Understanding Evangelicalism

It really is rather inaccurate to state that Evangelicals teach "works are irrelevant to God." The vast bulk of evangelical churches are squarely in the camp with Anglicans on the proposition that "works are a necessary outcome of faith." My first reaction to your post, Stalward, was that the latter position virtually goes without saying, but upon reflection I must admit that there are some radical churches overtaken by theological liberalism which either teach or allow the former, incorrect view of works. However it would be inaccurate to simply brand "evangelicalism" as the camp of "works are irrelevant" because there is no direct relationship between evangelicalism and antinomianism. Shoot, I have known Lutherans who bordered on antinomianism in their thinking.

You and I are in agreement that a living faith will not be devoid of good works. Good works will naturally flow out of the renewed, recreated person in conjunction with and in response to the indwelling Holy Spirit.

 

I just think it's a valid concern to recognize that many Protestant churches have been guilty of antinomianism, in exactly reverse way as the Roman church was taken over by works righteousness. We have developed historical tools against Rome's works righteousness, but if an evangelical professes to be saved, today, and he doesn't need to do anything or live a certain way, then we haven't developed the rebuttal that's equally as categorical to him. You have antinomian heretics like Tullian Tjividjian not from the past but today, poisoning people's ears today. And while the evangelical world is culturally still sane and orthodox, practically speaking these people have ripped jeans, tattoos, they commit sin, they divorce (and how!). Their culturally orthodox ("Biblical") Christianity is slowly giving into their antinomian theology.

We have to be strong that no, you have to look saved, and act saved, in order for you to be saved. You need to have fear and trembling in becoming Christian. It's not a fun thing you're subscribing to. You will be forced to struggle, to sacrifice, to give, and your profession of faith means that they will send lions on you, which you should withstand with humble fortitude. That's the Christian life.

 

When my daughter some years ago started a blog called "Living to Please God", she was accused of legalism by members of her evangelical church.

 

What?? That's...crazy. Yes, I'm going to use that adjective. And I grew up in the Evangelical world.

 

Again, I would respectfully disagree with the stance that "many Protestant churches have been guilty of antinomianism." If there are so many, it should be easy to come up with several names of churches or even whole denominations, so perhaps you could do us the service of listing all the ones you know about? It would be good to know this information, if it exists. But I suspect it does not exist.

I looked up this Tjividjian guy. He was in the South Florida Presbytery of the PCA but they tossed him out when his adultery was revealed. From this we can conclude that the PCA in no way endorses antinomianism. So far what we have is one rogue guy. (And Tjividjian himself denies the charge and claims that his teaching has been exaggerated and misinterpreted; the man disavows the heresy.)

It is well and good to be conscious of a potential heresy. But before we start seeing heretics behind every bush, let's have some facts to prove that the problem is as widespread as you characterize it. Otherwise it becomes a piece of broad-brush imagery that could cause people to wrongly assume an untrue thing about an entire category of Christians (namely, evangelicals), and that can cause unnecessary divisiveness.

BTW, my ACNA parish characterizes itself as an evangelical church, too!

 

Sure: most of the evangelical superstars of today are rotten apples. Mark Driscoll. Tullian Tjividjian. Rob Bell. Francis Chan. Steven Furtick. I speak nothing of the likes of T. D Jakes and Joel Osteen.

When I speak of Evangelicalism I speak especially of these most famous examples. I also think your dismissal of Tullian misses the mark. We are not dealing with your Anglican parish priest with 100 people on his charge, but with mega-pastors with book deals and music/fashion brands. Steven Furtick has 2.1 million followers on Instagram (I follow him, just checked), and ~10,000 people consume his sermons every week.

So if you have a bad apple in Evangelicalism, usually it means harming the lives of tens of thousands of people, as happened recently with Mark Driscoll, who up until he was fired by his own church was a superstar with millions consuming his theology.

And while Tjividjian was dismissed, it was for his personal misbehavior, but NOT for the antinomian theology which he had peddled for many, many years. He wrote books like “Jesus + Nothing = Everything” which sold in every Christian bookstore, and posed such a serious threat to basic Christianity that even the folks at Reformed Forum had to spend a whole podcast understanding his phenomenon and why he’s wrong:
https://reformedforum.org/rmr49/

These are not your high church types but up and down Reformed pastors. And if you listen to the podcast you’ll hear them speak with concern about a whole antinomian movement which was then (and still is) taking over Evangelicalism. See Juliana’s post above.

Here are the same chaps discussing (with concern) “the erosion of Inerrancy in Evangelicalism”
https://reformedforum.org/ctc54/

And here is their general overview of the Evangelical movement (which they are quick to note is wholly at odds with their Reformed tradition):
https://reformedforum.org/ctc33/

That’s good, and we should all be evangelical. I’m also evangelical, just not Evangelical.

