Carl, is there any point in studying the past—especially people’s lives? I mean, people like Henry Ford once said that “history is bunk”; can we learn anything from it?
Henry Ford is wrong. History is essential. It certainly serves a more important role than simply being a mere recording of facts. Actually, if the truth be known, we don’t have any recordings of pure facts because all history is interpreted on one level or another.
I think that the reason why it’s important for us to study church history is that many of the issues that we face have occurred at one time or another in the past. So studying these past events gives us a better perspective on issues and problems that others have already grappled with. Of course, it’s from this study that we can work out the best questions to ask as we face our own struggles in the present. In this sense, history plays an invaluable role. Every Christian should be interested in it.
What should be the areas of our focus in church history: men, women, movements/ideas or a combination of all three?
I would say a combination of all three. Although there has been a genuine attempt to be more inclusive of women in the writing of history, one of the problems historians face is that woman tend to leave less historical evidence behind. Historical evidence is like the ‘rubbish’ that we generate as part of the normal process of living. Men tend to create more of it than women. My wife likes to tell me that this is because women are generally more tidy and efficient. Whatever the reason, historians have to rummage through the ‘rubbish’ to construct a story. This explains why they tend to focus on subjects where there is a lot of it. Naturally, this leads them to write more about some subjects than others. Nevertheless, it is legitimate for church historians to focus on all three of the areas you have mentioned—men, women and ideas.
One of the towering figures in the early 20th century of Protestant Christianity is the Presbyterian theologian and churchman J Gresham Machen. Why has there been such intense interest in his life?
Machen continues to be a figure of interest for a variety of reasons. First, he was undoubtedly one of the most educated and articulate defenders of orthodox Christianity during the early decades of the 20th century. He figured prominently in the famous fundamentalist and modernist controversies. Machen was a highly respected New Testament scholar who sided very much with the defenders of traditional conservative orthodoxy.
Second, Machen has left behind an important institutional legacy. He was largely responsible for two institutions that survive to this day: the Orthodox Presbyterian Church of North America and Westminster Theological Seminary. I happen to be a member of the OPC as well as Dean of Westminster Seminary, so I have a personal connection to what he has left behind. My office is in part of the campus that is known as Machen Hall.
Finally, I also think that his little book, Christianity and Liberalism, was a tour de force that set out the issues of conflict between orthodox Christianity and liberal modernism in an amazingly simple, sharp and focused way. It has been a reference point for the issues in that debate ever since.
Can you give us a picture of the times in which Machen lived? Who were the leading thinkers and what was their agenda?
I think the early 20th century is clearly a time of great cultural turmoil. While the First World War did not have the same cultural impact on America as it did in Europe, it did precipitate something of a backlash against 19th-century Romanticism. A number of leading intellectuals like HL Mencken and Walter Lippmann were in the vanguard of a movement of religious scepticism that challenged the place of religion in American cultural life. They advocated sexual freedom and opposed Prohibition, among other things. Also, in the early part of the 20th century, John Dewey, the father of modern pragmatism, began to have an increasing influence in the education of Americans.
Before long, the rise of scepticism and pragmatism began to have an impact on the churches. This came to the surface in two areas. First, there was a growing acceptance of the so-called ‘assured results’ of higher criticism—that is, the belief that the Bible was merely a human document that was flawed. And second, it was during this period that there was a strong growth within evangelicalism of non-church-based Christian institutions, or what we might call ‘para-church’ organizations. Although many of the para-church organizations had laudable motives, their existence and prominence led to a weakening of the doctrine of the church and its institutions. This was the background from which Machen emerged and against which he needs to be judged.
To what extent do you think that the battle over the inspiration and inerrancy of the Bible in the early 1890s was the curtain-raiser for the full-blown theological battle that erupted in the Presbyterian Church in the 1920s?
Well, the heresy trial in 1892 of Charles Briggs, a professor at Union Seminary, was certainly a turning point in that process. Briggs, in his inaugural address as professor of biblical theology at the seminary, condemned “the dogma of verbal inspiration”. This led to him being charged and prosecuted by the Presbytery of New York. Although he was condemned by the General Assembly and suspended from the ministry, the movement that he represented gathered momentum over the next few decades so that by the 1920s, the liberals were in firm control in the Presbyterian Church.
