How should a Christian view modernism?

Speaking only of recent happenings, within the memory of living Christians, what do we find? Higher Criticism doing its deadly work of undermining the faith of multitudes in the inspiration of Scripture. Modernism the fruit of Higher Criticism refusing to believe in the plenary and full inspiration of God’s Word, weakening, and often denying it altogether, refusing the deity of the Lord Jesus, rejecting the Virgin Birth, and the true manhood of Christ, in some cases denying even the very resurrection of our Lord—in short, keeping the outward form of Christianity, but robbing it of all that is vital and fundamental.

In the Amen is finality, the full and final revelation of God. Nothing could be added to that revelation When the Amen had uttered His voice. And therein lies the great and unforgivable sin of Modernism, it takes from the revelation or adds to it, it attempts to sweep away the Amen, and says there has been no Amen as yet, no finality and never will be until man has evolved himself upward from the ape to God; it refuses the revelation that came down from God to men. It has no certainty, no assurance, no true Christ and hence no true God, and no Amen, and its condemnation and eternal judgment are just (ch. 32:18-19).

Verse 8, however, is parenthetical, and verse 9 picks up the thread from verse 7. These anti-christian deceivers were not abiding in the doctrine of Christ. They were transgressing or going forward, as they thought, to newer and better things. We have this kind of thing quite full-blown today in what is known as "Modernism." The Modernist believes that religion or theology is a human science, and that like all sciences it must not stand still but advance with the times and with the increase of all human knowledge. Hence he goes forward with much confidence to what he conceives to be greater light. No doctrine is sacred to the out-and-out Modernist. There is hardly one doctrine of the Scripture which he leaves intact.

And there are forms of modernism which would hardly be classified as "Modernist" in the religious world. They are not the less mischievous on that account. They may as yet only "transgress" or "go forward" in certain particulars. But it is the whole idea of "going forward" that is wrong. If there may be development as to some details of the faith, why not as to all?

And for ourselves, Christians of the twentieth century, is there any danger from this direction? Most assuredly, — very much so. The so-called "modernism" is just religious rationalism, and it is spreading as a plague. It can, however, only infect those who have no active, vital faith in the Godhead-glory of Christ. The full knowledge of Christ as presented here lifts the soul entirely out of the range of the miasma of modernism.

Modernism is characterized by total indifference to the glory and honour of Christ. His deity may be denied, His incarnation derided, His atoning work belittled, His resurrection rejected, but the Modernist is indifferent. Your belief or unbelief is of no consequence. If the virgin birth of Christ, the miracles of Christ, the sayings of Christ, do not appeal to your reason you are welcome to reject them — the Modernist is indifferent. But if the Modernist is indifferent to Christ he has much to say of himself, for he is not lacking in religious pretension and intellectual arrogance. According to his own estimate, he is rich in human ability and enjoys the monopoly of intellectual culture and ripe scholarship. He has grown rich through the accumulated stores of generations of laborious research. Thus equipped with the wisdom of the ages, the Modernist undertakes to criticise Scripture with unbounded confidence. He assumes to know more about the Word of God than Christ and the Apostles. He pretends to have discovered the original sources of Scripture and presumes to tell us how much may be discarded as myth and how little we may safely retain as genuine.

Modernism is very subtle. It takes many forms and is exhibited in various degrees. These losses may be imminent where least expected. Our only safety lies in the knowledge of Christ, the eternal Son of God. If we have that, we know the Father, we know the absolute need of the atonement, and of faith in the One who died to satisfy the claims of divine righteousness and set God free to express His love to sinful men. For this we must have a reliable revelation, and this we have, thank God, in the Holy Scriptures, verbally inspired in all the sixty-six books. Inspiration binds them into one revelation of God, and of His will and mind for us. May the Lord preserve His own in these days of apostasy.

The philosophy of modern days has the same source, the mind of man, though it acts differently in respect to Christianity. For instance, with some, Christianity is regarded as emanating from man, and so is compared with Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam, all of which are said to be branches of the same religion of man; though Christianity is judged to be the best, none are to be condemned; there is truth in them all! Others sit in judgement on the word of God, and profess to be able to cut out many parts as not being written by the professed writers, and having no claim, ought not to form a part of scripture. Others declare that modern thought cannot be cramped up in the dogmas hitherto held by Christians almost universally, which in general really means what scripture teaches.

Modernism is the thin end of the wedge, of which the thick end is open, rank infidelity. Many a nominal believer has begun with higher criticism, and ended in infidelity. Lawlessness and godlessness lend themselves to national suicide and individual disaster.

Modernism, old as the vagaries of man’s mind, cannot be classed as Christian in the remotest sense of the word. It has a genius for pulling down, but not for building up. It loosens every corner stone of morality and truth and involves in a cataclysm of ruin those who seek shelter where there is none.

There is, however, another phase of this modernist movement which is characteristic of the last days. The natural man has never been truly subject to a revelation from God; at the same time, for many generations, professing Christians have been outwardly controlled by a more or less orthodox traditional religion. To-day, however, we are witnessing a great change. Men are casting aside the trammels of tradition. We are thus faced with a great mass of people who, while retaining a profession of Christianity, are no longer governed by the revelation of God, or the tradition of man. The result being that the natural heart of fallen man is expressing its enmity and opposition to God and to Christ without any restraint. This means in fact that Christendom is heading for apostasy.

Modernism has tried to prove that Science contradicts the Bible, and that therefore the Bible is unreliable. The answer is, that true science never contradicts the Bible, for God is the Author of them both. His is the work of creation, and His is the work of revelation through His Holy Word.