BALMORAL BIBLE CHAPEL, SAVING FAITH VERSUS FALSE FAITH (SERMON ANALYSIS 8)

November 2011

This is the third sermon by Mr. Fox to review, and the eighth from Balmoral Bible Chapel. We listened by podcast.

Mr. Fox, Balmoral Bible Chapel, May 22^nd, 2011, Saving Faith Versus False Faith. 

Summary: (Mr. Fox begins with some announcements, then prays.) Turn with me to John 8.31-36. (He reads from there.) How many of you enjoy political debates? More and more, they are becoming nothing but sound-bites. The essence of true debate is for it to yield great benefit to those who listen. I have to thank the Lord for false teachers who try to air condition hell or tell us when the day of judgment is. They set such a dark curtain in order for the true light to shine. Last week we found ourselves hearing the debate that Jesus had with his adversaries. And we read that many believed in him as he said certain things. What things? He has been teaching about being living water and true light. In light of that, many believed in him. There’s truth in this word concerning unity. The word is not just the Old and New Testaments. Jesus is the Word. Jesus placed a stamp of certification on the Old Testament. The whole word is profitable. Three things from our passage: (A) the importance to continue in the word of Jesus Christ; (B) you will know the truth; (C) it is the truth that will set you free. This order cannot be changed around. We find Jesus making a distinction between true and false disciples. The fruit of discipleship is a manifestation of obedience. It’s not a condition. Both true and false disciples will profess belief in Christ. It’s not how people begin that counts, but how they continue that will distinguish them between having a possession of faith and a profession of faith. When trials come, those in Christ, through faith, will not be shaken. They will persevere. Those who hold fast, in time, bear fruit. Jesus tells his disciples that the one who endures to the end will be saved. We forget to tell people who come to Christ that you have a real enemy in yourself, in the world, and in the heavens. We will not be found amongst those who deny his word. We see that some believed Jesus to a certain point. Their discipleship was not genuine. It’s important to know the difference between saving faith and false faith. I don’t have the time to unpack this for you. True saving faith will have a profession and possession of faith. We want to find ourselves wrestling with the teachings of Jesus Christ. Remaining is the fruit of the disciple. Nothing else will set you free. Now to John 6.37-40. (He reads from there.) Continue in the word, know the truth, and you will be set free from yourself, sin, and the power of the enemy who comes in those who are enslaved in darkness. Christianity is not a game, but a life and death issue. I think we’ll leave the matter there. Let’s pray.   

Remarks: In this sermon many verses are quoted (not all mentioned in the summary) that support the gist of the passage chosen by Mr. Fox to preach on. This is done, however, at the expense of explaining the passage particularly. The doctrine of perseverance is in both the passage and the sermon. But something more must exist in the passage than the general idea that it is necessary to be found at last among the saved! One can make a verbal profession while having no faith in one’s possession. A sinner’s prayer, a raised hand, and a signed card are no proof of a sinner getting saved. This is what Mr. Fox is anxious to warn about. And this warning is very necessary in our Billy Graham ‘decision’-making milieu. So this is no ‘feel-good’ sermon. We are thankful for that. The jokes that Mr. Fox had prepared to let fly in his preliminary remarks are jettisoned (for the wrong reason, but we are thankful just the same.)

This sermon, like the two others we have listened to from this pastor, is a blunted arrow poorly aimed. The title promises that saving faith and false faith will be contrasted. But there is no hint of contrast in any of the three points introduced. Can anyone find a contrast there? First point: the importance of continuing in the word: no contrast found. Second point: you will know the truth: no contrast there. Third point: the truth will set you free: nothing again. Or can any of these points be legitimately contrasted with each other? No, continuing in the word does not contrast with knowing the truth or being set free. Try any other configuration that you want, using these three points, and you will find no contrast. Not only is there no contrast shown in these points, whether considered singly or together, but then after the points are introduced, they are abandoned to make way for the general idea that one must persevere! There seems to be no reason for anything that is done in this sermon. The title is ignored. The points are there we not why. And the pastor goes all over the Bible in search of perseverance, and then teaches nothing about it!

