R. C. Sproul:
Quoting Francis Schaeffer, “The church has lost its sense of antitheses.”
Albert Mohler:
“Once you buy into the logic of anti-supernaturalism, there’s no place to stop. . . . If you start to say, ‘It can’t happen; there is no possibility of a god who would act in that way,’ then you can’t stop at one doctrine just because you decide to stop there, or if you do, 
you need to understand that what you’re doing is merely exercising some arbitrary operation of the will, not some consistent operation of a theological mind. And one of the other problems that you have with this is that you run out of doctrines to deny. This is one of the most delicious predicaments of modern Protestantism. They started here, and they pretty much run through the catalog. Bishop Spong has denied every doctrine there is to deny, and he’s written a book on it, and he’s already been on the Today Show and Good Morning America, and there are no more doctrines to deny. He’s retired now.”
“When you come to understand liberal theology, you don’t know anything about theology, but you know a lot about liberals. Because their theology is an expression of who they are: ‘This is who I am; here’s my doctrine.’”
Thabiti Anyabwile:
“We must be ruthless about rooting our pastoral purpose and the mission of the church in the Word of God itself, and the gospel itself. So just to make this plain, is it the purpose of the church to win the culture, or engage the culture, or change the culture? Is that your pastoral purpose when you show up Monday morning at the church office? I would suggest to you that that very language — winning the culture, engaging the culture, changing the culture — as ambiguous as it is, the language itself signifies that mission-drift is already underway. We are gospel men. We are proclaimers of this gospel; we are appliers of this gospel; we are representatives of this gospel; we are stewards of this gospel; and the one thing we must do, and not go away from, is this gospel, its proclamation, its preaching.”
“This attempt to acculturate the gospel, to make it fit into our own cultural confines, as we engage the culture, is an adjustment of the gospel, and less than the gospel. When we say ‘church,’ I would implore us to think, to understand, to see, whenever we hear the word ‘church’ — certainly not the building, certainly not just the Sunday gathering — when we say church, I implore us to see the people, and not just people, but by definition, nations. The church is a multi-ethnic thing. And let me be clear: it is not only inescapably multi-ethnic, biblically, but it’s not multi-cultural. It is multi-ethnic, but it is mono-cultural. And it is not any of our native cultures. It’s this new way of being that God has created through Christ in the gospel. It’s a gospel culture.”
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Posted in: Together for the Gospel 2010
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2 Comments:
#1 || 10·04·20··17:21 || Bill Weber
Anyabwile says, "I would suggest to you that that very language — winning the culture, engaging the culture, changing the culture — as ambiguous as it is, the language itself signifies that mission-drift is already underway. We are gospel men."
I agree that this is the main mission for pastors and churches. However, is there a place for seeking what is best for a given society? For example, as Christians we know that marriage, the sanctity of life, and freedom of conscience are best for the society we also live in. How do we promote values that are good for our society, but still maintain the centrality of the gospel mission?
#2 || 10·04·20··18:07 || David
Bill,
I would suggest that you listen to the entire mesage (video, audio).
My answer would be that promoting “values” accomplishes little more than to create a “cultural Christianity” such as we see here in the USA, particularly in the Bible belt, which actually hardens people to the gospel. The gospel — and only the gospel — actually changes lives, which in turn may result in genuine societal change.
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