New Liberalism
Preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching. For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths.
— II TIMOTHY 4:2-4
Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, for many false prophets have gone out into the world.
— I JOHN 4:1
NEW LIBERALISM (Missional-ism) is, in some ways, different from the old liberalism addressed by J. Gresham Machen in his timely and still relevant Christianity and Liberalism (see at bottom of this page). The old liberalism focused on rejecting miracles, the deity of Christ, the virgin birth, the resurrection, inerrancy, and other Biblical doctrines. New Liberalism makes an emotive case for “human flourishing”(Note below), offers Critical Theory as a useful critical tool, accepts Social Justice categories and priorities, seeks to approve the ordination of celibate homosexuals, validates same-sex attraction, offers corporate worship appealing to unbelievers, and seeks to undermine Reformed and Presbyterian doctrinal standards in favor of current cultural considerations. New Liberalism believes Scripture and Reformed doctrine are not alone sufficient for addressing the needs of our culture. It believes the Gospel must not offend unbelievers and worship should be designed to attract unbelievers as well as believers.
Note: Regarding the Social Justice use of the phrase “human flourishing,” J. Gresham Machen makes the powerful and insightful statement that “Paganism is that view of life which finds the highest goal of human existence in the healthy and harmonious and joyous development of existing human faculties… [But] Christianity is the religion of the broken heart.”
Fighting Error in the Church
By Jay Adams
Sometimes it may seem that we spend too much time refuting falsehood. All of us are chagrined at the preponderance of error both within and without the Church. We may write off those who attempt to combat it and set forth the truth in clarity over against it as “heresy hunters.” The term is used pejoratively; but should it be? Take a quick look at the Books of the New Testament, merely scratching the surface, and see what you think.
On Heresy
By George Gillespie:
Heresy is a gross and dangerous error, voluntarily held and factiously maintained by some person or persons within the visible church, in opposition to some chief or substantial truth or truths grounded upon and drawn from the Holy Scripture by necessary consequence.
Believe God’s love and power more than you believe your own feelings and experiences. Your rock is Christ, and it is not the rock that ebbs and flows…
– SAMUEL RUTHERFORD
Recommended Reading
The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self
By Carl Trueman
“Carl Trueman explains modernity to the church, with depth, clarity, and force. The significance of The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self . . . is hard to overstate.” – Rod Dreher
“This is the most important book of our moment.” – Ben Shapiro
Christianity and Liberalism
By J. Gresham Machen
“This classic defense of orthodox Christianity, written to counter the liberalism that arose in the early 1900s, establishes the importance of scriptural doctrine and contrasts the teachings of liberalism and orthodoxy on God and man, the Bible, Christ, salvation, and the church. J. Gresham Machen’s Christianity and Liberalism has remained relevant through the years ever since its original publication in 1923. It was named one of the top 100 books of the millennium by World magazine and one of the top 100 books of the twentieth century by Christianity Today.” – Amazon
Unbelievers, An Emotional History of Doubt
By Alec Ryrie
“How has unbelief come to dominate so many Western societies? The usual account invokes the advance of science and rational knowledge. Ryrie’s alternative, in which emotions are the driving force, offers new and interesting insights into our past and present.” – Charles Taylor
The Missional is “a combination of classical liberalism, which promotes a social gospel; Neo-Orthodoxy, with its existential interpretations of Scripture; and the hermeneutics popularized in the New Perspective on Paul. These influences are so deeply rooted in the term ‘missional’ that it makes it counterproductive to use it in churches that do not affirm these views; it has the effect of creating cognitive and theological dissonance … I am convinced that missional thinking, with the roots I have mentioned, is a philosophy and model of ministry that will in time have a deteriorating effect on the historic definition and application of the gospel. That is, the gospel will be stripped of its power,
– DOMINIC AQUILA
leaving the church, the people of God,
impotent to be effective in a lost world…”
