gospel, as Paul would say,

From the one on Pentecost heard.

 

Nonsense articulated

In the churches and without

And compared to the quiet believers

These charlatans convincingly shout.

 

Experience is their thing,

Biblical doctrine is second-class,

An obsession with the charismatic gifts

And fakery unsurpassed.

  

Why harp on Reformation?

Transformation is the dire need,

 The Holy Spirit is on offer to do this

As we sow the spiritual seed.

Transformation works from within

Reformation from without,

That the latter relies of the former

There can be no doubt.

 

Nonsense articulated resoundingly

Does not make it sense

And the “New Apostolic Reformation”

Is an inexcusable offense.

 

Stewart Russell © April 18, 2023