Here is a suggestion of what might be done, with little effort, if any respect for the title were retained and exercised. We suggest one point. Saving faith sets us free to serve God; false faith keeps us in bondage to serve sin. There is a contrast that serves the title. Saving faith and false faith are at odds. That is what the title tells us; therefore why not tell us how and why this is so? For example, in what ways may the freed spirit serve his Maker? In what ways must the captive spirit serve his lusts? In what ways do these two spirits butt heads in the world? Address questions like these, and the sermon opens up to show the characteristics of both kinds of faith, not to mention the characteristics of each people on either side. By this kind of faithful treatment of our title, the saints can be blessed and warned to persevere, and the unconverted can get convicted for their lack of proof that their faith is of the persevering sort. These thoughts were prompted from just a few minutes of consideration for what the passage actually contains, and the reading of just half of what Matthew Henry offers up in commenting upon it. Yet this pastor has virtually nothing to say in this sermon except statements like these: the whole word is profitable; some believed in Jesus to a point; and Christianity is not a game. Can things get more uselessly elementary than this? And when he tries to say something more profound, he comes up with terms like ‘manifestation of continuance’ and ‘condition of continuance.’ He can’t explain these odd terms because he can’t understand them himself. Like Mr. Doeksen who departed from Deer Park Alliance, he seems to be imitating this overrated wannabe-scholar by the name of John Piper, which is a sure way to become obscure and irrelevant! If you can’t do the job in your own skin, it is certain that you will fail in the skin of another! If Mr. Fox had chosen a straight and simple route like the one we so painlessly gleaned and intimated above, he would not so heedlessly fall into the sin of preaching false security to his hearers (which is the very opposite of his intention: to preach a doctrine of perseverance.) “We will not be found amongst those who deny his word,” he says. What he should say is, “How many amongst us will be found to deny the word we profess to be saved by?!” And then, “How many of us deny God’s word every day and in how many ways? Here, let me show you what these ways are…now what does this say about us? about you?” That is the sort of content and tone that should naturally emerge if the doctrine of perseverance were applied. Mr. Fox does not persevere in this sermon. He does not persevere to make his points handmaidens of his title. He does not persevere to preach his points. He does not persevere to preach what he finally decides to preach on: the doctrine of perseverance. He does not persevere in the principal work that he thinks God has called him to execute.

Conclusion: “I don’t have time to unpack this for you,” says Mr. Fox about the difference between saving faith and false faith. Isn’t that your job, Mr. Fox? Isn’t that what the title of your sermon promised us you would do? Shouldn’t we expect you to unpack something from your chosen theme? “We forget to remind those who come to Christ that you have a real enemy in yourself, in the world, and in the heavens,” he says. Did you tell us anything about these enemies in this sermon? No, you said nothing about them; so the sin of forgetting is mostly yours because you, as the pastor, should lead by example. “We want to find ourselves wrestling with the teachings of Jesus Christ,” he says with seriousness. Does he not tell us something like this in every sermon? But have you wrestled with anything at all, Mr. Fox? If Christianity is not a game, then surely the pulpit must be something more than a mascot! We must be found wrestling, we must be found wrestling, he says, but in three sermons in a row the man who needs to wrestle most has done nothing to honor his title, his text, his points, or the theme he ends up talking about! The reason for this dishonor must be that he did not wrestle in his study and closet: not with his books and not in his prayers. But the more fundamental reason for his botched work may be the fact that his vocation has no call from God to back it up.

