Does Pragmatism Tend Toward Liberalism?

Why do theologically liberal movements and leaders sometimes grow out of evangelical churches? Two decades ago, the Emergent Church movement grew out of sectors of evangelicalism. More recently, some evangelical churches have begun to deny the Bible’s teaching on sexuality. And if we scanned over the last few centuries, we could mine more examples.

One source, I believe, is pragmatism. Ecclesiological pragmatism doesn’t necessarily lead to theological liberalism. Many, many pragmatic pastors faithfully preach the gospel week in and week out. Their churches are full of growing Christians.

And yet.

The goal of this article is to pose the question: does a slippery slope exist from pragmatism to liberalism? Does ecclesiological pragmatism make a church more susceptible to theological liberalism?

What Is Pragmatism?

“Pragmatism” is an approach to ministry that foregrounds whatever methods most effectively grow the church. It follows trends, borrows wisdom from the marketplace, and accepts strategies that prove to produce more people on Sunday mornings. More people = a greater opportunity for the gospel.

In some ways, this is exactly right. We want people to come to church, hear the gospel, and believe. In fact, if you are reading this as a dyed-in-the-wool 9Marks fan, let’s stop and remind ourselves that what motivates many “pragmatic” churches is a sincere desire to advance the gospel. While in this article I mean to supply some speed bumps and warning signs to churches who are pragmatic in their ecclesiology, I commend any church’s desire for more people to know and love and follow Jesus. This is a good thing.

Nonetheless, extra-biblical methods sometimes undermine biblical demands, and emphasizing methodology can sometimes undermine our message. Pragmatism too often follows these trajectories. What’s more is that once pragmatism becomes as bad as it can be, the temptation towards liberalism is just getting started. More on that in a minute. For now, let’s look at some common examples of pragmatism in churches.

Numbers. Numbers. Numbers. And no, not the Bible book. One way to spot pragmatism in your church is to consider what emphasis you place on the numbers. How many attended your service(s)? Your mid-week programs? Pastor, if the first thing you do when you get to the office on Monday is check the attendance of yesterday’s service, you may have a problem with pragmatism.

An even better way to spot pragmatism in your church is to ask yourself what your instincts are when your numbers are in the red two, three, or four weeks in a row. Do you look for ways to make attending more convenient? Maybe you tell people that the live stream feature is as good as attending in person? Or maybe you think about starting another service so people don’t have to get out the door so early. But these pragmatic practices lean more toward consumeristic Christianity than they do Christianity played out in community.

Another example of all-too-common pragmatism is in play when churches spend money incentivizing people to come to church. With good intent, I have seen churches give away cars, loaded gift cards, trips, and food in order to convince people to darken their doors. The undergirding belief is that if people would just attend an evangelistic service, then they would hear the gospel and believe. But the old adage is right: “What you win them with is what you win them to.” Candy-coating Jesus too often causes people to miss him altogether.

Back to the livestream for a minute. A friend recently told me that the reason so many churches set up their worship venues like concert halls is to prioritize the quality of the live stream. I think this is another example of pragmatism gone too far. After all, it’s really hard to sing to those you can’t see. It’s even harder to “stir up one another to love and good works” from the sofa (Heb. 10:24).

Lastly, pragmatism can easily be spotted by where it puts its weight in preaching. Pragmatic preachers often look to attract the lost with motivational talks on finances, parenting, or abstract virtues like courage. These things replace sermons on sin and the need for repentance. But doesn’t the Bible warn us that unbelievers won’t understand our message unless God supernaturally helps them (1 Cor. 2:11–12)? Our pulpits aren’t for entertainment that retains but preaching that saves.

These examples are added to those which 9Marks has spilled much ink in critiquing—things like spontaneous baptisms, child baptisms, altar calls, and the loss of meaningful membership and discipline. Such practices all appear animated by a pragmatic principle aiming at growth.

Will churches that engage in such practices always go liberal? Certainly not.

Still, my concern is that two assumptions, one posture, and one tendency in such churches create the conditions in which a slide toward liberalism becomes a little more likely than otherwise. Let me lay those out.

Assumption 1: The Bible Is Not Sufficient for Practice

When our church installs new elders, they are asked in front of the congregation, “Do you believe the Scriptures to be the Word of God, totally trustworthy, fully inspired by the Holy Spirit, the supreme, final, and the only infallible rule of faith and practice?”^{11 .} For our church’s elder vows in their entirety, see: https://www.9marks.org/article/elder-vows-sample/.  We expect them to answer yes.

A liberal pastor, however, would say no. An old-school liberal would say that Scripture is full of historical and scientific errors and that we can discern its spiritual meaning with our feelings. A new-school liberal might affirm that the Bible is inspired and authoritative, but in order to apply it faithfully today we have to understand its ethical trajectories. Therefore, they might say, homosexuality is actually okay. Yet both schools teach that the Bible isn’t sufficient for faith and practice.

