Recovering Evangelicals #14 Loose Threads: Evangelicalism (pt III) … four core problems
What is it about Evangelicalism that sets believers up for their faith to fail when confronted simply by scientific facts? We suggest four answers to this question …
(1) An inflexible adherence to inerrancy and infallibility of Scripture, and putting the Bible on too high a pedestal that borders on turning it into an icon … a thing to be worshiped. Bibliolatry.
(2) Diminishing God and elevating self. Too many Evangelicals treat God and Jesus as their good buddy. They speak of frequent (daily?) direct encounters with the ineffable, even a personal relationship. But what about the rest of us (many of us) who do not experience those feelings? On the other hand, there’s also a tendency to see ourselves as the center of the universe: that it’s all about us.
(3) Exclusivity. We’re always drawing lines … defining who’s in and who’s out. And then too quickly consigning those outside the lines to hell (and even insisting on an eternal conscious torment!?). And we think we have nothing to learn from other seekers, philosophers, or religions.
(4) Certainty. The arrogance that we know exactly what a given Bible passage means … that our theological understanding is complete and accurate … that the Bible is “so simple that even a child could understand it.” … that we’re right and everybody else is wrong. And that anything which might call our thinking into question … like scientific findings … are just wrong and to be dismissed.
What are your thoughts on this?
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