Once again, we have to ask, in wonder and with a wry face on, how those persons in this congregation who know better can be satisfied with a pastor who can teach nothing more than the most dreamy, apathetic souls in church already know! Mr. Fox is earnest; but zeal without aptitude for teaching is just one proof (and the only one we need) of a professed calling that has no divine backing. Not all that profess to be called are in possession of a calling. Not all that profess to be called are called to prophesy. There is this idea pervading churches of all kinds at this time, and which has pervaded the Brethren assemblies from their inception, probably, that he who desires to teach the Bible is ‘apt to teach.’ Desire to teach does not fulfill the qualification of aptitude that the Bible says an elder must have. Aptitude to teach means more than a desire to teach; it means that you have ability. This man has not the aptitude; he is not able. Therefore he is doing a thing for which he is not called, even the greatest thing for which a calling is most necessary. “I’ve been discipling for a long time,” this pastor assures us. With material like this? Successfully? We should wonder about that. We are very eager by this time to move on to examine the next church. But we have said something; we have more warrant at the close of this analysis than Mr. Fox has at the close of his sermon, to say, that ‘we’ll leave the matter there.’

But just one defense of our criticism before we store this analysis. Mr. Fox says that he’s thankful to live in a country where the worst that can happen to a Christian, in regards to persecution, is criticism. Since this analysis is nothing but criticism, and since it comes from a Christian quarter and therefore cannot be classified as persecution but only reproof and correction, he should be extremely thankful to receive our criticism and to take all that we have said to heart. Now we can move on. And we insist that we have nothing against this man except that his pulpit duties cannot be shown to be the outworking of that characteristic of aptitude the apostle Paul reveals the called man must be in possession of. “A bishop [an elder] then must be…apt to teach” (1 Timothy 3.2.)

CHARLES WOODBRIDGE, THE NEW EVANGELICALISM (BOOK REPORT 29)

GABOURY’S CRITICAL BOOK REPORT

Charles Woodbridge, The New Evangelicalism (Greenville, South Carolina: Bob Jones University Press, 1969), 62 pp.

That Christian who has read little or no theology from eras previous to the 20^th century is probably part of The New Evangelicalism. The term is not a putdown. It was coined by a spokesman for the new approach: Boston pastor Harold Ockenga. “In a formal statement he has declared: ‘The New Evangelicalism has changed its strategy from one of separation to one of infiltration’” (p. 14.) This new strategy is not biblical: “Had Moses been a New Evangelical, he probably would have reasoned thus: ‘Would it not be better for me to infiltrate Egypt rather than to separate myself from it? Would it not be more profitable if I disregarded God’s command and remained in Pharaoh’s court as a witness to the glory of God?’” (p. 13.) Here is the qualification: “Ministers of the gospel may certainly accept invitations to preach, even in strange and unexpected places, provided that they do not put themselves under the sponsorship or auspices of false teachers” (p. 41.) The new evangelicalism strategy is the same old pragmatism that the Jesuits used: “the teaching that the end justifies the means utilized in the attainment of the end” (p. 31.) The root cause of this pragmatic approach is the idea that “a new system of thought and practice is needed in setting forth the message of salvation” (p. 16.) The biblical methods of old are deemed insufficient. Dr. Woodbridge sketches the story of this new evangelicalism, proves his thesis against the new way, and names the guilty parties, just as the apostle Paul used to do.

New Evangelical magazines include World Vision, Christian Life, Moody Monthly, Christianity Today, and Eternity. These magazines, by promotion and publication, are connected to heretical beliefs in their effort to achieve their desired end. “Over against the teaching of the Word of God, some of the New Evangelicals now imply that in dealing with heretics the test is no longer doctrine but love. We must be less concerned about the theological errors of unbelieving ministers and more concerned about exhibiting love toward them” (p. 24.) This is to adopt “the ‘soft line’ of appeasement rather than the Biblical ‘hard line’ of repudiation” (p. 25.) The peer pressure to adopt the soft line is indeed great, since even Billy Graham has adopted it. “In the Los Angeles Graham crusade, the honorary chairman was none other than Bishop Gerald F. Kennedy of the Methodist Church” who, in a book called God’s Good News, “eloquently denies the deity of Christ” (p. 39.)

