A Basic Overview
I recently attended the ETS Annual Conference in San Antonio, Texas. “ETS” stands for “The Evangelical Theological Society.” The Conference takes place every year for three days in November, the week before Thanksgiving. Last month in San Antonio about 2,500 “Evangelicals” from around the country converged on the Hyatt Hotel, as more than 300 theological papers were read in multitudinous break-out sessions. There are four break-out sessions in the morning and then four after lunch. There will typically be one huge plenary session in the evening given by a “keynote speaker.” It is held in a massive ballroom to accommodate 2,500 listeners. Attendees to the break-out sessions have to pick and choose which papers they want to attend since forty sessions occurred simultaneously.
A typical session is forty minutes. The presenter reads his paper for thirty minutes and the last ten minutes is open for Q & A from the audience. Each break-out session varies in size, depending upon the popularity of the speaker and the interest in the topic. N. T. Wright drew about 600 listeners a few years back, while I drew a whopping twenty listeners in 2017 with my paper on “Calvin’s Apologetic.” I have attended a session with as few as five listeners in the audience. Actually, size doesn’t matter; getting to read and defend one’s pre-written theological treatise is the issue. Most all the sessions are recorded, so attendees can go back and listen to all the sessions, for a small fee. But not all the sessions are worth listening to.
I attended my first ETS conference as a senior Bible major at The Master’s College in 1989 at the behest of my New Testament professor, Dr. Doug Bookman. The theme that year was “Lordship Salvation,” and John MacArthur was a featured presenter. He read his paper on “Faith According to the Apostle James.” He was immediately rebutted by the champion of Non-Lordship Salvation, Earl Radmacher, then President of Western Seminary. There was a fiery short Q & A session with the audience after the presentation of a third paper on the same topic. To my knowledge it was the only time Pastor MacArthur ever presented a paper at ETS. He definitely has not attended the Annual Conferences regularly the past five decades of his pastoral ministry.
As for me, I was hooked ever since that 1989 session. I have stayed in tune with the progress of ETS for three decades now. I was hooked from the beginning for a couple reasons. One was because I got to listen live to some of the leading popular evangelical scholars of the day and talk with them personally. Many were my heroes since I had been blessed by their books and teaching ministry, men like Harold Lindsell, Norman Geisler, Randall Price, Eugene Merrill, Wayne Grudem, Robert Saucy, John W. Montgomery, John Frame, Bruce Demarest, Daniel Wallace, Michael Horton, Edwin Yamauchi, Walt Kaiser, Simon Kistamaker, Roger Nicole, Millard Erickson, Jerry Bridges, and many more—a veritable “Who’s Who” of evangelical movers and shakers.
Another reason I was hooked was because my Master’s College professors encouraged me to get involved in ETS, attend the conferences, and someday write a paper. My Master’s Seminary professors did the same, especially Robert L. Thomas, my Greek professor and mentor during my seminary days. He was the President of ETS in 1990 while I was a student at The Master’s Seminary. Their encouragement proved efficacious and I presented my first ETS paper in 2001 in Atlanta on “The Gospel of Jesus.”
The Origin of ETS
This past year ETS celebrated its 75th year of existence. ETS began in 1949 as the brainchild of theology professors at Gordon Divinity School in Boston, Massachusetts. Gordon commissioned a faculty committee consisting of Edward R. Dalglish, George Ladd, and Burton Goddard, which became the catalyst of ETS. Dalglish served as the chair. He was a respected professor of Old Testament and Hebrew at Gordon. Although he had some limited pastoral experience, he was first and foremost a prolific academic theological scholar, and so academic scholarship would be foundational to the purpose and tenor of ETS as an organization from its origin. And for seventy-five years that has remained the case. Dalglish formally invited twenty-four Bible and theology professors at twenty different “conservative” colleges and seminaries asking them to be a part of a new religious organization. The goals of the organization were few and simple, the main one being to provide a forum where conservative evangelical scholars could gather, have an intellectual interchange at the highest academic level in biblical scholarship, and then disseminate those results to a larger public audience.
