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Man’s Lust As An Agent of Change

Scripture itself chronicles an entire world history long Satanic attack on scripture. It is one of the few major components of apostasy, even as seen in 2 Peter 1. Man wants to do what he wants to do, what the Bible calls “lust.” He follows his own lust. The authority of scripture gets in the way of man’s own desires, so he follows the ideology of Satan by attacking scripture. Without the Bible, authority returns to himself and he goes his own way without compunction.

People who want to do what they want to do are the audience for evangelical outreach. These people look askance at true Christianity, wanting something closer to what pleases them not God. Mere biblical stuff does not attract or allure them.

Evangelical churches and organizations have choices about growth and then budgets. Evangelicals like the same comforts as their potential audience, who want to please themselves. They “get” that audience, because they operate in a similar trajectory. Christianity becomes another way of getting things, except with a lot of the negatives removed. It’s not true, but a desirable narrative, what people would want their Christianity to be. Much in scripture gets in the way of the false narrative.

The Bible becomes the casualty in the clash of desires, please one’s self or pleasing God. These desires compete and something’s got to go. Evangelicals will not keep their attendees without something going. One can see the biblical and historical doctrine of scripture change.

Naturalism in Academia As An Agent of Change

Naturalism also rose and took hold in academic institutions in the United States in the 19th century. This included evangelical ones and then churches out of these. Supernaturalism became unacceptable. The doctrine of the Bible reads from scripture as supernatural. God is in charge of His Words and He wants, even requires, people to follow suit. If professing academics try to take that supernatural point of view, they won’t fit in academia. They won’t be the smart ones, might not find their supernaturalism acceptable for publication.

So how did and does biblical, historical, or classical bibliology change? How did even evangelicals move the goalposts? It’s not always through all evangelicals taking the new positions, but it’s also accommodation of the new positions.

This series will not cover every diversion from scriptural bibliology, but it will represent the point of the title, moving the goalposts for bibliology by evangelicalism.

Moving the Goalposts on Inspiration

Scripture teaches that “all scripture is given by inspiration of God” (2 Timothy 3:16), so that is true. The historical, biblical position on inspiration is “verbal, plenary inspiration.” God inspired every Word and all the Words. The authority of scripture comes from that, even as seen in the rest of 2 Timothy 3:16: “and is profitable for doctrine,” etc. The authority of scripture proceeds from inspiration.

I provide three examples of moving the goalposts on inspiration, not necessarily in any order. Evangelicals see large numbers of deconversions or departures from the faith. These young people or students see apparent inconsistencies, incongruities, contradictions, or what look like errors. I remind you of the mixture of these discoveries with their lust. Why should these young people continue in this path without a perfect book?

The Christological Approach Pushed by Dan Wallace and Others

A text or book verbally, plenarily inspired by God must be perfect, every word and all of them. Since people “don’t see that,” they push the eject button. The presupposition for verbal, plenary scripture comes from scripture. Some might call that circular reasoning. Critics would say that no one should operate on circular reasoning. Daniel Wallace, longtime professor at Dallas Theological Seminary, offers instead what he calls an incarnational or Christological approach.

Describing Christology over Bibliology

This incarnational approach defers to errors in scripture, but says that the Word isn’t a textbook. In fact, the Word is Christ. Christ is perfect, so His Word is perfect. Sure you find contradictions and errors there in the Book. Wallace can’t vouch for a literal inerrancy. There is a mystical aspect to the faith, that starts with Jesus and not the Book.

The high view of scripture according to Wallace comes because of the perfection of Christ. He is the Word. Then those who start with Jesus go to scripture with the same view He had. As you read this, I can understand your seeing or thinking there are some gaps in Wallace’s position.

You might think, “Faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God” (Romans 10:17). It seems faith proceeds from the Word of God, not an experience external to the Word of God with Christ. What is this mystical experience? And if Christ is Who He is, I would expect Who He says He is, then isn’t His Word actually perfect? That is what He says. If He says it, and then we look into scripture and find it isn’t true, what does that say for the testimony of Christ?

John Wenham

Wallace seems somewhat honest about his expectations of the Bible. They are diminished by scholarship. He went back to the drawing board on inspiration, authority, and inerrancy, unlike when Bart Ehrman came to that same juncture. He found a book written by John Wenham in 1972, called, The Bible and Christ. There Wallace found this innovative position, and it’s the one he pushes on his students. Christ is a Perfect Christ no matter if the actual Words of scripture are perfect, and He would contend that we know that by a supernatural, extra-scriptural experience with Christ.

John Frame found the same shortcomings of Wenham’s book in a review he wrote in 2012. This is not an endorsement of Frame, but I would agree with Frame’s assessment of the approach that Wallace embraces on the Christology over Bibliology doctrine. Wallace moves the goalposts on bibliology. Perhaps many evangelicals would reject Wallace’s position, but they wouldn’t call it neo-orthodox. They would accommodate him. Someone included the following in a definition of neo-orthodoxy, which I believe is true about it:

Neo-orthodoxy teaches that the Scripture is a communicator or medium revealing God rather than being revelation by itself. The Word of God is Jesus Himself rather than Scripture serving as God’s Word. The emphasis is on an encounter with God rather than a focus on the inspired words of Scripture.

This kind of thinking, now spoken by evangelical Daniel Wallace, liberals embraced in the writings of Emil Brunner and Karl Barth. This is the end for evangelicalism, when its leaders sway the adherents into this direction and these types of positions.

More to Come

Grace Yields a Higher Standard Than Pharisees

March 22, 2024 / Leave a comment

The following recent articles and in this chronological order relate to this post. One Two Three Four Five

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The Pharisees

“The Pharisees” are those historical and biblical characters with whom Jesus interacted in the Gospels. Pharisees are those taking up the mantel of “the Pharisees” since then. The Pharisees inundated the Israel into which Jesus came.