There is no doubt that the trial of Charles Briggs was something of a watershed. While the supporters of orthodoxy actually won that particular battle, to use one of my colleague Richard Gaffin’s favourite phrases, I think they “chopped their wad” at the end of that struggle. They basically wore themselves out. The forces of liberalism became stronger as time went on, and the orthodox members of the church found that they could no longer call in political favours to help them in the struggles within the church courts. The cost of their victory left them spent and more vulnerable to the onslaught that was going to take place 20 or 30 years later.
Lefferts Loetscher, in his book, The Broadening Church, talks about the student body chaffing against some of the greats at Princeton like BB Warfield and other conservatives on the faculty. What was taking place in the intellectual climate and spiritual climate of America that would have set so many in the student body against such a stellar faculty?
This is a huge question that requires a far more developed response than I am able to give within the confines of this interview. But I can offer a few tentative suggestions that at least help to explain some of the most likely forces that were influencing the developments at Princeton.
Perhaps the first thing I should mention is that the 20th century heralded the growing power of youth. At the turn of the century, the scientific paradigm and the discovery of Einstein’s theory of relativity led people to question traditional values and beliefs. Then, following in its wake, the age of consumerism burst onto the scene. The influence of both these phenomena led to a lot of questioning and re-evaluation. Youth became more critical of accepted ‘dogma’ and wanted to challenge many things. They tend to be iconoclastic in that way. The scientific paradigm is built upon improving on the past. You have to get out of the past in order to move into the future. Consumerism is built on the idea that “Why have a horse and cart when you can have a motorcar?” New is better than the old.
Thus a major cultural shift began to occur in the in the early 20th century. These changes have been unravelling over several generations so that our culture now favours the young over the old. We see this in the business world. Employers often prefer young people because young people learn new skills better than old people. With the arrival of advanced technology, we feel that acutely. My 13-year-old niece understands DVD players better than I do. I am dependent on her to help me record something when I am back home with my mum.
So I think that in the early 20th century, there was a shift in influence towards youth, and that this shift was inherently iconoclastic. I also believe that there’s an underlying dynamic in academic life where young, hot-shot professors feel it necessary to establish themselves over and against their senior peers. This is also true in seminaries. There is always a temptation in theological institutions for young, aspiring professors to gather student groupies around themselves to pursue their own particular agendas. Again, it is always more exciting to think you have made a new discovery or advance than to simply hold the view that the old ideas were right all along. There were a whole variety of factors that led to disturbance at Princeton Theological Seminary in the early 20th century. In the first couple of decades, a perfect storm was developing that led to the kind of iconoclasm that you have mentioned.
One of the main advocates of secularism at the time was HL Mencken. He said that Machen’s arguments for orthodox Christianity against theological liberalism were completely impregnable. Is the fact that Machen was such an able apologist the main reason why we should be studying his life?
It’s certainly one of the more important reasons why we should be looking at Machen. The rather simple and obvious point that Mencken makes about Machen is that he was a front-rank, orthodox Presbyterian scholar who decided to speak and act like a front-rank, orthodox Presbyterian scholar who was justifiably angry at the betrayal of historic Christianity by so many liberal churchmen.
A few years ago, I invited a Roman Catholic friend to come and give a doctoral seminar at Westminster. I noticed that he was quite unashamed in asserting his position. The first thing that my friend said when he sat down was, “Okay, I know you guys are Reformed Protestant. However, I am a Roman Catholic, so I don’t apologize for being in your faces with my Roman Catholicism as I present today.”
I know I have sat in many meetings and have felt the temptation myself to back away from conflict over issues of doctrine. It’s easy as an evangelical, when you sit down in a room of Roman Catholics, to say, “Well, I know I’m a Protestant and you are Roman Catholics, but we have a basic core commitment and I am going to work on the basis of that”. Machen was the Protestant equivalent of my Roman Catholic friend. He knew what he believed, and he was unashamed about stating it. He was quite forthright in articulating what he understood to be the true Christian gospel.
Was there some particular incident or challenge that Machen experienced during his education that proved to be the catalyst for him to adopt the role of what Mencken described as ‘Doctor Fundamentalis’?
There is no doubt that Machen experienced a crisis of faith while studying in Germany under the German liberal theologian, Wilhelm Hermann. Ned Stonehouse describes the event in his biography of Machen. Darryl Hart also mentions it in his excellent book on Machen, Defending the Faith—J Gresham Machen and the Crisis of Protestantism.
