Doctrine

The first thing that liberals believe about doctrine is we don't need it.

It's not necessary. Christianity is ultimately a lifestyle. You folks sitting in the pew, you don't need to worry about theology or doctrine. All doctrine is, is the debate of the subtleties by the theologians. That's all doctrine is. When you've talked with other Christians about some of the things that you're learning as you study God's Word, perhaps even after you've listened to an episode of Renewing Your Mind, have any of them replied by saying, We don't need doctrine. We have Jesus.

If you have, you're not alone. I've heard it many times over the years, and so did J. Gresham Machen even a hundred years ago. You're listening to Renewing Your Mind, and today Stephen Nichols will help us understand the importance of doctrine, of right and biblical doctrine. As Machen responded to the liberalism of his day, he addressed specific areas of disagreement, areas where these liberals had abandoned the historic Christian faith. You can read Machen's response in a special 100th anniversary edition of Christianity and Liberalism available today only for a donation of any amount at renewingyourmind.org. One of these areas of disagreement was with liberalism's understanding of doctrine. Here's Dr. Nichols with how Machen responded. We're going to be studying doctrine, key doctrines.

You could even say basic doctrines. These doctrines all come from the chapters of Machen's book, Christianity and Liberalism. This book, as we've been talking about, was written in 1923, but there is a relevance and an urgency to this book, and I think the reason is this. Machen was in his times. He was a man of his day. The challenges, the conflicts, the controversies that were swirling around him, Machen wasn't aloof from that or removed from that. He was right in the middle of it.

He was in the arena. But Machen had the ability to look past what was the particular issue, or what others would have said was the pressing issue, to look at the theological issue behind that, to look at the ultimate issue, or to look at the issue that fundamentally was of eternal consequence. So Machen is taking very timely problems, and he's seeing that these are ultimately answered with timeless answers, and those timeless answers are theology. All that is to say is that this book, written in 1923, can speak, I believe, directly to what we as Christians and what the church is facing today, and likely, should Christ tarry, it will speak to generations to come. There is a timelessness here that I think is very helpful. And essentially, what we have in this book is a primer on Christian doctrines. A Machen is very careful not to get caught up in the minutiae, not to get caught up in the secondary or the tertiary, the sort of marginal concerns that sometimes we debate.

You know, like millennial positions. Those are huge issues for some people. Machen actually talks about them a little bit, but he says those aren't the crucial issues of theology. The crucial issues of theology are these. What do we believe about God? Who is God? What do we believe about man? And of course, when we're talking about man, it's what do we believe about sin? What do we believe about the Bible? What are we to make of the Bible?

How do we understand it? And then, of course, the center message of the Bible is Christ. And once we talk about who Christ is and what Christ's particular message was, that leads us to salvation, so the doctrine of salvation.

In fact, in many ways, what Machen is doing in this book is leading up to that chapter. And we understand the doctrine of regeneration and the doctrine of justification. And then once we're saved, we become part of this family of God. It's not just us.

It's not just individuals. We are part of a church, and so the final chapter is on the church. These are basic doctrines, and at each point, Machen just stops us and helps us think through what are the fundamental doctrines under those key six areas. But before he does that, he has a chapter on doctrine itself. How should we understand doctrine?

How do we approach doctrine? And in the context of the book, he wants to talk about how liberals understand doctrine. In fact, he'll come to say three things about liberals and doctrine. So, for liberals, doctrine is a life. Christianity is a life, not a doctrine. Christianity is about behaviors, not beliefs. So, the first thing in liberalism's teaching on doctrine is that doctrine ultimately doesn't matter. In fact, doctrine can even get in the way.

And at one point in this chapter, Machen is going to talk about an hostility of liberalism towards doctrine. Because ultimately, here's the mantra, Christianity is a life, not a set of beliefs. It's behaviors, not what you know.

It's how you live. Christianity is a life. And the second thing liberalism is going to say about doctrine has to do with this notion of Christian experience.

So, we're not talking about a message. We're not talking about doctrines. We're talking about a Christian experience. And what doctrine is, is a sort of changing structure around a unitary Christian experience. So, the doctrine of the first century church or the second century church was a way of expressing Christian experience in the first and second century. The doctrine of the sixteenth century church, the church of the Reformation, was just a way of expressing a Christian experience. And so now, this is liberalism, as we're moving into the twentieth century, we can change all that.

We can set aside all of that. It's like the packaging. The doctrines of the Reformation are like the wrapping paper, and the box, and the tissue stuffed inside. In there is that thing of Christian experience. And so, the doctrine of sola scriptura or the doctrine of sola fide, that can just be discarded. Because that belonged to the sixteenth century and the way they expressed Christian experience. As long as we have that kernel of Christian experience, the trappings don't matter.

And in fact, it's wrong-headed to apply the trappings of a previous age on this age. That's the liberal approach to doctrine. But you could take it one step further and say, that's actually the liberal approach to Scripture. The Bible itself is the packaging that covers up this kernel of Christian experience in it. So, don't get hung up on the particulars. Don't get hung up on the factual historicity of the text.