I like to say, “The inside of a barrel looks like the barrel.” If you live inside the barrel, your whole world looks like the barrel. The Pharisees so saturated the thinking of Israel during the life of Jesus that Israel looked like the Pharisees. The world of the audience to whom Jesus preached the Sermon on the Mount also looked like or literally was the Pharisees.

The most common viewpoint of the Pharisees is that they added a whole bunch of strict standards to the preexisting rules of scripture. This popular notion says the Pharisees multiplied an immense number of added regulations that burdened down the Israelite people. This idea leaves the impression that Jesus came to relieve people of standards. He came to save them from the imposition of written rules. This is a deadly lie about Jesus and what He did and taught that generation.

Jesus and Matthew 5

I return to Matthew 5 to see what Jesus said at the beginning of His Sermon on the Mount. He said in verse 17:

Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil.

The Pharisees and thus the people of that audience suspected Jesus would destroy the law or the prophets. He debunked that speculation and added, “I am come to fulfill the law or the prophets.” “The law or the prophets” in 5:17 is all of the Old Testament scripture.

“To fulfill” the Old Testament at least was keeping the Old Testament, but further transcending it. Jesus’ standard was not the minimized, reduced standard of the Pharisees. It went above theirs; it transcended theirs. His righteousness exceeded theirs. In no way, as He says in verse 19, was He teaching people not to keep everything in the Old Testament. No, just the opposite. Then Jesus illustrates that in six different sections between 5:21 and 5:48.

The purpose of Jesus was showing the sinfulness of the Pharisees and the audience they spawned. Their viewpoint was not God’s. They did not represent God. This would take someone back to the first thing He said in the sermon in verse 3: “Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” His audience needed to understand their spiritual poverty to enter the kingdom of heaven.

Saving Grace

Saving grace as an outcome of conversion, which proceeds from God — the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, does not lower the standard for righteousness of the Pharisees. It exceeds it. As a first illustration, Jesus uses one of the ten commandments, “Thou shalt not kill,” in verse 21. Pharisaical thinking justified itself by saying it had not physically killed anyone. That still occurs today. People still think they’re fine because of something they haven’t done. This indicates they lack spiritual poverty.

Using four different examples in verse 21 to verse 26, Jesus shows that His or God’s standard exceeds or transcends the letter of scripture. It is more than just physically killing someone. They’ve murdered someone in their hearts if they even showed contempt toward them. Jesus goes so far to say that they’ve murdered the person with whom they would not initiate reconciliation. Not reconciling is showing contempt. God would not accept their worship as long as they would not try to reconcile.

The Pharisees were not about strict standards. They were about diminishing God’s standards with their own, designed to be more easily kept. They tried to keep these on their own without the grace of God. Jesus was not following their example or trajectory. He taught a different way than theirs.

Evangelicals and Jesus and the Pharisees and Grace

Most evangelicals today take an opposite message from Jesus than the one He told in His sermon. They teach that Jesus came to relieve the people of standards. I use the word “standards,” but you could use laws, regulations, or the like. Jesus kept everything and in verse 19, He said that the greatest in His kingdom would teach others to do the same.

Jesus went further with adultery too. It wasn’t just the physical act, but looking at a woman to lust after her in your heart (verse 28). Jesus is explaining what He meant by fulfilling the law or the prophets. Keeping the standards was never the means of salvation. Yes, the addition of works was a burden on the people reckoned by the Pharisees. People could not escape whatever shortcomings they had with the Pharisee approach.

If salvation came by keeping the rules, no one could do that. This is why the Pharisees minimized or reduced the law or the prophets. They tried to concoct a way of salvation through works. The Pharisees developed their own handbook of sorts to accompany scripture to explain the procedures for keeping scripture. This was not internalizing what God said out of love and obeying it from the heart. Again, this is the burden they created.

The Pharisees made doing suitable good works impossible. This was an exhausting, never ceasing burden. Their system complicated the obedience to actual scripture. It put them, the Pharisees, ahead of God, while claiming credit for God.

The Repercussions of Botching the Pharisees

People like the idea of not having to keep moral standards. This is a very popular view of grace today. This mirrors the Pharisees in that it minimizes or reduces scripture. Pharisees did it to make a way for salvation by works. Evangelicals do it in a way to change the nature of the grace of God. I say that they treat grace as a garbage can, when scripture treats it as a cleansing agent. Grace instead enables the keeping of the standards, rules, or laws of scripture. Unlike the perversion of grace, grace saves from the violations of the law and the salvation changes the life.

You probably notice that churches have gone downhill. They have changed in nature. Part of it is this very interpretation of the Pharisees. Evangelicals use the Pharisees as a reason to reduce standards. They don’t get rid of all of them, which should send up a red flag. If the Pharisees were all about having standards, then why don’t we eliminate all of them? Quite commonly evangelical keep the ones still convenient, very much like the Pharisees did. With this system, you still get credit for doing good works without obedience to everything that God said.

Scripture shows God wants everything He said kept. It’s not grace not to keep what God said. That’s an impostor grace. It claims grace, but it’s a placebo or a poser of grace. God does not accept not believing and not doing what He said, even in the so-called non-essentials. Man’s adaptations, innovations, and modifications do not please God. They are not of faith.

In scripture, God killed people for changing the recipe for the incense at the altar of incense. He killed tens of thousands when David numbered the people against His will. Grace tends toward keeping what God said, not squirming out of it. Grace yields a higher standard than the Pharisees, not a lesser one.

WHAT IS TRUTH

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How Evangelicals Now Move the Goalposts on Bibliology (part two)