Is the Ligonier Theology Survey Too Complicated?

Hello, welcome back to Coffee with a Calvinist. This is a daily conversation about scripture, culture and media from a Reformed perspective. Get your Bible and coffee ready and prepare to engage today's topic.

Here's your host, Pastor Keith Foskey.

Welcome back to Coffee with a Calvinist. My name is Keith Foskey and I am a Calvinist. Today is Tuesday, November 10th, 2020, and I know it's been a while since I've mentioned it on the program, but if you are currently going through our Bible reading program that we have produced for Sovereign Grace Family Church, reading through the New Testament one chapter a day every weekday, then today you're going to be reading John chapter 16.

And if you would like to get a copy of that reading list, even though we're almost done with the year, we'll be producing a new one for 2021, but if you'd like to finish out the year with us, you can go to our website, sgfcjacks .org, look under the posts section and you will see a copy of our 2020 reading list.

The State of Theology Survey and the Question of Whether It Is Too Complicated

And as I said, we'll have a new reading list coming for 2021. What do Americans think about Jesus Christ, the Bible, truth and ethics? This is a question which has been posed by Ligonier Ministries in their State of Theology survey that they have been doing for the last several years.

And I believe it started out as a connection with LifeWay Research, in fact, I'm looking at it right now, and it does say that it is connected with LifeWay Research, partnered with them. And if you want to look this up, it is thestateoftheology .com.

And I've wanted to look at this for quite some time, but I have not yet because there have been so many pressing cultural issues. And obviously this program is Coffee with a Calvinist is a daily conversation about scripture, culture and media.

And there's been a lot going on in the culture recently with the president and presidential elections. And I've had guests on to talk about those things. But I think what I'm going to do at least today and maybe for a couple of days this week, is I want to look over this State of Theology survey.

I want to look at some of the questions that they've asked, and I want to see how people responded to see what Americans, in fact, do believe about God, salvation, ethics, and the Bible. I want to make a mention of something else, though.

Part of my reason for wanting to do this on the program, I mean, anyone can go and read this for themselves. So I didn't want to just read this to you. But rather, I wanted to respond to something I saw on social media.

I was watching on social media a conversation about this particular survey and someone on the social media, and I'm not going to name them, it doesn't matter who it was, but the person said, well, Ligonier has intentionally made these questions difficult.

And ultimately, it basically said that they were trick questions intended to somewhat show that the average person was less theologically adept, but doing so by using some form of either high church language or biblically obscure language.

And so that accusation has been made. And I want to examine this particular series of findings with that kind of lens, do I think as one, as a pastor, as a theology teacher, as a person who has taught church history, as a person who has taught theology, and as a person who pastors a small church, but a group of people of varying educational backgrounds and everything, do I think that this particular set of questions is too hard?

Do I think that it is overly intended to make people answer the question incorrectly? And that's what I want to do today. That's really what I want to do on today's program, is I want to deal with that question.

So as I said, I'm not going to deal with the whole thing today. Time will not allow it. But what we are going to do is we're going to look at just a few of them. And in the days ahead, if time allows, I may go back and look at a few more questions.

But we're going to look at the first one, though. And this is under the heading of Who is Jesus? And I'll just read it as it's stated here. The identity of Jesus of Nazareth has been a source of controversy through the centuries.

He personally claimed to be the Son of God and equal with God, and they have several Bible verses to support that. This is why his enemy sought his death. The Bible and the historic creeds of the Christian Church plainly declare that Jesus Christ is truly God and truly man.

But critics have often said that Jesus was a great teacher and nothing more. The State of Theology survey now reveals that a majority of adults in the United States hold this view. So this is the statement.

This is statement number seven in the Theology survey. Statement number seven is Jesus was a great teacher, but he was not God. Jesus was a great teacher, but he was not God. Now, this particular survey, again, this is supposed to be among United States evangelical respondents.

So this would not be, this survey is not supposed to include those who would not identify themselves as believers and who would not identify themselves as evangelicals. So I hope that I'm reading it correctly.

I hope that I'm understanding that correctly. If you are a listener and you find something incorrect about what I've said, please correct me. I'm certainly not above correction. I didn't do this survey.

I'm simply reading it as written. Statement number seven, it says, again, Jesus was a great teacher, but was not God. They have, among U .S. adult respondents that are evangelicals, 62 strongly disagree.

Okay. So 62 strongly disagree. Jesus was a great teacher, but he was not God. Okay. Strongly disagree. I strongly disagree with that. Certainly he was God in the flesh. And to say Jesus was a great teacher, but he was not God is to misidentify who he is.

It is to deny all the biblical statements about Jesus, as well as the historic teaching of Jesus down through the ages. So I think that the 62 that disagreed with that statement, Jesus was a great teacher, but was not God, but he was not God, 62 disagree.

