In a recent article, Christianity Today notes that research shows evangelicals struggle to maintain coherent doctrinal convictions.
I mean this in the most literal sense: according to the results of the survey cited and discussed in the article, many Christian beliefs held by evangelicals simply don’t cohere. They don’t hang together without contradicting each other. In particular, “many of the survey answers reveal…an alarming lack of Biblical literacy, as well a tendency to hold contradictory beliefs without seeming to recognize the incongruity.”
This means, for example, that 28% of evangelicals agreed that only Christ alone could be trusted for salvation, but also that Christ was simply “a great teacher” and not God. Half consistently agreed that people are good by nature. 44% think worshiping alone or with family is as good as attending church regularly, and over half say the Holy Spirit isn’t a personal being.
I’m not here to knock evangelicals in particular; I imagine this is a struggle for other Christians as well. Nor am I surprised by the results. What we allow ourselves to be tutored by, we eventually become, and I suspect many Christians in the US (not just evangelicals) are being tutored in their faith by everything outside it. In fact, many Christians I know are tutored in their faith by the following teachers:
- Social Media
Along with seemingly the rest of the country, many Christians derive their information and beliefs from teachers, influencers, and popular figures on social media outlets who deliver “Christian” ideas, beliefs, and concepts in small and digestible sound bites
- Politics
In our current era, Christianity and evangelicalism have been so conflated with politics and with prevailing current political ideology that political positions have become accepted Christian doctrine, and vice versa, with little thought given as to how this actually represents, emerges from, or addresses Scripture
- Authors and Teachers
Christian bookstore shelves host everything from the Pope to Tim Tebow to Joel Osteen to Girl Wash Your Face to The Secret. Many Christians seeking truth choose to apprehend it through the filter of authors or teachers they choose to enjoy, accepting without question that what they read is a accurate representation of Biblical truth.
- Unaffiliated Churches and Pastors
Four unaffiliated churches have cropped up in my area in the past year, all with slick, app-friendly names like Harvest and Soul Fire and Rock. They have sleek marketing materials, charismatic pastors who appear to be self-educated, and absolutely no affiliation with any denominational source. This is not to say that non-denominational churches are bad or teaching incorrect doctrine—but there is also little oversight of these churches and what they teach, so what masquerades as “Christian doctrine and teaching” here can be a real grab bag for better and sometimes for worse.
Certainly there is much freedom in Christ about how we might interpret or respond to certain Christian teachings (see the “eating meat sacrificed to idols” debate in the Pauline letters). And there are many topics the Bible doesn’t cover directly, giving us freedom of thought, conscience, and Spirit-led discernment about how to approach.
But orthodoxy and the central truths of the faith also matter. Acts and the epistles are one long effort of the early church to establish and to defend these truths, and church history tells us how critical this effort was. To hand down these understandings and to abide by them meant preserving the words and the commands of Christ, meant understanding Scriptural truth and safeguarding it with care even as we recognize and exercise our freedom in the Spirit. This is no small thing; this is what defines the very heart of our faith.
During my upbringing as an evangelical, I was fortunate to receive Scriptural teaching of great depth and rigor. I was able to grow up to read Scripture in part but also in whole—to, as Eugene Petersen so aptly put it in his titular text, “eat the book.” To read and understand the whole and the part, to engage in exegesis (even if I didn’t know that’s what it was), to understand and apply context to what I was reading, mattered to my congregation and mattered to me. To date, this has been the greatest spiritual present my church and my parents ever gave me. It has guided me ever since —yes, even away from the evangelical churches in my area that have slipped farther from truth and doctrine.
Without doctrine, without its core truths, Christianity becomes part of the spiritual-cultural-mashup common to our current era. Borrow this, borrow that, pick what you like and keep what you don’t. Choose the books and the teachers that mirror what you secretly believe, and avoid anything that challenges it. Create a Jesus who is not Scriptural but who looks like you need Him to look, and dispense with a Spirit that challenges, guides, and intercedes for you.
At my current church, the service follows a liturgical rhythm. The congregation confesses its sin together. We recite the creeds and the Our Father. We receive communion and a blessing. This happens every Sunday. It has become the pole around which my week revolves. And it is a reminder of truth.
If I had a good week and I feel good about myself and what I’m doing, I go to church on Sunday and I remember I am a sinner and I remember grace and I join in with the church at the table of God. If I had a bad week and I feel small and miserable, I go to church on Sunday and I remember I am a sinner and I remember grace and I join in with the church at the table of God. These truths and acts remain although I am variable in mood, in aspect, in hope. They shape me and form me.
This is what truth does. This is what God’s truth does.
We do not make it or shape it or invent it. It makes us. It challenges us. It holds us to account. In a world where my mood changes like the weather and my circumstances often do the same, the truths of my faith are the only rock on which I might build a house. God help me should I choose the sand, instead.
God help us all.
Samaritan's Song 