While Machen was studying under Hermann, he was deeply impressed by his professor’s passionate convictions. However, he couldn’t reconcile that passion with the emptiness of Hermann’s liberalism. I suspect that this challenged Machen to become as passionate in his own commitment to the truth of the gospel.
Later in his life, he faced a number of crises. One of these was when the liberal element within the Presbyterian Church tried to transform Princeton Theological Seminary. In 1929, liberal churchmen persuaded the General Assembly to reconstitute the board of the seminary. This meant that Princeton became a more broad-based, generic institution, and turned its back on being a confessional Presbyterian seminary. These dramatic changes at Princeton forced Machen to think long and hard about what it meant to be a Presbyterian. Is a watered -down ‘mere Christianity’ a realistic option for a church? Or does it need a more detailed statement of faith? This issue was critical to Machen.
Another incident was also critical in the development of Machen’s views. Disappointed by the number of liberal missionaries who were being sent by the Presbyterian Church, Machen moved to establish an independent Board of Foreign Missions. This enabled him to ensure that supporters’ funds were properly channeled to gospel preaching missionaries and not to liberal missionaries. In the end, I think that was the thing that brought him down in the church and shortened his life. This was probably his last great stand.
What is a ‘fundamentalist’, and was Mencken right in referring to Machen as ‘Dr Fundamentalis’?
According to the philosopher Alvin Plantinga a ‘fundamentalist’ is that ‘expletive deleted’ who is just to the right of you. ‘Fundamentalist’ is a pejorative word that is tossed around unthinkingly—usually to caricature someone who is taking a line that is reasonably conservative. I’ve been called a ‘fundamentalist’ from time to time. Interestingly enough, this has never happened when I have spoken as a conservative at a British University. It is only in my time at Westminster that some people have labelled me like this.
When the word is used properly, it can mean anyone who affirms basic historic Christian orthodoxy. This means anyone who upholds the basic truth and purpose of the Bible. When ‘fundamentalist’ is used in that way, then I am happy to say, “Yes, I’m a fundamentalist”. In some contexts, it can also imply commitment to dispensational eschatology, as well as a focus on what are really minor ethical issues such as whether or not one can consume alcohol or visit the cinema. So ‘fundamentalist’ can be used in this latter sense, in which case, I am not one. Machen was a ‘fundamentalist’ in the sense that he was a defender of the truth of classical Christian orthodoxy.
As a young professor, Machen taught at Princeton Theological Seminary, which was regarded as the ‘West Point’ of the Presbyterian Church. Nevertheless, in a few short years, Princeton abandoned its historic Christianity despite having scholars like Warfield, Hodge and Green there. Are there any lessons from what happened at Princeton for the church today?
Oh yes, there are a lot of lessons. First, it’s important to realize that no system of governance can provide an absolute guarantee that a Christian institution will remain orthodox. Of course, this applies to both seminaries and churches. Systems of governance are ultimately only as good as the men involved in them.
Second, I think the lessons at Princeton indicate that you have to be very careful about whom you appoint to be the stewards of orthodoxy. In the case of Princeton, it was the board and the faculty. When you appoint board members to a seminary, it’s crucial that the right people are appointed. It’s the same with faculty. They must be reliable and orthodox.
Third, history tells us that institutions don’t go off the rails because they are taken over by liberals. The rot sets in when good orthodox men don’t have the backbone to stand up and be counted when the drift starts. It is not liberals who allow seminaries to depart from the truth; it is the middle-of –the-road guys who want to get along with everybody. Their problem is that they want to get along—be nice guys—but they lack the strength to make a stand.
Machen became renowned among secularists like Mencken and Walter Lippman for his book, Christianity and Liberalism. What was it about the book that so impressed them?
I think the book is well-written by the standards of the day, although the style is now a little dated. It boils the problem down into its essentials. It’s only 151 pages, and highlights the principal issues between Christianity and liberalism.
Machen’s argument is that Christianity is a religion committed to a supernatural God who produced a supernaturally inspired Bible. Liberalism, however, is not committed to the supernatural, and is therefore an entirely different religion. It is not a subset or species of Christianity. That is not to say, of course, that we may be able to learn something from liberals. Nor does it imply that everyone who holds liberal opinions is not a true Christian. What Machen was saying was that liberalism as a theological system is not historic Christianity.
