FORGET NONE OF HIS BENEFITS, volume 6, number 46, November 15, 2007

Thy word is truth, John 17:17.

Post Liberalism

The United Church of Christ (UCC), the historic and largest Protestant denomination in New England, has a new ad campaign for television, newspapers, and signs posted on their churches, many of which stand on the village green of most New England towns.  A few of these ads read, God is still speaking. . . Our faith is over 2000 years old but our thinking is not. . . Never place a period where God has placed a comma.  Obviously they are trying to say that truth changes according to the time in which one lives.

Then denominations which many would describe as theologically liberal, churches like the United Methodist Church, the Presbyterian Church USA, and various Lutheran denominations are experiencing rapid and extensive numerical growth, something which was not happening only twenty years ago. Many of these churches sound theologically conservative. Gone are the days, for many of them, of denying the virgin birth of Christ, Christ’s atoning death and bodily resurrection, and the need to live by the Bible.

What is going on here? The answer is that many wish to jettison the old categories, saying that they are no longer helpful, that they are unnecessarily divisive. N.T. Wright, for example, says that the old evangelical formula which describes Scripture as the inspired, inerrant, and infallible word of God is a reaction against Enlightenment thinking, and since people have rejected the modernism of the Enlightenment we need also to alter these categories of thought and expression. They just don’t apply anymore. Wright is not opposed to these words and he even says that inspiration is still a valuable expression, but he thinks infallibility and inerrancy are divisive and simply do not say much today to people who are looking for an overarching story of truth. To go further, some are saying that the titles of theological liberal and conservative express inherent biases, that both camps are guilty of pushing their own political agenda, that both read Scripture with their own theological presuppositions and make the Bible say what they want it to say. Thus, many suggest that if we are to reach our post everything culture then we need to put aside our agendas and give the post modern man what he wants and needs, namely an overarching story which makes sense, which puts all the pieces of his fragmented life together.

For those of us over forty years of age, it is very hard for us to think in terms other than theologically liberal or conservative, but many younger theologians are doing just that. The question for us is- what are they saying and what are we to make of it? Yale Professor George Lindbeck, who describes himself as a post liberal, in his book, The Nature of Doctrine, calls for a cultural linguistic approach to Scripture. In other words, Lindbeck is calling for us to take Scripture seriously, especially the narratives of the gospels and Acts, to study the text and to apply it to our lives. However he is more interested in how the covenant community reads and acts out Scripture. He is saying that theology comes, not from the text of Scripture, but from how the covenant community lives out the text.

Allow me to make this as simple as possible. The old liberal view of Scripture denied supernaturalism, things like the miracles of Elijah and Jesus, the virgin birth of Christ and His resurrection. The post liberal view of Scripture does not deny these truths or their accuracy. This is not a concern. Instead it wants to know how the covenant community then and now applies them. The old conservative view is Scripture first, then doctrine derived from Scripture, and then our practice of Scripture, living out what God says. The post liberal view is Scripture first, then the covenant community’s present read on Scripture and its practice of it, and then theology derived from this practice. The post liberal wants to discern the Holy Spirit’s present day work in the church. In other words, the present day "take" on abortion and homosexuality maybe different than it was two centuries ago. Hence the UCC’s slogan, "God is still speaking."

Post liberalism is better than liberalism because it at least takes Scripture more seriously. It does not go far enough, however, because it still allows for truth to change from culture to culture. This is why, for example, you may hear post liberal Methodists or Presbyterians speak glowingly of Christ’s virgin birth and resurrection but get uncomfortable when one presses for Christ as the only way to God and for homosexuality to be called sinful.

So the problem with post liberal theology is that it does not go back far enough with Scripture. The question is this- what is our authority, what is our rule for life? The post liberal says that it is the interpretation of a local covenant community in its reading of Scripture. For some communities, Christ may be the only way to God and homosexuality may be a sin. But for other communities their read on these issues may be very different.

Of course there is an even bigger problem with post liberalism. Lindbeck assumes that the Bible is the beginning point of authority for the covenant community but because he denies propositional truth derived from Scripture, the question must be asked, "Why not the Qu’ran? Don’t Muslims have as much right to believe their holy book is true? Why not embrace truth as any local Muslim community may embrace it?"

So, even though post liberalism is an improvement over liberalism is still falls short. It does not answer the question, "What is truth and where can we find it?" At the end of the day post liberalism is too subjective, denying the possibility of what Francis Schaeffer called true truth.

So we cannot embrace post liberalism. But what can we embrace? If conservatives accuse post liberals of subjectivity and bias; the post liberals accuse theological conservatives of the same thing; and surely we should admit that they have a point. Our tendency is to come to the study of Scripture with our own theological bias, whether it is Calvinsim or Arminianism, broad evangelicalism or narrow fundamentalism; and our bias affects our interpretation and then our practice of Scripture. One obvious example is how evangelicals embrace the political conservatism of some in the Republican Party on issues of war and abortion but overlook the call to social justice and care for the poor. So what’s the answer? I will address this in my next devotional.

FORGET NONE OF HIS BENEFITS is a weekly devotional by Reverend Al Baker, pastor of Christ Community Presbyterian Church in West Hartford, Connecticut.

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