A Delicate Balance in Fundamentalism

Are there balanced fundamentalist churches out there!?

Not in Dayton OH, at least not within reasonable driving distance. My dh and I visited several IFB churches in our area, and we were enduring long, drawn out altar calls, 10 minutes of exposition and 30 minutes of story-telling, and hearing about great men of faith like Bob Gray and Jack Hyles (they obviously did not get the memo).

Some traditions are deeply ingrained - you’d think passing the offering plate was a sacrament akin to the Lord’s Supper… except that they pass the plate every week and have the Lord’s Supper once a year, if that. Makes you go hhhmmmmmmm.

It is going to take time and effort to bring authentic, historic Fundamentalism back to center.

“Balanced” Fundamentalism is almost impossible. I say that for historical and sociological reasons.

First, let’s talk about group polarization. Basically, group polarization tells us that in a group of people who knowingly share a similar trait, the group will enhance their preexisting tendencies, or in other words, strengthen their average tendency. This shift is noticeable after very short amounts of time. For example, there were studies on French students which revealed that some of them had weak to moderate anti-American sentiments in their politics. So, they put these students together in a discussion group that had to do with French-American politics. By the end of the discussion, the anti-American sentiment had intensified considerably, so that the group was more anti-American than any of the individual members had been previous to the group discussion. Group polarization has been pretty well known and supported by studies for a few decades.

But group polarization isn’t always that dangerous. After all, sentiments subject to quick intensification can also de-intensify quickly. People shift their attitudes all the time. But let’s say we put those French students back into that discussion group 5 days per week for half an hour. Over time, the polarization may become more intense and more permanent. But there’s still a complicating factor. These students have lives outside the group. They may have other friends who don’t share their anti-American sentiment, and when they engage in conversations, it provides a counterbalance. Likewise, the students might watch news or read papers that don’t have an anti-American sentiment, and this moderates the effects of polarization.

But let’s go one step farther. What if we forbade those students to discuss politics outside the group? Also, any political news or commentary could be read or viewed only with the group. Once counterbalancing influences are eliminated, there is nothing to prevent a feedback loop of intensification. Over time, this could get ugly. The anti-American sentiment might be expressed in harmful words and actions. Indeed, group polarization is one of the more popular explanations for terrorism.

At first, it might seem ridiculous to link a phenomenon used in the explanation of terrorism (among many other things) to fundamentalism. But it isn’t. Just Sunday one of my friends played for me part of a sermon he had picked up while driving through Georgia. This Baptist pastor was talking about Islam and said, and I quote: “Shoot em! Nuke em! Nuke em till they glow and then shoot em in the dark!” And the congregation roared with amens and applause. Now, I ask, how does a Georgia pastor advocate mass murder from a pulpit and Christians respond with cheers? Group polarization.

Fundamentalism, since the middle of the 20th century, has stressed separation as a primary characteristic. That means that fundamentalist churches are, by design, groups that have little interaction outside the group, and thus very little defense against group polarization. As the ability to hear outside criticism fades, so does the ability to be self-critical. Thus, any fundamentalist church is headed in one of two directions: either toward a weakening of its separatist identity, or toward an increasingly unhealthy extremism.

Now, I have been in churches that call themselves fundamentalist and yet seem to me to be healthy. I have friends who are this way. But I’ve noticed some interesting things about them. When I look at my friends’ bookshelves, they’re being influenced primarily either by Reformed(ish) evangelicals such as Tim Keller and John Piper or by dispensationalist evangelicals such as David Jeremiah and Darrell Bock. They also tend to get outside the fundamentalist bubble to go to conferences such as Together for the Gospel or the Evangelical Theological Society. Some of them are taking a class or two at a non-fundamentalist seminary. So, my conclusion is that my healthy fundamentalist friends are really not practicing much separation at all, and consequently, are balanced because they’re not really that fundamentalist. By continuing to accept influences from people outside the group, they resist the danger of group polarization.

There are balanced fundamentalist churches out there. They are separated from apostasy, liberalism, false doctrine and sinful living. They just don’t call themselves fundamentalists.

I think that some of the imbalance comes from those who believe that separation from disobedient brethren is as important as separation from false doctrine. Their practice of separation from disobedient brethren is not intended to “gain a brother” but seems to be a means of defining their own identity.

In my life I’ve seen Fundamental Baptists disdain Fundamental Presbyterians. I’ve seen fundamentalists separate from each other over non-Biblical issues. Recently I discovered a fellowship of fundamental churches whose primary cause for existence is separation from false doctrine AND disobedient brethren. (As a side note, in listening to them they continually confuse apostates (i.e. Robert Schuller with men like Mark Dever.) The current state of affairs fins them somewhat distrustful with each other (aren’t all of us disobedient brethren?) over things like Patch the Pairate, AWANA, Getty music, schools they recommend, ……the list could go on.

[Ron Bean]

There are balanced fundamentalist churches out there. They are separated from apostasy, liberalism, false doctrine and sinful living. They just don’t call themselves fundamentalists.

So, if the balanced fundamentalists don’t call themselves fundamentalists, then all the churches who do call themselves fundamentalist are imbalanced. Or, one can be a balanced fundamentalist only by severely attenuating one’s fundamentalist identity. That’s pretty much what I said. (But it raises the question, what do these churches call themselves?)

I didn’t mean to imply that all self-called fundamentalist churches are imbalanced.

While these churches don’t call themselves fundamentalist, the acknowledge they have a respect for historic fundamentalism and will gladly explain their beliefs and practice to anyone. They just don’t use the label.

There are balanced fundamentalists and tchurches out there. But much of it will all depend on the definition of balance. For instance, Charlie has defined it in such a way that leads only to his conclusion (separation primarily, and those that are healthy don’t actually practice separation as evidenced by the books on their shelves). That works well for his point, but doesn’t work well if you happen to know or recognize fundamentalists outside his definition. It is true that fundamentalism was recognized precisely because it didn’t depart from separation as a key issue whereas the new evangelicalism did. It is also true that many claiming to be fundamentalists are wrong in these issues. Ron Bean is right that there are those who continually confuse issues and men. But there are others who do not. There are some who make issues out of things like version, kids’ clubs, etc. But there are many who do not.

I doubt most fundamentalists would have any issue with reading people outside their particular orbit. So I would lose a lot of sleep worrying over it.

In the end, I think the pursuit of “balanced fundamentalism” is the wrong one. I think we pursue the Scriptures and obedience, and when we do, we will look very similar to fundamentalism in the best sense. And because we are fundamentalists, we will have a legitimate grounds for separation from those who do not walk with us.

I have used the quote of Dr. Mac a number of times from the pulpit to illustrate a balanced ministry. If one examines Scripture, it seems that truth is combined with various character qualities, such as mercy and truth, or grace and truth, or love and truth. We can extend love, mercy, or grace until the truth becomes compromised.

I do believe that the past has taught us to have a healthy skepticism of evangelicals, and that it continues to be borne out today. We may find individual ministries which we can more fully support, whether it is evangelicalism or fundamentalism, but that we ought to be careful as to what we really can support wholeheartedly. Do we give our allegiance to individuals and ministries too easily? And shouldn’t we be concerned as leaders of ministries in particular that we demand and expect truth be honored and exalted? The test of time is one of the best way to qualify and/or filter out those that we choose to partner with or associate with.