The Challenge Of Orthodoxy

This crisis involves the whole Christian program. You may take any declaration of faith you please, put forth by a modern evangelical body, and follow its articles from the first to the last, and you will not find a one of them left intact. Modernists who are professors in our evangelical denominational schools, and later graduates who go from their feet to occupy evangelical pulpits, have not left undisputed a single declaration of our holy faith. They deny that “the Holy Bible was written by men divinely inspired;” they scorn the thought that “It is a perfect treasure of heavenly instruction;” they openly deny that “It has God for its Author;” and they resent with fervor the claim that “It contains the truth without any admixture of error.” They deny the God that we believe to be “the One and only Creator and Ruler of the universe,” even Jehovah, making Him “the tribal God of the Jews;” and when the flight of oratory demands more dignified expression they speak of Him as “that mysterious ultimate which we call God.” They resent the declaration that “man was created in holiness, but by transgression fell from that happy and holy estate, and involved himself and his posterity in sin;” teaching on the contrary, that by a process of evolution man has come, by his own effort, over the almost impassable stretch from animal life to the high and moral plane upon which he is now found.

If we speak of “the way of salvation” they will not have it that salvation of sinners “is of grace” through the mediatorial offices of the Son of God. To quote the language of one of them, “Such a theory of the atonement finds no foothold in my consciousness or my reason.” As to justification, they repudiate the notion that it comes in consequence of faith, and, in express contradiction of the Bible, insist that “it can only be by works.” As to regeneration, that is not with them a super-work, wrought by the Holy Spirit, but subjective changes imposed by one’s self-thought. Concerning repentance and faith, they cannot concede the necessity of the first, saying it is out of harmony with the evolution theory, nor adopt the biblical definition of the second believing that the God of the Bible is largely the creation of man’s mind. Concerning sanctification, it is, in their judgment, of self, rather than by the Spirit, and their definition of the perseverance of the saints would take the form of human plodding rather than divine preservation. The ordinances, to these men, are matters of little or no moment; the church is a human agency that has voluntarily accepted the program of world improvement; the Great Commission to them is only a social message; as to the resurrection, they teach that when death overtook some who had hoped to have part in the kingdom, this thought was invented to save them for that participation, and as for heaven, the idea gradually developed with the abandonment of the social hope of the early Christians; the final judgment is a fiction of apocalyptic writers!

Some time ago, eighteen preachers, whose known leanings toward modernism had made their Sabbath services acceptable to the Chicago University, were united in a volume of sermons. One of the most capable writers of the South said of the output: “The sermons are beautifully written; they are academic; some of them seemed to make a pathetic effort to speak the language of Zion, but mostly they utter the dialect of Ashdod. For the most part they frankly and finally abandon evangelistic views. Doctrine is discounted, theology is underrated and berated, religion is ostensibly valued, but ill-defined; there is in them no clear presentation of Christ as Savior; their musings about God are sentimental and indefinite; many of them have denied the inspiration of the New Testament, and the reality of the atonement. The true Deity, Christ’s resurrection, reign and coming again, and other accepted beliefs of evangelical Christianity they relegate to the dogmatic scrap-heap. In fact, it is a book of philosophy and not of religion.”

Therein is our crisis explained, and therein is the challenge of Orthodoxy.

One might imagine from what has been said that modernism has wholly captured the church. On the contrary, we are confident that, as yet, it has made but slight inroads. It perhaps would not be an overstatement to claim nine-tenths of the active church membership of evangelical churches in America for evangelical Christianity. Up to the present moment, modernists have busied themselves almost wholly in subjugating the schools and in capturing key-laymen. There have seen their greatest success. Modernism reasons well that, once the schools [are] in hand, and a few key-laymen, the churches will quickly capitulate. With a modernist in every pulpit, modernism will mark rapid progress in the pew. That is the new Jesuitry! The reasoning is sound; the results are not debatable! But if God is not dead, neither is orthodoxy! Its time has come, its chance is on! The very challenge of the hour should invite to determined conquest.

