From the TeachingtheWord Bible Knowledgebase

These days, you can't merely take a college's word that it is theologically "conservative." Those who have a vested interest - Christian parents preparing to send their children as students, donors who finance the schools, and churches that recruit pastors and Christian workers from them - must verify.

No Problem - Or a Big One?

In previous articles, I've discussed the oft-repeated failure of many Christian college and seminary faculties and administrations to act as "watchmen on the walls" - to make sure that false teachers do not enter their institutions and infect the minds of young people in the classrooms. I've also emphasized the need for parents to be watchful, and to encourage their young people to understand the importance of letting their parents know when they encounter patently false or questionable teaching at a college or seminary.

Many parents and students have told us of their own experiences as victims (or near-victims) of this failure in Christian academia. Other readers have told us they don't believe this is such a big problem, and they think we're over-reacting. To these folks I pose the question, "Do you really know what they're teaching in 'conservative' Christian colleges these days?" I don't think they do, because if they did, they would be - or should be - up in arms about it!

It Didn't Start Yesterday

Let me cite just one example. Recently I reported on Dr. Bruce Waltke's public admission that he is a theistic evolutionist, and the resulting furor. A followup article documented the subsequent shameful actions of the administration of Knox Theological Seminary in hiring Waltke to teach there, in stating that they have determined that his views are within the pale of Christian orthodoxy, and in citing a study report of the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA) in defense of their actions.

However, readers need to understand that Waltke's "coming out" is not a recent change in his thinking. This is something that he has been teaching to young people in "conservative" Christian college classrooms, with the knowledge of their faculties and administrations, for at least twenty years. Readers also need to understand that Dr. Waltke's low view of Scripture extends well beyond the Genesis record.

In 1991, Crux, the theological journal of Regent College, where Waltke was a professor, published his essay titled "The Literary Genre of Genesis, Chapter One."¹ In that article, Waltke wrote the following:

Is [Genesis] a myth? Here the answer may be "yes" or "no," depending on one's definition of myth...Is [Genesis] history? Here our answer is both a qualified "yes" and "no."

A straightforward [i.e., literal] reading of the Genesis prologue is improbable in the light of its supplementary account of creation. To be sure the six days in the Genesis creation account are our twenty-four hour days, but they are metaphorical representations of a reality beyond human comprehension and imitation.

In this duplicitous statement, Waltke echoes the view of Cornelius Van Til, which we discussed in another recent article, that Scripture is not the actual word of God but merely an analogy that is "at no point identical with the content of the divine mind" (the emphasis is Van Til's). In support of his doubletalk about Genesis chapter one, Waltke cites Dr. John H. Stek, a Calvin Theological Seminary professor who studied under Van Til and was a follower of his false philosophy about the nature of Scripture. Waltke approvingly quotes this further bit of theological doubletalk from Stek:

What occurs in the arena of God's actions can be storied after the manner of human events, but accounts of "events" in that arena are fundamentally different in kind from all forms of historiography.²

Waltke echoed and elaborated upon his 1991 Genesis-is-myth position in his 2007 book, An Old Testament Theology - which, tellingly, won the Evangelical Christian Publishers Association's "Christian Book Award" in the "Best Bible Reference and Study Book" category. Waltke said this:

The best harmonious synthesis of the special revelation of the Bible, of the general revelation of human nature that distinguishes between right and wrong and consciously or unconsciously craves God, and of science, is the theory of theistic evolution.

By "theistic evolution" I mean that the God of Israel, to bring glory to himself,

1. created all the things that are out of nothing and sustains them
2. incredibly, against the laws of probability, finely tuned the essential properties of the universe to produce ADAM, who is capable of reflecting upon their origins
3. within his providence allowed the process of natural selection and of cataclysmic interventions - such as the meteor that extinguished the dinosaurs, enabling mammals to dominate the earth - to produce awe-inspiring creatures, especially ADAM
4. by direct creation made ADAM a spiritual being, an image of divine beings, for fellowship with himself by faith
5. allowed ADAM to freely choose to follow their primitive animal nature and to usurp the rule of God instead of living by faith in God, losing fellowship with their physical and spiritual Creator
6. and in his mercy chose from fallen ADAM the Israel of God, whom he regenerated by the Holy Spirit, in connection with their faith in Jesus Christ, the Second Adam, for fellowship with himself.³

