Who Said Liberalism is Dead?

It’s been the opinion of some that theological liberalism is dead. Simplistically, theological liberalism describes those who call themselves Christians but deny many (if not most) of the doctrines that make Christianity Christianity. Some believe that liberalism’s sun has set and its dead and buried.

I don’t think so. Come to Orwell sometime, and I’ll show you. Or Grand Rapids, MI. Or Mentor, OH. But if you can’t make the visit, consider Martin Thielen…

Thielen is pastor of a United Methodist Church, and has also served as a Southern Baptist pastor. He served for four years as a national worship and preaching consultant and editor of Proclaim for the SBC.

He’s just published a book titled, “What’s the Least I Can Believe and Still be a Christian?” In it he lists ten things Christians do not need to believe to be a  Christian–

1. God Causes Cancer, Car Wrecks, and Other Catastrophes
2. Good Christians Don’t Doubt
3. True Christians Can’t Believe in Evolution
4. Women Can’t Be Preachers and Must Submit to Men
5. God Cares about Saving Souls but Not about Saving Trees
6. Bad People Will Be “Left Behind” and Then Fry in Hell
7. Jews Won’t Make It to Heaven
8. Everything in the Bible Should Be Taken Literally
9. God Loves Straight People But Not Gay People
10. It’s OK for Christians to be Judgmental and Obnoxious

You have to note the whimsical, almost sneering tone of this list. That kind of attitude is typical of theological liberalism, almost an ecclesiastical snobbery, looking down the nose at “those fundamentalists.”

It would take a significant post to comment on each of these. It almost makes me want to get the book and read it so I don’t misrepresent him. From the list, though, it appears that one can believe that–

• Either God is not sovereign over all things or that there is no such thing as the effects of sin in the world  (#1)
• Genuine faith does not require absolute submission of the mind, will, and emotions to God’s Word (#2)
• The Bible should not be taken as an authoritative standard on the issues it speaks to (##3-4)
• Salvation and ecology are on the same plane (#5)
• The biblical account of divine judgment should not be taken literally (#6)
• There is not an exclusiveness to salvation, despite what Jesus taught (John 3:18; 14:6; #7)
• The Bible is not the written Word of God divinely authoritative in all it addresses (#8)
• Homosexuality is not sinful (#9)
• You can believe whatever you want to believe (#10)

Read some of the reviews of this book, and you’ll see that theological liberalism is not dead.

Thankfully, we’re not caught offguard by this sort of thing, nor are we left without hope–

You, however, continue in the things you have learned and become convinced of, knowing from whom you have learned them, and that from childhood you have known the sacred writings which are able to give you the wisdom that leads to salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness; so that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work. I solemnly charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by His appearing and His kingdom: preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort, with great patience and instruction. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires, and will turn away their ears from the truth and will turn aside to myths. But you, be sober in all things, endure hardship, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry (2 Tim 3:14-4:5).

Continue in the Word! Preach the Word! Faithfully serve Christ until He comes!

The Incarnation of Jesus Christ

I’m submitting the following for this week’s “Pastor’s Column” in our local newspaper. If you have thoughts or suggestions, let me know by noon today!

—————–

We just finished what for many is their favorite time of the year, Christmas. Increasingly our culture views this season in purely secular terms instead of praising God for the incarnation of Jesus Christ. However, regardless of what people may think, the Bible unequivocally says that Jesus of Nazareth was and is fully God and fully man!

The incarnation was necessary for a variety of reasons, but especially for the salvation of sinners. Before a holy God everyone stands as a guilty sinner, deserving eternal judgment. In and of ourselves we are incapable and unwilling to fix the situation—no amount of good feelings or religious works can ever remove sin’s guilt and pay the full price sin requires.

This is the reason for the incarnation, why the eternal Son added to His Person a human nature—so that a perfect man could offer Himself as a sinless sacrifice of infinite value being also eternal God. Believing anything short of this results in denying the Person and work of Jesus Christ and, sadly, the loss of any hope of eternal life. Let me encourage you—believe in and depend on Jesus Christ alone for deliverance from your sin!

The great hymn writer John Newton—who wrote “Amazing Grace”—also wrote another hymn that clearly sets forth the Biblical truth about Jesus Christ:

“What think ye of Christ?” is the test
To try both your state and your scheme;
You cannot be right in the rest
Unless you think rightly of Him.
As Jesus appears in your view—
As He is beloved or not—
So God is disposed to you,
And mercy or wrath is your lot.

Some take Him a creature to be—
A man, or an angel at most;
But they have not feelings like me,
Nor know themselves wretched and lost;
So guilty, so helpless am I,
I dare not confide in His blood
Nor on His protection rely,
Unless I were sure He is God.

Some call Him a Savior in word,
But mix their own works with His plan;
And hope He His help will afford
When they have done all that they can:
If doings prove rather too light
(Admitting their efforts may fail),
They purpose to make up full weight
By casting His name in the scale.

Some call Him “the pearl of great price”
And say He’s the fountain of joys;
Yet feed upon folly and vice,
And cleave to the world and its toys;
Like Judas the Savior they kiss,
And while they salute Him, betray;
O what will profession like this
Avail in His terrible day?

