Intro: The Latest Battle in the Social Justice Wars

Once more the evangelical sphere of the Internet is on fire. As with many recent kerfluffles, this one is about social justice. I’ve not said much about the social justice movement so far. I’ve posted a little bit, as some may remember. But I’ve largely stayed out of it for a number of reasons. I tend to think that the movement lacks wisdom and clarity. I also think its passion is somewhat justified, and the evangelical old guard which they have been fighting with has many problems of its own. The anti-social justice Christians are right about more things than those supporting social justice recognize, but the same is also true in reverse. There is a fair bit of blindness and sinfulness on both sides. There is also a plenty of righteousness and pure motivation on both sides. I don’t wish to antagonize either.

With that in mind, I have decided to address this new Statement on Social Justice and the Gospel. If you haven’t noticed it, it addresses some contemporary social justice issues. It has been signed by many big names, including John MacArthur, James White, Voddie Baucham, Doug Wilson, and more. It has also been hated and repudiated by many others. People have slung mud left and right over it.

My intent is to assess each of the statement’s affirmations and denials in a balanced way. Both sides should know that I extend to each the benefit of the doubt. My primary resource for thought will be classical Protestant orthodoxy. Hopefully this sheds light on some matters and contributes helpfully to the discussion.

I. Scripture

Affirmation All good, no issues at all. Denial Here is my first concern. It denies that “Christian belief, character, or conduct can be dictated by any other authority” than Scripture. Now, the odd word “dictated” raises some ambiguity, but by most possible meanings we have a bit of a problem. This appears to affirm what some call solo Scriptura. The Protestant doctrine of sola Scriptura (note the a) teaches that Scripture alone is the final and only infallible authority in all matters of Christian faith and practice. But other authorities do exist. And we should submit to those authorities, just under Scripture. But the statement apparently denies this. We are to learn everything we must do and think exclusively from what Scripture clearly says. This can sound wise, but it has major problems. Classically, Christians have upheld belief in general or natural revelation. God reveals truth not exclusively through Scripture but also through creation.[1. Romans 1:18-20, Psalm 19:1-4.] This includes the natural and moral law, which all know to some extent or another.[2. Romans 2:14-16] What is good and right and just can be seen from the created order. This means that Scripture is not the sole source for our knowledge of justice. We must obey the dictates of justice as we see it by reason in the natural law. Scripture can correct this when we get it wrong, of course. But sometimes, when we get Scripture wrong, we can even use reflection on the natural law to correct our misuse of Scripture. Moreover, since it is possible to know justice from nature, Christians don’t have a monopoly. While Scripture helps us know a great deal about justice, unbelievers can learn nearly all of this from nature.[3. At least in principle. Practically, this is complicated.] This means it is even possible for Christians to learn about justice from the theories of unbelievers.

II. Imago Dei

Affirmation Looks good to me. Denial Also unobjectionable. I much doubt, as some have claimed about the statement, that a racist could easily agree with this.

III. Justice

Affirmation True, thought the last sentence practically begs for more detail. Denial I have a lot of questions about what “socially-constructed standards of justice” may mean. Is this meant to deny something specific that someone is advocating? Do they have certain standards in mind? What exactly is a socially-constructed standard of justice? I am concerned this denial may imply two problematic things. First, does this deny the necessity of human prudence to apply the principles of justice, assuming that all matters of justice should be self-evident from Scripture? Second, this appears to deny what I affirmed above, namely that even the justice theories of unbelievers can be mostly correct if they respond reasonably to natural law. This, then, leads me to suspect they have targets in mind. Perhaps they think of the whole evangelical social justice movement as socially-constructed standards?

IV. God’s Law

Affirmation Technically, what this says is true. But classical Christian thought has seen the Ten Commandments as summarizing the natural law. Given the context, then, I’m not sure if they agree. For if we don’t see the Ten Commandments as summarizing natural law, but instead focus on their letter, we might run into all kinds of reductionistic problems in determining what is truly just. Denial My question here follows from what I said regarding the affirmation. Is the term “God’s commandments” here being used in a sense broad enough to include natural law and general revelation? Or are they limited to the text of Scripture? The context still seems to imply the latter, which would be a big problem.

