I recently heard somebody talking about “liberalism” as it relates to Christians and churches.   In so doing, I was reminded of how one reformer described liberalism–only a few decades ago in the early 1920s. J. Gresham Machen (founder of Westminster Theological Seminary) wrote of the stark contrast between true Christianity and modern liberalism:

Christianity differs from liberalism, then, in the first place, in its conception of God.  But it also differs in its conception of man.

Modern liberalism has lost all sense of the gulf that separates the creature from the Creator; its doctrine of man follows naturally from its doctrine of God.  But it is not only the creature limitations of mankind which are denied.  Even more important are is another difference.  According to the Bible, man is a sinner under the just condemnation of God; according to modern liberalism, there is really no such thing as sin.  At the very root of the modern liberal movement is the loss of the consciousness of sin.

The consciousness of sin was formerly the startingpoint of all preaching; but today it is gone. Characteristic of the modern age, above all else, is a supreme confidence in human goodness; the religious literature of the day is redolent of that confidence.  Get beneath the rough exterior of men, we are told, we shall discover enough self-sacrifice to found upon it the hope of society; the world’s evil, it is said, can be overcome with the world’s good; no help is needed from outside the world.

Some 86 years later, it still seems that there is nothing new under the sun: liberalism is still prevalent outside the church as it is inside so-called churches.  Some Christians today still refuse to call sin “sin”, but maybe just an “inadvertent mistake” or “unfortunate happening”.  Let the words above remind us all–Christians and unbelievers alike–to come to Jesus and run after him by faith and repentance.  Every person without the Spirit to convict us of sin and convince us of Grace is hopeless: without hope, without God, without Jesus Christ and His atoning blood to forgive us of our sin and to enable us to walk circumspectly according to His Word.

J. Gresham Machen, Christianity and Liberalism
 (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1923), 63-64 (emphasis mine).

“When I, who contemplate this matter, love someone, there are three things involved—I myself, the one whom I love, and love itself.  For I do not love love; rather, I love a lover. For there is no love where nothing is loved. Therefore, there are three things—the one who loves, the one who is loved, and love itself.”

–Augustine of Hippo, On the Trinity, 9.2.2.

15 We ourselves are Jews by birth and not Gentile sinners; 16 yet we know that a person is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ, so we also have believed in Christ Jesus, in order to be justified by faith in Christ and not by works of the law, because by works of the law no one will be justified. (Galatians 2:15-16)

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10 For all who rely on works of the law are under a curse; for it is written, “Cursed be everyone who does not abide by all things written in the Book of the Law, and do them.” 11 Now it is evident that no one is justified before God by the law, for “The righteous shall live by faith.” 12 But the law is not of faith, rather “The one who does them shall live by them.” 13 Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us—for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree”— 14 so that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles, so that we might receive the promised Spirit through faith. (Galatians 3:10-14)

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1 For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery.

2 Look: I, Paul, say to you that if you accept circumcision, Christ will be of no advantage to you. 3 I testify again to every man who accepts circumcision that he is obligated to keep the whole law. 4 You are severed from Christ, you who would be justified by the law; you have fallen away from grace. 5 For through the Spirit, by faith, we ourselves eagerly wait for the hope of righteousness. 6 For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything, but only faith working through love. (Galatians 5:1-6)

21 But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it— 22 the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction: 23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, 24 and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, 25 whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. 26 It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.

27 Then what becomes of our boasting? It is excluded. By what kind of law? By a law of works? No, but by the law of faith. 28 For we hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law. 29 Or is God the God of Jews only? Is he not the God of Gentiles also? Yes, of Gentiles also, 30 since God is one—who will justify the circumcised by faith and the uncircumcised through faith. 31 Do we then overthrow the law by this faith? By no means! On the contrary, we uphold the law. (Romans 3:21-31)

Christianity Today reports:

Two of the hottest issues in evangelical theology right now are the New Testament’s use of the Old Testament and evangelical textual criticism. Peter Enns’s 2005 book, Inspiration and Incarnation: Evangelicals and the Problem of the Old Testament, aimed to pose difficult questions about the human aspects of Scripture. It received both praise and criticism from noted evangelical scholars.

And it made things difficult for Enns at his school, Philadelphia’s Westminster Theological Seminary. A battle over whether the book undermined or contradicted the Westminster Confession of Faith has been raging for some time now, and apparently came to a head Wednesday at the meeting of the school’s board, which decided to suspend Enns (at the close of the school year).

Trevin Wax summarizes the controversy nicely:

1. Enns has been criticized for emphasizing the human nature of Scripture over against the divine.
   
2. Enns has written that the first chapters of Genesis are firmly grounded in ancient myth, which he defines as “an ancient, premodern, prescientific way of addressing questions of ultimate origins in the form of stories.”
   
3. Enns claims that Scripture is inspired and inerrant, however the way he describes Scripture seems to counter that belief.
   
4. Enns does not seek to harmonize seemingly-contradictory parts of Scripture because he believes the diversity of Scripture is complementary.
   
5. Enns rejects the idea of objective unbiased historiography.

It is very unfortunate whenever any seminary faculty member is suspended or dismissed on theological grounds. Do pray for Westminster Theological Seminary (students, faculty, Board of Trustees, and families) as they go through this controversial time. May we all examine ourselves and our own theology first, and read carefully about what is actually being debated, before pointing any fingers.

Tim Keller visits Google’s Mountain View, CA, headquarters to discuss his book, “The Reason for God.” This event took place on March 5, 2008, as part of the Authors@Google series.

(See here for Tim Keller’s 90min video at UC Berkeley)