How about the pragmatic pastor? Having just watched the liberals fail the sufficiency of Scripture exam, he approaches the microphone more confidently. When asked, “Do you believe the Scriptures to be the only infallible rule for faith . . .” he interrupts the moderator before he answers the question with a loud, “Yes!”

But then the moderator finishes the question: “. . . and practice?”

“Oh . . . and practice.” This is the bit that troubles him. Sure, the Bible tells us how to be saved—“call on the name of the Lord” (Rom. 10:13). And it instructs us on how we should behave toward others—“bear one another’s burdens” (Gal. 6:2). Easy enough.

“What do you mean by practice?” he asks.

The moderator replies, “The Bible determines how we should organize and govern ourselves. It tells us what we should emphasize when we gather together weekly and how we should disciple one another and evangelize our neighbors when we scatter.”

The pragmatist starts slow, but then gains confidence and speed: “Well, the Bible doesn’t exactly specify how we do all of this, right? We have to get a little entrepreneurial and creative. People are dying and going to hell. We need to do whatever it takes to help them know Jesus. Let’s not get so caught up in perfectly manicuring our little Christian garden. Let’s take some risks for Jesus!”

Not all pragmatists would say it just like this. Some pragmatists would even accuse us of being uncharitable. That’s not my intention. Instead, I merely want to point out that there’s a common assumption among pragmatic evangelicals that the Bible doesn’t have a lot to say about how we organize, gather, scatter, and grow as churches.

Assumption 2: Churches Exist for Reaching Non-Christians (and Therefore Numerical Growth)

You might have noticed a second assumption in the pragmatist’s reply above: churches exist for the sake of reaching outsiders.

As such, they tend to prioritize numeric growth and broad appeal. This is why pragmatic churches gear so much of what happens on Sunday toward the unbeliever. Winning them, pragmatists believe, requires meeting them where they are. Unbelievers aren’t jumping out of bed on Sunday mornings to sing stuffy old hymns and hear drawn-out monologues, only to return home tired and late for lunch.

So pragmatic churches hold multiple services and offer those services over live stream. They sing inspiring songs that contain some truths but too often center on man rather than God. They shorten their sermons and style them so that unbelievers remain interested from start to finish.

Notice how in all these things pragmatists prioritize an unbeliever’s assessment over what’s going on over everything else. Pragmatists combine a little of the world with a little of the Word to create an experience that will excite unbelievers and convince them to come back. This makes sense if the main goal of our gatherings is to attract seekers or unbelievers. It makes less sense if the main goal of our gatherings is to feed the sheep and build up the church.

Christians haven’t always viewed their Sunday gatherings—let alone the very existence of their churches—as being primarily for evangelism. To be sure, evangelism is one purpose of the church. They should include it on Sunday’s agenda. However, churches gather primarily to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus, hear God’s Word preached, and respond in song, prayer, and the ordinances. These ordinary means of grace are purposed by God to equip Christians for Monday through Saturday living—living which ought to testify to the saving power of the gospel. Churches exist, therefore, primarily for Christians. Our gatherings should reflect this commitment.

Posture: Lean Hard Toward Outsiders

These two assumptions, especially the latter, produce a posture of leaning hard toward outsiders. So pragmatism essentially asks, “What’s popular?” “What’s impressive?” and “What attracts?” rather than, “What does God require?” and “What does the Bible say?” Seeker sensitivity, as pragmatism is sometimes called, is born out of the answers to these very questions.

Take Rick Warren’s now infamous Saddleback Sam as an example. Saddleback Sam was an avatar made to represent Saddleback Church’s target audience. He is in his late thirties, has a college degree, works a stable job that he likes, and enjoys his life and the trajectory it is on. With “Sam” identified as their target, the church set out to mold its ministry around Sam’s needs and desires. The resulting strategies look a lot like those I’ve already discussed—experience-oriented worship, multiple services held in person and online, attractional programming, and so forth.

Of course, Saddleback isn’t alone. There are estimated to be about 1800 megachurches (2000-plus members) in the United States.^{22 .} Scott Neuman, “Megachurches Are Getting Even Bigger as Churches Close Across the Country. NPR. July 14, 2023. https://www.npr.org/2023/07/14/1187460517/megachurches-growing-liquid-church. While not every one of these churches espouses an attractional ministry philosophy, many do. I suspect the majority do. What’s more, according to NPR, megachurches are growing in the face of rapidly declining church attendance across the board. If that’s right, more people are in pragmatic churches today than ever before—churches whose primary outlook is reaching more people.