If asked what of Jesus I think,
Tho’ still my best thoughts are but poor,
I’ll say He’s my meat and my drink,
My life, and my strength, and my store!
My husband, my trust and my friend,
My Savior from sin and death’s gall,
My hope from beginning to end,
My portion, my Lord, and my all.

 

God the All

O God, it is amazing that men can talk so much

about man’s creaturely power and goodness,

when, if thou didst not hold us back every

moment, we should be devils incarnate.

Valley of Vision, p. 5.

Do Evolutionists Believe in God?

If there was ever an illustration of the truths of Romans 1:18-23, this latest news item from National Public Radio is it:

Jesse Bering’s mother died of cancer on a Sunday, in her own bed, at 9 o’clock at night. Bering and his siblings closed her door and went downstairs, hoping they might somehow get some sleep.

It was a long, hard night, but around 7 a.m., something happened: The wind chimes outside his mother’s window started to chime.

Bering remembers waking to the tinkle of these bells, a small but distinct sound in an otherwise silent house. And he remembers thinking that those bells carried a very specific message.

“It seemed to me … that she was somehow telling us that she had made it to the other side. You know, cleared customs in heaven,” Bering says.

The thought surprised him. Bering was a confirmed atheist. He did not believe in any kind of supernatural anything. He prided himself on being a scientist, a psychologist who believed only in the measurable material world. But, he says, he simply couldn’t help himself.

“My mind went there. It leapt there,” Bering says. “And from a psychological perspective, this was really interesting to me. Because I didn’t believe it on the one hand, but on the other hand I experienced it.”

Why is it, Bering wondered, that even a determined skeptic could not stop himself from perceiving the supernatural?  It really bothered him.

It was a very good question, he decided, to take up in his lab.

…

Bering says that believing that supernatural beings are watching you is so basic to being human that even committed atheists regularly have moments where their minds turn in a supernatural direction, as his did in the wake of his mother’s death.

“They experience it but they reject it,” Bering says. “Sort of override or stomp on their immediate intuition [cf. Rom 1:18--"who suppress the truth in/by unrighteousness"]. But that’s not to say that they don’t experience it. We all have the same basic brain. And our brains have evolved to work in a particular way.”

You can read the full article or listen to it here. Sadly, but predictably, when the article tries to come to some resolution on the matter, it basically throws up its hands by saying such answers are “As unknowable — ultimately — as God himself.”

Let’s listen to Paul again in Romans 1–

¹⁸For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, ¹⁹because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them. ²⁰For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse. ²¹For even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened. ²²Professing to be wise, they became fools, ²³and exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God for an image in the form of corruptible man and of birds and four-footed animals and crawling creatures.

The Standard of Holiness

“There can be no proper doctrine of the atonement and no proper doctrine of retribution, so long as Holiness is refused its preeminence. Love must have a norm or standard, and this norm or standard can be found only in Holiness. The old conviction of sin and the sense of guilt that drove the convicted sinner to the cross are inseparable from a firm belief in the self-affirming attribute of God as logically prior to and as conditioning the self-communicating attribute” (Strong, Systematic Theology, p. x).

Jonathan’s Faith

Jonathan’s statement in 1 Samuel 14:6 has always been an encouragement:

Come and let us cross over to the garrison of these uncircumcised; perhaps the Lord will work for us, for the Lord is not restrained to save by many or by few.

Jonathan had biblical support for his faith, for God told Israel that one man would put a thousand to flight. Now, keep the historical context of 1 Samuel 14 in view here: Israel’s army numbered about 600 men (14:2), whereas the Philistines’ army had 30,000 chariots and 6,000 horsemen (13:5). No mention is made of just your plain old foot soldier like Israel had!

Jonathan’s faith in God’s promise–one man will defeat a thousand–helped Jonathan to focus on the Lord, not the material circumstances. From Jonathan’s perspective, because the Lord was on their side, their measly 600 men could be used of the Lord to defeat an army of  600,000! So Jonathan by faith was able to look at the 36,000 that the Philistines assembled as a measly number that was no match for the Lord.

In light of what I’ve been teaching during our Wednesday Bible Study (Knowing God), particularly the fact that as God is spirit he is personal, incorporeal (non-material) and invisible, I have a greater theological appreciation for what Jonathan has said here.

God is the infinite and perfect spirit, in whom all things have their source, support, and end. All God had to do was remove his “support” from the Philistines, work on behalf of Israel, and the end result should not be surprising: “the multitude melted away” (14:6), “the commotion in the camp of the Philistines continued and increased” (14:19), “every man’s sword was against his fellow, and there was very great confusion” (14:20), and “the Lord delivered Israel that day” (14:23).

The Philistines, their horses, and chariots were no match for the infinite and perfect Spirit, who is all-powerful and present everywhere. As David would later say,

Some boast in chariots and some in horses, but we will boast in the name of the Lord, our God (Ps 20:7).