Many key conservative evangelical scholars of the day were intrigued by the concept and the first ETS meeting was held on December 27 and 28, 1949 at the YMCA in Cincinnati. Sixty scholars participated and that group elected R. Clarence Bouma (Calvin Seminary) as the first President. Some of the scholars originally invited included O. T. Allis, J. Oliver Buswell, Gordon Clark, Carl F. H. Henry, Ralph Earle, R. Laird Harris, Merrill Tenney, Merrill Unger, Charles Woodbridge, Kenneth Wuest, and E. J. Young, among others. Institutions that were contacted included California Baptist, Eastern Nazarene, Calvin Seminary, Butler University, L. A. Baptist Seminary (later, The Master’s College), Faith Seminary, Fuller Seminary, Western Baptist Seminary, Westmont College, Concordia University, Bethel, Wheaton, Dallas Seminary, Moody Bible Institute, and Westminster Seminary, among others. The theological umbrella was wide as it included several denominations with varying theological traditions. The common denominator was their commitment to “conservative” theology as evidenced by a high view of the inspiration of Scripture. Significant to the forming of the original DNA of the organization is seen in that the original participants were academics, not pastors; and men who taught full-time in academic institutions, not as spiritual shepherds in the local church.
The Need
The above consortium of evangelical scholars believed there needed to be a regular, public arena to counter two growing competing movements at the time in American Christianity. One was religious “modernism,” which came to be known as theological “liberalism.” This movement was typified by those who professed to be “Christian,” but at the same time rejected biblical inspiration and inerrancy, especially with respect to historical claims the Bible made. During the early Twentieth Century, religious liberal leaders had over-run most of the mainline Protestant denominations, as well as many formerly Christian colleges, universities, and seminaries, jettisoning orthodox theology in favor of a shallow social gospel coupled with a higher-critical view of Scripture inherited from compromised European Bible scholars. In addition to this empty shell of theological liberalism was the growing popularity of Christian “fundamentalism.” Fundamentalism was typified by a hyper over-reaction to the modernism of the 1920’s and its leaders went into retreat mode, cloistering themselves, not just from the world, but from anyone who deviated from their short-list of doctrinal and idiosyncratic ecclesiastical priorities. The most popular fundamentalist leaders had a penchant for disparaging formal education and scholarship, including seminary training, preferring to denigrate the institution by giving it the tongue and cheek moniker of “cemetery.” The byproduct of fundamentalism many times was a strident, narrow-minded, and ill-informed brand of Christianity that fostered an inward, isolationist perspective. As a result, fundamentalists, who claimed to hold to biblical inspiration, were not producing solid, well-studied biblical research for the greater public to counter challenges from religious liberalism or secular humanism that was also thriving more and more in American culture. The scholars of ETS wanted to counter these movements with solid biblical answers and practice.
The Theology
To meet their stated goals, the newly organized ETS leadership formed basic leadership committees, a Constitution and By-laws, and a Statement of Faith. The Doctrinal Statement of ETS has become legendary for its brevity, clarity, and staying power. It reads as follows: “The Bible alone and the Bible in its entirety is the word of God written, and therefore inerrant in the autographs.” I remember the first time I read it back in 1989 when I applied to become a student-member of ETS. To become a student-member I had to be sponsored by a full-ETS member and I had to agree with and sign the one-sentence creedal statement. I couldn’t believe how short it was. It was embarrassing and laughable at the time. But I was naïve. The statement is actually profoundly crafted and was well-thought out when originally composed. Much of the word-smithing when it was written in the 1950’s was left to the genius of Gordon H. Clark, long-time chair of Philosophy at Butler University, but also a first-rate theologian and Reformed pastor, and ETS President in 1965. He was also a scholar in Formal Logic, and this creedal statement takes the form of an air-tight logical axiom.
The statement has three main components, with the truth of Scripture’s inerrancy being showcased and prioritized. It also affirms inerrancy comprehensively, in both a verbal and plenary manner. This would vet out the growing faction of partial-inerrantists masquerading as conservative Christians. The statement also affirms the Bible is God’s Word inscripturated; the Bible does not just contain the Word of God; the Bible is itself the Word of God. This would exclude a Barthian or Neo-Orthodox view Scripture. And by the phrase, “the Bible alone,” being called the Word of God, sufficiency is championed, thus ruling out the Roman Catholic perspective. So, with one fell swoop, this short, highly concentrated statement effectively proved to be a vetting clearinghouse paving the way for a specific ground of agreement guaranteeing unity among many conservative theological Christian traditions at the most important level, namely one’s specific view of the Bible. And because it was only one sentence, that left great freedom, flexibility, and latitude for theological dialogue and interchange on a vast array of topics. The one-sentence doctrinal statement would serve the society well for the next forty years.