“Frankly, if you do not genuinely believe the Bible, or if you lack implicit faith in the accuracy, finality, and complete validity of the Word of God…this message may seem to you to be strange, exaggerated, or irrelevant” (p. 9.) Beware, New Evangelicalism is “a false doctrine which seems to have a fascinating appeal to theologically unwary or academically ambitious souls” (p. 21.)

The author’s affiliations (see back cover) may be irreconcilable with this book’s message.

Content: A- (New Evangelicalism defined, exposed, and refuted.)

     Style: A- (Concisely communicated.)

    Tone: B  (Quaint but true.)

                      

Grading Table: A: a keeper: reread it; promote it; share it.

                        B: an average book: let it go.

                        C: read only if you have to.

JONATHAN EDWARDS, SINNERS IN THE HANDS OF AN ANGRY GOD AND OTHER WRITINGS (BOOK REPORT 28)

GABOURY’S CRITICAL BOOK REPORT

Jonathan Edwards, Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God and other Writings (1700’s; Nashville, Tennessee: Thomas Nelson, 2000), 314 pp.

The selection contains four sermons, An Essay on the Trinity, and the Freedom of the Will. This is a very odd selection. Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God is as mighty a sermon as the title promises. And it was mightily used by God to awaken sinners: “Those of you that finally continue in a natural condition, that shall keep out of hell longest will be there in a little time! your damnation does not slumber” (p. 16.) The Presence is felt in that sermon more than in the other three, though all are good. The essay on the trinity, by today’s standard, is also good, but it does not compare well with so much else that Edwards has written. The rhetoric is complicated, and it is a real pain to decipher.

The Freedom of the Will must be about as abstract and esoteric as any theorem in existence. I have little doubt that Edwards is right and the Arminian is wrong. But who is sharp enough to follow Edwards down such narrow corridors of reason? Like most philosophy, this must be gotten through only by the stubborn reader. Who can labor through this without leaving so many parts unknown? The difference between Necessity and necessary, and between impossible and Impossibility, are these necessary to state and possible to fathom? (p. 125.) About Edwards’ philosophical subtleties, John Erskine says this in his Advertisement (1774) to Edwards’ History of Redemption: “the abstruse nature of the subject, or the subtle objections of opposers of the truth, led him to more abstract and metaphysical reasonings.” (He is not speaking there, of the History of Redemption, though.) Edwards’ Freedom of the Will is the domain of “divines, metaphysicians, and logical writers,” as Mr. W. the Editor calls them in a note (not in this edition.) This being the case, do we not require the full disclosure of what Edwards worked so hard to prove before we can hope to grasp more than a few slivers of what he meant? When Volume One of Edwards’ Works providentially came into my hands, I discovered that I had struggled to understand the Freedom of the Will with only part of the treatise to read! Thanks Nelson Publishers!

Over twenty percent of the Will is missing in Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God and other Writings by Thomas Nelson Publishers. There is no indication of omission in the Publisher’s Preface, and none in the Introduction—yet the Will’s Preface, its Footnotes, even vast Sections of the grand Treatise itself, and the Appendix, and even the Conclusion—are all omitted! On Nelson’s final page, it says, The End, as if to cause the impression that we’ve just read the full version. With something as important and hard to comprehend as the operation of man’s will, by which our choice for evil or good is made in consequence to eternity, what are we to make of Nelson’s deletions? Even the conclusion is dropped from the Farewell Sermon, which is where Edwards extends his love to that guilty, ungrateful congregation that dishonorably voted him out. It’s as if this selection of abridged material is painstakingly calculated to give the reader a low opinion of Edwards. I recommend Hendrickson’s edition of his Works.  

For help in understanding Edwards’ treatise on the will, I recommend the essay by William Cunningham: Calvinism, and the Doctrine of Philosophical Necessity. This may be found in The Reformers and the Theology of the Reformation (1862.)  