You have just written the introduction to a republished version of Machen’s Christianity and Liberalism. Why do you believe that its republication is so timely, and why have you bothered to write an introduction to it?
I did it for a number of reasons. Firstly, we are approaching Westminster Theological Seminary’s 80th anniversary, and it’s an appropriate time to reaffirm our commitment to our past. Not only are we looking to the future, we want to reaffirm that we still stand where Machen stood on the issues that really matter. Nothing has changed on that score.
Secondly, I think the book presents the issues between the two opposing views in as nice and pointed a way as has ever been done.
Thirdly (and this I try to develop in my introduction), one of Machen’s chief complaints about theological liberalism is that it degenerates ultimately into sentimentalism. In the introduction, I try to focus on Machen’s polemic against Christianity and sentimentalism. I think sentimentalism is making a strong resurgence in our postmodern age. Today, matters of taste and ‘niceness’ are assuming far greater importance, whereas the value of the doctrinal content of Christianity is being downgraded. There is a growing trend within the modern church to think of Christianity primarily in terms of feelings, journeys and aesthetics. It is the old sentimentalism in a new dress. Machen speaks very forcefully on that point. His focus is on the historical realities of the Christian faith—the incarnation, the cross and the resurrection. These events in Christ’s life are not sentimental if we understand their effect in space and time. It is in these historical events that God really comes to us, takes away our sin through a horrific death on the cross, and vindicates his Son through his resurrection. The emphasis here is on saving action, not sentimentalism.
Machen wrote with considerable passion about the Bible. He claimed that it was infallible and inerrant. Although his arguments are almost 100 years old, are they still of relevance in the current theological scene?
Definitely. I think the Bible itself teaches that it does not contain error or mislead us, and it is powerful to achieve what God has designed it to achieve. Both those truths have abiding validity. I think the debate today in evangelicalism is in some ways different to the one that he faced in his day. For instance, some of the issues that we face in relation to biblical authority, such as the relationship of authorial intent, public intention and the communal reading of biblical texts, are not issues that Machen faced, so he is not as helpful for us as a resource at that point. I think the basic point is that the Bible contains no error and it is powerful to achieve what God intends it to achieve.
In the last 30 years, both Carl Henry in his magisterial God, Revelation and Authority and Francis Schaeffer in The Great Evangelical Disaster have stressed the importance of an inerrant Bible for mission, evangelism and church life. Why has this issue resurfaced again and why is there so much questioning of the Bible’s authority and inerrancy amongst evangelicals?
I don’t think there’s a simple answer to that. I am sure that one of the reasons is that the discipline of theology has become more fragmented. Biblical scholars now specialize in very small sections of the Bible. Systematic theologians generally don’t study biblical exegesis and don’t wrestle with issues that the old scholars were forced to deal with. Where you have a situation where biblical scholarship is so individually specialized and fragmented, it’s inevitable that the Bible itself will begin to look fragmented to these experts. It’s impossible to avoid because scholars are using a particular lens to look at Scripture which introduces inevitable distortions.
Another problem that we face is that some scholars have abandoned the presupposition of the unity of Scripture as well as the unity of the God who inspired it. Of course, there other factors as well that have contributed to this trend—for instance, some scholars who are anxious for scholarly credibility think that they can obtain some kudos among their peers by pointing out problems with the Bible. On the other hand, some of those who have tried to defend the doctrine of inerrancy have done a less than able job. In this sense, the doctrine hasn’t always been helped by some of its friends. There’s not one reason in particular to explain why inerrancy has come under attack; there’s many of them.
Why did Machen think that doctrine is so important? Why did he believe that he should devote his career to defending it?
Machen believed that doctrine is important because the Bible teaches doctrine. The proposition that God exists is doctrine. So too is the belief that Christ was the second person of the Trinity who took on flesh and came down to die for our sins. In saying that these statements are doctrine, I am automatically making a statement about their referential truth value as well. If my belief that God exists is merely a reflection of my own religious psychology, then my belief is nothing more than sentiment. Again, if the statement, “God came down and died for my sins” is merely the religious aspiration of the faith community to which I belong, then again it is nothing more than communal sentimentality. Machen believed that the Bible teaches history. Further, he believed that it taught interpretive history, not neutral history. The interpretation of that history is doctrine.
Did the liberals have a point in their attack on Machen when they said that Christianity is not essentially about doctrine, it is about a relationship with a person or the possession of a life?
