Angus Harley

Are there limits to the Gospel? The natural answer is, of course there are. If you don’t believe in Jesus’ death and resurrection, then you cannot be a Christian. No one will be accepted into an assembly as a member, if one does not believe in these things. Straightforward.

Or is it? My old professor was a rank Liberal theologian. He ‘believed’ in Jesus’ resurrection, as taught in 1 Corinthians 15. He made that confession regularly, without any pang of conscience. He would say amen to the traditional bodily resurrection of Jesus. Except, he means this (as he says in his book): the early apostles believed it, and they passed it down to us, so we believe it; but we know it is mere myth, so we follow this belief as a tradition, not as a fact of history or spiritual life. Yet, he does ‘believe’ what Paul says!

Is my old professor a Christian? To some it is a no-brainer: no! To others in Evangelicalism, we need to pause. Who knows man’s heart? Maybe he does actually believe, but is a bit confused. Weren’t the Corinthians confused? Don’t be so hasty, we are told. Doesn’t he agree with the ‘spirit’ of what Paul writes? Isn’t it about the positive things the professor believed? If it is, I can take the reader to statements by the Council of Trent that clearly pronounce that salvation is by grace alone, not by works. The multitude of comments that traditional Protestantism point out about Trent are true, but should they really get in the way of those positive statements Trent makes? To some, the answer would be, no.

Now, for most NCTers, there’s nothing too complicated about this stuff; it’s ‘easy meat’. Both the professor and Rome are clearly going against the true Gospel. Agreed. But, then, why do certain theologians get a pass? I’ve seen the most conservative of Evangelicals denounce Rome, yet hail Bonhoeffer. Why target Bonhoeffer? Isn’t this just a nasty spirit on my part? It would seem that Ray Ortlund would think it was being ungracious, and TGC, too.[1] There it is, then. I’m obviously being mean-spirited and anti-love. I must repent, therefore.

So, why am I so ‘angry’ and ‘graceless’- apart from my blatant innate selfishness and nastiness? The reason is this kind of quote:

“A bit more about ‘religionlessness’. I expect you remember Bultmann’s paper on the demythologizing of the New Testament? My view of it to-day would be not that he went too far, as most people seem to think, but that he did not go far enough. It is not only the mythological conceptions, such as the miracles, the ascension and the like (which are not in principle separable from the conceptions of God, faith and so on) that are problematic, but the ‘religious’ conceptions themselves.” [Bonhoeffer, Letters and Papers from Prison, 155.]

“Bultmann would seem to have felt Barth’s limitations in some way, but he misconstrues them in the light of liberal theology, and hence goes off into the typical liberal reduction process (the ‘mythological’ elements of Christianity are

dropped, and Christianity is reduced to its ‘essence’). I am of the view that the full content, including the mythological concepts, must be maintained. The New Testament is not a mythological garbing of the universal truth; this mythology

(resurrection and so on) is the thing itself but the concepts must be interpreted in such a way as not to make religion a pre-condition of faith (cf. circumcision in St. Paul).” [LPP, 149.]

I can pile up such comments. Obviously, to those who love Bonhoeffer, such as Ortlund, Bonhoeffer is accepted as a Christian. That’s what we do, right? As long as some ‘great man’ has written ‘heroic’, super-spiritual things, then he gets a pass on those things called ‘beliefs’ and those limits that are in the Gospel. I’ve been told, ‘How could he not be a Christian? Look at his comments about the cross.’ I have. But, have Ortlund and others looked at those passages where Bonhoeffer spews forth heresies and denies fundamentals of the Gospel?  

But, lest I be misunderstood, my concern is not with the mere mindless supporting of Bonhoeffer. I’m old school. The reason why I write about Bonhoeffer is not because he is a heretic, but because so many conservative Evangelicals who know about Bonhoeffer’s heretical theology nevertheless continue to lift him up as a ‘saint’.  That is why I write!

So, I ask again, are there limits to the Gospel?

[1] Ray Ortlund, “Literally”, TGC, June 14, 2016, https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/ray-ortlund/literally/.