V. Sin

Affirmation All well and good. Denial This is probably mostly true. However, it says that people only share guilt in the sins of their ancestors if they approve, embrace, or try to justify them. But I question whether it is not also possible to share guilt by uncritically participating in what one’s ancestors constructed by means of sin. What, as well, if the past sins are simply ignored or denied? These two questions loom large in the social justice debate, and this section would more useful if it addressed them. In fact, the first of these two questions might very well be the most important. To use a really extreme analogy, imagine your parents murdered a hundred people and made furniture out of their bones. Should you use the furniture? Even if you should, should you do it without giving it a second thought? While the real situation is less extreme, a lot of people talking about social justice view current institutions, laws, and cultural artifacts as similar to this bone furniture. The statement, however, gives no answer here.

VI. Gospel

Affirmation This part is sufficiently general to be agreeable to almost anyone. Denial In this instance I think the statement got very close to the target but missed a crucial opportunity for clarity. For it is quite true, as it says, that no works, opinions, or applications can be required in the Gospel as such. However, they missed an opportunity to frame this through the Law/Gospel distinction. The Gospel is good news about what God is up to by His Son Jesus in the Spirit. Commands and obligations, the things we need to do or the perspectives we need to adopt, are not news. They are more like questions. Will we obey, or will we disobey? Will we be rewarded or punished? This is why the Protestant tradition has always cleanly distinguished everything we must do as Law, not Gospel. So, then, the statement here has a point. Those who call social justice issues “Gospel issues” are usually mistaken. Instead, most of those are actually law issues. This doesn’t reduce their importance, however. Lots of the point of law is that it tells us how we have to live. When we try to put this job onto the Gospel, we can only create legalism and fear. Nonetheless, there is a kind of social justice issue which is a Gospel issue. Yet this the statement does not mention at all. Segregation of the Lord’s Table, or similar partiality along racial, class, or other lines implies a Gospel heresy in which Christ is not in fact equally Savior to all through faith. This, as Paul explained with the Galatians, is a true Gospel issue. Unfortunately, the statement does not speak of this at all.

VII. Salvation

Affirmation Good and standard Protestant fare. Denial Everything here seems reasonable to the point of obviousness, and I really wonder if they think there is someone they are contradicting here. Are there people who they think believe that cultural heritage can mitigate or remove the obligation to respond to the Gospel?

VIII. The Church

Affirmation This is more true than many Christians for social justice believe. But it lacks vital distinctions. First, what do they mean by “Church”? It it the invisible Church (all true believers), the visible Church (all the baptized), or the local church (small bodies of the baptized, assembled as such)? Neither the invisible nor the visible Church has a “role” necessarily, except to be human the way God intends. Now, in a sinful world, this does include working for justice. But that job is not specific to the Church. It applies to everyone. Everyone is responsible for being human per God’s design. So the differences between the Church and the unbelieving world here are that the Church has the help of the Spirit to perform the task, the help of Scripture to understand the task, and additional dimensions to the task. But pursuing justice itself is a common task to believers and unbelievers. The local church is different. Wherever there are members of the visible Church and they assemble together precisely as the Church, there is a local church. The local church has a small set of tasks for the precise purpose of building up believers together in Christ. It is to help the people of God be the people of God. So the local church is tasked with fellowship, the ministry of Word and Sacrament, discipline, and other tasks specific to being Christians. If this is what “the church” means in the statement, then it is correct. The local church assembles to do what is unique to the people of God. To seek justice and social good is not unique to the Church but belongs to all people. Denial See all I just said. However, I should add that the narrow focus on “laws” misses what much of the social justice movement is about. It is not just what’s on the books but also about non-legal institutions, biases in legal institutions which are not in the letter of the law, and other cultural structures.

