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History is Repeating Itself (Again)

A religious controversy popped up in the 1920/30s between the Fundamentalists and Modernists.  It began within the Presbyterian Church in the US, but spread to most protestant denominations of the time during these two decades.

This controversy was characterized by the 1922 comic below.  It was really about conservative vs. liberal theology.  The mainline denominations which were more liberal in their views about the Bible was up against fundamentalist or evangelical Christianity which was more conservative in their view of the Bible.

The Conservatives contended that if the Modernists continued down this liberal theological road it would begin to strip away the fundamentals of the faith.

Keep in mind that the words, “modernist,” “fundamentalist,” “liberal”, “postmodern” and “evangelical” all have different and changing definitions.  There was no “postmodern” back in the 1920s.  This makes this controversy more complex today.

They were right.  A liberal view of the Word of God leads to destruction.

The same battle continues to rage today between “Evangelicals” and “Postmodernists” (which includes neo-orthodox, emergent church, liberal theology and more).  It all hinges on whether you believe the Bible is infallible, inerrant and inspired by God in it’s original languages or not.  If you believe it is, than you would fall in the conservative, evangelical, and fundamentalist group.  If not, you would be more mainline, liberal and “modernist” or today “postmodernist” in your theology.

This is a significant issue in our day and worth looking into or we risk believing the Bible is not infallible, man is not made in God’s image, there are no miracles, no virgin birth by Mary, Jesus is not God, the substitutionary atonement of Christ is false, Jesus did not rise from the dead and this all leads to being an agnostic or worse an atheist as the comic shows.

I have written about those individuals and groups who are throwing sound orthodox evangelical theology out the window in the following links series here.

What will you die for and thus live for today?  What do you believe about the Bible?  Jesus?  Jesus’ mission?  and God?

Paul commanded us to watch our lives and doctrine closely and wrote half of the New Testament defending the Gospel against false teaching.  Nothing is new under the sun.  The battle is still on.

What do you think? 

Read more about the Fundamentalist and Modernists Controversy here