Moving Toward Authenticity: Musings on Fundamentalism, Part 2

tracksDr. Doug MacLachlan presented this paper at Central Seminary’s fall conference on Oct. 17, 2011. Read part 1. Part two begins with the second of three indispensible necessities for authentic fundamentalism.

2. Pursuing the radical center

It was G. K. Chesterton who suggested that the Christian life is like a narrow pathway with deep ditches on both sides. For much of its history, large segments of the body of Christ have too often found themselves off the “narrow pathway” (the radical center) and in one or the other of these ditches. It doesn’t matter which ditch we fall into. In both of them, believers become muddied and defiled. In this condition, the watching world is once again receiving a skewed view of Christ and His body. Far too large a percentage of the evangelical world has descended into the “left ditch.” And doubtless, far too much of the fundamentalist world has descended into the “right ditch.” This tragic descent into the ditches mandates a deep commitment to a strong pursuit of the “radical center,” if we are to recover historic, mainstream fundamentalism.

A word of caution is necessary here. In coming up out of these ditches, there is often a tendency to overreact and miss the radical center by passing right over it, and ending up in the opposite ditch. The Christian faith is replete with examples of this. When we “over-correct” we don’t correct. We simply create a whole new world of hypocrisies, because both the right and left ditches are full of hypocrisies. The only place to find authenticity (genuine Christianity) is in the radical center.

Incidentally, the radical center should not be thought of as a compromising posture that allows for one foot in the church and the other in the world, as though we were straddling the fence. Rather it is the narrow pathway defined by Jesus in Matthew 7:13-14. Pursuing the radical center means absolute love to the Triune Godhead, and absolute loyalty to absolute truth. This combination defines precisely what it means to pursue the radical center.

3. Recognizing the interdependence of the hard and soft virtues

Peter Kreeft has argued that our ancestors were better than we are at the hard virtues such as courage and chastity, holiness, righteousness, and justice. We, on the other hand, are better than they were at the soft virtues such as kindness and philanthropy, love, mercy, and grace. But you can no more specialize in virtue than in anatomical organs. The virtues are like organs in the body—interdependent—the one cannot survive without the other. In other words, the hard virtues are like bones in the body; the soft virtues are like tissues in the body. Bones without tissues are a skeleton. Tissues without bones are a jelly-fish. Neither can survive without the other, and apart from their union our full humanity is lost.

In the very same way, authentic Christianity cannot survive without both the hard and the soft virtues. They are absolutely interdependent. Too much of evangelicalism has opted for the soft virtues, exclusive of the hard. Too much of fundamentalism has opted for the hard virtues, exclusive of the soft. Neither of these movements will be capable of authentic Christianity or genuine ministry, until they are deeply committed to the union of both the hard and the soft virtues. The hard virtues strengthen the soft, and the soft virtues temper the hard. We cannot specialize in one or the other and hope to survive, because without both we inevitably forfeit our integrity, ministry, and authenticity.

And this, too, is a reality that has biblical justification. Paul’s final word to the “dysfunctional” body of believers at Corinth is: “Watch, stand fast in the faith, be brave, be strong. Let all that you do be done with (in) love” (1 Cor. 16:13-14). This call to watch alertly, stand faithfully, and lead courageously (v. 13), is Paul’s mandate to embrace the “hard virtues.” But his warning to beware of the lessons we learn in warfare by loving visibly and tangibly in all that we do (v. 14), is his mandate to embrace the “soft virtues.” Corinth’s dysfunctional behavior and missional failure would continue unless both ends of this equation were to be honored.

For us at Central Baptist Theological Seminary, this is the critical balance that defines an authentic Fundamentalism. We remain deeply committed to historic, mainstream fundamentalism; a fundamentalism that is marked by a combination of grit, grace, and scholarship; a fundamentalism that is theologically sound, exegetically rich, dispositionally gracious, and intellectually astute. But we have no desire to join forces with either left-ditch evangelicalism or right-ditch fundamentalism.

As I close, I would like to make one final observation. It seems to me that on the one hand post-conservative and neo- or generic-evangelicals are bolting to the left. On the other hand, it appears that neo- or hyper-fundamentalists are bolting to the right. There is, however, a group on both sides of this divide that appear to be in pursuit of the radical center. Both groups represent minority movements in their respective theological settings. Confessional or conservative evangelicals aspire to distance themselves from the majority of the evangelical movement that is bolting left. And natal or historic, mainstream fundamentalists aspire to distance themselves from the majority of the fundamentalist movement that is bolting right. This looks very much to me as though both these groups are moving toward the radical center.

