October 18, 2001 (David Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061-0368, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org) - In the Friday Church News Notes for October 12, I stated that Kevin Bauder, one of the authors of the newly published book "Only One Bible" (which promotes modern textual criticism and tears down defenders of the King James Bible), is a New Evangelical ecumenist. I described an advertisement in Christianity Today which listed Dr. Bauder in an ad for "Pilgrims in the Sawdust Trail: Evangelical Conversations." According to this ad, he was scheduled to be involved with a dialogue-type exchange with Roman Catholics Richard John Neuhaus and Jeffrey Gros and various other heretics and ecumenists at Samford University's Beeson Divinity School on October 2-3.

I have since learned that Dr. Bauder teaches at Central Theological Seminary in Minneapolis and is a fundamentalist. (I am overseas and did not have a copy of the book with me as I wrote that article.) He said that he was broadsided by the way the conference was presented in Christianity Today and other media, that he attended to present a fundamentalist challenge to ecumenism, and that he was not there to dialogue.

After reading the ad in Christianity Today and after further communication with a friend who is an author and a librarian and does a lot of important research and is ordinarily very careful, and who intimated to me that Bauder is a New Evangelical, it did not cross my mind that he might be a fundamentalist. Also, the very location of the meeting, Beeson Divinity School, spoke volumes to me. About three months ago I visited Beeson and talked with some of the students and toured the chapel and other parts of the school. The Dean of Beeson, Timothy George, signed the extremely dangerous documents, Evangelical and Catholics Together and Evangelicals and Catholics Together II. The $10 million school chapel prominently features a bust of neo-orthodox theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who denied the virgin birth of Jesus Christ and the objective infallibility of the Scriptures. I was told by a school representative that Bonhoeffer was featured because he was a martyr for the faith in the 20th century; yet that does not answer the question of why an allegedly "evangelical" school would honor a man who denied many fundamental doctrines of the Christian faith. A Beeson graduate student told me that he does not think that belief in the virgin birth is necessary for salvation.

I had no idea that a fundamentalist would participate in any forum at such a compromised institution, and upon further consideration and communication with Dr. Bauder, I still am very uncomfortable with such a thing. Dr. Bauder told me that he was doing the same thing as Paul did when he confronted Peter about his compromise. It is not the same, though. Paul did not attend an ecumenical meeting and associate with the Hymenauses and Philetuses of his day. Dr. Bauder attended a conference which included heretics and apostates who preach a false gospel. The Bible expressly commands us to mark and avoid such heretics, to have no fellowship with them. How is it possible to obey that while participating in ecumenical forums at deeply compromised institutions and thus treating the participating heretics in a fraternal manner? Some would argue that Paul preached at a similar forum on Mars Hill. It was not the same, though. In that context, Paul preached the gospel to pagans and idolaters. He did not enter into an ecumenical forum under the auspices of false and deeply compromised teachers.

I spend 150 or so hours each month in research and try to be careful, knowing that I must answer to the Lord for errors and also knowing how difficult it is to retract something once it is published. In this case I made a mistake based on false information that I had no reason to suspect, and also based upon an action by Dr. Bauder that is questionable in the eyes of some fundamentalists, by his own admission.

At the same time, I stand behind the conclusion to last week's report as follows:

"Those who rush to defend the modern critical Greek text of necessity find themselves yoking together with the Dallas Seminary/The Evangelical Divinity School-type New Evangelicals and the Bruce Metzger/Kurt Aland/Matthew Black-type Modernists. This is because the fathers and chief scholars of modern textual criticism are not now, and never have been, strong Bible believing people. Modern textual criticism is founded upon the unbelieving principle that the Scriptures were not preserved by God and therefore it was necessary for 19th century scholars to use secular principles to recover the lost scriptures. As Dr. Edward F. Hills, Harvard Th.D. in textual criticism, observed in the 1950s, it is impossible to find the preserved Scriptures through the 'science' of textual criticism. Without faith it is impossible to please God."

For evidence of this statement, simply consult the content of the bookstores, recommended reading lists, and classroom textbooks at Central and Detroit Baptist Seminary and many other schools that promote modern textual criticism. On the Bible version issue you will find material by modernists such as Bruce Metzger, Carlo Martini, Kurt Aland, and Matthew Black, and by New Evangelicals such as Donald Carson (who accepts inclusive language translation to some extent and form criticism of the Gospels). The book From the Mind of God to the Mind of Man, for example, authored by men associated with Bob Jones University, quotes Bruce Metzger repeatedly with no warning to the readers that he does not believe that Moses wrote the Pentateuch, that he denies the worldwide flood and claims that Jonah was not swallowed by the great fish and that Job is a fable. In many of the college bookstores that support modern textual criticism you will also find a wide variety of titles by popular New Evangelical authors such as Max Lucado, Francis Schaeffer, Kay Arthur, Charles Stanley, John Maxwell, Chuck Colson, Philip Yancey, James Dobson, David Jeremiah, Jerry Bridges, Jim Cymbala, and Elisabeth Elliot. None of these authors are friends of fundamentalism and biblical separation, but in many cases you will not find a warning on these books except perhaps a standard disclaimer that the school does not necessarily recommend everything contained in the books it sells.

These schools all claim to stand against New Evangelicalism, but while there is some warning about prominent New Evangelicals from the past, such as Billy Graham, there is little warning about the popular New Evangelicals, such as those mentioned previously, who are influencing churches today. In these college bookstores you will find only a handful of books, at best, on biblical separation, specific warnings against New Evangelicalism, and correction of error in general. This is a reminder that many fundamentalists, especially those on the scholarly side, are gradually adopting the positive attitude of New Evangelicalism and are becoming increasingly soft in their approach to error. They will speak against a few of the grosser errors such as Romanism or the cults, but they are quiet about many other things that are at least as destructive. The warnings about heresy are more often given in broad generalities than in specifics. Very few names are named. The rapidly increasing error within fundamentalism itself tends to be overlooked. This change is not something that is easy to discern. It is more a change of mood and attitude than an overt change of action.

When these facts are pointed out and the accusation is made that there is a growing softness, those concerned raise a hew and cry against the one making the accusation. They become indignant. Why, aren't they the very bastions of fundamentalism? Who could bring an accusation against us of being soft for the truth?

In spite of this, I do make the accusation; and it is based on almost 30 years of diligent observation and research. I make the accusation not because I hate anyone but because I care about fundamentalism and I desire that the truth be exalted in this hour of compromise and apostasy. I was did not grow up in a fundamentalist home and did not know anything about fundamentalism when I was saved in 1973 at age 23 from a hippy lifestyle. I became a fundamentalist by personal conviction by studying the Bible.

I pray that those concerned will listen and consider and pray about the matter instead of shooting the messenger. If I am wrong, I pray earnestly that the Lord will show me this and that my concern can be resolved.