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Title: The Uneasy Conscience of Modern Fundamentalism by Carl F. H. Henry, Richard J. Mouw ISBN: 0-8028-2661-X Publisher: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co. Pub. Date: August, 2003 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $12.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 4 (1 review)
Rating: 4
Summary: Redeeming Society with the Gospel
Comment: The late Carl Henry sets forth the case that there is a great divorce within Evangelicalism. He argues that evangelical Christianity has become separated from any form of social reform. Christianity has failed to deal with the pressing issues, which face the world today. Doctrine has become divorced from ethics and orthodoxy (right teaching) has become divorced from orthopraxy (right living). While redemption in Christ is the only answer to this world's problems Henry argues that Christianity has ceased its preaching of this message to the culture. Christianity has given up its humanitarianism.
Sadly, since the church has given up its social endeavors, non-evangelical efforts have taken over. Therefore the saving message of the cross of Christ is replaced with sub-Christian methods of reform. The effort to save society continues but without a redemptive foundation all such efforts are bound to failure. Without the gospel social reform may feed a few empty stomachs but will fail to provide the living water of Christ, which is the world's only hope.
Henry offers a solution by properly understanding kingdom preaching. The kingdom must be preached both as a present reality (kingdom now) and as a future reality (kingdom then). There is an already, not-yet dimension to the kingdom of God and this needs to be applied to kingdom ethics. We must live out the kingdom now with expectant hope of the kingdom then. This dimension of the kingdom needs to be restudied toward the end of being applied to the social and ethical challenges for this present age.
It is also the doctrinal integrity of evangelical Christianity, which must confront the world. To give up the gospel for social reform is to cease to be Christian, but to give up social reform is to give up the gospel. Henry argues that it is the very metaphysics of Christianity, which provide the underpinnings for Biblical ethics. The Christian needs to have a biblical worldview to confront the needs and evils of the world. It is only the Christian worldview founded upon the cross of Christ, which provides the proper redemptive framework, which is the only hope for a world in travail.
The balance of social concern and gospel preaching is rarely achieved, but Henry offers a helpful way forward by arguing that the very means of social reform is through gospel preaching. Through the proclamation of the redeeming gospel of Jesus Christ the world will be changed. The gospel properly understood seeks to change not just individual sinners, but the world, which groans under its present bondage. He correctly recognizes that the present world problems are not primarily economic, political, or societal, but spiritual. Nonetheless the evangelical Christian is to apply the spiritual-redemptive message of the gospel to the economic, political, and societal woes of today.
While one may not fully agree with everything Henry says (I certainly did not), his underlining thesis is true: the gospel must be proclaimed and applied to the present cultural crisis, which our world faces. In applying the gospel of Christ to the world need the evangelical Christian remarries the truth of Christ with the humanitarianism of Christ. This today is most necessary.
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