Paul, Doctrine & Orthodoxy

Here's another good excerpt from the new book, "Why We're Not Emergent (By Two Guys Who Should Be)":

"There's no question that Paul believed in orthodoxy. 'Follow the pattern of sound words that you have heard from me, in the faith an love that in Christ Jesus,' he told Timothy. 'By the Holy Spirit who dwells within us, guard the good deposit entrusted to you.' (2 Tim.1:13-14). Paul's message undoubtedly had a doctrinal center. There were certain propositions of fact regarding election, the incarnation, the resurrection and the atonement that Paul had passed along to Timothy that absolutely had to be preserved and protected at all costs, even if it meant suffering and death (1:8-11).

"Doctrine was to die for because it was the heartbeat of Paul's saving message about saving historical facts. Machen writes, 'But if any one fact is clear, on the basis of this evidence, it is that the Christian movement at its inception was not just a way of life in the modern sense, but a way of life founded upon a message. It was based, not upon mere feeling, not upon a mere program of work [activism], but upon an account of facts. In other words it was based on doctrine.'

"As soon as you say Jesus died and rose again for your sins according to the Scriptures, you have doctrine. You have a message about what happened in history and what it means. That's theology. There is no gospel without it."

-- Kevin DeYoung, "Why We're Not Emergent" (pp.112-13, with a quote from J. Gresham Machen's "Christianity and Liberalism) [Moody Press: 2008]