Tag: Matt Olson

Fundamentalism: Separation-Centered rather than Gospel-Centered

~ Bob Hayton ~ 3 Comments

President Matt Olson at Northland International University is stirring up his fair share of criticism as he enacts reforms and quietly changes the ethos of what was Northland Baptist Bible College. From afar, I applaud his efforts and his bravery. He is taking shots from all sides of the ring!

My blogging friend Will Dudding at The Reforming Baptist, recently explained the pickle that Olson is in a post intriguingly titled “Northland, CCM, Fundamentalism & the Separation Nazis.”

One particular comment from his post really resonated with me. I believe it is spot on and covers almost the entire gamut of fundamentalism. I have bolded the phrase in the except below.

The gospel as the central unifying factor and the matter of first importance is often scoffed at on their blogs. They regularly deride movements like T4G and TGC that are propelling the gospel forward more than Fundamentalism has been doing. Being Separation-centered is more important to them than being Gospel-centered. Fundamentalism as a movement has done nothing in my generation and is going nowhere except to the trash heap of history. Christianity will survive well enough without it. Matt Olsen would do well to eject, but it may cost him his school.

I believe this is the problem, fundamentalists as a whole eschew a gospel-centered unity in favor of a separation-centric modus operandi. I have shared similar thoughts on this idea before in my post “Minimizing the Gospel through Excessive Separation.”

What’s your thought on this? Is it unfair to say fundamentalism is separation-centered?

Matt Olson and “What Matters Most” with Separation

~ Bob Hayton ~ 5 Comments

Matt Olson, the president of Northland Baptist Bible College (now called Northland International University), has been writing a blog recently and saying some really important, and risky things. He’s taking a stand against institutional legalsim and is making his constituents a little uneasy.

Recently he started a multi-part series on “What Matters Most.” He is thinking through separation in light of how the fundamentals of the faith are what truly matter most. I have made a similar point in a post entitled: “Minimizing the Gospel through Excessive Separation.” Olson also is open about the positive influence on his thinking from Al Mohler’s “Theological Triage” illustration, which is quite helpful in my view as well.

Here is how Olson distills the three levels of his view on separation:

The first/top tier is orthodoxy. What doctrines are necessary for a person to truly be “Christian?” Sometimes we have referred to these as “the fundamentals of the faith.” While five of these were distinguished in the early part of the last century, I do think there are more. These would be beliefs that are necessary to have a true gospel, an orthodox faith, and an authentic Christianity. I believe it is very clear that Paul draws a hard line here with orthodoxy when we read Galatians. If we don’t get this right, we don’t get anything right.

The second tier is one of functional distinctives. These teachings are necessary for a local church to function effectively—such as mode of baptism and church polity. We may have great fellowship with a Presbyterian and even have him preach for us in our church, but we probably won’t be members of the same church. We differ because we interpret certain texts differently. I see this as a “dotted line.” We can both be Christians who love the Lord and seek to please Him in all we do and we can enjoy times together in and out of the contexts of our local churches.

The third tier is personal convictions. These are matters of conscience or preference. These are important, but believers should be able to differ and still enjoy fellowship within the context of the same local church. Love and respect will “give people space.” It is a Romans 14 spirit within the body and does not prohibit a healthy functioning of the local assembly of believers. In fact, the differences can be a strengthening characteristic. [from part 1 of his series]

Olson seems to differ from the fundamentalist party line in his last post in this series, where he makes the following observations:

I believe that the same lines that I draw for an orthodox Christian faith are the same lines that I should draw for Christian fellowship. I believe that every true born again Christian is a brother or sister in Christ and that not only can I have fellowship with him or her, it is what Christ has intended, and it is what brings him great delight (Romans 1:1; Philippians 2:1-11). For me to draw dividing lines that He has not drawn grieves Him, hurts the body of Christ, and hinders the work of the Great Commission.

The mode of baptism, timing of the rapture, cessationist or non-cessationist positions, dispensational or covenant positions, church polity, style of music, philosophy of ministry—are NOT fundamentals of the faith. They never have been. When we get to heaven I think there are going to be a lot of people feeling ashamed about how they fought over these things and neglected what matters most.

Every local church or ministry will have its functional distinctives, and we need these. Every believer will have his own personal convictions, beliefs, and opinions. We need these as well. They are not unimportant and they may even affect the degree of practical cooperation in certain ministry contexts. But, these are not matters of separation and those who don’t agree with someone else’s opinions are not simply disobedient brothers.

A disobedient brother is someone who is in clear violation of biblical teaching and one who after repeated confrontation continues in his sin. The Bible gives plenty of instruction on how to work through these situations in love and toward restoration (Galatians 6:1-5). [from part 3]

I wholeheartedly affirm what he is saying above, and can agree with the gist of his conclusion:

What do we separate over?

  1. The Christian should expose and separate from a false Gospel (Galatians 1:8,9).
  2. The Christian should expose and separate from another Christian who continues to walk in disobedience (after following a biblical process for restoration, I Corinthians 5:9-13).
  3. The Christian should separate from the world (This is another discussion that I would like to take up in the future because I find many people have a wrong view of ”the world” I John 2:15-17).