Kevin Bauder has made the point that,

Mainstream fundamentalists are coming to the conclusion that they must distance themselves from hyper-fundamentalists, and they are displaying a new openness to conversation and even some cooperation with conservative evangelicals. Younger fundamentalists in particular are sensitive to the inconsistency of limiting fellowship to their left but not to their right. (Four Views On The Spectrum of Evangelicalism, Andrew David Naselli, Collin Hansen, General Editors, Zondervan, 2011, p. 45)

He argues further that, “Many fundamentalists (and I am among them) are growing in their appreciation of the contribution that confessional evangelicals have made… . Yet differences remain between us, the largest of which is our assessment of indifferentism” (Ibid., p.103). Following J. Gresham Machen, Bauder defines “indifferentism” as the offense of those “who personally believed the fundamentals of the gospel but who extended Christian recognition to others who did not.” Though confessional evangelicals are “not indifferentists themselves,” they have exhibited a reluctance to “distance themselves from indifferentism or to warn against it publicly” (Ibid., p.102).

Nevertheless, though confessional evangelicals and historic, mainstream fundamentalists are not a perfect match, and though it is true that real and significant differences remain between them, it is fair to say that both of these groups seem equally committed to finding the radical center, and that both often have much more in common with one another than with those in their own movements who have jettisoned the radical center for one or the other of the ditches. In this regard, Bauder affirms what confessional evangelical, Mark Dever, recently said: “There is nothing wrong with our having fences. But let us keep our fences low and shake hands often.” I concur with Bauder’s response: “That remark nicely summarizes the sense of a growing number of fundamentalists” (Ibid., p. 103).

To begin with then, achieving an authentic fundamentalism will require a deep-seated commitment to the three indispensable necessities, which we have attempted to address in this essay:

  • Expressing holiness and love simultaneously (1 Thess. 3:12-13). It mandates a combination of both critical thought and cruciform.
  • Pursuing the radical center (Matt. 7:13-14). It mandates a combination of absolute love to the Triune God and absolute loyalty to absolute truth.
  • Recognizing the interdependence of the hard and soft virtues (1 Cor. 16:13-14). It mandates an equal passion for and implementation of both sets of virtues.

These define for me the broad, general, and I believe biblical, principles which provide the parameters or boundaries within which we should do our work as we move forward toward an authentic fundamentalism.

Discussion

[Aaron Blumer]
[Don] But, please, on this right ditch business, can you show me in the Scriptures where that is found? Do you think it is possible to pursue purity too far?
In a word, yes.

To clarify, it is possible to pursue our understanding of purity too far. God has only revealed so much and application is a human thing.

But this verse is relevant…

Mk 7:7–8 And in vain they worship Me, Teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’ 8 For laying aside the commandment of God, you hold the tradition of men— the washing of pitchers and cups, and many other such things you do.” (nkjv)
Aaron, how is this the “right ditch”? Weren’t they entirely wrong? They turned pure religion into a kind of superstitious idolatry.

The expression of their sin was different from the way sin was expressed by the pagans, but it was ‘the same thing’ - see Rm 2.3.

The talk of ‘right ditch’ vs. ‘left ditch’ makes this very political, as if truth is found in the minds of reasonable men. (Guess who gets to decide what ‘reasonable’ means?) In fact, following God is spiritual, not political, and God is always right.

Maranatha!
Don Johnson
Jer 33.3

[Don Johnson] I can’t speak for others, but for myself I am concerned about the things that are happening at NIU. How is it illegitimate to ask questions about such things? I am not calling for separation, but I’m not sure I could recommend young people attend there until these questions are cleared up and a more “certain sound” is heard coming out of NIU. These issues must be discussed and should be discussed in public, in my opinion. No more “back rooms”, openness and transparency are supposedly the watchwords of the day, no?
Yes, they should. But what objective information do we have to discuss re: NIU in particular? Blogposts where someone asserts boldly that NIU is embracing CCM without proof? Vague assertions that the grad student programs are having in teachers from outside of our circles, without knowing what the actual content that’s being taught by said teacher?

Let’s face it, Don. It’s a whole lot easier to stand up, hold up a book or video, and say in a sermon that ‘this is heresy’ than it is to actually prove that said item contains heresy. That’s the methodology that BJ Jr. used to attack MacArthur. Do you REALLY want to go back to those days? I am sure that you don’t.

It all comes down to sources of information. Personally, I want proof - objective, verifiable, public truth - that I can see before I’m ready to start assigning the heresy or backsliding cards to people or places. Assuming things - especially when said claims are based on a lack of evidence to the contrary - usually winds up making fools out of both you and I.

