Evangelicalism in Terminal Decline (Part 4)
After perusing his latest book, Losing Our Religion, it may be fair to say that Russell Moore is a better theologian than a social critic. But then again, Moore has only recently become an “accidental exile,” not enough time to realize how deep the rabbit hole goes. Moore, at least, is beginning to question the validity and value of many of the distinctives of his prior church heritage.
For the many travesties which Moore has encountered and permeate the Evangelical savannah are consequent of an unconverted ministry and sheep without genuine shepherds. In Moore’s recent writings, the stress has been on the need for revival.
This should be a time for revival in our churches. Revival is a concept with a long history in American evangelicalism, rooted in the Bible, that says a people who have grown cold and lifeless can be renewed in their faith. It is a kind of resurrection from the dead.1
But I would ask, a revival to what? For a revival without theological, even soteriological, reform would simply return the revived to subscribing to the many errors and incoherencies that have insidiously crept into the Protestant Evangelical church over the centuries.
A Different Gospel or Two
I am amazed how quickly you are deserting the One who called you by the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel— which is not even a gospel. Evidently some people are troubling you and trying to distort the gospel of Christ. But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be under a curse! As we have said before, so now I say again: If anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to the one you received, let him be under a curse!2
The primary reason for the spiritual enervation, theological waywardness, and accelerating number of travesties occurring within Evangelical Christendom is that the overwhelming number of adherents are not genuinely converted Christians. And the primary reason that adherents are not genuinely converted Christians is that they have been taught counterfeit gospels.
Much of evangelism is built upon the template of Bill Bright’s Four Spiritual Laws, wherein an interlocutor is counseled to ask Jesus into their heart. I found this “gospel” dominating the tracts that my sister distributes in her church’s street evangelism. This gospel differs from the one promulgated in Scriptures, namely “believe upon the Lord Jesus and you will be saved,”3 an encapsulation which seems deceptively simple.
For “asking Jesus into your heart” effectually constitutes a gospel of regeneration, some label it “decisional regeneration.” Regeneration, or being born of God, effectively grants a person the gift, the sentence of eternal and abundant life. The only faith, which might be involved in this counsel, is trusting that this regeneration has taken place.
However, the Sovereign of the cosmos intends to govern the cosmos upon the foundations of righteousness and justice. And because of that strict and scrupulous divine adherence to those attributes, moral criminals (a.k.a. sinners) cannot receive the sentence of life eternal until they acquire a verdict, the legal authority, to receive that sentence of life eternal.
But to all who did receive Him, to those who believed in His name, He gave the [authority] (exousian) to become children of God—children born not of blood, nor of the desire or will of man, but born of God.4
As in human justice, a verdict must logically and temporally precede a sentence. And, Justification, the formal and juridical basis of Salvation, is accomplished through relying and resting upon the amnesty scheme, established through the atonement of Christ which scrupulously satisfied all the necessary attributes and principle required of an exact and exacting substitutionary justice.
But now, apart from [] law, [justice] of God has been illuminated, as attested by the Law and the Prophets. And this [justice] from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no distinction, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. God presented Him as the atoning sacrifice through faith in His blood, in order to demonstrate His [justice], because in His forbearance He had passed over the sins committed beforehand. He did this to demonstrate His [justice] at the present time, so as to be just and to justify the one who has faith in Jesus.5
Folks who buy into the counterfeit gospel of regeneration are not accepting the terms of the Gospel as laid out by the God of Scriptures, one which is rationally and juridically sound.
For I testify about them that they are zealous for God, but not on the basis of knowledge. Because they were ignorant of God’s [justice] and sought to establish their own, they did not submit to God’s [justice].6
At an experiential level, many, who subscribe to this counterfeit gospel of regeneration, that is those who do not see this gospel as a get-out-of-jail-free card, expect that their minds and psyches will magically transform to automatically seek the true and the good. And when that does not happen, many will dismiss the Christian Faith, while a desperate few will rinse and repeat many times. The experiential only confirms the invalidity of this counterfeit gospel of regeneration.
Pursue peace with everyone as well as holiness, without which no one will see the Lord.7
The other counterfeit gospel which pervades the Protestant Evangelical savannah and has crippled Protestant Evangelicalism since the Reformation itself is one which denigrates the need to pursue righteousness and peace in order to be saved. There have existed two enduring flaws in Protestant thought which have contributed to this counterfeit gospel, this other heresy.
The first flaw is the lack of a valid elucidation of the nature of faith, which is a generic, pre-theological, and universal entity which all humanity encounters. (The gift of faith, noted in Ephesians 2:8–9, pertains to faith upon Christ, the object of faith.) For the nature of faith requires acting upon the assertions, counsels, promises, etc. that one claims to subscribe, whether in a passive capacity, as in relying and resting upon the lifeblood of Christ for our Justification, or in a more active capacity.
Indeed, in the notorious passage, James 2:14–26, about which both Catholics and Protestants have long squabbled, and in which Catholics and Protestants have both erred, James is philosophically defining the nature of faith and its psychological dynamics. Herein, faith operates synergistically (synērgei) with one’s decisions and actions,8 and not apart from them (choris).9
The second flaw, which of more recent vintage, is the conflation between Justification, the formal and juridical basis of salvation, and salvation, the ontological or existential reality. They are not the same, nor are the terms of each the same.
For in Justification, the ontological merit of Christ suffices under the juridical regime governing substitutionary exchanges. Nothing more can be added without effectively denigrating the ontological merit of Christ. Moreover, by including additional requirements, the person must perfectly satisfy each and every other condition in order for the equation of their own defined justice to be valid.
But in salvation, all the other elements of the Faith are required, albeit not perfectly, but as the necessary instrumental means by which a person’s faith effectually endures until the end,10 (even faith in the lifeblood of Christ for one’s Justification).
Why do you call Me ‘Lord, Lord,’ but not do what I say? I will show you what he is like who comes to Me and hears My words and acts on them: He is like a man building a house, who dug down deep and laid his foundation on the rock. When the flood came, the torrent crashed against that house but could not shake it, because it was well built. But the one who hears My words and does not act on them is like a man who built his house on ground without a foundation. The torrent crashed against that house, and immediately it fell—and great was its destruction!”11
This is the warning that Christ gives. This dynamic is one, which logic is unlikely, albeit not impossible, to appreciate. Rather, this dynamic becomes more apparent in those who genuinely have faith, who genuinely attempt to act upon the full counsel of God and thereby experientially find that practical abidance or, alternatively, rejection insidiously strengthens or weakens one’s faith respectively.
Future chapters to this screed, in the weeks to follow, will consider the rational and juridical incoherence of contemporary explanations of the Atonement with regard to Justification (there being multiple purposes in the manifold wisdom of God); or the loss of the knowledge of the nature of justice, especially within Reformed circles, and various other anthropogenic doctrines and practices which are at wide variance with Scriptures; or the rampant intellectual integrity and incompetence among the seminarians and intelligentsia, even resulting in the deliberate mistranslation of the Greek Text.
Russell Moore, “The American Evangelical Church Is in Crisis. There’s Only One Way Out,” The Atlantic, July 25, 2023, https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/07/christian-evangelical-church-division-politics/674810.
Galatians 1:6–9
Acts 16:31
John 1:12–13
Romans 3:21–26
Romans 10:2–3
Hebrews 12:14
James 2:22
James 2:26
Matthew 24:13; 2 Timothy 4:7
Luke 6:46–49