[from part 3]

While I applaud Olson’s conclusions on this matter, I’m curious as to what degree this will impact his decisions at the helm of a large fundamentalist institution. I’m hoping he continues to make positive changes, such as his controversial tack on the use of demerits at the university and his changing stance on music (see his open letter for more on both). I wonder if it is too much to hope that he would steer a course for Type B fundamentalists to come into greater fellowship and interaction with the Type Cs who don’t hold to the name fundamentalist but are nevertheless similar in their beliefs. (I’m using Joel Tetreau’s ABCs here.) Apparently others are taking note about Olson’s practice, as the FBFI blog recently put his feet to the fire over an endorsement of a church that belongs to the Sovereign Grace Ministries group of churches. I’m curious to see how Olson answers the very specific questions that have been raised.

These questions are why I am not a part of the fundamentalist movement, because there is such a to-do made about institutions and structures. If you have a fundamentalist institution committed to the movement, then you can’t endorse churches connected to a non-fundamentalist movement. But following Scripture would move you to endorse such churches in the spirit of all Olson has stated above. This is the quandary in store for other fundamentalist leaders who see the deficiencies of an “us four, no more” mentality and really get the Gospel-centered focus of today’s conservative evangelicals. To truly follow their conscience and lead their institutions, they’ll have to invite Mark Dever to their conferences and will inevitably say and do things the fundamentalist base will see as a betrayal of their “cause.”

Here’s hoping that this next generation of fundamentalist leaders are the genesis of a sweeping change within fundamentalism as a whole, and that the wider Church is blessed because of their willingness to follow Christ at all costs.

Independence, Influence and IFB Churches: Followup on the 20/20 Report

~ Bob Hayton ~ 8 Comments

Here’s a few more thoughts about the 20/20 report on Independent Fundamental Baptist Churches. These may be random, but I thought I’d push this out for clarity.

First off, I want to explain for people who don’t know, what an Independent Fundamental Baptist church is. It’s independent in that, it doesn’t have a denominational hierarchy. Such churches are often part of a fellowship of likeminded churches, or they associate with other churches connected with a Bible camp or a college. But no one can tell them what to do directly, hence they are independent. They are fundamental, but not in the sense of being firebombers or radicals. Fundamental or Fundamentalist refers to the fundamentals of the faith and the struggle between conservatives and modernists back in the 1920s (I have some info on that here).

Secondly, while in theory IFB churches are independent, in practice they are interdependent. This story could really be just about one church in New Hampshire, and some of these abuse stories are about one crazy church or one incident by a bad person. For instance, Fred Phelps (no relation to Chuck Phelps), the infamous pastor who protests the funerals of soldiers and who hates gays, he is an IFB pastor. But his church truly is an island and has virtually no influence among the vast majority of IFB churches. His could truly be said to be a cult. But the churches and pastors in the report are not isolated like Phelps’ small church (composed mostly of his own family members) is. Two of the pastors named in the report, Chuck Phelps and Matt Olson, both were at one time presidents of large influential Bible Colleges that train pastors. Phelps was president at Maranatha Baptist Bible College, and Olson currently is the president of Northland Baptist Bible College. The 20/20 report didn’t mention that fact, but it certainly dispels the notion that whatever happened is just a local, minor incident. The fact that both Olson and Phelps dealt with issues poorly (at least per the 20/20 take on things), does reflect a wider problem among IFB churches in general. Additionally, the air time given to Jack Schaap’s rantings is not insignficant. He is the president of another Bible college with a large influence over thousands of IFB churches. The preacher boys at Hyles-Anderson College are going to emulate Jack Schaap and pick up on his denigration of women. So that isn’t just a minor issue among IFB churches either.

I still stand by my thoughts that IFB churches in general are not all bad. There are many good IFB churches and the movement as a whole is changing and growing. But there are bad apples, and a tendency to produce or insulate bad apples. Let’s not ignore that.

For additional reading, Pastor Brian Fuller of Trinity Baptist in New Hampshire explains why he allowed 20/20 cameras into the church. I do think he did a great job (as good as could be expected), given the circumstances and I’m thankful he let the cameras in. But StuffFundiesLike.com brings up some important points too. Normally that website doesn’t major on thoughtful commentary, preferring to illustrate absurdities among fundamentalists. The commentary on the 20/20 report, though, was actually quite insightful. I think there are valid points raised there worth thinking through.

Christianity is not served by churches refusing to budge and admit they have problems. But Christianity is also not about being perfect and having no problems. This IFB scandal is not a reason to bail on Christianity. It might be a reason to bring up questions with your church and pastor, or to think through whether you are in a good church. But the potential for abuse is widespread and goes beyond IFB churches only.

For those looking to help their churches or looking for help in handling abuse situations, I recommend listening to this interview on Reformed Cast on the problem of abuse in the Church. You can also learn more at GRACE (Godly Response to Abuse in the Christian Environment).