The term “orthodoxy” needs reaffirmation. It requires no new definition. It still stands for “correctness in doctrine,” for “soundness in biblical teaching.” This word, by its very staunchness of character, tempts opponents to scorn. Failing to discredit it by reasoning, they are found now subjecting it to ridicule; all of which argues for its retention and its re-emphasis. Let the man who will, claim that “an ever changing experience involves and ever changing theology,” but true believers will continue to base their theology upon an immutable, because an inspired book. Let modernists assert, if they will, that “the revelation of one age can never satisfy the needs of another,” but orthodoxy will go on contending that truth is as unchangeable and its tenets as eternal as their Author—God. If the modernist insists upon making his religion “out of the daily experiences in the great currents of the world’s life,” let him join the Athenian crowd. As for evangelical believers, they will continue to count their lot with the prophet of the Old Testament and the Apostle of the New, who alike received from God an unchangeable revelation, fit not alone for their needs, their day and hour, but for the needs of all men and of all times!

It sounds quite smart to say, “The 20th century world needs a 20th century religion, and it is part of its task to make that religion for itself,” but the one serious attempt in that direction, characterizing modern times and called “Christian Science” shows how a mental and moral insanity easily result from a repudiation of the binding authority of Scripture. We prefer, rather, the basis of the psalmist’s belief. “Thy Word is true from the beginning,” and “forever, O Lord, Thy word is settled in Heaven.” We prefer the faith of our fathers, namely, “that the Holy Bible was written by man divinely inspired, and is a perfect treasure of heavenly instruction; that it has God for its author, salvation for its end, and truth, without any admixture of error, for its matter; that it reveals the principles by which God will judge us, and therefore is and shall remain to the end of the world, the true center of Christian union and supreme standard by which all human conduct, creeds and opinions shall be tried.” We believe with Paul, “All scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God (in any age) may be perfect, thoroughly furnished in all good works” (2 Timothy 3:16–17). We believe, with Peter, that prophecy came not in old time by the will of man, but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost” (2 Peter 1:21). We believe, with Christ, “The Scripture cannot be broken” (John 10:35). “Our God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by His Son,” (Hebrews 1:1–2); and this is the voice of orthodoxy, and has been for full two thousand years!

The Powers Of Orthodoxy Need Fresh Illustration

We are now told that “ready made religion from whatever age it may come to us, will not fit our spiritual needs, however well it may have fitted the age from which it came to us.” The answer of orthodoxy is, “Show us a human necessity not met by the book called the Bible! Relate to us a human experience unknown to its sacred pages! State to us a problem for which it has been proven insufficient!”

Walter Rauschenbusch, liberal though he was, frankly admitted that “insofar as humanity has as yet been redeemed, Christianity has been its redemption.” It was a fixed faith, an immutable, guide-book, that “lifted woman to equality and companionship with man; that secured the sanctity and stability of marriage; changed parental despotism to parental service; eliminated unnatural vice, the abandonment of children, blood revenge and robbery of the shipwrecked, from the customs of Christian nations; abolished slavery, mitigated war, covered all lands with a network of charities to uplift the poor and fallen, fostered the institutions of education, aided the progress of civil liberty and social justice, and diffused a softening tenderness throughout human life.”

One of the most infidel productions that has ever emanated from professed Christian pens, finds itself compelled to pay this tribute to evangelicalism, “however much it has failed to appreciate the inefficiency of aristocratic conceptions in morality, to it are due the conceptions in morality, to it are due the abolition of slavery, reforms in prisons, care of the insane, and of the poor, the establishment of Y.M.C.A.’s Bible and Foreign Mission Societies, colleges and theological seminaries.” The question arises as to whether evangelicalism, which is only another name for orthodoxy, remains as adequate to the problems of the present, as it has proven itself sufficient for the interests of the past. The best answer that orthodoxy can give to this will be fresh illustrations of the Scripture. “Ye shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free.” The triumph of orthodoxy will come in proportion to its loyalty to the authoritative source of the truth—the Holy Scriptures, the incarnation of its truths to all peoples! It is the task of orthodoxy to show that evangelical Christianity has the same power to save the individual now that it had when Saul of Tarsus was converted; that it has the same power to move a city to repentance that it had when Peter preached at Pentecost: that it has the same power to create a church that is efficient as it had when the church at Ephesus was brought into being and under blessing; that it has the same power to break down racial prejudices that it exercised in the days of the Roman Empire; the same power to work social reforms that it had when it accomplished the repeal of the “corn Laws” in England, and “the abolition of slavery” in America; that it has the same power to change the nude, filthy cannibal into a clothed, clean Christian, that it exercised in the South Sea Islands!

Let doubters doubt, if they will; but let orthodox men know that the best answer to that infidelity is a Spirit-endowed life, engaged in Spirit-animated tasks.

At a time when infidelity is doing its utmost to take the Bible from the people by bringing it into disrepute, it is ours to defend and display it, print and distribute it, preach and practice it.