A Fundamentalist Elegy

As we're in the process of revisiting area churches, I had occasion to attend a rural Fundamentalist congregation about forty-five minutes from where I live. I had last visited there 3-4 years ago and the level of decline just in that relatively brief period of time was remarkable.

As with many such congregations, about twenty years ago it had been stretching the limits of its auditorium with regular numbers in the seventies and eighties – which is a good size congregation in a rural area. But like many of these Fundamentalist groups they've entered a sharp decline and the few that are still left are seemingly in a death spiral.

When I visited this Baptist church about 2018, the congregation was running about thirty people. Deaths, people moving away, people leaving for other churches, and people just quitting church altogether – combined in some cases with Covid concerns has dropped them down to about seven people. It was pretty stunning. I noticed in response to Covid they were streaming services on Facebook but it was clear that the size of the crowd (or lack thereof) was being deliberately obscured and the singing was also omitted. No wonder, there's nothing much to hear with that small of a crowd.

In some cases these congregations have financial trusts that were established in the past, but usually such situations are found among older mainline groups. I know for example of a nearby small town Presbyterian USA congregation that has a massive building and a congregation of maybe forty people. They're not taking in enough money to pay the pastor's hefty salary let alone maintain the ostentatious building. But over a hundred years ago wealthy members established trusts which have been invested in the US financial system and as such the congregation is sitting on several million dollars. Unfortunately (in the case of the PCUSA congregation) they will be able to keep going for a long time – feeding as they are on the usurious and wicked system. It's kind of a double evil taking place in terms of theology and ethics.

But the Fundamentalist Baptist church I'm referring to was formed in the 1980's and (whether proper or not) I don't believe they have any such resources to fall back on. This being the case their days are certainly numbered. If the pastor is willing to work full time and then lead the congregation without pay, it may continue. But given that the pastor does not have local ties and on that snowy late March morning didn't seem to be overly fond of northern Pennsylvania weather – it's highly doubtful he's going to stick around.

I know of some other congregations that have reached that point – under twenty regular attendees and then losing their pastor. They can't get a new one. Their best hope is to find a retired man who has a pension from a previous job as well as social security – and who happens to love the area and is attached to the small group. He may under those conditions come and lead them – basically without pay or with a pittance. And it also needs to be said, the area generally speaking is also in decline with basics like banking and shopping become more difficult all the time. There's a spiritual decline but also an economic and cultural one which simply exacerbates the problems in areas like this. There's not much here to attract people. They might love hunting and fishing but in terms of living daily life it's getting to be a challenge and increasingly involves long car trips to regional hubs.

So apart from someone with an independent income and a love for the area, they have no chance of getting someone to pastor their congregation. And then the clock ticks away – a few more people die and it gets so small that it becomes awkward for many visitors to even darken the door. If there isn't a capable man in the congregation to fill the pulpit, they rely on pulpit supply or listen to tapes or watch videos. Another congregation I'm thinking of has men traveling well over 90 minutes to come and preach to what is often a congregation of less than ten. I commend those men but there has to be times that it's pretty depressing. And when they can't get anyone they listen to old cassette tapes.

This is what has happened to the Fundamentalist churches. In the 1990's they were still booming but by the early 2000's a serious decline set in. There are many factors at work but one of them was definitely the larger cultural change that took place in the 1990's. Consequently some Fundamentalist congregations changed and adopted an Evangelical style. They got praise bands or some variety thereof, dropped a lot of their legalism with regard to dress and what not and basically focused on numbers and church growth gimmickry. These congregations survived but it doesn't mean they're doing well and as they now decline they have nothing left to turn to – no new ploys or stratagems to pull out of a magician's hat.

Those that stood fast have continued to wither and as I've told my kids, take note, these congregations, yea this world your parents grew up in – will soon be gone.