God is Spirit

Some great quotes from the puritan Stephen Charnock’s The Existence and Attributes of God, volume 1–

As it is impossible for the eye of man to see [God], it is impossible for the art of man to paint him upon walls, and carve him out of wood. None knows him but himself, none can describe him but himself….No corporeal [material] thing can represent a spiritual substance; there is no proportion in nature between them. God is a simple, infinite, immense, eternal, invisible, incorruptible being; a statue is a compounded, finite, limited, temporal, visible, and corruptible body. God is a living spirit; but a statue nor sees, nor hears, nor perceives anything (p. 193).

No creature, nor all creatures together, can furnish us with such a magnificent notion of God, as can give us a clear view of him. Yet God in his word is pleased to step below his own excellency, and point us to those excellencies in his works, whereby we may ascend to the knowledge of those excellencies which are in his nature (p. 196).

We are to elevate and refine all our notions of God, and spiritualize our conceptions of him. Every man is to have a conception of God; therefore he ought to have one of the highest elevation. Since we cannot have a full notion of him, we should endeavor to make it as high and as pure as we can (p. 200).

These next two I especially liked–

Whatsoever God is, he is infinitely so: he is infinite Wisdom, infinite Goodness infinite Knowledge, infinite Power, infinite Spirit; infinitely distant from the weakness of creatures, infinitely mounted above the excellencies of creatures: as easy to be known that he is, as impossible to be comprehended what he is (p. 200).

The world perishes; friends change and are dissolved; bodies moulder, because they are mutable [changeable]. God is a Spirit in the highest excellency and glory of spirits; nothing is beyond him; nothing above him; no contrariety within him. This is our comfort, if we devote ourselves to him; this God is our God; this Spirit is our Spirit; this is our all, our immutable, our incorruptible support; a Spirit that cannot die and leave us (p. 202).

If you’re interested in reading Charnock’s work, it’s available for free at Google books to read online or download. Click here to go there.

Obama on Origins

I just came across this interview conducted when our President was running for office. He was asked, “What’s your attitude regarding the teaching of evolution
in public schools?” His answer:

I’m a Christian, and I believe in parents being able to provide children with religious instruction without interference from the state. But I also believe our schools are there to teach worldly knowledge and science. I believe in evolution, and I believe there’s a difference between science and faith. That doesn’t make faith any less important than science. It just means they’re two different things. And I think it’s a mistake to try to cloud the teaching of science with theories that frankly don’t hold up to scientific inquiry.

Hmmm. Is a Christian supposed to conform his mind to the world? Answer:

Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect (Rom 12:2)

Our President is right about one thing: there is a difference between genuine faith and this kind of “science,”  and that difference is:

O Timothy, guard what has been entrusted to you, avoiding worldly and empty chatter and the opposing arguments of what is falsely called ‘knowledge’–which some have professed and thus gone astray from the faith (1 Tim 6:20-21).

But more on that in this coming Sunday morning’s sermon.

One last thought–what should control our “science”? Answer: genuine faith–

By faith we understand that the worlds were prepared by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things which are visible (Heb 11:3).

But more on that in this coming Sunday afternoon’s message!

Instructions to the Jury

For this month’s series on The Bible and Evolution, I’ve been reading the complete stenographic report of the famous trial held July 10 to 21 1925, the State of Tennessee v. John Thomas Scopes. It’s been a fascinating read—well, to me anyway!

On the first day’s proceedings, Judge John T. Raulston gave the following instructions to the jury, and I would urge you to note the sections I have highlighted—very interesting!

Later today or tomorrow I’ll post the statute that John T. Scopes was accused of violating.

The vital question now involved for your consideration is, has the statute been violated by the said John T. Scopes or any other person by teaching a theory that denies the story of the Divine Creation of man as taught in the Bible, and in Rhea County since the passage of this act and prior to this investigation.

If you find the statute has been thus violated, you should indict the guilty person or persons, as the case may be.

You will bear in mind that in this investigation you are not interested to inquire into the policy or wisdom of this legislation…

The statute involved in the investigation provided that a violation constitutes only a misdemeanor, but there are degrees involved in misdemeanors (not by expressed provision of statue, but in reality), as well as in felonies, and in the very nature of things I regard a violation of this statute as a high misdemeanor, and in making this declaration I make no reference to the policy or constitutionality of the statue, but to the evil example of the teacher disregarding constituted authority in the very presence of the undeveloped mind whose thought and morals he directs and guides.

To teach successfully we must teach both by precept and example.

The school room is not only a place to develop thought, but also a place to develop discipline, power of restraint, and character.

If a teacher openly and flagrantly violates the laws of the land in the exercise of his profession (regardless of the policy of the law) his example cannot be wholesome to the undeveloped mind, and would tend to create and breed a spirit of disregard for good order and the want of respect for the necessary discipline and restraint in our body politic.

Now, gentlemen of the jury, it is your duty to investigate this alleged offense without prejudice or bias and with open minds, and if you find that there has been a violation of the statute you should promptly return a bill, otherwise you should return “no bill.”

From The World’s Most Famous Court Trial: State of Tennessee v. John Thomas Scopes, pp. 6-7.

God’s Holiness and Self-Righteousness

If any man think well of himself, he has never met God. Nothing will demolish self-righteousness like one real sight of God.

–R. A. Torrey, What the Bible Teaches, p. 41