That's good. Here's the problem. So 26 strongly agree that Jesus was a great teacher, but he was not God. Now again, this is U .S. evangelical respondents in 2020, 26 of people who identified themselves as evangelicals, 26%, get that in your mind, that's one in every four, 26 strongly agree that Jesus was a great teacher, but he was not God.

Now I want to read what it says here. It says, these results suggest a significant need for Christians to be taught Christology. I certainly believe that. And then it goes on to say, Christology is the doctrine of the nature and identity of Christ.

And they have a link here to the Ligonier statement on Christology, which was written a few years ago. It was intended to help explain in a little more modern vernacular what we mean when we say Jesus is both God and man.

And so again, I think this is pretty significant to say one in four evangelicals do not believe Jesus was God. Now if we go up, they also have the U .S. adult respondents. This is a mixture of, I'm assuming, all kinds of different people without particular to their religious identity or their particular specific identity.

In that sense, it's all over the map. It's almost the same though. Here's the interesting thing. 28 strongly agree Jesus was a great teacher, not God, and 27 strongly disagree. So what happens is if you go down to the evangelicals, more people disagree with the statement, Jesus was a great teacher, but he was not God.

But about the same amount of people strongly agree with it. So essentially what it's showing is that the amount of people inside the evangelical community who identify as within the evangelical community is basically the same as those outside who would affirm the statement, Jesus was a great teacher, but he was not God.

And so I would ask you today, if you claim to be a Christian, if you claim to be an evangelical, do you think that's a difficult question? Do you think the question, Jesus was a great teacher, but he was not God, do you think that's a hard question to answer?

Because remember, that was the accusation that was made, that Ligonier has intentionally made these questions difficult. Ligonier has intentionally made these questions obscure. Based on what I'm seeing here on this question, I cannot affirm that in any way, shape, or form.

This is not an obscure question. This does not seek to obscure the issue. It doesn't really bring up a lot at all. Now, some might say that using the unqualified statement, Jesus is God, is a difficult statement because in general, what we would say is Jesus is God incarnate, Jesus Christ is the Word made flesh.

We would seek to help understand the Trinitarian language of one God, one in essence, three persons who are all God, the Father who is God, the Son who is God, and the Spirit who is also God, three persons, one being, and all three share the glory of God, and so that is the typical Trinitarian language.

So if someone says Jesus is not God, I think that's the issue, and I think they're actually clarifying it. I think it would have been a harder statement if they said Jesus is God period, yes or no. I think more people would have been confused by that question than by the way that they worded the question, Jesus was a great teacher, comma, but he was not God.

By saying Jesus is not God, we are denying the very opening words of John's Gospel. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. Then it goes on later to say, and the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory.

So we know who the Word is, it's referring to Jesus. We know who the Logos is, it is Jesus, and therefore to say Jesus was not God, and to have one in four evangelicals agree with that, I think one is that's striking, and it does show, as those who have created this survey and who have written the article that goes with it, I think they're right.

I think it shows a major problem with Christology in the modern church, and I don't think that this particular question is in any way meant to be a trick question, or in any way meant to be somehow hard to understand.

Now, there are other questions, and you can look at those for yourself if you want to go to thestateoftheology .com, and in the days ahead, as I said, unless a particular issue comes up that I feel like I need to deal with, I do this show every day, every morning at 630 a .m.

If nothing else is pressing, certainly there's a lot going on in culture right now, but when it comes to the stuff surrounding the presidency, I'm trying to take a break from some of that. In the meantime, I want to look at theology, I want to talk about Scripture, and ultimately, I want to spend some time on this state of theology and answer the question, do I think these are hard questions?

So far, I've only looked at one, so I can't give an overall answer to that question and that assumption, but I can say this, based on what I've seen so far, I don't think these are trick questions. I don't think these are meant to confuse people.

I think, actually, if anything, they're meant to make it easy enough that we know what we're saying. Is Jesus God in the flesh? The Bible says absolutely, and one in four Evangelical Christians say no, so that's a problem.

That means one in four Evangelical Christians don't know their Bible, and that's pretty serious. And I would say it's even more than that. We could look further at it and see that there's more to it than that, because only, what did we say, it was only 62 affirmed it, and then there's a lot of somewhats and not-sures and somewhat agree, somewhat disagree, not sure, in the middle.

But the big standout, of course, is that 26 that strongly agree that Jesus was a great teacher, but he was not God. That statement is not true, and the 26 that agree with it are in serious error. I hope you will continue to listen to us day by day.

We come on, as I said, I'm here every morning at 6 .30 a .m. with Coffee with a Calvinist, and if you have a question or you have a topic that you would like for me to address, please feel free to send a message through whatever medium you listen to.

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May God bless you.

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As you go about your day, remember this, Jesus Christ came to save sinners. All who come to Him in repentance and faith will find Him to be a perfect Savior. He is the way, the truth, and the life, and no one comes to the Father except through Him.

May God be with you.