Page:Moody Bible Institute Monthly, Volume 23 (1922-23).djvu/351

 God of the Bible and of Christian faith!

In the second place, modern Liberalism differs from Christianity in its view of man. It differs because it obliterates the distinction between man and God in the way I have said, but it differs in a more fundamental manner still. At the very basis of modern Liberalism in the church is a loss of the consciousness of sin. You can examine the religious literature of the present day, the Sunday-school lesson helps and the sermons, and you will find that the characteristic thought through the whole of them is a profound satisfaction with human goodness. The modern preacher has no words too strong to express his scorn of the Christian view of the awfulness of sin.

A few months ago I stopped in a distant city and went to what seemed to be the leading church. It was the day when the new Sunday-school teachers were inducted into their office; and the preacher preached a sermon about Christian education and told his people, especially those who were to train the young, that formerly there had been a terrible view that children were lost in sin and needed a Redeemer. And he got a laugh from his congregation by quoting the old theologians about the awfulness of sin under which all men were born in this world and the need of redemption in order to escape the righteous judgment of God. He said, "People really used to believe that all children were born in sin and needed the Saviour, Jesus, but we have learned in these days that it is our duty as Christian teachers merely by the teaching of Jesus to draw out the good that is already in them."

The question arose in my mind why he quoted the theologians, why he indulged simply in the vulgar ridicule of them, when he wanted to cast ridicule upon the doctrine of the retributive justice of God; because he could have raised a better laugh if he had quoted the words of Jesus!

Jesus said more awful things about the terribleness of sin and the retributive justice of God than any man, and it is exceedingly strange how men at the present time who claim to have Jesus as Master (they speak of him always as "the Master," but they do not speak of him as Lord or Saviour), who claim to have Jesus as their authority in the sphere of religion, will proceed in the same breath to cast despite upon the things which are at the very center of His teaching, and at the very center of Christianity, as is the awfulness of the guilt of sin.

Do you want me to tell you what the fundamental fault with the church today is? It is this—the modern preacher, whether in the Sunday-school class, or in the home or in the pulpit, is feverishly engaged in an absolutely impossible task. He is engaged in calling the "righteous" to repentance, in trying to bring men into the church, and at the same time permit them to retain their pride in their own goodness. Even our Lord did not succeed in calling the righteous to repentance, and probably we shall be no more successful than He. At the very basis of Christian preaching is the mystery of the consciousness of sin and that is produced by the Holy Spirit, and when a man comes under the conviction of sin his whole attitude is changed.

These are the two presuppositions of the Christian message—the Christian view of the awful holiness of God and the Christian view of the terrible guilt of sin. God could only bring sinful man into His presence through the atoning death of Jesus Christ our Lord, but the account of that gospel is found in the Bible and with regard to the Bible modern Liberalism differs fundamentally from Christianity.

The Christian view of the Bible of course makes the contents of the Bible absolutely unique. You might have all the ideas of the Bible in some other book, but you would have no Christianity; because Christianity is an account not merely of things that always were true, but an account of something that happened, and unless the thing really happened then we are still hopeless under the guilt of sin. It all depends upon the question whether, as a matter of fact, the eternal Son of God did take our sins upon Him and die instead of us on the cross.

According to the Christian view of the Bible it not only contains an account of something that happened, but contains a true account, and thus there is added to the Christian doctrine of revelation the Christian doctrine of the inspiration of the Word of God, and upon that doctrine despite is everywhere being cast today. Men are always talking about the "mechanical" view of inspiration, which makes the Biblical writers little more than stenographers. But as a matter of fact the Christian doctrine of inspiration does not deny the human characteristics of the biblical writers, nor display any lack of interest in the human means that these writers had for gathering their information, but it holds that by the Spirit of God these writers were preserved from the errors which are found in other books, and thus gave to us the only infallible rule of faith and practice.

But what does modern Liberalism substitute for the authority of the Bible? Sometimes a totally false impression is produced that it substitutes the authority of Jesus.

That is altogether false, because when asked what they consider the authority of Jesus, we discover that modern Liberalism rejects a great many of the recorded words of Jesus. It does not believe that Jesus ever spoke some of them, because in His recorded words in the gospels are some things most hateful to it. Modern Liberalism says that not everything recorded of Jesus in the Gospels was spoken by Jesus, and we must sort out the words which were spoken by Him and reject the rest.

But suppose we press it further. We shall discover that even in the reduced Jesus of modern liberal reconstruction there are some things abhorrent to the Liberal church, and modern Liberals if pinned down to it will say that they do not believe everything Jesus said was true, but they will say they are still Christians, they are still His followers, because they still hold to the central life purpose of Jesus.

Well, what was the central life purpose of Jesus? According to the Gospel of Mark the central life purpose of Jesus is found in His atoning death. "The Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and give his life a ransom for (instead of) many."

These words are of course abhorrent to the Liberal Church. But when you ask what the central life purpose of Jesus was, you will find you are in the mire of dispute, and that they will accept as authoritative only a few of the sayings of Jesus, not because they are His sayings, but because they happen to agree with their own opinions. The real authority of the modern Liberal is not Jesus, but it is, as men say, "Christian experience."

But what do you mean by Christian experience? What do you mean by Christian experience as authority? Surely you do not mean merely a majority vote of the organized Church. Do you mean, then, individual experience? But this is endlessly diverse, and therefore what you will have substituted for the true authority of the Word of God, is no authority at all but the shifting emotions of sinful men.

But people say what a foolish thing it is to depend upon a book! It all depends upon the book, my friends. The Reformation of the sixteenth century was founded upon the authority of a Book! May that Book again set aflame the world, and may the present bondage give place again to the glorious freedom of the sons of God!

When you come to the contents of the Bible everything points to the central figure—Jesus Christ. What is thought of Christ, first, by the modern liberal church and second, by Christian men?

At this point a further perplexity arises, for ask the modern liberal preacher his view of Christ, and he will say with great conviction, "I believe in the deity of Christ, I believe that Jesus is God."

We hear much like that today. People say, "Why, after all, this great preacher is most orthodox because he believes in the deity of Christ, and those who are objecting to his presence as a leader in the church, are mere uncharitable heresy hunters.

Do you not see, my friends, that, when they say Jesus is God, the value of that utterance depends upon what they mean by God? That little word "God" is not a bit more beautiful than any other English word. The value of it depends altogether upon what you mean by it, and when the modern liberal preacher says he believes Christ is God, he may mean God exists in all the world, God exists wherever life pulsates through humanity, and only appears April, 1923