Content: ? (This Nelson Royal Classic is a royal rip-off.)

     Style: ? (Nothing is so disorienting as omission.)

    Tone: ? (Abridgments are ugly; beguiling Publishers, uglier.)

                      

Grading Table: A: a keeper: reread it; promote it; share it.

                        B: an average book: let it go.

                        C: read only if you have to.

CONFIRMING THE WITNESS OF CHRIST (SERMON SKETCH 17)

(Because of the wretched state of Red Deer’s pulpit space, it is now, as predicted by Solomon in Ecclesiastes 3, the time to ‘pluck up that which is planted…a time to break down…a time to weep…a time to cast away stones’ and even ‘a time to refrain from embracing.’ And it is certainly more ‘a time to speak’ than ‘a time to keep silence.’ Be that as it may, the wrecking ball of negative criticism should be followed by the laying down of truth. To this end, we introduce the sermon sketch as an intermittent blog feature. As the term ‘sketch’ implies, this kind of post, in distinction from the usually lengthy analysis, will be pithy. The source for each sketch will be indicated at the bottom of each post.)

Confirming the Witness of Christ

“Even as the testimony of Christ was confirmed in you” (1 Corinthians 1.6.)

Introduction. The most gifted church is not always the healthiest. The Corinthian church was first-class. But it was one of the worst in all Greece. Gifts are no good, even evil, unless consecrated to the service of God. He who buries his ten talents may expect to be given over to the tormentor. We must judge men, not by their talents, but by the use they make of them. Some Corinthians could work miracles. Now the church needs no such support. Therefore God has left us without extraordinary gifts. But we must use the gifts we have to confirm the testimony of Christ Jesus.

(1) The Testimony of Christ Jesus. That this world is fallen is the first truth in theology. God might justly have left the world to perish. But being full of mercy, he determined to send the Mediator to restore it, and save the elect of God. Beginning with Abel, God sent forth a priesthood of testifiers. Enoch walked with God, Moses climbed the steep sides of Sinai. During the times of the judges and kings, truth ran in a shallow stream. Next came a Nathan or Elijah, then the eloquent Isaiah and the soaring Ezekiel. Behind these came the minor prophets. God might deluge the world with water. But never would he extinguish the flame of testimony. The stream of man’s wickedness and of time may be crossed by stepping-stones of testimony, from Noah to Abraham to Moses, and so on. The last stepping-stone is Jesus Christ. John speaks of Christ as ‘the faithful witness’ (Revelation 1.5.) Now, then, I am not dishonoring my Master by calling him a ‘witness.’ He is the last witness, the greatest witness. Christ witnesses directly for himself. Jeremiah and Daniel spake only what God had revealed to them. Christ’s testimony was uniform. We cannot say that of any other, whether Noah, David, or Abraham. These were certainly good testifiers. But sin has left a plague-spot upon them all. Sin never contradicted Christ’s testimony. Further, Christ’s testimony was perfectly full. Other men gave testimony to parts of truth. There was more of God revealed by Christ than in the works of creation and in all the prophets. He testified to all God’s attributes: to God’s mercy by healing the lame; to his power by stilling the wind; to his justice by languishing on Cavalry. I bless God that there are so many denominations. We have different men to defend different kinds of truths. Christ defended and preached all. And mark, Christ’s testimony was final. He said finis to the canon of revelation. All who come after him are confirmers of his testimony.

(2) The Testimony of Christ is to be Confirmed in You. The best confirmation of gospel truth is inside the Christian. I love ‘Paley’s Evidences.’ But I never need them for my own use. The witness inside me defies all infidelity. Says John Newton, life is too short to be spent reading contradictions of my religion. O, says the Christian, do not tell me there is no power in religion, for I have felt it. Otherwise, I would never have changed. Sometimes persons come asking me to confirm the truth outside of them. I cannot do that. I want them to have the truth confirmed in them. Try religion yourself, and you will see its power. O, it is a blessed thing to trust in the Lord. It is also our business to so live that we might be the means of confirming the truth in others. Wicked men do not read the Bible; they read Christians. With a careful eye they watch how they live. O, may you have grace to live in such a way that the world will find no fault in you.

