Friday, January 17, 2020  |  Steve Jordahl (OneNewsNow.com) AddThis Sharing The United Methodist Church is splitting over an internal compromise on a biblical definition of sexuality. But one Christian leader explains the UMC isn’t the only denomination that’s drifting in that direction.

Talks are under way between leaders of the United Methodist Church for conservative congregations to split off into their own denomination that will be faithful to scripture, leaving liberal denominational leaders and some like-minded congregations in a vastly weakened UMC. But Christian author and apologist Dr. Alex McFarland says they aren’t the first denomination to split over the Bible’s definition of sexuality. What’s behind the leftward-drift among major Protestant denominations in America? (Select two)’Twisting’ of biblical teachingFlippant attitude toward ScriptureLiberal-led seminariesSocial justice movementInternal LGBTQ activismVoteView ResultsCrowdsignal.com

“I think the Presbyterian Church … already did; the hyper-hyper-liberal PCUSA,” he shared this week on American Family Radio. “Three conservative Presbyterian denominations – the PCA, the EPC, and the ECO* – those are three conservative, Bible-believing groups [that] emerged once it was clear that the PCUSA was not merely liberal, but actually apostate.”

Even more alarmingly, he says the Southern Baptist Convention – the largest Protestant denomination in the U.S. – is trending left as well, although not over sexuality. “The current leader of the SBC, JD Greear, a few months ago … said, ‘Unless we include social justice, we are not preaching the gospel,'” notes the Christian educator.

McFarland

That line of thinking, according to McFarland, voids the history of the Christian church. “If we say that we have to include social justice in the gospel, then that means for the last 1,800 years people were not preaching the gospel,” he argues.

McFarland is calling the Southern Baptist Convention away from political and socially liberal concepts and back to its roots.

“These [concepts] are code-speak for progressive ideas,” he contends, “and we’ve got to remember … the message of Christianity is not social revisionism and socialism: the message of the gospel is salvation through Jesus alone.

“The surest way to make Christianity irrelevant is to try to make it relevant,” McFarland concludes.

* Presbyterian Church in America (PCA), Evangelical Presbyterian Church (EPC), and Evangelical Covenant Order of Presbyterians (ECO). AddThis Sharing ButtonsShare to FacebookFacebook932Share to TwitterTwitterShare to EmailEmailShare to MoreMore227