IX. Heresy

Affirmation This seems basically correct, if perhaps it could be clearer. Saying that heresy often involves elevating non-essentials to essentials opens a big can of worms, though. I know that some of what some of the signatories consider essential, I consider non-essential. Denial I guess this is a response to explicit or implicit accusations that the statement’s drafters have a heretical view of the issues related to social justice concerns? The point is obviously correct, but oddly defensive.

X. Sexuality and Marriage

Affirmation I would like to fully affirm this without reservation, but I do have one nit-picky reservation. “Chastity” is used specifically for unmarried, seemingly in contrast to the “sexual” description of marriage. Historically, Christianity has spoken of chastity within marriage. So it should be noted that “chastity” does not actually mean “abstinence.” Chastity does require abstinence for the unmarried, but it also applies to the married and requires of them faithful fulfillment of their sexual duties. Denial This section is mostly fine, if a bit reactionary, except for two problems. First, denying that “human sexuality is a socially constructed concept” ignores the common distinction made today between sex and gender. Now, I happen to agree with many who think this novel distinction is problematic. But even so, it is there, and this space could have used profitably. Even though it is wrong to use the sex/gender distinction to create the possibility of something like transgender identities, there is a right use. In our context, it would be helpful to acknowledge the difference between the aspects of sexual difference embedded in human nature itself and the experience of gender which is socially constructed on top of those natural sexual differences. This distinction is crucial to maintain unless we want to force everyone into one narrow, culturally contextual idea of “gender roles” or defy sexual difference altogether. The second problem here is more subtle. It denies that any union but one man and one woman for life can be properly called marriage. This is quite wrong. I agree with them that polygamy and divorce are bad. They are at best inferior to lifelong monogamy and at worst deadly sin. But that doesn’t invalidate the marriage. A man can be genuinely married to multiple women,[4. In the Old Testament, God recognizes the marriages of many men who had multiple wives. This doesn’t mean He approved, but He certainly considered them real marriages.] but he should not do so. Likewise, a wife can truly divorce her husband, but she ought not to do so in most circumstances.

XI. Complementarianism

Affirmation This is essentially correct, though I think the language of “roles” isn’t usually helpful. Alastair Roberts has pointed out that a biblical complementarianism is less about, “Men should do X and women should do Y,” than about, “Men by nature tend to be like X and women by nature tend to be like Y, so we should act responsibly in light of X and Y.” Denial This is fine, given what I said above.

XII. Race/Ethnicity

Affirmation I think this is agreeable. As long as “Race is not a biblical category” doesn’t mean “Race doesn’t exist” or “Race is an anti-biblical category.” Denial This starts off well enough, but then there’s this: “We reject any teaching that encourages racial groups to view themselves as privileged oppressors or entitled victims of oppression.” At the most cynical level, this would seem to be a way of saying, “We deny that white privilege exists or that any other racial group deserves any kind of correction or restitution for prior wrongs.” It could just be defended by the careful choice of words. One could try to exonerate it by saying, “This only means we can’t say that all white people are oppressors and that anyone should feel entitled.” In the end, this claim feels flexible enough to deny the whole point of the social justice movement, but worded specifically to avoid easy refutation. Also, the last sentence about feelings and stuff is weird. Do they think anyone actually believes this, or are they making fun?

XIII. Culture

Affirmation This is pretty much solid. Some people have objected to the notion that some cultures operate on assumptions inherently better than others. They are wrong to do so. For example, a culture where human life is considered massively valuable is operating on a much better assumption than a culture where it is viewed as dispensable. A culture that values generosity is more humane than one that values arbitrary accumulation of private wealth. Perhaps most importantly, there is much evidence from history and that cultures which have been shaped by worship of the true God have many advantages (even in ways that cosmopolitan liberal should agree) over cultures shaped by centuries of idolatry. I do wonder, however, if the last sentence implies that conversion and biblical training leave no need for legal or social efforts to change culture. That would be mistaken. Denial This is true enough. Again, though, I wonder if they think someone disagrees with this.