As Satan is prone to do, he is always subtly at work trying to undermine biblical truth, Christian institutions, and the fellowship of believers. ETS would not be impervious to the devil’s nefarious ploys, and with time ETS as an organization and its doctrinal statement would undergo various challenges. One challenge was with various cultists, who claimed to believe in inerrancy, who tried to apply for ETS membership. It is true that Jehovah’s Witnesses hold to inerrancy in their New World Translation of the Bible, yet they deny the Trinity. So, it was theoretically possible for someone to agree to the face-value statement of the ETS creedal statement while rejecting the Trinity. As a result, in 1990, under the leadership of Robert L. Thomas (of The Master’s Seminary) who was serving as ETS President that year, an additional creedal statement for ETS membership was proposed, which was heartily accepted and added, and stands to this day for the organization. It reads as follows: “God is a Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, each an uncreated person, one in essence, equal in power and glory.” Therefore, from 1990 to 2023, ETS members are required to affirm in writing, annually, their commitment to the inerrancy of the Bible and the Triune nature of God. ETS members are also exhorted to hold to a definition of inerrancy as outlined by the Chicago Statement of Inerrancy (1978). Those who wish to become a member of ETS must apply and have the minimum of a ThM degree or its equivalent. Any ETS member is eligible for presenting a paper at an annual meeting for a break-out session. Each year the Annual Conference has a theological theme, and papers are encouraged to intersect with or orbit around that theme.
Strengths and Weaknesses
Having been affiliated with ETS for thirty-four years now, I see it has some specific strengths and also some vulnerabilities as a Christian organization. As to its weaknesses it is a para-church organization. It is not the Church. As such, it is prone to spiritual depreciation with time, like all man-made religious institutions, and all human organizations. Most organizations flow through the inevitable process of institutionalization, marked by compromise through the loss of the original vision and purpose that was cast by the founding fathers. The next generation loses their way by resorting to myopic personal agendas or by implementing novel policies and methodologies that short-circuit the original mission. After seventy-five years it is clear that ETS has a calcifying case of organizational institutionalization.
Some in the current generation of ETS leadership have forgotten the original purpose and vision of the founding fathers. Compromise has set in. Every one of the original scholars who constituted the first meeting in 1949 agreed on the meaning of the word “inerrancy.” To them it meant that the Bible in all its parts, and as a whole, was without error. No matter the genre or topic, Scripture did not make mistakes, because God is perfect. That is not the case today.
Beginning in the 1960’s, there was a strong movement by some self-professed evangelical scholars to re-define “inerrancy” and make the term more elastic. They wanted it to accommodate certain errors in the Bible, in the areas of history, science, and textual criticism. At the same time, they alleged that inerrancy applied to only religious and moral truths in the Bible, thus creating a false dichotomy in the content of the Bible. They wanted to say they believed in the inerrancy of the Bible while teaching that the Bible was not a science textbook. This would allow them to reject the historicity of Genesis 1-11, while holding to a Darwinian evolutionary cosmology, and in the same breath say, “I believe the Bible is God’s Word.” To reconcile this obvious disparity and compromise, some in this camp proffered a new word as a replacement for “inerrancy,” namely “infallibility.” For the first time in modern history, professing Christians would be making a technical distinction between the infallibility and the inerrancy of Scripture. They could then say, “I believe in the authority of the Bible,” while claiming it had errors in history, science, and other non-religious areas. They were now talking out of both sides of their mouth. This problem became so widespread that it prompted Carl F. H. Henry to publicly declare in 1976 that there were many in ETS signing the creedal statement who in fact did not agree with it. Instead, they were agreeing to the newly devised concept of “infallibility” instead. Henry was making a wholesale accusation of a lack of academic integrity toward his ETS colleagues. (See Carl Henry, Evangelicals In Search of Identity, Waco, TX: Word Books, 1976, 50.) But Henry would have known, since he was with the organization from its inception and served as President in 1969. He was highly informed and well-connected, with his ear to the ground. And his suspicions proved true.
