Todd Wilken, host of Issues, Etc., has shown great insight and skill in analyzing trends in the Church and culture. I appreciate his ability to break things down and clearly present the underlying beliefs and principles. He has done this with the trend present today that has often been called "radical Lutheranism."
The term is really a misnomer, because this trend does not confess the same theology as the Book of Concord. However, most who advance this theology claim to be Lutheran and frequently appeal to Martin Luther. They use Lutheran theological language and emphasize themes that are very familiar to Lutherans.
Wilken has developed a list of points that describe the theology of radical Lutheranism and help to identify it. The more I work with this subject, the more I appreciate how insightful and accurate these points truly are:
The teachings of Radical Lutheranism
can be recognized by any combination of the following ideas:
1. Sin is reduced to
self-justification. The only thing intrinsically sinful about any thought, word
or deed is that it is an attempt to justify oneself before God.
2. The Christian's struggle against
sin is replaced with a struggle against feelings of guilt.
3. The Christian's struggle against
sin is described as, at best futile, or merely an attempt at
self-justification.
4. The Holy Spirit's uses of the Law
are usually abandoned one by one (usually in the order of 3, 1, 2)
5. Contrition over sin is assumed,
even in unbelievers. People are generally assumed to have a knowledge of, and
guilty conscience over their sin.
6. The Law is confused with the pain
and trouble of living in a fallen world. The Law may be described as any bad
situation or evil occurrence in life.
7. The distinction between
Justification and Sanctification is blurred in statements like
"Sanctification is simply the art of getting used to justification."
8. Christian cooperation in
Sanctification, clearly and carefully taught in the Lutheran Confessions, is
equated with cooperation in Justification.
9. Christian cooperation in
Sanctification is depicted as resisting, rather than cooperating with the Holy Spirit.
10. Encouragement or instruction in
Good Works is considered de facto legalism.
11. The Law itself is viewed as the
source of legalism, rather than man's sinful misuse of it.
12. Scripture's warnings against
falling away from the faith are minimized or ignored.
13. Scripture is often searched to
find the sinner, rather than the Savior.
14. The sins of Biblical figures are
exaggerated or sensationalized.
15. Teaching is often guided by a
reaction to the errors of moralistic evangelicalism, rather than God's Word or
the Lutheran Confessions.
16. Man's sinful condition is
described as though a person's sin qualifies him to receive Grace, rather than
Grace being without qualification or condition in man.
17. The effects of the Law are
attributed to the Gospel.
18. The Law may be avoided to such
and extent that the Gospel is pressed into service to do the Law's work
(produce repentance, instruction in good works through "Gospel
imperatives”).
19. The Gospel is sometimes replaced
with "We're all sinners, who am I to judge?"
Thank you, this has helped me a lot.
ReplyDeleteSPOT. ON.
ReplyDeleteTHere is a great ambiguous affinity for the use of the word "Broken" as well. The effects of sin or being unhappy about sin's consequences are confused with contrition.
ReplyDeleteA lack of a third use of the law contributes to a rupturing between the law a expressive of the design of creation and it merely becomes an abstract "paradigm" or even alien to God. That the law doesn't save in that thinking makes it bad. This is where gospel reductionism goes around the corner and meets Gnosticism coming around the other corner.