Sunday, September 12, 2010

Liberation theology of the right

Todd Wilken:

You have written that there is a liberation theology of the left and there’s also a liberation theology of the right. Of course a criticism of many of those who were supporting Glen Beck and his Restoring Honor rally was that President Barack Obama is a “liberation theologian.” What do you mean by a liberation theology on the right?

Russell Moore:

Well I think liberation theology is any kind of theology that seeks to bypass the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ and the empty tomb in order to get to some temporal value.

And so I think on the left you’ve got a liberation theology that says what we’re looking for is freeing the oppressed and we’re looking for all these — which may be good and right in and of themselves, but when you get to them apart from the Gospel you’re getting something other than the Gospel.

The same thing happens on the right, where you can take values that can be good in and of themselves and can be commendable, but you seek to get to them some other way than through the Gospel.

That’s essentially exactly what is happening in the third temptation of the Lord Jesus. Satan says to him, “You can have all of the kingdoms of the world if you just bow down and worship me.” Jesus refuses to do this even though Jesus ruling over the kingdoms of the world is obviously a good thing.

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