05
Jun
“Remember the Alamo: Is the Battle for the Bible Really Over?” by Dr. Al Mohler
Here is a hot-off-the-press column that ran in the World Magazine issue that came to my doorstep yesterday. It is in the issue that will be distributed free at the convention next week. I don’t want to infringe the copyright of World by printing the whole column, but you can access part of it online. The best part, however, falls at the end and is not accessible without a subscription.
Regarding the question of “Is the Battle for the Bible Really Over?”, Dr. Mohler states,
“A group of younger pastors and bloggers is now openly asking the question, Is the ‘Battle for the Bible’ over? Some go further, arguing that the theological issues are settled, health has been returned, and the SBC should move on from theological preoccupations. Are they right?The SBC is certainly in no danger of an organized takeover. The more liberal elements have largely moved on to other groups and have little to do with the SBC. There will be no rematch on the question of biblical inerrancy in San Antonio.
Still, all is not well. The denomination is losing many of its young people, especially at the crucial transition between adolescence and adulthood. New controversies have emerged even as older fissures have been reopened. A generation that was playing Little League as the “Battle for the Bible” raged now includes some who loudly claim that the Conservative Resurgence has gone too far.
Not hardly. The incipient controversies of the present serve to remind Southern Baptists of what was at stake when we last met in San Antonio and of where we would be if the Convention had headed in a very different direction. The issue of biblical inerrancy is as important today- and as in need of defining and defending- as it was then.
Southern Baptists will do well to remember what every Texan remembers when reminded of the Alamo: There are some battles worth fighting, some stories worth remembering, and some causes that never die.”
And we at Thoughts and Adventures say a hearty “Amen” to that.
June 5th, 2007 at 11:35 pm
Great words by Dr. Mohler! Words that we truly need to hear today.
I know some mentioned it in the past, but Dr. Mohler would make a great candidate for President of our Convention in 2008. I don’t know if he would ever consider accepting such a position, but we can hope.
June 6th, 2007 at 9:59 am
[…] In the most recent issue of World Magazine, Dr. Albert Mohler considers this question, “Has the Conservative Resurgence gone too far” (HT: Scott Lamb). Here is how he responds: […]
June 6th, 2007 at 10:22 pm
I’d like to know who are these young bloggers who claim the Resurgence has gone too far. I hear far more of them saying the Battle for the Bible has not gone far enough. Conservative Southern Baptists claim to believe in the inerrancy of scripture, but when the Bible appears to conflict with “tradition” it all too often seems to be the tradition that comes through unscathed, and the scriptures that are injured.
June 7th, 2007 at 10:40 am
G.F…just visit around the Southern Baptist blogs. You will quickly come to find those who Dr. Mohler are talking about.
June 9th, 2007 at 7:09 am
We are witnessing ,on a fairly large scale ,the shifting of the catagories that historically defined what it meant to be an ‘Evangelical’.Perhaps this is no where more obvious than with the touchstone doctrine of Scripture and the long held understanding of Biblical inerrancy. The ‘hot off the press’ advocates of what goes by names like ‘post-conservative Evangelicalism’, or ‘post- modern Evangelicals’ as well as the very vocal group that marches under the banner of ‘Emergent’ all take a very jauniced view of Old Princeton’s BB Warfield, the most noted defender of inerrancy, and charge everyone who has embraced Warfield’s position with having bought into modernity’s overbearing confidence in the Enlightment’s intellectual arrogance of certitude. They tell us it is much better and more importantly, a sign of true humility (and certainly more in keeping in step with the times) to acknowledge that we are equally unsure whether or not God has really given us His Word in that fashion-and even if He did, we are all plagued by the fact that language is after all a social construct. So it is best not to ever say ‘Thus saith the Lord’, that comes across overbearingly dogmatic, something that post moderns will not tolerate, so we tell them that the Bible serves to help ‘the community’ that we belong to try and find meaning and significance when interpreted along side the voice of the Spirit in the surrounding culture, who leads us to not make any moral judgements that might offend the sensitivies of that culture. So, given this developing situation, we should be all that surprised that suddenly we hear people boasting that Biblical inerrancy needs to be put away in the attic of irrelevance.
June 10th, 2007 at 8:23 pm
Dr. Mohler as SBC President? Hasn’t that position always been held by an actual pastor?
June 10th, 2007 at 11:14 pm
Tripp, Dr. Mohler would bring great vision and leadership to the SBC at a time when we need both.
Steve, in answer to your question, even recent history says \”no\”.
June 11th, 2007 at 7:57 pm
“Dr. Mohler would bring great vision and leadership to the SBC at a time when we need both.”
Amen!