The secularization of mainline Protestantism and the dominant theological academy is evident in the evisceration of the Christian truth-claim at the hands of theologians and church leadership. Virtually no doctrinal essential has been left untouched, no truth left intact, no creed or confession defended against compromise. Increasingly--in the name of pluralism, tolerance, inclusivity, and sensitivity--all that is solid appears indeed to melt into air.

And yet the tragedy is not limited to mainline liberal Protestantism. The modern secular worldview is increasingly apparent within evangelicalism as well. An aversion to doctrinal Christianity has been growing for several decades, along with an increasing intolerance for doctrinal and confessional accountability. Evangelicals have embraced the technologies of modernity, often without recognizing that these technologies have claimed the role of master rather than servant.

The ubiquitous culture of consumerism and materialism has seduced many evangelicals into a ministry mode driven by marketing rather than mission. To an ever greater extent, evangelicals are accommodating themselves to moral compromise in the name of lifestyle and choice. Authentic biblical worship is often supplanted by the entertainment culture as issues of performance and taste displace the simplicity and God-centeredness of true worship.

Voices within and without warn of a crisis of truth among evangelicals. Theologian David Wells argues that modernity has left virtually "no place for truth." Sociologists have traced the increasingly secular message of evangelical preaching and the triumph of the autonomous self over theological concerns in evangelical piety. James Davison Hunter has traced and projected the pattern of "cognitive bargaining" by which the younger generation of evangelical intellectuals is increasingly forfeiting biblical orthodoxy in the face of academic hostility. A candid survey reveals even more ominous signs. Some evangelicals are embracing the radical subjectivity, perspectivalism, dehistoricism, and relativism of the postmodernist academy. In the name of a paradigm shift, the claim to objective truth has itself been forfeited by some evangelicals. Book and chapter titles such as Truth Is Stranger Than It Used To Be and "There's No Such Thing as Objective Truth and It's a Good Thing, Too" serve notice that postmodernism is not merely a problem external to evangelicalism.

Indeed, evidence of the embrace of relativistic, subjectivistic, perspectival, privatistic, and constructivist theories of truth is widespread among evangelicals. In the name of narrative some have discarded propositions, and are thus unable or unwilling to make any statement of propositional truth. In the name of pluralism some have excluded the existence of absolute truth, and have thus abdicated the foundation of Christian truth, only to land in various relativisms. In the name of perspectivalism, some have rejected the unity of truth and embraced unconditional subjectivity. In order to gain distance from "foundationalism," many evangelicals have abandoned the foundation.

Evangelicals are faced with a stark choice: either to join the postmodern descent into a truthless, foundationless confusion, or to stand with conviction on the truth of God's Word. Of course the glory of God can never be captured in propositional statements; but neither can it be forgotten that the Christian gospel is good news. It consists of objective, propositional announcements: Jesus died for sinners. He rose from the dead. And He is coming again to judge the living and the dead. When those truths are discarded in favor of a postmodern inclusivity, what is left is something less than biblical Christianity. So will it be the rock of Scripture, or the vapor of postmodernism? The church of the next generation will decide for itself.

_________________________________________________

R. Albert Mohler, Jr. is president of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky. For more articles and resources by Dr. Mohler, and for information on The Albert Mohler Program, a daily national radio program broadcast on the Salem Radio Network, go to www.albertmohler.com . For information on The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, go to www.sbts.edu . Send feedback to mail@albertmohler.com .