Another Thought From HEF

“You see, we Protestant modernists have sometimes been so anxious to be liberal that we have forgotten to be religious.”
Some of you may not recognize that statement by Harry Emerson Fosdick. Harry is one of my favorite liberals. He was the "modernist of modernists" in the 1920's to the 1950's. He made this statement circa 1935, but it still carries weight. The current “modernists,” liberals, progressives (or whatever name they’d self identify with) are so anxious to be seen by the world outside the church as liberal that they have forgotten Christianity has a foundation upon which it stands.
Maybe they haven’t really forgotten. It’s just that they’d rather be liberal than stand on that foundation.
They’d rather be liberal than religious.
They’d rather be liberal than be biblical.
They’d rather be liberal than Christian.
Now here’s the kicker. Those of us who identify ourselves as Bible believing or evangelical don’t have a problem with them being liberal. We want them to believe what they choose to believe even if we disagree with them, but we want them to be straight forward enough to admit that their choice to be liberal, modernist, progressive, non-Bible believing, or however, they might characterize their position, is a departure from the traditional Baptist position, and we want them to start their own organization and not destroy the American Baptist Churches as a denomination. In my opinion, that would be the honorable thing to do. Do I have much hope that they will stop disturbing the ABCUSA? No, I don't. So Bible believing ABCers will probably continue to leave, not only because ABCUSA is not what it ought to be, because they have no other option if their desire is to be a part of a biblical denomination.