XIV. Racism

Affirmation Seems sufficiently true. Denial This seems mostly true. Some have questioned whether the denial of systemic racism as compatible with evangelical Christianity means the belief in systemic racism or systemic racism itself. I think they mean the latter. The former would need a lot of proof. I do raise issue with the way it finishes. To quote it: And we emphatically deny that lectures on social issues (or activism aimed at reshaping the wider culture) are as vital to the life and health of the church as the preaching of the gospel and the exposition of Scripture. Historically, such things tend to become distractions that inevitably lead to departures from the gospel. Now, here’s where failing to distinguish the meaning of “church” comes back to haunt us. It’s true, as I said before, that the local church is assembled primarily to do unique things which Christians must do specifically because they are Christians. They are to preach the Word, encourage one another, administer the Sacraments, etc. So, technically, it’s true that lectures and activism are not “as vital to the life and health of the [local] church” as preaching and such. But this claim lacks in a couple of ways. First, the preaching of Scripture necessarily means that sometimes we will be required to say things from the pulpit which will sound a lot like “lectures on social issues.” If we preach Amos, we will have to address complacent affluence and the needs of the poor. If we preach Galatians, we may have to point out the ways that modern social, racial, and class divisions can cause similar damage to the Jew/Gentile conflict in the early church. Preaching the Sermon on the Mount raises a lot of “social issues.” (And, indeed, I wonder whether any of these signatories would consider their own frequent speech against abortion and the LGBT movement, speech with which I agree, as potentially distracting lectures on social issues.) Second, we should remember that the whole Church, not considered as local bodies specifically but as simply all Christians, does not have the limited task. The whole people of God is simply to be human the way God intends. It is the same task as humanity in general. This includes the task of justice. It’s just loving our neighbor. So “lectures” and activism can have a true place in Christian life. In fact, Christians are especially needed in these spheres. We can provide needed biblical wisdom. We can use the opportunity to be witnesses and to show Christ-like love.

Conclusion

I have already said in my introduction how I generally feel about the social justice controversy. By going through the Statement on Social Justice and the Gospel as thoroughly as I have, I hope I have been of some help to both sides. But I would also like to add some concluding reflections about the statement and the issues.

This statement, for all of its flaws, was produced by rather godly people. They mostly mean well, and they have done more to point people to Jesus Christ than I or many of their Twitter critics have. So on that count they deserve respect.

That said, new movements don’t generally pop up where everything was fine. Many of the issues the social justice movement are reacting against are quite real. Even when they misunderstand the reality, the reality is still something that needs fixing. G. K. Chesterton’s quippy summary of this dynamic is ever relevant:

I believe what really happens in history is this: the old man is always wrong; and the young people are always wrong about what is wrong with him. The practical form it takes is this: that, while the old man may stand by some stupid custom, the young man always attacks it with some theory that turns out to be equally stupid.

I don’t want to call either side here “stupid,” but the point is clear enough. The statement in this case represents the old man trying to argue with the young man’s theory. But he refuses to concede very much of what he did wrong to prompt the young man to form a new theory to begin with.

On the other hand, I stand by what I have said in the past. The young man’s theory, the current social justice movement, has serious deficiencies in wisdom and clarity. I think it will create its own new problems without great caution. This statement does appropriately address some of these issues.

So, what do I think actually is wrong and needs to be done? I’ll save that for later. But to hold you over until then, I think our justice problems have a great deal to do with class and the abolition of man. Neither side is talking enough about these. Our society, culture, and economy will need to change radically to deal with them. But the kind of radical change I hope for is not utopian or Marxist or theonomist. It would require a return to natural law thinking, basic human sanity, economic justice, and political and social principles developed in early Protestant thought. One of these days I’ll explain all of that.

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