It is an interesting point to make. I would say that a relationship actually requires propositions to be meaningful in any real sense. It requires true speech acts. Sure, I have a relationship with my wife, but I have to be able to express that linguistically and in a true fashion for it to have any meaning and satisfaction. The Bible describes God’s relationship to us in a way that presupposes and requires speech. In fact, the Bible presents God as a speaking God. He tells us things. I think that we create a false dichotomy if we oppose the personal and relational aspects of our relationship with God to the doctrinal and didactic ones.
Why were Machen’s detractors so opposed to the idea that Christianity is not doctrinal?
Thinking people since the time of the philosopher Immanuel Kant have been faced with a major religious problem: how do we justify the existence of God if we can’t rely on reason? Kant said it was impossible, using reason, to prove anything about the spiritual or what he called the ‘noumenal’ realm. Many people were convinced that he was right. They believed that it was impossible to make meaningful statements about God. All that could be done was to make statements of a moral nature—about whether a particular act or course of action was right or wrong. Theology was reduced to ethics.
In the wake of Kant’s critique of reason, another theologian Friedrich Schleiermacher tried to rescue Christianity by reconstructing it in terms of religious experience. It was a valiant but ultimately fruitless attempt. He deserves some credit for having a go, but it was just a hopelessly heterodox form of Christianity that he came up with.
We are now living in a postmodern world. Does Machen’s basis for defending the Christian faith still have any currency in the new intellectual climate today?
It certainly does. The form of postmodernism that we face today is not so new at all. It’s just a form of scepticism. Look at the debate between Erasmus and Luther in 1524-25. The claim of Erasmus’ case is that Luther can’t be certain about anything and that the Bible is not clear. He goes on to say, “You know, people have different opinions on this and that we mustn’t make certain statements about things because that is arrogant”. Postmodernists say something similar today. Interestingly, Richard Baxter said something similar in the 17th century. He talks about the problem of dogma, and says that we need to simplify Christianity down to the basics. We want a ‘mere Christianity’. There is an overtone of scepticism in this approach, and I see it being replicated in post-conservative evangelicalism today.
So how do you feel about a book like CS Lewis’s Mere Christianity?
I don’t know enough about Lewis’ book to say. I certainly do not want to say that Mere Christianity is necessarily a bad thing. For the most part, it seems to be a good book. However, it is not enough to build a church upon. While it’s possible to be a mere Christian and be saved, there is much more to the Christian life and calling that goes well beyond that.
One of Machen’s most forceful claims against his opponents is that admiration for Christ falls short of faith in Christ. Is it possible to be a Christian simply because you admire Jesus, or must you believe in his virgin birth, atoning death and resurrection?
I don’t think it’s possible to say that you trust Christ unless you take into account that Christ is presented to us in the Bible as an interpreted Christ. The significance of that interpretation demands more than a certain respect that you might have for a Prime Minister or the Queen. The Christ of the Bible demands more than respect; he demands absolute trust and commitment.
Is this issue still a live one in the church at the moment?
Yes, it is. I think we are already hearing a similar refrain from some of the ‘emerging church’ people who say that Christianity is a way of life and not a set of doctrines. I don’t believe it’s possible to separate the Christian way of life from those doctrines.
Should Christians be indifferent to matters of doctrine that may divide us in terms of denomination?
I think you will always face a problem when you substitute the confessional church with a para-church body. You end up having to set aside so called ‘No Go’ zones that may involve matters of some doctrinal significance. At one point in Machen’s Christianity and Liberalism, he comments that it was a tragedy that Protestantism split over the issue of the Lord’s Supper because the Lutherans couldn’t agree with the Reformed church on the Lord’s Supper. However, he goes on to say that it would have been more of a tragedy if they had agreed to disagree and said that the matter was unimportant and set it aside. For me, that was a very helpful and insightful comment. There are some things in which it is more important to be wrong about than to think that they are not important. It’s better to lack complete clarity over baptism than to say it doesn’t matter.
It has been said that being indifferent to doctrine is the first step on the road to liberalism. Is that so?
People who are indifferent to doctrine—who think that church confessions are unimportant—are left with no real criteria by which to judge truth from error. Furthermore, if you think that holding a firm position on the doctrine of baptism or the Lord’s Supper is unimportant, when both doctrines are taught in the Bible, then what is to stop you from deciding that that the Bible’s teaching on the incarnation or on the propitiation of Christ’s sacrifice are not significant too? We are living in a day when we judge people by aesthetic categories rather than by their beliefs. We have lots of Christians who say, “If the guy who lives down the end of my street is a nice chap and says nice things about Jesus, then why can’t he be part of the fellowship?”