But at what cost? Answering this question leads us to a tendency that is often found in pragmatic churches.

Tendency: Soften Boundaries and Downplay Doctrine

When we combine the two assumptions and the one posture mentioned above, a tendency often follows: to soften boundaries and downplay doctrine. That is to say, pragmatism can begin to look for ways to make entering the church easier, like forgoing membership, forgoing discipline, or giving all authority to the church leaders. And no doubt, this is where the real trouble begins.

One of the first things to go missing in pragmatic churches is regenerate church membership, or any meaningful way to discern whether or not a person wanting to join has placed their faith in Jesus. This is largely because pragmatic churches often view Sunday mornings as evangelistic events. They focus on effective communication and too often avoid offense. Some pragmatic churches even allow non-Christians to join their membership so that they can serve in various ways: the band, the nursery, the midweek soup kitchen. If unbelievers keep coming, pragmatic pastors say, they will have a better chance of eventually accepting Jesus.

With the loss of membership comes the loss of church discipline. Jesus teaches that churches should excommunicate those who persist in unrepentant, serious sin. Yet pragmatic churches rarely excommunicate. In so far as they refuse to obey the Bible’s clear teaching on this, they implicitly confess that God’s Word isn’t sufficient for faith and practice. Jesus’s prescription in Matthew 18:15–17 isn’t ambiguous. Paul’s commands in 1 Corinthians 5 aren’t vague. By ignoring them, pragmatic churches put forward a deficient view of Scripture and at least imply its prescriptions for dealing with sin are irrelevant or expired.

Not only that, such a church undermines its preaching, like a parent who threatens a child with a consequence for disobedience but never follows through. The kid learns that mom and dad don’t mean what they say. So with the church that preaches against theft but doesn’t remove the thief. “I guess stealing is not that big of a deal,” members conclude.

In churches where unrepentant sin goes unremarked upon, church members won’t know what it looks like to follow Jesus. Now that’s beginning to sound like liberalism.

Add to these losses the persistent obfuscation of many pragmatic churches on the issue of complementarianism. Because churches must reach all people, they decide that all must be represented in the church’s public teaching ministry and leadership—women included. What’s going on here? The softening of boundaries and the downplaying of doctrine.

Yet what about Paul unambiguously telling Timothy, “I do not permit a woman to teach or to exercise authority over a man; rather, she is to remain quiet” (1 Tim. 2:12)? Pragmatic churches argue around passages that teach male leadership in the church. Any response that denies a clear reading of Scripture makes it clear that man is really in charge, not God’s Word.

Along the same lines, pragmatic churches who punt on complementarianism will be simultaneously tempted to capitulate on biblical sexuality. And while both of these errors are dangerous, the latter is far more so. It is possible to be an egalitarian Christian. In 1 Corinthians 6:9–10, however, Paul observes that those engaged in unrepentant homosexual sin will not inherit the kingdom of God.

On top of all this, how many sermons on sin, judgment day, or hell have you heard recently? If your church doesn’t preach on these matters, it’s likely there is some form of pragmatism driving its ministries. Too often in pragmatic churches, sin is not treated in theological categories but therapeutic ones, while eternity is replaced with temporal happiness.

All these things reflect a lowering of standards and a loosening of doctrine.

And the result? Christians live more and more like the world. They think more and more like the world. Or we can put it the other way around: non-Christians come into church and start calling themselves Christians, but they aren’t real Christians because their churches never told them that following Jesus means leaving the world behind.

Eventually, as all this continues, the church slowly, bit by bit, creeps into the land of theological liberalism. Some members simply apostatize, intuitively recognizing that liberal world-mimicking versions of Christianity serve no real purpose.

A Slippery Slope?

Does ecclesiological pragmatism make a church more susceptible to theological liberalism? Not necessarily, but it can and often does.

Liberalism and pragmatism share a deficient view of the Scriptures, even if the latter doesn’t carry it to the extent of the former. Denying the Bible’s authority in areas of obedience can easily spill the banks of “practice” and flood into eternity-dependent “faith.” In our own day, we have seen pragmatism pave the road to liberalism—just consider how so many ended up in the “exvangelical” camp.

Liberalism and pragmatism borrow the world’s thinking and methodology and rate their success accordingly. For liberalism, success is acceptance in academics or power in politics. For pragmatism, success looks like a growing church with a massive online viewership.

Paul told Timothy to keep a close watch on his life and his doctrine. We must do the same (1 Tim. 4:16). The Bible has a lot to say about both faith and practice, and it’s the only place we can go for answers to both. It also teaches us to view success from an eternal perspective. So we can be confident that following God’s Word is always its own reward, no matter what happens as a result. Does your church want to be successful? Then stay faithful to God’s Word. There is a great reward for those who do.