November 2013

C.S. Lewis’s words are timely as some church goers, even in the evangelical church, are drifting away from historical, biblical, orthodox Christian faith, and falling prey to the current heresies of our day. Lewis writes,

…there will be progress in Christian knowledge only as long as we accept the challenge of the difficult or repellent doctrines. A “liberal” Christianity which considers itself free to alter the Faith whenever the Faith looks perplexing or repellent must be completely stagnant, Progress is made only into a resisting material…

Have I stood firm (super monstratas vias) amidst all these “winds of doctrine”?...Our upbringing and the whole atmosphere of the world we live in make it certain that our main temptation will be that of yielding to winds of doctrine, not that of ignoring them. We are not at all likely to be hidebound: we are very likely to be the slaves of fashion. If one has to choose between reading the new books and reading the old, one must chose the old: not because they are necessarily better but because they contain precisely those truths of which our own age is neglectful. The standard of permanent Christianity must be kept clear in our minds and it is against that standard that we must test all contemporary thought. In fact, we must at all costs not move with the times. We serve One who said “Heaven and Earth shall move with the times, but my words shall not move with the times”…

Our business is to present that which is timeless (the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow) in the particular language of our own age. The bad preacher does exactly the opposite…

The core of his thought is merely contemporary; only the superficies is traditional. But your teaching must be timeless at its heart and wear a modern dress.

As many in the church today become slaves to the latest in theological fashion, such as a rejection of the doctrine of hell, or an acceptance of universalism, Lewis reminds us that our faith is solid, timeless, and is not meant to change from what Jesus and the Apostles taught 2,000 years ago. We must guard the true faith that has been entrusted to us and handed down from generation to generation.

“This is what the Lord says:
'Stand at the crossroads and look;
ask for the ancient paths,
ask where the good way is, and walk in it,
and you will find rest for your souls.
But you said, ‘We will not walk in it.’"
JEREMIAH 6:16 (NIV)

¹ C.S. Lewis, “Christian Apologetics,” in God in the Dock (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998), 91-94.