The Upper Register Blog

A brief follow-up on my previous post. In the essay I quoted yesterday, William Abraham ponders the potential impact of inclusivism on evangelicalism. This is something that occupies only two brief sentences — one at the very beginning and one at the very end.

At the beginning (p. 131), he points out that, while inclusivism is the working ideology of the mainline churches, it’s not at present very influential among evangelicals, at least not in the driven, abusive sense described by Abraham. Nevertheless, it has the potential to be, since …

evangelicals readily pick up on the agendas of the mainline in a decade, or maybe a generation or so, after they have been readily accepted elsewhere.

Then at the end Abraham says (p. 145):

It is the gospel of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, which alone can save us from our corruption and idolatry. We can surely hope that evangelicals will be assiduous in ensuring that this medicine is kept available for all who seek its healing.

I hope evangelicals will be assiduous in preserving the medicine of the gospel. But I’m not sure how many of them really feel their need. The truths of the gospel — the atonement, justification, sanctification, assurance – are a healing balm only to those that know their spiritual need before a holy God. Many evangelicals appear to be too preoccupied with transforming the city of man through lefty politics and a revived social gospel (e.g., Brian McLaren, Red Letter Christians, etc.) to care about preserving any soul-healing medicine for Professor Abraham. 

William J. Abraham is a professor of Wesley Studies at the Perkins School of Theology at SMU. He does not self-identify as an evangelical, but he has a great article in an evangelical multi-author book on ecclesiology edited by two Wheaton guys. In the article, Professor Abraham analyzes the malaise of the mainline churches in the United States, drawing extensively from his experience in the United Methodist Church. While fully embracing the stand of the mainline churches against racism and patriarchy, he is fed up with the way these original protests have taken on a life of their own and evolved into an idolatrous pursuit of inclusivism as the end-all and be-all of the church.

Here are some excerpts from his insightful analysis. I think it’s fair to say that he doesn’t pull any punches!

(1) The origins of inclusivism (p. 133):

How did this call to inclusivism arise? Clearly the origins of inclusivism lie, as far as the recent past is concerned, in the quest to rid the world of racism and patriarchy in the social revolution of the sixties. Inclusivism began life as a response to racism, the doctrine that white races are superior to black races, and to patriarchy, the doctrine that men are essentially superior to women.

(2) How inclusivism migrated (pp. 133-34):

In time inclusivism migrated as a solution to other forms of oppression and exclusion … As the boundaries of exclusion were extended and other victim groups were added to the initial list, it is easy to see how inclusivism became de facto the orthodoxy of modern mainline Protestantism.

(3) Current characteristics of inclusivism

a. It has become a new oppression (pp. 134, 136):

The morally charged nature of our situation makes it virtually impossible to question the place of inclusivism in the life of the church, society or academy. Reformers will immediately be castigated as racists and oppressors … What began as an effort to include excluded minorities and women becomes over time an instrument of exclusion silencing those who want to raise fundamental questions about crucial moral, educational and theological proposals in the church … Truth be told, some among the oppressed have rapidly turned into oppressors … The march to progress becomes relentless, systematic, blind, pharisaical, self-righteous and manipulative.

b. It is ultimately a form of idolatry (p. 137):

When we worship together now in mainline corporate settings, the first question before us is not whether God is present but whether the right range of diversity is present … One T-shirt recently captured the limiting case for me when it noted that embracing diversity was embracing God. At this point we are on the edge of idolatry. We have made a god of ourselves, putting our varied identities at the core of our worship.

c. It engenders a poisonous moralism (p. 138):

What has happened overall is that a virulent form of moralism has poisoned the church … Those driven by moralism have great difficulty seeing that their moralism can readily turn into self-serving idolatry. A spiritual egocentrism develops that becomes virtually incurable; it is as if moral endeavor excuses moral blindness.

d. It fosters a misplaced sense of identity (p. 140):

The kind of identity promised in the gospel and in baptism has been trumped by our biological and ethnic identities. We are first identified in terms of race, gender and ethnicity and only secondarily identified in terms of faith and baptism.

(4) Strategies for combatting abusive inclusivism:

a. Voting with one’s feet (pp. 143):

When inclusivism elbows out the great mercy of God and usurps the place of the cross in the gospel, ordinary believers readily slip away and find food for their souls elsewhere … In the limiting case, where things are hopelessly out of order, say, in one’s local church, then one can simply leave and go elsewhere. In cases where there is a real danger to one’s spiritual life, I would not hesitate to endorse such a strategy.

b. Reinstating the gospel (pp. 143-44):

The best antidote to abusive and self-serving forms of inclusivism is to reinstate the gospel at the core of the church’s life … When it comes to our turn to speak, we can change the subject and return to the first order of discourse of the gospel. We can immerse ourselves in the great themes of the gospel; we can drink afresh from the mercy of God in the cross; we can ensure that the full faith of the church is tended to and taught; we can lift up Christ like the serpent in the wilderness and watch him draw all to himself; we can cry out for a fresh outpouring of the Holy Spirit on the church; we can do all we can to ensure that the sacraments are duly administered; we can pray without ceasing for the comprehensive renewal of the whole people of God.

[William J. Abraham, “Inclusivism, Idolatry and the Survival of the (Fittest) Faithful,” pp. 131-45 in The Community of the Word: Toward an Evangelical Ecclesiology, eds. Mark Husbands and Daniel J. Treier (Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity; Leicester: Apollos, 2005).]

Under 4a, one might add that entire congregations can vote with their feet too. This is happening in the PC(USA) where a number of conservative congregations are voting to withdraw and join the EPC’s transitional presbytery. (Thanks to EPC Pastor David Fischler for providing these updates on his blog, Reformed Pastor.)