The Fundamentals: 17th Century Style

In 1697, the English Baptist Benjamin Keach published The Glory of a True Church, and its Discipline display'd. Within his detailed discussion of discipline, Keach admonishes churches on how to deal with "hereticks and blasphemers." I thought his description of fundamental doctrines might be interesting:

Heresy is commonly restrained to signify any perverse Opinion or Error in a fundamental Point of Religion, as to deny the Being of God, or the Deity of Christ, or his Satisfaction, and Justification alone by his Righteousness, or to deny the Resurrection of the Body, or eternal Judgment, or the like. Yet our Annotators say, the Word signifies the same thing with Schism and Divisions; which if so, such that are guilty of Schism or Divisions in the Church, ought to be excommunicated also. Heresies are called Damnable by the Apostle Peter; without Repentance such cannot be saved, as bring in Damnable Heresies, denying the Lord that bought them.

Two things render a Man an Heretick according to the common signification of the Word. 1. An Error in matters of Faith, Fundamental or Essential to Salvation. 2. Stubbornness and Contumacy in holding and maintaining it. A Man that is an Heretick, after the first and second Admonition reject. [Quotation from the reprint of Keach's work in Polity, ed. by Mark Dever, p. 75]

A few observations might be worthwhile. First, many of the issues to Keach were the same as those that eventually crystallized more than 200 years later in the fundamentalist-modernist controversy, such as the deity and resurrection of Christ and substitutionary atonement. That's surprising to me since Keach was writing before the rise of critical theology and the modernistic denial of the supernatural. Perhaps there's an obvious explanation I'm missing. Second, he doesn't seem to believe that these points were a comprehensive statement of all fundamentals of biblical doctrine. Third, he seems to identify doctrines as fundamental relative to their proximity to the gospel. Finally, he demands the excommunication of heretics. Although the wording might sound a little different from historic 1920s fundamentalism and the separatist terminology we use today, it seems to me that the essence of Keach's approach is the same that was advanced in the early 20th century.

Fundamentalism Needs to Return to the Sufficiency of Scripture

Chances are, you or someone you know thinks that the young punk fundamentalists point out flaws in fundamentalism because they want to destroy or maim it. Well, folks can think what they will, but when past and present presidents of a fundamentalist seminary the same arguments, those folks might want to reconsider their assessment. Listen to the last four minutes of this interview to hear Sam Harbin of Calvary Baptist Seminary and Dave Burggraff, formerly of Calvary and now of Clearwater Christian College, talk about how fundamentalism needs to reestablish its commitment to the Word.

Listen to the whole interview, as well as part one, to hear Burggraff and Harbin talk about the kind of spiritual formation and conformity to Christ that would characterize genuine allegiance to the Word.

Historic Separatism: What Issues Mattered to Baptist in the 1800s?

In 1891, Jeremiah Bell Jeter wrote The Recollections of a Long Life, an autobiographical refletion on decades in pastoral ministry. Mark Dever quotes from this book in Polity, his compilation of 19th century Baptist documents on the life of the church. Jeter had some very interesting things to say about the kinds of theological issues that spurred Baptist pastors to militancy during his youth in the 1820s:

"Presbyterians and Baptists were quite ready to assert and defend the doctrines of election, and the certain salvation of all believers; nor were they slow to attack what they considered Arminian errors. While they did not give "undue prominence to their distinctive views," the Baptists of fifty or sixty years ago "believed, and were ready to fight for, 'the five points,' . . . Baptists of the present day . . . are less carefully indoctrinated than were the fathers." (Dever, Polity, 11-12)

And here's a little bonus quote from Dever's Nine Marks of a Healthy Church booklet (not the full book):

Our understanding of what the Bible teaches about God is crucial. The Biblical God is Creator and Lord; and yet His sovereignty is sometimes denied, even within the church. For confessing Christians to resist the idea of God's sovereignty in creation or salvation is really to play with pious paganism. [emphasis added] Many Christians will have honest questions about God's sovereignty, but a sustained, tenacious denial of God's sovereignty should concern us. To baptize such a person may be to baptize a heart that is in some ways still unbelieving. To admit such a person into membership may be to treat them as if they were trusting God, when in fact they are not.

As dangerous as such resistance is in any Christian, it is more dangerous in the leader of a congregation. To appoint a person as a leader who doubts God's sovereignty or who seriously misunderstands biblical teaching on these matters is to set up as an example a person who may be deeply unwilling to trust God. Such an appointment is bound to hinder the church. (19-20)

Calling Many Fundamentalists "Fundamentalists" Is a Misnomer

Greg Linscott links to an article by a Southern Baptist, who argues that calling the "overwhelming majority of Southern Baptists" fundamentalists is a misnomer.

The author of the article acknowledges the proper historical distinction between theological conservatives and fundamentalists. That distinction is grounded on the practice of separation from unbelief. Even the theological liberal Harry Emerson Fosdick recognized that distinction in his famous sermon, "Shall the Fundamentalists Win?", preached way back in 1922. He loved the "conservatives," who were content to affirm the historic, orthodox faith of Christianity, except for the part that required repudiation and separation from false teachers.

