The archbishop was guest speaker at the seminary's annual Gaffin lecture series on theology, related the story of the birth of GAFCON in the Hilton Hotel in Nairobi in 2007 along with the outcome resulting a year later when some 1600 Anglican leaders met in Jerusalem as a solid phalanx against an increasingly moral and theologically decadent Western Anglicanism.

His voice occasionally breaking with emotion, Jensen described the meeting in Nairobi prior to Lambeth as "shocking." Should we reject the invitation by the Archbishop of Canterbury to attend Lambeth or not, he asked. "What provoked the invitation was a new way of expressing the faith, hence a new crisis in the Anglican Communion.

"Then something astonishing happened. Out of this was born the Global Anglican Futures Conference (GAFCON). Bishop Bill Atwood (ACNA) suggested GAFCON meet in Jerusalem. Another Bishop, Martyn Minns was also thinking of Jerusalem. Thus GAFCON was born with about one third of the Anglican Communion committed to breaking away from attending Lambeth."

In the end, a third of the bishops stayed away. "He summoned, some came, others declined to come." Jensen described the process as heart wrenching as few wanted to oppose the Archbishop of Canterbury, but they believed truth was more important that a false collegiality. "It was a radical decision," added Jensen.

Touching on the issue of unity, Jensen observed, "We don't have to manufacture unity. There is one Body one Spirit, one Lord one Faith one Baptism. Instructions are to local churches and personal relations, it is not delivered to church leadership. True unity is the gathering of the saints, so the local church is the focus. Unity as it is expressed in the NT is a fellowship which takes us further than the local church."

The community of Anglicans is neither the local church nor the eschatological church but the communion of saints in the Anglican Communion. Denominations are a network of churches. Unity is always established by Christ; it is not just local and eschatological.

"Our unity and communion is in saving his people and disunity distorts the gospel." Breaking communion is a serious business, he noted.

"To divide the Anglican Church in Canada is sad; in Kenya it is a tragedy." Nairobi was a major breach in the communion, but the call was for a rival conference in Jerusalem.

The evangelical archbishop said the answer to true fellowship dates back to the 1998 Lambeth Conference that voted 528 to 89 to affirm biblical sexual norms, upholding faithfulness of marriage in life long union, and abstinence for those not married. "The force was moral not legal. It was a powerful statement of the bible and the mind of the Communion.

"The next ten years saw the Anglican Communion in turmoil. Rowan Williams was in a complete quandary. He did not invite Gene Robinson living in married relationship with another man (from whom he is now divorced) and consecrated a bishop with 48 bishops. This was in clear defiance of Lambeth 1.10."

Jensen cited the obvious contradiction in trying to repair the breach by not inviting Robinson but inviting those who made him a bishop, while CANA Bishop Martyn Minns (formed in association with the Nigerian HOB) was not invited.

"The global Anglican leadership fought for unity which they cherished. They now saw it being sundered by the actions of the North Americans. They had broken faith and fellowship and defied Lambeth 1.10. They appealed to culture not scripture. They challenged the authority of the scriptures and the rule of Christ.

"The global South bishops called for repentance before reconciliation. The Episcopalians would not give. They had broken communion and caused schism, they were no longer in historic communion, so to invite them to Lambeth was to collude in their actions. We asked, why did the Archbishop of Canterbury not launch a campaign of non-recognition especially for those who had not taken action.

"Here was a major community in world Christianity comprising evangelicals and Anglo Catholics no longer living in a safe haven, giving room to sexual permissiveness and not see this as a gospel force and a crisis when that comes."

While Jensen broke no new ground in his lecture, he reinforced the actions that had been taken as legitimate and that being united around the Lord Jesus Christ is the imperative now.

"The Holy book of our civilization is being treated with disdain. We must choose to believe true faith is bound to bring suffering. The waters of unbelievers have become a deluge."

Citing Romans Chapter 1, he observed how revisionists had refused the knowledge of God and abandoned obedience and opened everyone to vilification. "The power of sexual abandonment has gripped the Church, our identity has become one of aloneness and narcissism and our view of Christ and God when we abandon Scripture becomes distorted.

"We have a new gospel of man. The Africans and Asians are now in the forefront of resistance. That resistance is both cultural and biblical. They felt sorrow at what the Americans had done and they would not have fellowship with them. At huge costs they no longer would get money from those sources. Those sources now represented tainted money and that meant fellowship by accepting it. They went without anything rather than receive money from those who had abandoned the gospel. Money is conduit of blessing and seduction."

The Global South rescued faithful Anglicans and constituted the Anglican Church in North America (ACNA).

Jensen believes that the way forward is not to rubbish the arguments of the other side. "They are powerful arguments. I have sat with counterparts in the Global South who have lived in non-Christian cultures and accepted the Bible dealing with polygamy. You came with Bibles and said it was your turn to pay the price for being Christian. What they see now is arrogance and cowardice as they succumb to the unbiblical decadence of the West."

"It is the GAFCON primates who broke communion," said Jensen. "GAFCON exists to heal, not to cast off, but to be a safe place where the gospel unites."

Jensen said the ordination of women arises from feminism. "If we accept this the consequences are far more grave and raise issues of anthropocentric and Trinitarian theology." Jensen cited I Tim 2.

"Homosexuality demonstrates the same point. These texts deal with human identity and purpose. This is not a matter of order but salvation. Repeatedly we are told to repent of homosexual acts and if you continue it places you outside the kingdom of God. Sex matters. The sexual revolution, the images of pornography do immense damaged and will devour us. We cannot make him a leader in the church. It is an assault on the human person. The Christian toleration of the sexual revolution is profoundly unjust."

Jensen said the new world was coming to the rescue of the old world. Out of this the ACNA and AMiE were born. "The men in Nairobi did not break the Communion, the Anglican Communion was already broken. The leadership called the Church to a Bible based identity. They maintained the unity in bond of peace. By seeking the truth and repudiating error. They only wanted to confess the faith.

"Theirs is a theological testimony in the midst of a deadly threat to the Christian Faith and Christian of all denominations. By submitting to the authority of the word of God, we are lead away from a false gospel. We must no longer walk in error."

The Gaffin Lecture on Theology, Culture, and Missions is a lecture in biblical or systematic theology to honor the work of Dr. Richard B. Gaffin, Jr., professor of Biblical and systematic theology, emeritus. To hear Archbishop Jensen's lecture, click here:
http://www.wts.edu/stayinformed/view.html?id=1993&utm_source=WTSBooks+eNewsletter&utm_campaign=3c80e47b99-What_Does_the_Bible_Really_Teach_4_7_2015&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_7274bcb3fc-3c80e47b99-87164033

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