Selection from Conclusion. “Now, my friends, to close…If you can die without fear, or repining, or remorse, knowing that you are forgiven—if you can die with the song of victory on your lips, and with the smile of joy upon your countenance, then you will confirm the witness of Christ.”

{This sermon by C. H. Spurgeon (1834-1892) is sketched by M. H. Gaboury.}

DONALD D. CROWE, CREATION WITHOUT COMPROMISE (BOOK REPORT 27)

(One’s level of piety, whether devotional or practical, depends much on knowledge being either learned or misconceived. In these analyses we have made mention, occasionally, of books that either help or hinder the grand object of piety. It seems natural, consequently, to supplement the analyses, now and again, with correlating book reports.)

GABOURY'S CRITICAL BOOK REPORT

Donald D. Crowe, Creation Without Compromise (Brisbane, Australia: Creation Ministries International, 2009), 296 pp.

Evils like eugenics, abortion, infanticide, and genocide are more acceptable from the standpoint of believing that man is an evolved ape than from the view of man being made in the image of God (p. 17.) If ‘survival of the fittest’ is the method by which man came into his own, then why not continue to exploit the weak? (p. 239.) A Darwinian struggle for existence involves no matter of right or wrong (p. 266.) “The survival of the fittest necessarily involves the death of the less fit” (p. 265.) Therefore it remains relevant and necessary to weigh the theory of evolution against the biblical account of creation, to decide for one of the other, and to promote the truth. 

The theory of evolution still lacks the fossil evidence that is needed to back it up (p. 88.) Not only this, but it has no answer as to how the universe came from a speck, how randomness came to order, how inanimate matter came to life, or how life proceeded to intelligence (p. 276.) Darwin admitted that complexity coming about by natural selection to be an absurd proposition (p. 103.) In his most influential book may be found many suppositions just on one page (p. 100.) If a hypothesis (like the theory of evolution) seems uncertain, it is wise to maintain our position (for creation, p. 142.)

The present immoral situation that we are in came about through a gradual dismissal of biblical content. Supernaturalism was first set aside, then the moral system (p. 256.) Donald C. Crowe would convince us to take the Bible seriously, not only on matters touching the supernatural and moral, but the cosmological and scientific as well. That the Bible was ‘not written to tell us how the heavens go, but how to go to heaven’ is an apology that he considers a compromise (p. 202.) Moreover, he believes that the genealogies of Genesis 5 and 11 are to be taken as if they yield to us a detailed record of transpired years from the days of Adam to Abraham. This is why, I suppose, that he is able to pigeonhole the scattering that occurred at the tower of Babel at ‘about 2242 B. C.’ (p 22.) In short, he defends the chronological scheme of Archbishop Ussher (p. 62.)

