What's Postconservative Evangelical? Theology Unfinished, 'Inerrancy' Not Dogmatic: Roger Olson

Does anyone else besides me ever entertain the thought that sometimes academia appears so disconnected from the vast majority of believers within Christ’s church that it makes your spiritual heart hurt? That is my statement of sorrowful bewilderment at such verbiage that Olson is putting forth. To think I preach with confidence and joy, affirming a “thus saith the Lord” according to Scripture, when I should realize that there is some new nuance and qualification that I should be pursuing.

Agreed. That’s the feeling I get when I read many academic articles, and it makes me feel sick.

It reminds me of the reality that a lot of nonsense is published by universities because you can’t get your Ph.D. for saying previous people got it right; since there’s only so much truth out there, especially in the liberal arts, that means a lot of falsehood gets published because that’s how you get the degree and a shot at a professorship.

That noted, even as one who will freely admit that his approach to Scripture follows the “KISS” principle fairly closely, it strikes me that there is a tremendous amount of good scholarship to be done with Scripture. For example, I would dare suggest that there is a tremendous amount of good analysis to be done with prophecy that falls into neither the “spiritualizing” trap nor John Hagee’s “Paperback Writer” approach. So I think Olson’s critique might somewhat reflect some valid critiques of how “we” tend to operate, but it’s unfair when one steps back and takes a good look at how conservative theology ought to operate. No need to jettison Sola Scriptura or the inerrancy of Scripture to do that.

Olson’s beliefs on theology go back many years. See his Who Needs Theology (1996, InterVarsity Press) where he lays the groundwork for what you see today.

where the anti-academic sensibility in the pew came from.