“Gospel-Onlyism”

The following article by Eric Salmons, a Baptist pastor, was published a month ago. I am generously posting excerpts:

The movement that began as gospel-centered morphed into what I will call gospel-onlyism. This is a mindset that treats anything beyond the message of personal salvation as a “distraction,” encumbrance, or even a danger to the mission of the church.

What began as a recovery of grace has in many places become a retreat from truth. It has become a gateway to progressive ideology, and it casts conservatives as Pharisees to condemn, while liberals are just victims to be gentle with. 

Gospel-onlyism has become a subjective filter, often applied against right-wing political concerns (many of which are simply Christian political and moral truths, such as opposition to abortion, homosexuality, and transgenderism). Those who implement it selectively and subjectively apply this filter to whatever they deem to be the more “gospel-centered” thing. Manufacturing diversity in the church? Yes, that’s gospel-centered. Preaching white hot truth against Christians who vote for the party of baby murder? Well, that’s a distraction from the gospel. You get the point.

The irony is that it replaces Scripture and mutes (one could even say “whispers”) areas where the Bible sets forth straightforward moral teachings about life, marriage, and human society. These are superseded by the “virtuous” cause of “keeping the main thing the main thing” to avoid offending non-Christians…

This has created a generation of pastors who believe the most “gospel-centered” thing to do is never to let any truth offend someone except the gospel itself. It has stripped pastors of their desire to give wise counsel and made everything a gospel issue. They are nuanced on fundamental truths like God’s design for marriage, government, sexuality, justice, and immigration. All of these things are reduced down to potential “obstacles” for evangelism. 

Sunday gatherings have shifted from deep discipleship to “evangelistic showcases,” designed more for seekers than for the sanctification of the saints. In their preaching, they either don’t exhort or do it bound up by fear of being “legalistic.” Their grace-based approach to everything creates ditches on the “left” side of things, such as parenting without asserting authority or using discipline, and an inability to confront moral evils in the political realm.

The result is a church that overemphasizes evangelistic causes, confusing gentleness with silence and grace with avoidance. 

But this is not the model of the apostles, nor of the Reformers, and we need to abandon it.

The Reformers were radically gospel-centered, but never gospel-only…

The gospel that saves us also sanctifies us, and that sanctification extends into every corner of our lives and culture…

To ignore national stability, justice, and the moral fabric of society is not biblical love; it’s sentimentality without wisdom…

Pastors are called to preach Christ and then teach believers how His Lordship transforms every realm of life. Paul did not shy away from confronting rulers and systems. John the Baptist lost his life for calling a governor’s sin what it was.

To preach the gospel fully means to apply it boldly. The gospel has something to say about abortion, justice, economics, and government. Silence on these matters does not protect the gospel; it diminishes its scope.

The manipulative aspect of (J.D.) Greear is that he has learned to wield this Gospel-onlyism selectively. He uses the pulpit on political issues he deems a gospel issue and silences others with “If you can’t say ‘Thus saith the Lord,’ then don’t say it” on matters outside the peripheral view of his “gospel-lens.”

The answer is not to abandon the gospel; it’s also not to curse those operating with a “gospel-only” cover like Greear. The answer is to root everything in it again and embrace a worldview that includes the whole counsel of God’s Word, including its moral and political teachings.

A faithful pastor preaches Christ crucified for sins, yes. But then he also teaches his people that God’s truth and moral order must govern marriage, work, family, citizenship, and morality. And he should do both of these from the pulpit. A faithful church sees Sunday not just as an “evangelistic opportunity” for the non-believers who may come, but as the training ground for disciples who will shine as witnesses in the world.

We must return to the kind of preaching that charges, exhorts, and challenges God’s people with both grace and truth. This is the balance Christ Himself embodied (John 1:14).

The gospel does not silence truth; it empowers it. The grace that saves us also sends us, strengthens us, and summons us to speak all of Scripture and apply it to all of life…

(The church) needs faithful shepherds who will preach and lead us to herald all of Scripture in all of life. Christ & His truth are the only things that will heal, bless, and guide families, churches, institutions, and governments.