It is true that the genealogies of Genesis 5 and 11 present a more ‘interlocking format’ than does Matthew 1, which makes it more problematic to justify hidden years between persons (pp. 67, 68, 179.) But William Green (1890), strongly criticized by Mr. Crowe, would have us consider (in Evolution and Antiquity by J. D. Thomas, p. 59) that the impression we get from reading the narrative concerning Abraham is that the persons carried through the Flood had passed away long before Abraham was born. Was the death of Noah and the birth of Abraham really separated by just two years, as Mr. Crowe insists? (p. 63.) It doesn’t feel like it when you read the life of Abraham in Genesis. That the Bible does not ‘state a date of creation’ is a statement that Mr. Crowe will not bear (p. 288.) The man is so wild with zeal to convince us of a certain, precise, inspired chronology that he unleashes insupportable allegations against Green, Charles Hodge, B. B. Warfield, and even C. H. Spurgeon.  Maybe Spurgeon asserted, in one sermon or other, the existence of ‘pre-Adamite humanoids,’ as Crowe alleges on page 244. But do ‘races of creatures’ (p. 243) have to mean ‘humanoids’? Spurgeon speaks there of ‘races of creatures’ created by God ‘before he tried his hand on man.’ We might disagree with that. But the quote on page 243 does not support what Crowe alleges on page 244. Because Green points out the names that are omitted from the genealogy of Matthew 1, does that amount to the passage being ‘abused in order to discredit Genesis’? (p. 60.) Was it Green’s object to abuse Scripture in order to discredit Scripture? Really, what Crowe approves of on the next page, in the words of Henry Morris, is not far from what Green contends: that Genesis 5 contains “the only reliable chronological framework we have for the antediluvian period of history.” Does a ‘framework’ mean an exact delineation of years? Does Henry Morris intend for us to take what he says that way? Or is Crowe just fishing for support where none can be found? When Hodge asserts that the Church has been forced to accommodate scientific discoveries, does that mean that Hodge is guilty of destroying Genesis? (pp. 115, 116.) An allegation like that does not accord with calling Hodge a great defender of the faith (p. 109.) Moreover, the quotes that are gathered from the works of Hodge do not contain the concessions to evolution that Crowe alleges. I do not see from these quotes any evidence of Hodge being a ‘piecemeal accommodating apologist’ (p. 124.) As far as I can see, Hodge maintains the same ground as the man that Crowe finds no fault with: R. L. Dabney. Though Warfield sometimes concedes too much to evolution (pp. 158, 174), is it fair to put incriminating words in his mouth? From page 163: “‘The Bible tells us nothing about the mode of creation’ is little more than a euphemism for ‘I do not accept what the Bible tells us about the mode of creation.’” No source is cited for this, and calling the statement a euphemism for not accepting what the Bible says is unfair. If one does not believe that the Bible teaches a certain thing, then it is hardly an issue of not accepting what the Bible says about it. The lack of proof for Crowe’s many allegations begs another criticism regarding yet another ‘quote.’ If you claim that H. G. Wells wrote that inferior races ought to be exterminated, would it not, considering the seriousness of the charge, be kind and prudent to cite the original work in which the statement was made instead of relying on secondhand sources? (p. 268.)

After all of his ranting and raving against Spurgeon, Green, Hodge, and Warfield, Mr. Crowe attempts An Exegetical Study of Genesis, which I did not find compelling at all. It did not come close to convincing me of Crowe’s very particular Creation Without Compromise. I found it not only unconvincing, but confusing also.

It is true that “Christianity has no place for random chance; evolution has no place for God’s design” (p. 25.) But Crowe’s Creation Without Compromise is not the book that I would recommend for showing the truth of this. In this book may be found a store of facts by which to expose the falsehoods of evolution and to highlight the truthfulness of the biblical account. It contains enlightening facts on the characters and events that helped to occasion Darwinism, like the writings of Darwin’s grandfather and the death of Darwin’s daughter (pp. 84, 89, 91, 159.) The liberal scholar’s contradictory use of Scripture is nicely shown (p. 169.) The contents of Darwin’s Origin of Species are neatly summed up (p. 97.) There is more than one instance of wit: “While the ‘dogmatic agnostic’ may be an oxymoron, it is not an endangered species” (p. 87.) And our interest is heightened by the mention of some old books in which the great controversy between evolution and creation was waged when still in its infant stage (pp. 194, 195, 197.) But the author of Creation Without Compromise is often unfair, frequently nasty, and his exegesis is muddling and uneventful.           

Content: B (An attempt to establish creationist boundaries.)

    Style:  B (Commonplace.)

   Tone:  C (Overconfident, condescending, and slanderous.)

                           

Grading Table: A: a keeper: reread it; promote it; share it.

                        B:  an average book: let it go.

                        C:  read only if you have to.