It would be just eight years later, after Henry’s public indictment, that ETS had a major scandal with one of its scholar members, Robert H. Gundry of Westmont College in Santa Barbara. Gundry wrote a commentary on Matthew in 1982. At the time he was a member of ETS. In his commentary he made claims that undermined an orthodox view of inerrancy. For example, using higher-critical tools of scholarship, such as redaction criticism, he alleged that Jesus did not actually say all the beatitudes that Matthew claimed Jesus said. Gundry also denied that the magi appeared at the time of Christ’s birth even though Matthew says they did. The ETS membership challenged Gundry’s views, accusing him of undermining inerrancy. Gundry continued to claim he held to inerrancy while denying historical events in Matthew’s Gospel. The ETS membership eventually voted on Gundry’s membership, with 70% asking him to resign. And he did in 1983. In 1986 Gundry was my Greek professor at Westmont College and continued to explain to us, his college students, that he was misunderstood. He averred that one could deny the historicity of certain parts of the Bible and still hold to inerrancy.
The fact that 30% of ETS members supported Gundry’s views shows the subtle defection ETS is making with respect to bibliology in general and inerrancy in particular. Gundry should have been removed by 100% of the voting members who claim to believe in inerrancy. The vote exposed the growing tendency of those who call themselves evangelical who are operating by the newly redefined meaning of inerrancy which alleges that the Bible is only inerrant with respect to religious and moral statements, but is not without error in science, history and other forms of genre that are not narrative.
Fast forward to 2003 when ETS members voted on the fate of Clark Pinnock, an ETS member who claimed to believe in inerrancy while at the same time taught things contrary to the Bible. For example, Pinnock argued that God didn’t know the future, for God was still learning. Utter heresy. Yet only 63% of ETS members voted to remove Pinnock (I was one of those votes), while 37% voted in support of him. A 2/3 majority vote was needed to remove him, so Pinnock retained his ETS membership. In 1949 the vote would have been 60-0 against Pinnock and he would have been expeditiously removed, based on the traditional meaning of inerrancy. But times have changed, and the word inerrancy has been polluted and redefined. As a result, defection and compromise within ETS grows more and more with time. Today in 2023 there are numerous ETS members who say they believe in inerrancy while undermining the truth of the Bible in the papers they read at the Annual Conferences. This compromising trend will only grow worse with time.
In light of the ominous trends of compromise one might wonder what the positives are of ETS. There are a few. One is that the super-majority of members still hold to a healthy view of inerrancy and a high view of inspiration. And many of them present papers at ETS on a regular basis, providing a robust body of fresh scholarship that helps stem the tide of false teaching wherever it rears its ugly head. The countless solid, conservative scholars who remain in ETS have proven to be a vital ameliorating force over a period of decades in influencing public thought, opinion, and interpretation on many vital Christian doctrines in the evangelical world. They serve as a protective hedge and watchmen to the few faithful God-honoring Christian colleges and seminaries that are out there. They sound the alarm when a new popular heresy begins to ride a wave of popularity in Christian culture.
It was at ETS in the early 1990s, for example, that Non-Lordship Salvationism (easy-believism) was featured as the theme of the year and was categorically decimated by numerous scholarly papers that exposed it as counterfeit Christianity. It has never retained its widespread popularity among mainstream Christians ever since. It was at ETS where Open Theism was scrutinized, critiqued, and exposed as heresy by several of the most prominent evangelical scholars of the day. Ever since that meeting, Open Theism has been dying a slow death and its propagators have lost all credibility in the evangelical community. It was at ETS where The New Perspective was shown to be nothing more than an old heresy that endangers the Church. It is within the ETS community where inerrancy has been most championed, defended, and bolstered, for decades, at the scholarly level against the perennial onslaught of detractors who try to undermine biblical veracity. Committed conservative scholars within ETS continue to serve as the orthodox conscience of biblical Christianity in America amidst the proliferation of one false heresy after another.
A Look Ahead
As I perused this past year’s ETS catalogue I was encouraged by the veritable army of solid defenders of the faith represented from excellent schools including Moody, The Master’s, Dallas, Southern, Western, Westminster, Bob Jones, Corbin, Cedarville, Gateway, Southwestern, Liberty, and many others. And the leadership of The Cornerstone Seminary is committed to contributing to the cause in an ongoing manner as long as we are given the platform and venue to champion the cause of Christ, His Word, and His gospel without compromise. Next’s year’s theme at ETS in San Diego is “Global Evangelicalism.” Lord willing, me, Pastor Derek Brown, and others from Cornerstone Seminary hope to present several papers showcasing the preeminence of the Great Commission, the priority of the local church, and the power of the life-changing message of the gospel of Jesus Christ (Rom 1:16).