 

What is wrong with Francis Chan? He seems to be quite popular around where I live

 

Having spent the better part of 46 years in the American Evangelical world I can say that it is a broad spectrum ranging from antinomian on one end to full on legalist on the other. I have sat in churches and heard preaching at both ends, but most are somewhere in the middle. I would guess that among Big Box churches, most lean in the direction of "easy believism / once saved always saved". Most rank and file Evangelical churches, like my old SBC, would be opposed, at least in theory, to antinomianism, however, it seems to me that their commitment to eternal security leads them in that direction, in practice. My Mother ( an arch Baptist, if you will) swore up and down that I was saved at the age of six because I had knelt and "asked Jesus into my heart" and all of my reprobate behavior for the next 23 years was irrelevant, yet, she would have been offended at the accusation of antinomianism.
She is now reformed Baptist btw

 

I have thought highly of Chan, personally. But he is something of a rock star, and I have become rather disenchanted with that whole world

 

Jakes and Osteen are the only ones on your list that I've even heard of (and I haven't looked hard at any of their teachings). I guess this whole thing was off my radar, and I wouldn't have thought it possible for that line of belief to gain much traction anywhere but on the fringe. I can appreciate your desire to 'head off at the pass' the antinomian sentiment you see growing.

I did listen to the first audio you linked to (thanks), but actually I gleaned more about Tchividjian's book from reading some of the critical Amazon reviews of it.

 

I have never sat in a church that taught 'once saved, always saved.' It would be interesting to know what percentage of US Christians subscribe to that. Any idea? Do the Southern Baptists fail to teach the importance of avoiding sin?

Your 'reprobate behavior for the next 23 years' certainly was relevant, yet it was not enough for God to write you off.

 

Indeed so. An adjective comes to mind etymologically related to a certain natural resource once extensively mined on Pacific islands, which I shall restrain myself from using, and simply call it Bonkers.

 

I’ve seen people actively sin and say its OK because God has already saved them.

 

Indeed so. Every pious Christian is evangelical, but not an Evangelical.

Was Tullian the very unpleasant chap who was the grandson-in-law of Billy Graham, and who used that as a faux-credential to replace the late Dr. James Kennedy (memory eternal) at Coral Ridge, and proceeded to excommunicate the bereaved daughter of Dr. Kennedy and stop the various evangelical initiatives and programming of the church, like The Coral Ridge Hour?

Ahh, I see that it was. Tullian I can pronounce a heretic at least from his approach to worship; his destruction of the traditional worship at Coral Ridge to introduce music which was not decent and in order, and his excommunication of Mrs. Kennedy, and the organist, most of the choir and the other musicians, and the laity who protested his actions, was an act of arbitrary and capricious cruelty evocative of Paul of Samosata and Nestorius. And if he was an antinomian, this is also an established heresy, which is Universalism, and also Monergism, anathematized at the Fifth and Sixth Ecumenical Councils. Monergism of course encapsulates Universalism, Pelagianism and any other theological system where the soteriology is non-synergetic. So that’s two heresies right there. I expect a further analysis would yield more, but I don’t have the stomach for it.

I also really dislike how he exploited his connnection to Billy Graham, memory eternal, despite being different from his pious grandfather in most respects. That scenario to me underscored the importance of an episcopal polity, which while not perfect, has more strength than a Presbyterian polity; if Dr. Kennedy were an Anglican, with his profile he would logically be a bishop, who would have appointed many clergy and had a suffragan bishop earmarked to replace him.

 

I don't know about the American scene, but we were with the Plymouth Open Brethren for a time, and 'once saved, always saved' was definitely taught there. In fact, one young man stood up to preach the gospel (always from the 4 Gospels...), and said "if you are saved tonight, even if you kill 600 people next week, you will still be saved."
I couldn't resist rebuking him afterwards.

 

I wouldn't have statistic, but from observation, "once saved always saved" seems to be the majority opinion. The problem with that, of course, is that some will make a profession of faith and then at some point fall into grave sin or even apostacy to which it would be said that his profession was not true. Well how do I know that MY profession is true? So that form of assurance, for me, is deficient. Rather, my assurance now is in an ongoing relationship with God though Christ, not in a transaction dependant in my own, supposed, sincerity.
Southern Baptists are in fact very strong on morality, sometimes to the point of Phariseeism ("we don't drink and we don't chew and we don't go with girls that do"). My home church is rather moderate. This is held, of course, in tension with their view of assurance

 

Well put Stalwart: I would go a little further in favour of the Anglican position stated at (2) though. Our 'Justification' is actually imputed by God in His omniscience. Faith is merely the means by which we apprehend the fact of its existence. We 'believe' in a judicial act of God, whereby God has declared us justified through no merit of our own will or faith. It is God's declaration that makes us justified, not our faith 'enabling' the justification. It is ALL from God and ALL of God's Grace. We contribute nothing to the fact of our justification, not even our 'faith'.