You're asking the wrong question. What is the experience of the encounter with the divine that is in the biblical text? That's a terrible way to read Scripture. It's such a wrong-headed way to read Scripture. But what happens is that method gets applied to doctrine. And now we understand such a disdain for doctrine, it can just simply be set aside. So, the first thing that liberals believe about doctrine is we don't need it.

It's not necessary. Christianity is ultimately a lifestyle. Secondly, what is doctrine? Well, it's constantly changing.

It's a moving target. And there are some where as Christian experience, don't get hung up on the particulars. It doesn't matter at all the particulars of what you believe.

It's the experience. And then thirdly, a number of times in liberalism, especially preached from the churches, you folks sitting in the pew, you don't need to worry about theology or doctrine. All doctrine is, is the debate of the subtleties by the theologians. That's all doctrine is. It's the academics, it's the scholars debating subtleties that have absolutely nothing to do with living the Christian life. Now, you've got to ask yourself, what do you mean by subtleties? Well, Machen is going to tell us the deity of Christ. That's understood as a subtlety within liberalism, the exclusivity of the message of salvation in Jesus Christ. That's a subtlety that the liberals are going to dismiss.

Is the Bible fully, 100%, the inerrant authoritative Word of God? That's a subtlety that we're just going to get tripped up on and that the academics get all excited about, but really has no bearing on the Christian life. So, Machen is painting this picture of liberalism to set the stage so that as we get into particular doctrines, we see that behind it is this approach to doctrine that in a sense is so wrongheaded.

So, how do we correct this? Well, we've got three problems with liberalism and its approach to doctrine. I want to correct this by having three counter-proposals by Paul and looking at three places in Paul that are a counter to this understanding of doctrine. But since the view within liberalism tended to prefer Jesus over Paul, let's look at Jesus too. So, let's take a look at three things Jesus has to teach us about doctrine, and then we will draw one single conclusion. All right, so we've got the three approaches to doctrine from liberalism.

We're going to have three counter punches from Paul, and we're going to have three counter punches from Christ himself. So, three texts for each of these. For Paul, the first text is 1 Corinthians 15, 1 Corinthians 15, 1-8. Now, you know this text.

You probably know exactly where I'm going with this text. In 1 Corinthians 15, Paul is going to give us a concise definition of the gospel. He says, Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you which you received in which you stand, and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you, unless you believed in vain. Well, let's just pause over those first two verses.

What do we see here? Ultimately, what we find is that doctrine is a message, and that message is going to be an account of facts. This is the message. This is the word. So, he says in verse 3, For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received. So, let's pause here for a second.

This is very important. There's a body of knowledge that is intentionally transferred to another person, and that person then intentionally transfers it. So, now we have Christ, who is the originator of this message. We have Christ, who is the originator of this account of facts.

In fact, we have Christ, who is the object of this account of facts. And what did Christ do but bring around Him the apostles that He entrusted this message to? And then what do the apostles do?

They inscripturate it. They put it into words on paper as objectively true and as the message of Christianity is the New Testament. And what else do these apostles do? They train pastors and teachers.

And what is the job of those pastors and teachers but to receive that teaching and then to teach others? So, when Paul says, I delivered to you what I received, he's talking about this transmission of a message. He goes on to say that this is the message, that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scripture, that He was buried, that He was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures, and that He appeared to Cephas, then to the Twelve, then He appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep. In other words, there's eyewitnesses.

And if you want to track them down, go ahead and track them down and they will testify to what they saw. Then He appeared to James, then to all the apostles. And then last of all, this one untimely born, He appears to Paul. So, right up front, what Paul is saying is what Christianity is about is a message. And that message is an account of facts.

And we have a word for that. That word is teaching. And that's doctrine. When we're talking about doctrine, all we are talking about is teaching, a body of teaching.

But it is a body of teaching predicated on a message. And it is a message from God Himself. So, 1 Corinthians 15, we could go to Galatians chapter 1.

And you know that text, and you know where I'm going with that. So, Galatians chapter 1, verse 6, I am astonished, Paul says, I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting him who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel. Not that there is another one, but there are some who trouble you and want to distort the gospel of Christ. But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preach to you, let him be accursed. As we've said before, so now I say again, if anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to the one you received, let him be accursed.

There's no way you can pull out of this that Christianity is a lifestyle. It's a doctrine. It's a doctrine. It's a doctrine that can be distorted. It's a doctrine that can be false. That's what's bothering Paul.

It's not the morality of the Judaizers. It's the teaching of the Judaizers in Galatians. That Paul is anathematizing, not just once, but twice to drive home the point. Well, we could keep going in Paul, but I have one last text for us. It's over in 2 Timothy chapter 2.

Let's just go to verse 2 and 3, because there's something very important going on here. Paul says to Timothy, you then my child, be strengthened by the grace that is in Christ Jesus. And what you have heard from me, there's that message again, there's that accounting of facts, there's that teaching.

What you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses and trust, give over as a steward of something precious to teach others also. That's doctrine. That's doctrine.

And then look at verse 3, Sharon's suffering as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. That's the Christian life. But the Christian life proceeds from a message. The Christian life proceeds from a doctrine. Liberalism wanted to short circuit that and say, no, it's just about the lifestyle. Paul doesn't even understand that.