"Our task today is to tell people — who no longer know what sin is...no longer see themselves as sinners, and no longer have room for these categories — that Christ died for sins of which they do not think they’re guilty." - David Wells

[Don JohnsonI’m not sure I could recommend young people attend there until these questions are cleared up and a more “certain sound” is heard coming out of NIU.
There’s nothing quite like being assumed guilty rather than being presumed innocent — and towards a “brother” (institution), no less. Wouldn’t it be a wonderful thing when one could give their fellow believers the benefit of the doubt rather than put them into the position of having to justify every decision and defend themselves from every accusation — no matter how insignificant the charge or source?

Sigh.

Dan Burrell Cornelius, NC Visit my Blog "Whirled Views" @ www.danburrell.com

Aaron, how is this the “right ditch”? Weren’t they entirely wrong? They turned pure religion into a kind of superstitious idolatry.
I think Aaron’s point about the right ditch is used because enforcing the rules meant more to the Pharisees than making sure that they understood what the rules were meant to do and be (Matthew 15:3-6, Matthew 23:2-9, 13, 23-24). If the Pharisees had taught that all that mattered was that people wanted to do the right thing and excused behavior, would we not refer to them as falling in the ‘left’ ditch? If so, there should be ‘right’ ditch - how else would we know of a right side of the ditch?

Here’s an alternate question that might be helpful for illustration - are we more interested in defending Fundamentalism or in defending the Gospel? If a person’s identity is wrapped up in ‘being a Fundamentalist’ as opposed to being ‘Gospel centered’, then I think it’s correct to say that they may be off-track.

"Our task today is to tell people — who no longer know what sin is...no longer see themselves as sinners, and no longer have room for these categories — that Christ died for sins of which they do not think they’re guilty." - David Wells

I think we give some words too much baggage. For instance, the idea that moderation=compromise, when moderation is commanded in Phil. 4:5. I think the way it is used there is to indicate propriety, a thoughtfulness and patience in how we deal with others.

But is that embraced along with doctrinal militancy in IFBism (in general)? Have many not fallen for the idea that militancy literally means beating up others verbally (and sometimes physically)? But how is this consistent with James 3:17? But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, and easy to be entreated, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality, and without hypocrisy. Some camps of IFBism are as far from peaceable or easily petitioned, gentle, merciful, impartial… as you can get. I’ve heard and read again and again over the years, that “If you don’t know what I am saying is God’s truth, you are an idiot”, “If you don’t agree then there’s the door- don’t let it hit you in the butt on the way out”, “If you don’t understand what I’m saying, God’s probably through with you”… What they are really saying is “Trust me” without feeling that they need to provide any evidentiary support for their contentions. They simply demand loyalty, and that loyalty is their barometer of other’s spirituality. That is idolatry.

Funny how many say “You’re following a man, you’re following a man” and every man that says that is following a man. Men may be good examples, and have wisdom from study and experience, but none of them are the Holy Spirit or God manifest in the flesh.

I think the right and left ditches are composed of militant IFBism that may be ‘right’ doctrinally, but their practice is devoid of compassion and mercy and good fruit, and the other extreme is those who have so much compassion it practically oozes out of their pores, but they have no doctrinal backbone. Moderation is having sound doctrine and practice. The middle is not compromise- the middle is balance.



“Stridency” is not equal to “Militancy” nor is it a synonym. Points to frequently forgotten.

Dan Burrell Cornelius, NC Visit my Blog "Whirled Views" @ www.danburrell.com



“Be not righteous over much.”

“What does it mean to be overly righteous? Of course God is perfectly righteous; this does not mean He has taken it to an extreme. Clearly Solomon here is not addressing genuine piety, righteousness, or wisdom. He is speaking of what all too often passes for it. So what does this mean? Not to put too fine a point on it, it means…Nice Christian. Priggish Christian. Sanctimonious Christian. Tight-shoes Christian. Pursed lips Christian. Stickler Christian. Insufferable Christian. Prudish Christian. Doctrinally correct Christian. Know-it-all Christian. Ostentatious Christian. Quiet-time-every-day-or-I’ll-go-to-Hell Christian. Conceited Christian. Orthodox Christian unChristian Christian.” -Douglas Wilson

Joy at the End of the Tether: the Inscrutable Wisdom of Ecclesiastes.

[Jay C.] Let’s face it, Don. It’s a whole lot easier to stand up, hold up a book or video, and say in a sermon that ‘this is heresy’ than it is to actually prove that said item contains heresy. That’s the methodology that BJ Jr. used to attack MacArthur. Do you REALLY want to go back to those days? I am sure that you don’t.
Personally, I would LOVE to have Dr Bob Jr still around. Not sure he would like to be here.

