MAINSTREAM MESSENGER
Vol. 3, No. 5 Sept. 2000 Editor: Bruce Prescott
The Chief Sin of Fundamentalism
By Dr. Bruce Prescott
The chief sin of Fundamentalism is that it makes the “Word of God” a dead metaphor. “Dead metaphors” are phrases that can be understood automatically – without thinking -- by simple, literal mental associations. Fundamentalists automatically and literally associate the metaphor “Word of God” with the Bible.
The Bible almost always employs living metaphors. “Living metaphors” cannot be understood by automatic mental associations. Understanding living metaphors requires thought. There is a tension in living metaphors that points to a meaning that is greater than can be conveyed by a simple, literal mental association.
With few exceptions, the phrase “Word of God” as used in scripture, means more than simply “Bible” or “written word.”
In scripture, the “Word of God” is “living and active” (Heb. 4:12-13 NASB), or “living and abiding” (1 Pet. 1:23). Jesus likened the “Word of God” to a “seed” that is planted and grows in a heart (Luke 8:11). After Pentecost, Luke wrote that the Word of God “increased” (Acts 6:7) and “grew and multiplied” (Acts 12:24). Most of the Bible verses about the “Word of God” relate to the dynamic spiritual processes involved in “preaching,” “hearing,” or “receiving” the “good news” about Jesus. John’s Revelation talks about one who is “clothed with a robe dipped in blood; and His name is called The Word of God.” (Revelation 19:13) In almost every biblical instance, “Word of God” is best understood as a “living metaphor” that points beyond the “written word” to the “living Word” which “was with God and . . . was God” and “became flesh, and dwelt among us.” (John 1:1,14)
Most significant is the fact that, in the one instance in which Jesus used the metaphor “word of God” in a sense that primarily referenced scripture, he was complaining that the “traditions” of men had made the Word “of none effect” (Mark 7:13). No stronger denunciation of creedalism has ever been given. God told Isaiah that the Word “shall not return unto me empty, without accomplishing that which I desire, and without succeeding in the matter for which I sent it.”
Apparently, there is one thing that can “empty” God’s Word and make it “of none effect.” When men remove the “wiggle room”1 created by “living metaphors” and replace them with the “dead metaphors” of creedal interpretations, the “Word of God” is made “of none effect.” What happens is that the place where God’s Spirit speaks to the heart and soul is filled instead by the automatic, literal mental associations of men.
This is precisely what the “tradition” codified in the 2000 BF&M does to the “Word of God.”
___________
1
On August 31, 2000 at Midwestern Seminary Paige Patterson said "I'm glad we took it out," referring to a difference between the 1963 BF&M and 2000 BF&M. "We needed to take away the wiggle room."