Beware the Erosion

On March 5, 2021, Megan Basham wrote on Twitter:

“In 2015, GracePointe Church in Nashville became one of the first large Evangelical churches to affirm same-sex marriage. Today, they no longer believe the Bible is the Word of God.”

I think it can be argued quite cogently that they no longer held to the Bible as the word of God when they became affirming of homosexuality and gender fluidity. This is offered in one of their sermons:

As Progressive Christians, we’re open to the tensions and inconsistencies in the Bible. We know that it can’t live up to impossible, modern standards. We strive to more clearly articulate what Scripture is and isn’t.

The Bible isn’t the Word of God, self-interpreting, a science book, an answer/rule book, inerrant or infallible.
The Bible is a product of community, a library of texts, multi-vocal, a human response to God, living and dynamic.

Some of these descriptions are non-controversial, but others place this church outside historic Christianity. What’s interesting about GracePointe Church is the journey they’ve taken from Conservative Christianity to Progressive Christianity. To do so they’ve had to jettison the uniqueness of Jesus and the authority of the Bible.

I did a GOOGLE search of “Progressive Christian Churches Near Me.” About a mile from us is St. Anne’s Episcopal Church, as is the First United Methodist Church on whose property the Mission Peak Universal Unitarian Church meets. These differ from GracePointe Church in Nashville in that they are mainline Protestant denominational churches that have embraced theological liberalism for several decades, meaning that they do not believe in the authority of the Bible.

As I perused a number of progressive Christian church websites, quite a few of them had this phrase: “We take the Bible seriously, but not necessarily literally.” In one sense I get that – the Bible employs both literal and symbolic language. Yet I can’t help but think that this is code-speak announcing something like: “You don’t have to worry about us believing in the authority of the Bible or anything like that – you can relax.” The problem is, if you dismiss the literal, you’re not taking the Bible seriously.

Pastor Chuck used to say that the devil attacks the word of God, the person of Jesus, and the work of the Holy Spirit. If he can successfully do this, he will deal a death blow to those deceived by his lies. Progressive Christianity is what emerges when the devil is successful. That’s not the harsh truth; that’s the hard truth.

There are three postures to uphold: be aware of the erosion of the faith happening in our day; pray for those in the devil’s deceit; stand firm and uphold the authority of the Bible and the majesty of Jesus and the glorious transforming work of the Holy Spirit and contend for faith once-for-all delivered to the saints.