This statement presents a series of blatant denials of the inspiration and authority of Scripture, not to mention the nature of God himself, couched in some deceptively orthodox-sounding language. To name but three of Waltke's false teachings:

• In Waltke's construct, "ADAM" (note that the name is all capitals and plural) is not the man Adam who with his wife Eve is the historical progenitor of the human race; "ADAM" is the human race itself. Elsewhere Waltke has said that he believes that Adam was a historical person, but one cannot help asking this: If he really believes that is so, why speak of "ADAM" in this way, which echoes the thinking of so many liberal "scholars" (such as Dr. Peter Enns of the BioLogos Foundation) who assert that the Adam of Genesis is but a mythical character who in some ill-defined way represents humanity?
• Waltke says that "ADAM" is the product of "direct creation", but in explaining what he means by this he thoroughly contradicts the Biblical doctrine of direct creation. Waltke's "ADAM" is not the immediate creation of God who, on the sixth day of the creation week, formed him from the dust of the ground and breathed life into him (Genesis 1:26ff, 2:7). Waltke's "ADAM" is the result of God's "finely tuning the essential properties of the universe" and employing "natural selection and cataclysmic interventions."
• Waltke asserts that "ADAM" was driven by "their [note the plural] primitive animal nature" and was not the perfect individual created in God's own image, who fell into sin because of the exercise of the perfectly free will that a perfect creature possesses.

To Bruce Waltke, Genesis is "myth", the Bible must be "reconciled" with fallen man's speculations about the natural world, and the human race was the product of natural selection and cataclysm. One cannot help concluding that Dr. Waltke, and the many who applaud his so-called scholarship and follow his lead, do not really believe the Bible to be what God Himself declares it to be, but actually view it as a book that they can twist to suit their own fallen thinking.

Many do not see the connection or do not wish to admit it, but the fact is that Waltke's baseless speculations about Genesis, which he asserts as Biblical truth, undermine the doctrine of salvation itself. He does so by denying the Genesis underpinnings of the key Bible doctrine of the federal headship of the historical man Adam over all of the fallen human race, and therefore also the doctrine of Christ as the second Adam (Romans 5:14, 1 Corinthians 15:22, 45).

Bruce Waltke and others like him have been sowing the seeds of doubt about God and His Word in the minds of students at "conservative" Christian colleges and seminaries for much longer than many people either realize, or wish to admit.

Those With a Vested Interest Must Take the Initiative

Something else is abundantly clear: Those who have a vested interest - Christian parents, the students they send to these institutions, the donors that finance them, and the churches, schools, and mission agencies that recruit pastors and Christian workers from them - cannot merely take an institution's word that it is theologically "conservative." They must verify.

Among Bible-believing Christians, the word "conservative" used to mean "true to the Bible." But in a 21st-century Evangelical world that is so tragically influenced by postmodernism, the meaning of the term "conservative" has evaporated in a fog of relativism. Those with a vested interest must do the sometimes difficult work of verifying the claimed "conservatism" of a Christian college or seminary, by comparing what is actually being taught with the only rule of authority, Scripture itself.

A Prayer Request

With that in mind, let me mention something that is going on at TeachingTheWord Ministries right now. We're considering sponsoring an initiative that would help close the "information gap". The program we're contemplating would assist those who have a vested interest in verifying an institution's claims of theological conservatism, by establishing a public database of documented and verified instances of false teaching in reputedly conservative colleges and seminaries. Please pray that the Lord will give us wisdom and clear direction about this contemplated initiative. We hope, the Lord willing, to share more news about this in the near future.

References:

1. Bruce K. Waltke, "The Literary Genre of Genesis, Chapter One," Crux: A Quarterly Journal of Christian Thought and Opinon, Volume 27, Number 4, December 1991, pages 2-10.

2. Here Waltke quotes John H. Stek, "What Says the Scripture?" in Portraits of Creation: Biblical and Scientific Perspectives on the World's Formation, Howard J. Van Till, editor (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Eerdmans, 1990), page 236.

3. Bruce Waltke and Charles Yu, An Old Testament Theology: An Exegetical, Canonical, and Thematic Approach (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan, 2007), pages 202-203.

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