Is anti-intellectualism an enemy of preaching that really transforms lives?

Dr James Boys said “Whatever a church uses to get them in, it has to keep using the keep them in.”

We all want people to be saved, right? Well what do we need to tell them?

Ultimately, if we want them to stay in because they know and love Jesus. Well we then have to begin with what it means to know and love Jesus. J Greshamachen in his book Christianity and liberalism in the 1920s said:

“But it will be said that Christianity is a life not a doctrine. The assertion is often made and has the appearance of godliness but it is radically false and to detect its falsity one does not even need to be a Christian. The questionings can only be settled by an investigation into the beginnings of Christianity. If any one fact is clear, on the basis of the first century evidence, it is that the Christian movement, at its inception was not just a way of life in the modern sense but a way of life founded upon a message. It was based not upon mere feeling, not upon a mere program of work, but upon an account of facts. In other words it was based on doctrine. Certainly based on Paul himself there can be no debate that Paul certainly was not indifferent to doctrine, on the contrary, doctrine was the very basis of his life. The New Testament gives not one bit of comfort to those who separate faith from knowledge. To those who hold the absurd view that someone can trust a person without knowing who he trusts. What many despise today as doctrine, the New Testament calls the gospel. “

Some say that the most important thing isn’t to know the gospel but to live the gospel. However the gospel is not a system of ethics you live, its news about what God did. Its good news, not encouragement, advice, edification, exhortation –all of which you find in the bible, all of which you should preach. Our life is lived in gratitude of this news.

 Ok so what does doctrine mean? The word doctrine means the truths, teaching, promises and facts about man and God and how we are to respond to God in light of these. You can never separate practical Christian living from doctrine. The two are inseparable. Our minds transform our hearts and this transforms our actions. The doctrine is at its heart the gospel, who God is and what He has done for us to reconcile us to Him Self. To regard doctrine as irrelevant is to regard God and His work as irrelevant, making us and our work the really important stuff.

 People say that the church just needs to live out the gospel however the Church is the very problem that necessitates Jesus’ death in the first place. The church is such a horrible nest of iniquity that Jesus died for it. The gospel is that Jesus has done something for that church that it could not do for itself.

When Paul faces either, churches that already know the doctrine, like rome, or churches that are living sinfully and unrepentantly, like Corinth, he never says I know you have good doctrine, but your not living the gospel, he tells them they actually need to keep going back to what the doctrine actually is. In fact in almost all His letters His first two thirds are doctrine and the last section is comprises of what a thankful response to this gospel looks like with the conjunction of doxology (praise) and the word "therefore" or something to the effect of. When we think that people won’t understand the gospel we are underestimating the power of the Holy Spirit to open their minds to understand because Jesus clearly says in John’s gospel that my sheep will hear and know my voice. They will hear his voice when preachers faithfully preach his word. Secondly we really undermine the importance of building God’s people up in the knowledge of doctrine. Unfortunately what happens when you pit doctrine with life, is you pit the head against the heart. The mind being influenced by doctrine is always changed first but it will always drag the heart along with it. Grasping the truths will transform what we do. Paul says in Romans 12:2 “Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is-his good, pleasing and perfect will.” How does God want you to respond, think and act? Well we find this out when we learn doctrine.

The practical living is built on the doctrine, which is the intillectual stuff- the stuff that engages the brain. We won’t know what it means to follow him unless we know who Christ is and what he has done for us. People won’t trust Jesus and enjoy and glorify God the Father until they know who he is. We need to preach the truths of the gospel at every opportunity. And never be ashamed of them because they are the power to save.