He has no option for that. To see that somehow you could have the Christian life apart from a teaching. In fact, as you go on to read from verses 3 to 13, it's all about the Christian life.

With all of these wonderful metaphors of being an athlete or being a farmer or being a soldier. It's a rigorous life, this Christian life. The whole thing, the whole thing is grounded on a message. So, this leads Machen to say this. Paul was convinced of the objective truth of the gospel message.

So, there we have message. There we have facts, which are objective truths, not relevant to what one particular age expresses as truth. Beyond any expression in a particular age, objective. Paul was convinced of the objective truth of the gospel message. And devotion to that truth was the great passion of his life. Christianity for Paul was not only a life, but also a doctrine. And logically, the doctrine came first. So, if you want to say Christianity is a lifestyle and not a doctrine. Or I can be a Christian and I don't need doctrine.

Or doctrine is for the theologians, it's not for me. Paul would not understand that. Paul would look at you like you just dropped off of some planet from outer space. He has no category for that.

Well, that's Paul. What can we make of Christ? Well, Jesus' message was all about an event. For the apostles, their message wasn't about an event.

But it was an event that happened. The death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. For Jesus, it's an event to come.

And all of his message points to that, like an arrow aimed at the center of the bullseye. We find it in Mark chapter 10, verse 45. Jesus didn't come to just tell us how to have a good lifestyle. Jesus didn't come just to set an example for us. Jesus came to give his life a ransom for many. He came with a mission of an event to die on the cross. That was what we call the Messianic mission. That's the first text, Mark 10, 45. This is Jesus telling us why he came.

Not just to teach us how to be selfless. Secondly, we have John chapter 14 to 16. I don't have time to read all three of those chapters for you. But I'd love for you to read through those chapters and look at how many times Jesus uses the word truth. How many times Jesus reminds the apostles of what he taught them. And how many times in those three chapters he says that the Holy Spirit... Jesus calls the Holy Spirit a teacher who will bring to your mind all that I said and did.

And you will then have an exact recording of what my message was. And you will then proclaim that to the church for generations to come. His final words with his disciples are about the importance of the message. That is true words.

Words exactly true. That will then be the lifeblood of the church. And how does John 14 to 16 begin? They're anxious, these disciples, because Jesus said, I'm going to leave you. And like, what? We gave up our careers to follow you.

We've done this for the last three years. We're going to be orphans. They're anxious. And Jesus could put his arm around them and come along and give them all kinds of warm teachings about how to live a fun and successful life.

You'll be okay. He doesn't do any of that. He points them to doctrine. He leads them to teaching, right? And then lastly, Machen says, okay, you say Sermon on the Mount? Let's go there and let's see what Jesus has to say. Well, we come to Matthew chapter 7, verses 21 to 23. We come to Matthew chapter 7, verse 29.

And what do we find there? But that Jesus is judge and the eternal destinies of souls are in Jesus's hands. Matthew says this when it's all finished. When Jesus finished these teachings, the crowds were astonished at his teaching, for he was teaching them as one who had authority. So even the Sermon on the Mount, which is all about lifestyle, the liberals would say, no, no, it's about teaching.

It's about teaching. Well, this leads Machen to say this. But of those who quote this passage, Sermon on the Mount, so triumphantly and this way ever stopped to reflect upon the other side of the picture, upon the stupendous fact that in this same passage, the eternal destinies of men are made dependent upon the Word of Jesus. Jesus here presents himself as seated on the judgment seat. Clearly, it is impossible to escape from theology, even in the chosen precincts of the Sermon on the Mount, a stupendous theology with Jesus's own person at the center of it. That is the presupposition of the whole teaching.

That is the entire message of Christianity. So we have three false ideas about doctrine from liberalism. We've got three texts in Paul which refute it. We've got three texts in Jesus which refute it. And now we have a conclusion. It matters profoundly what you believe.

That's the conclusion. Doctrine matters profoundly. And because our life flows from our doctrine, it matters profoundly how we live. The liberal error is to think that Christianity can skip over doctrine and go right to lifestyle, and that doctrine doesn't matter, and that all that matters is the Christian experience within it. That is foreign to the Bible, it is deadly to the church, and it is deadly to the Christian life. It matters profoundly what you believe. It does matter profoundly what you believe, which is why Ligonier Ministries continues to produce discipleship resources, including Renewing Your Mind, to help you know what you believe, why you believe it, how to live it, and how to share it. You're listening to Renewing Your Mind, and today's message is from Stephen Nichols' new series, Christianity and Liberalism, and today is the final day to request digital access to the complete 12-message series and the study guide and receive the special 100th anniversary edition of J. Gresham Machen's classic book, Christianity and Liberalism. Request your copy with a gift of any amount at renewingyourmind.org, or if you prefer, call us at 800 435 4343. Your generosity is fueling the bold and uncompromising proclamation of truth. Thank you. How do you discover God's will for your life? That's a common question and one Sinclair Ferguson will address tomorrow, here on Renewing Your Mind. Copyright © 2020, New Thinking Allowed Foundation