What does this mean for evangelical agencies that have minimalist confessions—like the Evangelical Theological Society, for instance?
I think it means that the boundary is always going to be fuzzy. There is always going to be trouble drawing lines in these situations. On the other hand, I think we need to bear in mind that the ETS is not the church. It is not as important for it to have a really tight and comprehensive standard. I am happy to stand shoulder to shoulder with brothers who disagree with me on some quite important things in para-church organizations. However, what I will never do is allow that difference to creep in the church where I belong. Church and para-church organizations are two separate things, and it is important that we understand that distinction.
Does the Bible consider all doctrines of equal importance? For example, is church government as important as the death and resurrection of Christ? Should we defend our distinctives if they are not of first importance?
Clearly, the Bible does not consider all doctrines to be of equal importance. You can certainly go to heaven as a Baptist or a Presbyterian or a pentecostal. You can be saved without even being baptized, but you cannot be saved if you deny the resurrection of Christ. Paul is very clear about that in 1 Corinthians. Having said that, I would maintain that if our church life and ministry is going to be orthodox, orderly and stable, we need a biblical form of church government. It is important to have good order, procedure and practice. Everything needs to be done decently and in order. This is the reason why churches must have constitutions and procedures for dealing with error. Everything needs to be done in an orderly and godly way.
I respect other forms of church order, but I am convinced that the principles of the Bible are best reflected in Presbyterian church government. I certainly do not deny the Christian nature of the Anglican or the Baptist churches as long as the gospel is preached and the sacraments administered in those bodies. Each church needs to be clear about what it is in the eyes of God, and it needs to have rules and procedures to safeguard the faith that is being delivered to it.
How important is it to ensure that strong doctrinal views are not only held by clergy but also embraced by those in the pew? What practical measures can we take to ensure that that happens?
It is very important for all church members to have strong doctrinal convictions. Church history is littered with disasters in churches where great ministers have not managed to penetrate the pew. For instance, I believe that the minister who replaced the great Bible commentator Matthew Henry was a Unitarian. Richard Baxter’s church went Unitarian shortly after his departure. English Presbyterianism collapsed into Unitarianism in the early 18th century. So it is crucially important that we have an educated congregation.
How we educate church members to be mature in their understanding of doctrine is a tough call. Today’s culture is by and large indifferent to Christianity, and many people in the church know less about their Bible than they used to. Many churches have abandoned evening services. So we teach people less at the very time that they need to be taught more.
The other important thing that ministers can do is commit themselves to systematic expository preaching throughout the Bible. This is crucial in helping congregations to understand how they are meant to handle the whole canon of Scripture. If ministers fail to do this, they risk leaving their people ignorant of the ‘whole counsel of God’. Personally, I think the old Dutch tradition of preaching expositionally from Scripture on Sunday mornings and then using the catechism to guide thematic preaching in the evening. It seems to me that we need to find the modern equivalent of that so that we can supplement our expository preaching with preaching that gives people doctrinal categories so they can see the whole picture as well as understand particular books of the Bible.
Modern evangelicalism has been described by some religious sociologists as nothing more than moral therapeutic deism. Does Machen’s defence of the doctrine of God have anything to say to us in our weakened state of understanding of God’s nature and character?
Sure. I think one of the great things about Machen’s Christianity and Liberalism is that when he wrestles with the theodicy question, he really hits the deists and the sentimentalists hard. He points out that suffering and pain are realities that God is completely involved in. A doctrine of God has to take into account suffering and pain. Just having a sentimental being with a white beard sitting in the sky looking benignly down on the earth is not helpful, and fails lamentably to do justice to the Bible’s account of God. We need to recapture all of the terror, awe and majesty of the God of the Bible. I think Machen tells us to face up to the true God of Scripture. He calls on us to recognize that the God with whom we have to deal is an awesome and terrifying being, unless we meet him as saviour in the person of Jesus. Sadly, too many Christians are ‘moral, therapeutic deists’. It’s a great phrase, isn’t it? It express precisely what many Christians have become.
Reproduced with kind permission from Australian Presbyterian.