And, quite frankly, I think you are doing to him what you say he did to others. I don’t think his complaint against MacArthur was based on nothing. I don’t say he dealt with the whole situation as well as he could have, but I don’t think you are being fair to imply that his complaints were based on nothing.

Maranatha!
Don Johnson
Jer 33.3

[Dan Burrell]
[Don Johnson] I’m not sure I could recommend young people attend there until these questions are cleared up and a more “certain sound” is heard coming out of NIU.
There’s nothing quite like being assumed guilty rather than being presumed innocent — and towards a “brother” (institution), no less. Wouldn’t it be a wonderful thing when one could give their fellow believers the benefit of the doubt rather than put them into the position of having to justify every decision and defend themselves from every accusation — no matter how insignificant the charge or source?
You know, you don’t seem to know why I have reservations about recommending NIU at the present time. You assume that my reasons have to be the same as someone else who is loudly complaining about them. But you don’t kniow, do you?

In any case, Matt has been quite public about changes of philosophy they are implementing, people they are associating wiith, etc. These are not matters of interpretation or vague suspicions. I don’t agree with some of the things he has said or with some of the things he is doing with the school. It isn’t a matter of being assumed guilty, there are clear objective things he is doing that I disagree with.

On the other hand, you seem to want to assume that I am guilty of base motives in having a disagreement or concern with Matt/NIU. It would be nice if you presumed innocence and actually considered those points of disagreement as worth discussing.

Maranatha!
Don Johnson
Jer 33.3

[Shaynus]… -Douglas Wilson

Joy at the End of the Tether: the Inscrutable Wisdom of Ecclesiastes.
… joined the apostolic band just when?

Still waiting for some Scripture to prove the ‘right ditch’ analogy.

Maranatha!
Don Johnson
Jer 33.3

“What does it mean to be overly righteous?…Doctrinally correct Christian…” -Douglas Wilson
Since when is being doctrinally correct to be viewed in any sense as something that is overly righteous? But then with Wilson’s grotesque Federal Vision error I do understand his wishing to have doctrinal correctness viewed as an undesirable property.

[Don Johnson]
[Jay C.] Let’s face it, Don. It’s a whole lot easier to stand up, hold up a book or video, and say in a sermon that ‘this is heresy’ than it is to actually prove that said item contains heresy. That’s the methodology that BJ Jr. used to attack MacArthur. Do you REALLY want to go back to those days? I am sure that you don’t.
Personally, I would LOVE to have Dr Bob Jr still around. Not sure he would like to be here.
Oh, I’m sure he’d rather be in heaven than on SI. Can’t say I blame him :)
And, quite frankly, I think you are doing to him what you say he did to others. I don’t think his complaint against MacArthur was based on nothing. I don’t say he dealt with the whole situation as well as he could have, but I don’t think you are being fair to imply that his complaints were based on nothing.
You’re sidestepping the question, Don. Do you really want to go back to the day when Pastor X (I’m not thinking of anyone in particular here - just a hypothetical pastor) tells you who is and isn’t OK to fellowship with? Or do you want to be able to follow the dictates of Scripture and your own conscience, which is what you will use when you stand before God, acc. to Romans 14:10-12?

His comments *were* based on nothing - or at best based on comments ripped out of context and used unfairly - which is why BJIII finally admitted such and assured Phil and Dr. Mac that it never should have happened. But it did, and the reverberations are still ongoing today, even though BJU hasn’t actually come out and said so publicly.

Now, as for the Scripture thing - do you agree with my argument re: the Pharisees? Or did you not see the connection there?

"Our task today is to tell people — who no longer know what sin is...no longer see themselves as sinners, and no longer have room for these categories — that Christ died for sins of which they do not think they’re guilty." - David Wells

That’s a strong claim that I made, so http://www.spurgeon.org/~phil/articles/blood.htm here’s documentation :
In the BJU article, Jones quoted MacArthur as saying, “It is not His bleeding that saved me, but His dying.” Jones then cited Hebrews 9:22 (“without shedding of blood is no remission”) and intoned, “MacArthur’s position is heresy.”

