The Rise and Fall of Existential Baptists

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The fall of every denomination begins with such thoughts as these from David Gushee given in a plenary address at the recent CBF sponsored conference on Sexuality& Covenant.

"Some of our most thoughtful leaders are functioning more with a repertoire of resources beginning with Scripture but extending to tradition, reason and experience. I think that there is an awareness in our part of the Baptist world at this time that tradition, reason, and experience are always operative when people are reading Scripture. You might call it a loss of naiveté."

And in this lies the problem of declining membership and increasing apostasy in mainline denominations. The “starting” with Scripture; not as a source of authority, but as simply a genesis for the theological underpinning of our doctrine and practices. And to add insult to ecclesiastical injury, Gushee then brings Scripture under the vicarious authority of tradition, reason, and experience.

In other words, in the frame of reference of the Conference on Sexuality and Covenant, despite the fact that the Bible clearly states that sex is to be confined to marriage partners, that marriage is to be between one man and one woman for one lifetime, and that homosexuality is sin, we can ignore these facts. Because tradition, reason, and experience trump that old fashion, unreasonable, and bland old doctrine, anyway. 

Tradition has changed to the place where the culture has welcomed the homosexual lifestyle as alternative, if not normative, but most certainly not sinful. I mean, really, why would any rational thinking individual try to stop true love or confine a couple to marriage for life? Maybe he will find a woman he loves more than his first wife. So?  We can clearly see that this teen age couple loves each other, why make them get married in order to have sex? The experience of young love should not be denied.

It doesn’t take long to see how little value the Bible has in the denominations that take a view of the Scriptures as relative. When the church views doctrine from such an existential worldview, ontologically speaking, the battle is already lost. With no clear, decisive, and authoritative source for our beliefs, the progression of thought will lead to where all existentialism leads…atheism.   If not an outright denial of God’s existence, it certainly plows headlong into practical atheism. A religion whose god is a weak-kneed, spaghetti-spined, limp-wristed, feeble, vacillating deity that cannot decide on what he or she wants. Hmmmm.

The only loss of  naiveté then, is the naiveté of believing that we can have a "God" that has no authority, no consistency, nor relevance in a word of ever changing ethics.

A Modern Look At Existentialism

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So...we live in a post-modern, relativistic world dominated by the philosophy called existentialism. This philosophy basically states that there are no absolutes in the world, especially when it comes to truth. What is true for you, is not necessarily true for me. This view of existentialism is especially held with post-modernity's view of religion. It was Friedrich Nietzsche who said, "There are no facts, only interpretations." Which he took to mean that his own statement was factual, by the way. It is like the man who says "There are no absolute truths." I say, "Are you absolutely sure?" The existentialist says, "There are no facts, only interpretations." But then tells modernists, quite factually I might add, that they are wrong and bigoted because the modernists' interpretation differs from their own.




Now friends, let me assure you that there are absolute truths in this world. For instance, let's say I hit an existentialist...when he gets up...he will know that some things hurt. That is a truth. :)



Or better yet, let's say that there are three men on the roof. One believes that the law of gravity exists. One believes that the law of gravity is relative. The third has never even heard of Newton. All three jump. I promise you this, all three will go splat. Not just the one who believed or had knowledge.



There are some inescapable truths:

2+2 will always equal 4.

What goes up, must come down.

The French will always surrender.

The Word of God is the Absolute Truth.



Look, we don't have to teach our children to lie. Do we? We also don't have to teach them to know it's bad either. An Aboriginal living away from society and western culture still knows that there is something greater than we are. He may not know which god is God, but he knows there is something that is innate in his being that desires to worship something or someone. That is an absolute, also. Even the atheist's have their gods. They may not acknowledge them as such, but they are gods in their lives. Science, technology, and even philosophy itself can be worshipped.



The Apostle Paul said this in Romans 1:

18 But God shows his anger from heaven against all sinful, wicked people who suppress the truth by their wickedness. 19 They know the truth about God because he has made it obvious to them. 20 For ever since the world was created, people have seen the earth and sky. Through everything God made, they can clearly see his invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature. So they have no excuse for not knowing God.


21 Yes, they knew God, but they wouldn’t worship him as God or even give him thanks. And they began to think up foolish ideas of what God was like. As a result, their minds became dark and confused. 22 Claiming to be wise, they instead became utter fools. 23 And instead of worshiping the glorious, ever-living God, they worshiped idols made to look like mere people and birds and animals and reptiles.


24 So God abandoned them to do whatever shameful things their hearts desired. As a result, they did vile and degrading things with each other’s bodies. 25 They traded the truth about God for a lie. So they worshiped and served the things God created instead of the Creator himself, who is worthy of eternal praise! 26 That is why God abandoned them to their shameful desires. Even the women turned against the natural way to have sex and instead indulged in sex with each other. 27 And the men, instead of having normal sexual relations with women, burned with lust for each other. Men did shameful things with other men, and as a result of this sin, they suffered within themselves the penalty they deserved.


28 Since they thought it foolish to acknowledge God, he abandoned them to their foolish thinking and let them do things that should never be done. 29 Their lives became full of every kind of wickedness, sin, greed, hate, envy, murder, quarreling, deception, malicious behavior, and gossip. 30 They are backstabbers, haters of God, insolent, proud, and boastful. They invent new ways of sinning, and they disobey their parents. 31 They refuse to understand, break their promises, are heartless, and have no mercy. 32 They know God’s justice requires that those who do these things deserve to die, yet they do them anyway. Worse yet, they encourage others to do them, too.

See, they try to suppress the truth, but they can't. Now tell me that this passage doesn't sound like modern America? In this new land of the free, the only thing that is not tolerated, is intolerance itself! We are told by the existentialist crowd that we MUST be tolerant of other's religious views. Yet they themselves are intolerant of our intolerance! This intolerance is Christianity's most valued doctrine. There is but one God, and His name is Jehovah. He is represented in three personalities, The Father, Son, and Spirit. And THE ONLY WAY to have a right relationship with Him, is through His Son, Jesus. Jesus said, "I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father, except through Me." That is as absolute as truth gets. And quite frankly folks, as intolerant, also.