From the TeachingtheWord Bible Knowledgebase

PCUSA, the acronym of America's mainline Presbyterian church, also describes its philosophy: "Political Correctness in the USA." It is also a striking object lesson for Bible-believers: We must never hold onto any visible church, denomination, or institution in such a way that we place loyalty to the institution above loyalty to Christ and His Word.

During the past two years I have spent many hours in the massive library of Princeton Princeton Seminary Library doing research for a new book series we are planning. Princeton's is the largest theological library in the world outside of the Vatican, housing materials useful to my research that date back over 400 years.

Princeton is also one of the most radically liberal seminaries on the planet. But it was not always so.

"Old Princeton"

Founded in 1812 under the auspices of the Presbyterian church by Archibald Alexander, Princeton Seminary was once a bastion of sound theology in America. A number of Alexander's descendants were associated with Princeton, and among them were leading preachers, Bible scholars, and noted scientists.

The Princeton Seminary library was originally known as the Alexander Library because the donated personal libraries of Archibald Alexander and his descendants comprised much of its initial collection. Several times during my research I have opened a 17th, 18th, or 19th century book to find the signature of one of the Alexanders in the front, along with his notation of the date he acquired it, and sometimes the place or circumstances. Quite literally you hold history in your hands.

In the days of "Old Princeton" these Spirit-inspired words of the Apostle Paul were the lodestar of its professors and students:

For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh. For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds, casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ... (2 Corinthians 10:3-5)

Princeton Today: A Fountainhead of Heresy

Princeton Seminary today is a far different place.

One of the best ways to understand what seminary students are studying is to look at a library's return carts. Library staffs insist on doing the mundane but vital work of returning books taken down from the shelves to their precise locations. Princeton's massive collection would soon become jumble and chaos if this policy were not enforced.

During my visits I soon found that I was the only one using the library who had an interest in the Biblical text itself. The vast majority of the books on the return carts showed that students are imbibing unregenerated men's misinterpretations of Scripture. The vast majority of books on the return carts dealt with feminism and feminist theology, and so-called social justice - the present-day stealth term for Marxist liberation theology.

Most of the other works on the return carts carried two perennial themes of apostasy - denial of the inspiration and authority of Scripture, and denial of the deity of Christ. One book was remarkably representative: Putting Away Childish Things: The Virgin Birth, The Empty Tomb, And Other Fairy Tales You Don't Need To Believe To Have A Living Faith. Such is the theology of Princeton in the 21st century.

Princeton is the leading seminary of the Presbyterian Church (USA). The books on the return racks were not surprising in view of the emphases to be found in the PCUSA's ordination examinations.

A typical PCUSA examination on Bible exegesis encourages pastoral candidates to give their interpretations of the Song of Solomon from a feminist perspective or by perverting the roles of the sexes, which is fully in keeping with the denomination's policy of permitting sexual perverts in its pulpits. Another examination encourages candidates to interpret the account of Jesus' raising of Lazarus in John chapter 11 from a humanist perspective, effectively denying His deity. Another examination asks candidates for ordination to state a position on the relationship between Christianity and Israel, in a thinly-veiled attempt to ensure that pastoral candidates support the PCUSA's virulently anti-Israel political stance.

Altogether missing is authentic Biblical Christianity, especially any commitment to the great solas of the Reformation - that the church's authority is Scripture alone; that salvation is by God's grace alone, through faith alone, in the person and work of Christ alone; and that the glory belongs to God alone.

21st-century Princeton denies all of these, substituting postmodernist philosophies in general and secular humanism in particular. Someone has said that "PCUSA" actually stands for "Political Correctness in the USA." That is the sad, Satanic truth.

Lessons for Bible Believers

Princeton Seminary is a striking object lesson for Bible-believers, especially for those who far too often tend to hold onto failing ecclesiastical institutions rather than the unfailing Christ and His eternal, inerrant Word. We must recognize that all man-made Christian institutions are temporary and passing away. Their path, like the path of all creation under the curse of sin, trends ever downward. In Scripture and in the subsequent history of the church we find no visible body or ecclesiastical institution that has remained faithful to the Word of God and the testimony of Jesus Christ for more than two or three generations without descending into apostasy. Only the invisible Church, the true Body of Jesus Christ, is eternal and triumphant.

Within forty years the church at Ephesus degraded from a body of those who were "faithful in Christ Jesus" (Ephesians 1:1) to a visible church that had left its first love, to whom Christ said through the Apostle John, "Remember therefore from where you have fallen; repent and do the first works, or else I will come quickly and remove your lampstand from its place - unless you repent" (Revelation 2:5).

Hundreds of thousands of religiously observant people were in Jerusalem for PentecostPentecost after Christ died, rose, and ascended to Heaven - including multitudes who had once followed Him but had turned back (John 6:66). But only 120 were in the upper room obeying His instruction to wait for the coming of the Holy Spirit upon them. Yet God "turned the world upside down" (Acts 17:6) through this small and humanly insignificant band of brothers and sisters in Christ, and the remnant throughout the Roman Empire that the Spirit brought to saving faith through their uncompromising witness.

The path of truth is always a narrow way trod by a remnant and not a majority. On this fact we have our Lord's own word:

Enter by the narrow gate; for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and there are many who go in by it. Because narrow is the gate and difficult [literally, constrained] is the way which leads to life, and there are few who find it. (Matthew 7:13-14)

Scripture and subsequent history both shout to us the fact that God does His great work through faithful remnants. We ignore this reality at our peril.

We must not hold onto any visible church, denomination, or institution in such a way that we place loyalty to the institution above loyalty to Christ and His Word. Scripture and church history place on exhibit before us manifold failures in this regard - men who insisted on remaining loyal to and preserving a church body or institution long after it had departed into apostasy. May we be about the Lord's business in our generation, as were the Thessalonians whom Paul commended:

For from you the Word of the Lord has sounded forth, not only in Macedonia and Achaia, but also in every place. Your faith toward God has gone out, so that we do not need to say anything. For they themselves declare concerning us what manner of entry we had to you [literally, what a reception we had among you], and how you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God, and to wait for His Son from Heaven, whom He raised from the dead, even Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come. (1 Thessalonians 1:8-10).

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