On June 13, 1986, MacArthur wrote to Bob Jones III, complaining that the magazine had taken snippets of his remarks out of context and deliberately made them seem sinister. MacArthur assured the magazine’s editors that he absolutely affirms the necessity of the shed blood of Christ for atonement and explained that the point he was trying to make in the quoted excerpt was merely that the saving efficacy of Christ’s blood is not because of some property in the blood itself, but rather because Christ had poured it out in death as a substitute for sinners. Indeed, in the very same source Dr. Jones, Jr. had selectively quoted from, MacArthur had written,
Peter calls His blood “precious” and I agree … but Peter’s reference there is to the sacrificial nature of His death… . The phrase “Christ died for our sin” (Romans 5:8; 1 Corinthians 15:3) expresses the truth that death was the penalty, not blood… I Peter 2:24 is not saying we are saved by his wounds… . If we say that it is the blood that saves … what are we saying? His actual blood, physically, saves us? Or perhaps we are stuck with the Roman Catholic Church “perpetual offering” view that some hold. This view says that Christ perpetually sacrifices Himself. He took His blood into heaven and keeps offering it. Hebrews 10:12-14 forbids such a view. Clearly it was His death … once for all. His shed blood was part of the violence of it, and speaks of it as sacrifice, but we are saved by His substitutionary death for us, not by the chemicals in His blood.
After an exchange of correspondence in which MacArthur thoroughly and carefully explained his original remarks, Jones wrote on October 16, 1986, saying, “I believe the position [MacArthur] has taken in this matter is a heretical position, and all the correspondence in the world is not going to affect my convictions on that point.”

Finally, five years after the original correspondence with Jones, Jr., Bob Jones III wrote MacArthur (July 3, 1991) and assured MacArthur that BJU had tried to let the matter drop. (as opposed to coming clean and admitting it was wrong) He clearly did not regard MacArthur’s position as heresy:
Once you published in your own paper an article stating that the blood was “efficacious and meritorious” we have never said another word about it. The issue was resolved at that point; and it has been our joy to tell people who continue to be concerned that they can be at ease, and refer them to your own published statements as evidence.
The point isn’t to rehash endlessly the he-said, he-said. The point is to find out if that’s the kind of Fundamentalism that you really want to be a part of, where things can be ‘dropped’ only after the malicious rumor has spread and metastasized.

"Our task today is to tell people — who no longer know what sin is...no longer see themselves as sinners, and no longer have room for these categories — that Christ died for sins of which they do not think they’re guilty." - David Wells

[Alex Guggenheim]
“What does it mean to be overly righteous?…Doctrinally correct Christian…” -Douglas Wilson
Since when is being doctrinally correct to be viewed in any sense as something that is overly righteous? But then with Wilson’s grotesque Federal Vision error I do understand his wishing to have doctrinal correctness viewed as an undesirable property.
If someone is looking to their doctrinal correctness as their righteousness, then that would be a form of righteous over much. Doug Wilson doesn’t have to be correct in all counts in order to have a point in others.

[Don] Aaron, how is this the “right ditch”? Weren’t they entirely wrong? They turned pure religion into a kind of superstitious idolatry.

The expression of their sin was different from the way sin was expressed by the pagans, but it was ‘the same thing’ - see Rm 2.3.
I’m thinking of “right” here as the direction of restriction and left as the direction of accommodation or acceptance. That seems to fit MacLachlan’s usage here. (And maybe isn’t far from Machen’s as well)

I was chewing on this question the other day, before this article came to us… and in reference to something else entirely. But it fits: Is there anything that is impossible to overemphasize?

I decided that I think the answer is no. The next question was, what are the problems that constitute overemphasis? Several came to mind:

1- when emphasis on something leads to the neglect of something else that is similarly—or more—important

2- when emphasis on something leads to a distortion of the thing itself (as when overemphasis on God’s love, for example, results in misconstruing what His love even is—so that people understand it mean something like “warm tolerance.”)

3- when emphasis on something leads to incorrectly identifying it as the thing foundational to other things

4- when emphasis on something leads to overused terms and, eventually, championing buzzwords rather than substance

There were some others I don’t remember now. Hope to get this fully baked one of these days… it’s only half baked right now.

But here’s the relevance: it is possible to emphasize “correctness,” “purity” and the like so much, that they become distortions of themselves or take on an importance to us that leads us to justify the neglect of other things like right affections, brotherly love, patience and humility.

To me that’s really where the “right” ditch is. It doesn’t consist of being “too right” but of overemphasizing “being right” with the result that we are, ironically, less right.

This is what I think the Pharisees are faulted for doing in Mark 7:7-8. They took the idea of ceremonial cleanness and emphasized it so much that they began to restrict what God had not restricted—and then even to justify blatant wrongdoing in the name of the (mostly invented) letter of the law. They become comfortable with being impressive on the outside while inwardly full of the rot of decaying corpses.

(This is probably something like what Wilson meant by “overly righteous” as well… he is sometimes elliptical)

Views expressed are always my own and not my employer's, my church's, my family's, my neighbors', or my pets'. The house plants have authorized me to speak for them, however, and they always agree with me.