Dr. J. Gresham Machen's Response to Old Liberalism

In the early 20th century, Dr. J. Gresham Machen responded to the old liberalism that promoted Christian life without much emphasis upon doctrine. Machen reminded the church that healthy doctrine leads to healthy righteous living, and healthy living is the result of healthy, or correct biblical doctrine. He wrote the following:

The facts that are rehearsed are not, indeed, bare facts, but facts with the meaning of the facts. "Christ died" is a fact; but to know merely that fact never did good to anyone; it never did anyone any good to know that a Jew, who was called Christ, died on a cross in the first century of our era. But it is not in that jejune [lifeless] way that the fact was rehearsed by the primitive Jerusalem Church; the primitive message was not merely that Christ died, but that Christ died for our sins. That tells not merely that Christ died, but why He died, what He accomplished when He died, but why He died, what He accomplished when He died, it gives not merely the fact but the meaning of the fact.

But when you say "fact with the meaning of the fact" you have said "doctrine." We have already arrived, then, at the answer to our question. Christianity at the beginning, we have discovered, was not a life as distinguished from a doctrine or a life that had doctrine as its changing intellectual expression, but just the other way around, it was a life founded upon a doctrine.

"Fire: the Want of the Times"

Brethren, there is nothing in the gospel, apart from the Spirit of God, which can save a man, for man hates the gospel with all his heart!

Though the reasonableness of the gospel of Jesus ought to make the belief of it universal, yet its plain dealing with human sin excites deadly antagonism. Therefore, the gospel itself would make no progress were it not for the divine power.

There is an invisible arm which pushes forward the conquests of the truth. There is a fire unfed with human fuel, which burns a way for the truth of Jesus Christ into the hearts of men.


- Charles Spurgeon, "Fire: the Want of the Times"


Tom Carter, author of Spurgeon at His Best (Baker, 1988), wrote the following:

"Each time I read one of Spurgeon's sermons, I fall in love with preaching all over again. My faith is rescued from the temptation to consider the proclamation of God's truth irrelevant. . . . I'm also challenged to preach biblically. As I read between the lines of these sermons, I hear Spurgeon saying to me, 'As a preacher, your job is not to create your own material. Just discover what God has already said in his Word, and then relay that to your people.'"

Fulfilling the Great Commission

The church only speaks with God's authority as she handles aright the Word of God. The church must conform herself to God's thoughts recognizing the authority of God over the heart, mind, and soul. Whenever anything is substituted for the accurate teaching of Scripture, God's authority is usurped. Pride must never allow this. Pastors especially are stewards who are to explain the meaning of the text of Scripture and exhort people to obey it. Expositional preaching is the communicating of God's truth by God's servant to meet the needs of God's people. Unfortunately, many postmodern trends being adopted by the church deny that the Lord Jesus Christ will build His church by the agency of the Holy Spirit and by the power of the Gospel. Very simply, it is the Word of God building the church. The church grows quantitatively and qualitatively through the systematic teaching of God's Word. The Holy Spirit creates the church by the Word of God (2 Kgs. 22-23; Neh. 8-9; Isa. 55:10-11; Ezek. 37:1-14; Mt. 4:4; Jn. 1:1, 4, 14; Acts 19:20; 20:32; Rom. 1:16; 10:17; 1 Thess. 2:13; Heb. 4:12; Jas. 1:18, 21; 1 Pet. 1:23, 25). When the church neglects the accurate preaching and teaching of the Word of God, the church hinders the work of the Holy Spirit. The church will be catapulted into the future only as she is carefully governed and powerfully driven by the Word of God.

Although evangelism and communicating to a lost person the reality of salvation by grace through faith in Christ alone are vitally important components of the total responsibility of the local church, the church must be continually reminded that the New Testament places the utmost emphasis upon the feeding (teaching) of those who are already Christians! Indeed, it may be said that the indoctrination of converts in the whole counsel of God's Word is the basic New Testament pattern for world evangelization. Apart from this emphasis, Christian evangelism will soon become ineffective and superficial. Again, the Word builds the church. It is crucial to teach the church that God's chosen method to bring new life is to use His Word. If God's chosen method for building His church is replaced with man's thoughts and will, it will inevitably ensure the eternal futility of the church's work. Our primary method for fulfilling the Great Commission is to communicate the Word of God accurately and clearly as widely as possible.
As written in the introduction to Thomas Boston's classic, The Art of Manfishing: "The main way in which God advances conversion is through the sustained faithful of parents, friends, and church leaders witnessing, instructing, and encouraging informally, and of preachers expounding the gospel from Scripture in worship contexts." Can it be any clearer? PREACH THE WORD!! HEED THE WORD!!