Wygle Wide Web

In the late 1800’s, early 1900’s, a wave of liberalism hit Christian institutions. So what happened—like Princeton, Harvard—those places were one time very biblically based. Liberalism slammed into the institutions in the United States, and what the Christian movement did was they withdrew. They withdrew from the city, they withdrew from certain avenues—the arts and things like that—they withdrew from institutions and they began to build their own institutions. Correct? Absolutely. Now for all of our ranting and raving against the Fundamentalists, if it was not for them, you would not be here. If it was not for that retreat, then we would be France, England, Canada. We’d be those other parts of the world where the Church is dead. So the older brother, as much as he exhausts us all—if it was not for him—you would not be sitting in this room. I can promise you that.

Now what’s happened is as that movement of withdrawal has begun to mature, it has tried to engage society again. It has tried to live missionally, it has tried to engage its neighbors; it’s tried to engage the cities. But here’s the problem. We’re no longer the new kid on the block à la the Puritans; we’re coming back with an unbelievable amount of baggage.