When the serpent tempted Eve in the Garden he asked the question, “Did God really say…?” The serpent hasn’t changed his tactics. In Eve’s case the question was whether or not God said not to eat the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. In our day it’s not the serpent asking the question, directly anyway, it’s people.
“Did God really say that Jesus is the only way?”
“Did God really say that homosexuality is sin?”
“Did God really say that pastors must be men?”
Honestly, I expect these kinds of questions from the unbelieving world. What I cannot for the life of me understand is people who claim to love Jesus yet repeatedly ask these kinds of questions as if God has not spoken. I realize what’s happening on one level; Jesus and the Apostles warned about wolves masquerading as sheep or arising from within the church. So it should be expected. But I honestly cannot understand the person who claims to love Jesus, claims to be a Christian, and denies that there is any foundational Christian truth.
Today’s exhibit: Tylor Standley. Mr. Standley has written an article appearing on Relevant Magazine’s website arguing that there are five things that should never be said in spiritual conversations. I’ll interact with each of his points below.
His first argument is that we should never use the word heresy in a spiritual discussion. He writes:
Technically, heresy is any belief contrary to the teaching of the Church. Here’s where things get sticky: which church? If by “church” we mean the largest and most historical group of Christians, that would be the Roman Catholic Church. So, every Protestant is a heretic. If we mean “Orthodox Protestantism,” then the term becomes even more confusing. Protestantism has no collective doctrinal agreement. Between creedal and non-creedal denominations, very few things can be described as “generally accepted doctrines.” Even the things on which everyone agrees have a wide variety of different interpretations, all of which are held by people committed to following Christ.
Heresy is not teaching that is contrary to the teaching of the church. Heresy is teaching that is contradicts what the New Testament calls sound doctrine. It is a false belief that contradicts, ignores, or incorrectly puts together what is revealed in Scripture.
Standley is either ignorant of church history or deliberately trying to create confusion with this paragraph. Most of the doctrines that have historically been recognized as heresies were identified as such long before the Roman Catholic Church became the Roman Catholic Church. And yes, Rome would call me a heretic, but since the official doctrine of Rome contradicts Jesus and the Apostles, I’m fine with that. Those who take the time to study church history will see that there is an “orthodox stream” of Christianity that has survived from the Apostles until today.
The fact that some people throw the word heresy around carelessly does not mean that we should not call genuine heresy, heresy. Arius was a heretic. All those today who deny that the Son has eternally coexisted with the Father and Spirit are heretics as well. Pelagius was heretic. Montanus was heretic. Gnosticism was a heresy. Those today who hold to the same teachings are heretics. And it’s not because the church says so, it’s because God’s written word contains truth. Telling someone that they are teaching or believing heresy isn't an attempt to discredit the person, it is a warning that their soul is in danger.
I actually agree with much of his second point. I’m not entirely opposed to the idea of categories, as we all fall into certain categories. But, it can be very unhelpful to put someone into a category and then refuse to see them as anything else. When confronting error we need to interact with the individual, not the category we put the person into.
Point three is that we shouldn’t insult in the name of love. He writes:
True love leads us to see that our loved ones are usually not “rebelling,” but are doing the rarely performed task of asking tough questions and searching for truth. Even where our loved ones are wrong we should cheer them on in their quest, challenging and provoking them to dig deeper. Where correction is needed, true love leads us to do it with humility and grace. After all, we are all unknowingly wrong about something.
John the Baptist called the Scribes a Pharisees a brood of vipers. Jesus called them blind guides and hypocrites. Paul said he wished the circumcision party in Galatia would emasculate themselves. Not once is wrong teaching or thinking “cheered on” anywhere in Scripture. The Pharisees asked questions and Jesus refused to answer them. A person who is genuinely seeking after truth should be dealt with gently. A person who has already departed from the truth, whether they teach it outright or put on a veneer of humility by asking “Did God really say?” should be dealt with as a wolf trying to destroy the sheep.
For all his talk of love and humility, Standley is incredibly hateful and arrogant. He is the one standing apart from God’s word. He is the one standing outside of 2000 years of orthodoxy. He’s asking others to join. That is neither humble or loving.
His fourth point is the most absurd. He claims that we should never say, “The Bible clearly says…”
His fourth point is the most absurd. He claims that we should never say, “The Bible clearly says…”
The problem: every word of the Bible is clearly written. For example, the Bible clearly says, “πᾶσα γραφὴ θεόπνευστος καὶ ὠφέλιμος πρὸς διδασκαλίαν, πρὸς ἐλεγμόν, πρὸς ἐπανόρθωσιν, πρὸς παιδείαν τὴν ἐν δικαιοσύνῃ.” In English, as translated in the ESV, “All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness” (2 Timothy 3:16). So the Bible clearly says that all Scripture comes directly from God and clearly says that the Bible is profitable for teaching, reproof, correction and training in righteous. The Bible says to use the Bible to correct error. Clearly. It says it. The Bible clearly says that God created the world in six days. It clearly says that God created Adam and Eve, a real man and a real woman in a real garden. It clearly says Jesus was born of a virgin. It clearly says that Jesus lived without sin. It clearly says that Jesus physically died on the cross. It clearly says that he he was physically resurrected on the third day. On and on and on I could go.
Finally, Standley warns against fear-mongering by using slippery-slope arguments, writing:
It goes something like this: If evolution is true, God is a liar. If God is a liar, we can’t trust the Bible. If we can’t trust the Bible, we can’t believe in the resurrection. If Jesus wasn’t resurrected, we are all wasting our time and might as well be atheists! Some Christian schools even teach that belief in evolution leads to school shootings, AIDS, and the holocaust!
Of course, this is an extreme example….
It’s interesting that he tacks on that list sentence about school shootings, AIDS, and the holocaust then calls it an extreme example. He calls evolution a non-essential issue, yet Jesus roots his teaching about marriage in the creation narrative. Paul roots the gospel in the sin of Adam. Seriously, read the book of Romans. If there was no Adam, there is no gospel. This is not a slippery slope argument. Read 1 Corinthians 15. If there was no resurrection we are to be pitied above all men and we have wasted our lives. So he makes arguments that Scripture itself makes, then throws on a ridiculous final sentence to make the whole thing seem absurd. Standley is engaging is some high level deception here.
He closes by saying if you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all. This won’t be very nice, but Standley is a wolf. He repeatedly gives the impression that conversation about spiritual things without any care for what is right and wrong is the height of the Christian experience. He makes himself out to be a humble, loving man, all the while he is doing everything he can to undermine the truth of God's word. He seems to be to one of the men Paul warned Timothy about just a few verses after telling Timothy how to use the Bible. “For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths” (2 Timothy 4:3-4).
The Apostle Paul devoted his life to both the proclamation and defense of the gospel. He wrote to the Galatians concerning the circumcision party, "To them we did not yield in submission even for a moment, that the truth of the gospel might be preserved for you" (Galatians 2:5). We must not yield to men like Tylor Standley who want to silence the truth in favor of gentle conversation with no right and wrong. We must fight for the faith once for all delivered to the saints.
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