I am in no place to comment on what portion of Southern Baptists are mere conservatives, and how many are militantly repudiating and separating from apostasy. The direction of the Convention as a whole is undeniably toward the former.

What does seem clear to me is that not all within the fundamentalist movement meet this definition of historic fundamentalism. Obviously, affirmation of the five fundamentals are not all that define fundamentalism. I think we’ve all learned that by now. Even the willingness to separate based on those five fundamentals alone is insufficient. Those points were merely a reflection of a particular set of issues most prominent and reflective of apostasy at one particular period of time.

But I wonder, how many fundamentalists would be willing to apply that separation test to folks within the “fundamentalist movement”? Would there not then be many “Fundamentalists” who are not true fundamentalists? Are there not many Fundamentalists who not only practice but tolerate aberrant doctrines and practices? Are there not associations of Fundamentalists that have refused to affirm the plain meaning of their own historic confessions of faith? Was that tolerance not the common practice of the denominations on their long, slow, certain slide into theological liberalism? Would it not be quite simple to make this paragraph much longer if one chose to do so?

Out-Fundamentalling Fundamentalists?

Doug Smith has written a great article for SI that summarizes a Capitol Hill Baptist Church Weekender. Doug's experience closely mirrors mine from spring '05. It had such an encouraging impact on me in my love and appreciation for the church that I applied for one of the internships to which Doug refers.

Doug wrote this about CHBC and fundamentalism:

Several Weekender attendees were current or former students at fundamentalist seminaries. Several CHBC members had come from fundamentalist churches and schools. Have these individuals become liberal? Or have they only joined because they could not find a “fundamental” church in the area? I don’t know about the second question, but as for the first, the answer is no. They have not turned liberal. They were attracted by the focus on practicing the Bible as a serious community of believers at CHBC and appreciated the sound teaching and preaching. They were not against separating from false teachers, but they obviously had jettisoned some of the more extreme varieties of secondary separation. While many fundamentalists certainly would not laud CHBC as a bastion of Fundamentalism, they should admit that there is much to be thankful for there.

Doug said this quite well, but I'll take it a step further. I absolutely do think CHBC is a bastion of fundamentalism. I think it is "out-fundamentalling" most of the fundamentalist movement when it comes to foundational matters of Scripture, the gospel, local church health, discipleship, and evangelism.

Fundamentalist Episcopalians?

Not two minutes after I finished writing a paper on Harry Emerson Fosdick's sermon, "Shall the Fundamentalists Win," for the CHBC internship, I read this editorial from the Washington Post written by prominent members of The Falls Church. John Yates and Os Guinness explain in detail why they left the ECUSA, and as I observed recently, it's about far more than homosexuality, as many news reports have suggested.

Thinking about these two situations in such close juxtaposition reminded me how many of the same concerns, values, and ideals Yates and Guinness and the 1920s fundamentalists share.

The conclusion of the editorialfollows. Regardless of our remaining denominational differences, this stand is cause for rejoicing:

These are the outrages we protest. These are the infidelities that drive us to separate. These are the real issues to be debated. We remain Anglicans but leave the Episcopal Church because the Episcopal Church first left the historic faith. Like our spiritual forebears in the Reformation, "Here we stand. So help us God. We can do no other."

Read Fosdick's sermon here.

"Fundamentalists Have Altered Radically"

It shouldn't come as news to anyone that much of the fundamentalist movement has for decades been rather inconsistent (at best) regarding its ban on movie theater attendance. What is news to me is the historical background to the rise of this inconsistency, which Kevin Bauder has most helpfully sketched. Apparently, many "historic fundamentalists" aren't quite as historic as they would like to think.

But amid all the SI comment chatter (some of which is comical . . . at best) about things he hasn't even begun to address, I fear that the point will be lost—at least the point that jumped off screen to me. Here it is: It's less significant that fundamentalism now accepts theater than how it arrived at that conclusion. Sure fundamentalism kept some (not all) of the external moral standards for appropriate content, but it's a hollow M&M—a bit of air covered by a thin candy shell (at best). For in the sweeping consignment of Tertullian, Augustine, Pascal, and Tozer to the trash heap, fundamentalism eviscerated itself of thoughtfulness in this matter.

I really don't know what these men said, and I surely don't know whether they were right or wrong. I'm looking forward to finding out what I believe. And at the risk of losing my Young Fundamentalist membership card, I'm open to hearing and embracing objections to the medium as a whole. But in spite of what I don't know, what seems patently obvious to me is this: Once again, Bauder has demonstrated that fundamentalism as it exists today is not serious.

By the way, has anybody out there come up with an authoritative decision yet on whether it's ok to see a "film" in an IMAX theater while it's showing in ordinary theaters?

On Ecclesiastical Separation and BJU Obtaining TRACS Accreditation

Here's a link to some old-school Paleo--an article from 2005 on TRACS accreditation and "The Changing Face of Ecclesiastical Separation."

NOTE: I've left the original article unedited. Some links may not work. I know that the link to the Google cache is not available, but I'm sure the book that contains the quotes is still floating around in the BJU Campus Store if not on Amazon. And if not, I've got one for sale to the highest bidder.

Read the whole story on BJU receiving TRACS accreditation here.