This is what sets Anglicanism apart theologically from many other denominations. Far from being unenthusiastic though, about the security of our salvation, our salvation deposit or downpayment is in perfect alignment with the teaching of Our Lord and his Apostles. Our assurance of salvation is a daily and hourly experience of life in The Spirit, at war with the flesh, not a mere past experience of 'conversion', 'regeneration' or 'warming of the heart' etc. We are, as Paul put it, "running a race". We are not yet in the winners enclosure, we are being cheered on daily by a great cloud of witnesses and we strive to achieve, through God's good grace and the power of The Holy Spirit. This is the process of 'Sanctification', (As Peter put it), without which no one will see the Lord. We are not earning anything, we are investing in that which is truly lasting, laying up treasure in heaven, Matt.19:21, Mk.10:21, Lk.18:22, and generously doing it with the resources God has Himself given us. God is most certainly a rewarder of those who seek Him both metaphorically and literally.
.

 

Well, wait a minute. I think we have to be careful with that statement. If our justification exists (is imputed to us) prior to our coming to believe in Christ as our Lord and Savior, then are you saying that we are 'born again' prior in time to our formation of faith? Does Romans 10:9-10 say, if we confess Jesus is Lord and believe in our hearts, we already were saved? No, it says we shall be saved, for with the heart man believeth unto righteousness and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. Faith is not "merely the means by which we apprehend the fact" of our justification. Faith is the key element by which we receive justification. This does not necessary have to be viewed an "act" on our part, per se, but a "fact," the existence of said fact being analogous to a spiritual version of "one's outstretched hand opens up" so that God, who has been holding this gift in His own hand expectantly, can finally place it in our opened hand. We are not justified until this occurrence. We do not receive the promised Holy Spirit until this time. Our justification is there with God, waiting for us, but we do not have it until we believe. I read once something to the effect that the believing and the receiving are inseparable, inextricably commingled, and simultaneous, and that one cannot happen without the other.

Now (as a side matter) to broach the issue of whether our salvation involves an "act", some would point out the relevance of confessing verbally (Jesus said, if you confess me before men I will confess you before the Father, but if you deny me (or by implication, refuse to confess) I will deny you before the Father. And we all acknowledge the relevance of baptism, an important component of which is to be an outward act of testimony to all people concerning our faith (belief, having accepted the gift of redemption). So I personally do not think it so important to distinguish faith (belief, trust in God's promise) as a "non-act" in a zealous effort to claim that no "works" were involved, because some outward acts are involved (yet they do not seem IMO to be the sort of acts that come under the heading of "works" per Paul's explanations in Romans, Galatians, Ephesians, etc.). They are "acts of faith," acts performed in (and because of and in witness to) faith. I think we could perhaps lump these acts of faith in as fitting within the category of James' works, though, for without a willingness to perform such works as confessing Christ and being baptized, the person's faith is dead.

Yet I do not view faith itself as an act on our part. A decision to assent mentally would be an act of sorts, but genuine belief in Christ is something that either happens in us or it doesn't; we can't "work up the gumption" to believe. Faith is a change of heart, a spiritual change, and thus is not "an act" per se.

I hope I have not been careless or negligent with my language, but one never knows...

 

which is Universalism.................. I thought that teaching universalism is the truth was declared heresy not that it might be true and it is ok to hope for it like Bishop Ware does.

 

We can not know we have justification, (in the temporal sphere), until we believe that we have it. But in the eternal sphere our salvation dates from the foundation of the world. Matt.25:34, Eph.1:4. It is due to God's omniscience, that He can foreknow every decision we have ever made and will ever make in the temporal sphere, from the point of view of eternity, and hence make a judicial decree in the eternal realm, that we are, as an individual, called, chosen, justified and then made perfect to all good works, according to His purpose. John 17:23. Eph.2:10. Rom.8:28, Rom.9:10-12.

That is why we can baptise infants, knowing that God will take care of the eternal destiny of the children of believers. They are GOD's children, not merely our own. They also are 'bought with a price', just as were their parent(s). God will therefore see to it that they fulfill their Faith obligations, offering them every opportunity, lifelong, to draw near to Him, or suffer the consequences of attempting to separate themselves from His grace and providence, becoming wayward renegades and covenant breakers.
.