On that particular Sunday, I must say it was rather disappointing. I winced when I realised he would be preaching through Romans 9 – a notoriously difficult passage, especially for Arminian Dispensationalists. It was a disaster. He would read verses and then strain and huff and puff and do all he could to make it say something else and then try at every opportunity to re-emphasize not just man's free will (in defiance of the text) but the continued prioritisation of Israel in God's plan. It was a bit of a fiasco and even the congregation was confused. He would ask a rhetorical question in which he wanted to prompt a negative response but people were nodding – only to stop in confusion when he would then complete his point.

I'm hardly the Calvinist I once was and to be frank I might be just as unhappy sitting in a Reformed congregation and hearing the passage dealt with. Run through the lens of systematics and subjected to the full gambit of extra-textual deduction, the end result is often less than faithful to Paul's argument in the Romans context – let alone the way it's used to cancel out and override the truths revealed in other doctrinal passages. The truth is much bigger than either the Calvinist or Arminian paradigm but I must say with regard to this particular instance – it was pretty disappointing.

And then we came to the altar call games. I had spoken with the pastor extensively before the service, quizzing him about the decline and sharing some of our reasons for leaving our previous congregation. It was an awkward conversation. I could tell he was in pain as he attempted to gauge where I was at in terms of these controversial issues and as he attempted to navigate the turbulent waters of the Trump and Covid eras. He tried to posture as moderate and wise but it took me about five minutes to figure out that his primary epistemological grounding was located in a television channel known as FOX.

While I didn't elaborate in terms of my testimony, let alone its specifics, our interaction should have given him every reason to believe he was talking to a fellow Christian. If he had doubts, he should have asked but he didn't. Instead he pulled the Fundamentalist Finneyite trick on us and tried to pin us down with the altar call.

'Heads down and eyes closed!'

Some readers will know the drill and maybe even now are fighting the urge to smile. He then proceeds to invite people to the front. Usually 'Just as I Am' would be playing or something along those lines but they no longer had a pianist.

After the invite to the Finneyite Altar, he proceeded,

'If you know that you're saved, raise your hand.'

Under the Once Saved Always Saved model of Fundamentalist Baptist theology you're not really regenerate unless you know 100% that you're saved – such knowledge is rooted in a decision experience you had at some point. Often it's expected that you'll be able to recount this and name the actual date. If you can't recall that Born Again experience, then you're likely not saved. For them the Once Saved Always Saved tenet is the sine qua non of their gospel presentation. Sadly, this understanding (or perhaps a permutation of it) has crept into Calvinist circles and few today realize just how different it is from the old Perseverance of the Saints doctrine – so clearly elaborated by the Puritans both in the specific and technical aspects of their theology and certainly in their overall ethos and piety.

Once Saved Always Saved is an expression of cheap grace (that some confuse with Calvinism) and that day it was put in a particularly callous form as the pastor insisted that you didn't have to be baptised, go to church, or anything else. You just had to believe and know you're saved.

While an appeal can be made to the thief on the cross they're guilty of making the exception the rule – and not just the rule, but the foundation stones of a larger deduced soteriology, one that simply ignores or explains away a wealth of New Testament revelation.

It was glaring and troubling but I also noticed his entire gospel presentation completely omitted the necessity of repentance. It's not uncommon in those circles to view repentance as optional – a good thing to be sure but not necessary, not of the essence of the gospel message. It demonstrates just how paltry their definition of faith is – in the end a mere intellectual assent, a faith no more profound than what James associates with the same kind of knowledge (or faith) the demons already possess.

Contrary to Finneyite Fundamentalism's more palatable and market-driven model, the New Testament knows of no saving faith that is divorced from repentance. They are inseparable and this is part of the reason why the gospel is so often offensive to the lost. It assails their self-righteousness and it certainly runs contrary to any notion of the gospel as being something attractive, something that can be sold to people. It is necessary to understand that we are sinners deserving of God's wrath and in need of forgiveness and reconciliation.

Rejecting not only Once Saved Always Saved as an unbiblical way to present or frame the issue, along with the watered down concept of saving faith, I resented the altar call games being played wherein he was attempting to figure out if we were (by his skewed definitions) Christian people. If you want to know, then ask us. We don't need to play Finneyite games to try and determine if we can pronounce your shibboleth in a correct manner or if we know the correct liturgical responses to what is functionally a Fundamentalist ritual.

