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Monday, 12 August 2024

History Is Repeating Itself, with a New Twist

 




You have likely heard the saying, those who do not study history are destined to repeat it. Or the probably more accurate variant, history does not repeat, but it sure does rhyme. We see this with the evangelical church today. Just as the Catholic Church as it spread over Rome became Romanized and started to bring Roman thoughts and religious beliefs into its practice, so too has the modern evangelical world done this with the various spiritualist and materialist ideologies of the modern era.

It is hard to convince some Christians just how corrupting that the profession of psychology has been on the Church, and its practice, but perhaps if you think about it like you would think about lifting up the saints as the Catholics do this might help. Just as the Catholics lift up the saints and pray to them, something the Scriptures never teach, so too does the evangelical church lift up pagan ideas about understanding the mind as authoritative for healing people spiritually and therefore equal to the word of God. You may think this is an exaggeration, but did you know many church denominations will not certify pastors as qualified who have not been psychologically examined? The psychological syncretism in the Church is strong, and is a real problem. 

Dave Hunt explains this very well,

“It is staggering to see that in the so-called Protestant church of today there are many parallels to what the Reformers complained about in the Roman Catholic Church of their day. Moreover, many of those who promote these false teachings have been elevated to pedestals of Protestant infallibility as lofty as those of the pope and the Catholic priesthood. Christian psychologists comprise a new Protestant priesthood, which has its own therapeutic “confessional” and cannot be corrected by Scripture. To be a simple Berean and check against the Bible the doctrines of Christian leaders who are parroting the theories of secular psychology masquerading under a “Christian” label is condemned as strongly as daring to question the Pope and Catholic dogma was in Luther’s day.

It is the pope’s great authority, the huge Church he heads, its antiquity, and, as some insist, “the great good [in spite of overwhelming evil] it has accomplished,” which are used to brush aside any questions of doctrinal purity concerning salvation that are raised. In this manner, any actual discussion of the issues and the merits of the arguments for or against Catholicism vis à vis biblical Truth are avoided.

The same is now true among evangelicals. The popularity of a certain leader, the size of his church or ministry, how long it has been established, and the great good he or she may have done become the basis for deciding issues rather than the Bible. Needless to say, this practice is very dangerous to the health of the evangelical church.

Two major foundation stones of the Reformation were the sole authority of the Bible and the priesthood of all believers. The Bible teaches that neither man nor organization can add to or take from Scripture or interpret it for others. The response of the Council of Trent (1545–1563) was to reject the Reformers’ cry of sola scriptura! and to declare that the Bible was not enough for life and doctrine. In addition there were the pronouncements of the popes, of the Councils, and the traditions of the Roman Catholic Church, which were as authoritative as Scripture and more persuasive.

Clearly, the situation is very similar among Protestants today. There are, of course, the various new “prophets” who claim to have “new revelations” that must not be judged and who even deny the right and the responsibility of each believer to check what he has been taught against the Bible. The once very influential but now thoroughly discredited Earl Paulk said, “When we take our Bibles home, get on our knees and make our own decisions concerning the preacher’s sermon, we decide the truth of God’s anointing [upon a preacher or ministry] according to our own private interpretations.” He condemned this Berean activity, although the Bible calls it “noble” (Acts 17:10–11).

History Is Repeating Itself, with a New Twist

Similarly, today’s “Christian psychologists,” a new infallible priesthood unknown at the Reformation but now highly honored among both Protestants and Catholics, also reject the cry of sola scriptura! They respond with their own slogan, “All truth is God’s truth!” One can no longer be a simple Berean and “search the scriptures daily” to see whether what is being taught is biblical. No longer is all of “God’s truth” pertaining to “life and godliness” (2 Peter 1:3) to be found alone in Scripture, where the Bereans looked to check Paul’s teachings.

Christian psychologists claim new sources of “truth” unknown not only to the Bereans and early church but all through history until this century. New “revelations” have been given to the church, and not through men and women of God (as is true of the Bible) but through the godless, antichristian apostles and prophets of psychology (Freud, Jung, et al.). Incredibly, this infusion of humanism and atheism into the church has met with the approval of most pastors and Bible teachers and has been accepted by most of the church as of equal authority with God’s infallible holy Word!”[1]

I remember visiting a friend's church once and hearing the pastor's mum get up and "preach" through a bunch of psychological principles like it was Scripture. But this is neither uncommon, or only found in progressive denominations.  

Evangelical Christians will proclaim Sola Scriptura today, and then turn around in the next breath and send a young woman in their church struggling with anxiety to a disciple of Freud or Jung for healing to deal with her issues. Rather than counsel her scripturally. 

However, if the Scriptures are not useful for such issues, then why proclaim Sola Scriptura? Why not simply agree with the Catholics and say Scriptura plus. At least with the Catholic Church they have taken steps over the millennia to make sure that the things they add to scripture are the collected wisdom of the leaders of their Church. Whereas the evangelical Church has knowingly and blithely incorporated the ideologies of modern pagans into the Church and then turned around and accused those of challenging it as being simply fundamentalists. There is a sad irony in this when you think about it.

The idea that only Catholics believe in Bible+ is simply not born out by the evidence. They are simply more honest about it, and have a far more systematised way of evaluating what extra-biblical doctrines can be incorporated in. 

Now, I know that someone might respond here and say, “Yea, but you don’t consult your Bible to know how to service your car.” To which I can only say, of course not. But my mechanic is not claiming to be a soul scientist which is what the word psychologist means. My mechanic is not claiming to step into a realm in which God says that Scripture is sufficient, he is working in the realm of a gifted tradesman, which is something the Bible honours and which the Bible teaches is necessary in this world, “Let every skillful craftsman among you come and make all that the Lord has commanded…” (Ex. 35:10).

If you were to then respond, “Yea, but can’t we just see psychologists as skilled tradesmen of the mind and the soul?” To which I would respond, “And how can you do this apart from the word of God?” I think it is entirely possible that humans will discover truths about humanity that shed light on what the Bible says about the mind and soul, but I do not believe that we can find things which add to Scripture. And Christian psychology explicitly seeks to add to scripture with the ideas of man.

This should not be acceptable. 

List of References



[1] Hunt, Dave; McMahon, T. A.. Psychology and the Church: Critical Questions, Crucial Answers (pp. 166-167). The Berean Call. Kindle Edition.

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