I learned long ago how to deal with the altar call game. I used to stand up and just refuse to raise my hand, or look up as they sometimes ask you to do. Then they just think – the poor man isn't saved. Instead I no longer stand. I just sit there and prop up my Bible on the pew in front of me and leaf through pages and completely ignore the entire proceeding. I've taught my family to do more or less the same – maybe in not such a deliberate fashion as I do. The bottom line is this – just ignore it. Don't bow your head, don't even acknowledge what is happening. It's all unbiblical rubbish anyway and rooted in grave theological error. I have found this quiet nonconformity derails them and on this particular Sunday that was my experience. It reminds me of my experiences with car salesmen. Both my parents worked in the industry and I know the games and know when I'm being manipulated. I've had more than one salesman become exasperated with me.

We were the only visitors, and probably the only visitors in a long time. The whole proceeding was geared toward us and when it was clear that we weren't playing along, he quickly abandoned it and ended the service. I'm sure he thought we were probably unregenerate people – and he didn't even know that we're not baptistic in doctrine! Let's just say I'm not terribly concerned with what he thinks. I'm not saying he isn't a saved man but I am saying he doesn't possess the tools to evaluate the question and his gospel presentation is potentially quite dangerous and destructive. I know I was misled by that egregious system for many years and during my teens it played no small part in fomenting my hostility to Christianity. It was a source of great joy for me to revisit the Bible a few years later and discover that it was in fact a contrivance and rooted in error. I felt vindicated even if my earlier motives for resistance and hostility had been wrong.

As we drove off (I'm sure for the last time) I was filled with a degree of sadness. On the one hand I cannot help but have an affinity for the old Fundamentalism. My wife and I both remember the sense of antithesis and we miss it. It was misguided at times to be sure but there was a real division between the people of God and the world and a sense of conflict that transcended politics and culture war. It was more fundamental if I can use that term.

But now it's as if some of the good things have dissipated and are gone and some of the worst elements of the system have come to the fore. The gospel message is there but just as with Rome it's buried under heaps of rubbish, false rituals, superstitions, and teachings that just about overthrow its essential message. On the one hand I was saddened to think that congregation won't be there in a few more years. But on the other hand as I reflected on the tortured exegesis of Scripture, the destructive nature of Dispensational doctrine in the realm of politics, its effect on New Testament understandings and ethics, and then the truncated gospel mixed with all the rubbish of the altar call system – something like a wave of indignation swept over me.

There was a time when I was so zealous with regard to my Calvinism that I wouldn't have even darkened the door of such a place. But over time my views shifted, much of the Calvinist glow turned out to be a false glory, and today I would hardly bother with a Reformed (let alone a Presbyterian) congregation even if it was right down the street. This doesn't mean I've moved back in the direction of Fundamentalism. Not at all. Rather, my understanding has broadened and the Scriptures grant a much bigger picture as does a wider and deeper read of Church History and historical theology. I realized the Reformed world has its problems and its narratives and while at one time I drank deep from those wells, an honest study of Scripture and reading of history would not allow me to remain in that camp, let alone consider occupying one of its pulpits – a goal I once pursued with great zeal. Eventually in the face of the Magisterial Reformation and its eventual outgrowth in the form of Dominionism, I came to miss certain aspects of the old Fundamentalism and diving into its less than deep history revealed that in some respects it had once been a movement with some promise and on certain points its radicalism (now long abandoned) had come much closer to the Scriptures in terms of New Testament life and ethics than anything ever seen in the legacy of the Reformation or Confessional Reformed theology.

And yet those days are gone. The answers must be found elsewhere. Unfortunately for me, living in a rural area and with little in the way of financial resources my options are severely limited. I have no money to move and the list of viable congregations within even a two hour drive is getting pretty slim. But that's another issue. In the meantime, the hour has come for a Fundamentalist elegy. For good or ill that epoch of Church history is quickly passing away.