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The Problems with Progressive Theology

The Problems with Progressive Theology

Last updated on: June 9, 2026 at 1:08 pm by Layne Wallace

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The Problems with Progressive Theology 2026-06-09T13:08:08-04:00 Layne Wallace

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Defining Progressive Theology

The differences between modern progressive Christianity and *orthodox Christianity are quite sharp, and it is helpful to examine them. Several weeks ago, a Presbyterian minister, Mark Sandlin, wrote an article entitled, “What Do Progressive Christians Believe? A Field Guide for the Curious and the Rebuilding.” In it, Sandlin articulates progressive thought quite well, and it demonstrates why the progressive theological project is doomed to fail. The problems with progressive theology are legion.

What do Progressive Christians Believe

God Is Love

He writes, “We believe God is love, not a distant evaluator.” Believing God is love is not particularly progressive in nature. Everyone who names Jesus as savior has that conclusion. The New Testament records it, “…God is love…” Sandlin is also correct when he says that God’s love is not soft and sentimental. Again, orthodox believers would agree. The problem is, however, that Sandlin’s version of love does not include any sort of boundaries. God is love, but Love opposes all that destroys Love’s object, however. Sin is not only in opposition to God, it is an attack on creation. God, in His love, therefore, opposes sin.

The second part of this sentence is a straw man. God is not distant, and few orthodox believers would argue that. No, God is omnipresent. While God may seem distant on occasion, God is everywhere, all the time. There is no place where God is absent.

There is more here. If God is to judge, if God is to seek justice, then God must evaluate. How can there be a repair of injustice if God has not evaluated the circumstance as injustice? God most certainly is an evaluator, therefore. God is the judge, and for the sake of the world, He must judge. Removing evaluating from God is tantamount to making God our cosmic buddy.

Jesus and Love

His second argument is, “Jesus shows us what love looks like in human form.” Of course, Jesus is God in the flesh, and God is love. So, Jesus is love. Had he left it there, he would be ok. He continues, “Jesus matters profoundly here, not because he grants spiritual exemptions, but because he lived a life that reveals who God is.” It sounds almost passable, but where is the declaration that Jesus is God in the flesh? Jesus is not just profoundly important. Jesus is God in the flesh, the Second Person of the Trinity, the One who lived, died, and rose again. He is important not just because His “…way of being human leads toward wholeness…” Jesus is more than a moral example. Jesus is Lord.

Progressives and Scripture

The section on the Scriptures is deeply problematic. He writes,

Progressive Christianity sees scripture as a sacred library of people doing their best to name God and understand life in a world they actually inhabited … We ask honest questions: Does this passage lead to compassion? To liberation? To justice? To Love?

Calling this section problematic is to understate the issue. In reading the Bible, the one needing to adjust is not the Bible. It is the reader. What Sandlin is describing is a process of evaluating a text by modern notions. How can one tell if a passage leads to justice if one does not know what justice is? Justice is notoriously slippery to define. Philosophers, theologians, and economists have wrestled with the definition of justice for thousands of years. To come to a text with a pre-conceived idea of justice, evaluate the text according to that view, and then decide how much weight to give a given text based on that evaluation, is nonsensical.

This view of the text gives the reader, and whatever philosopher or theologian is rumbling around in the mind of the reader, authority over the text.

The Nature of Salvation

His next argument is that salvation is more about becoming whole than escape from earth. He writes, “Understood this way, salvation becomes something practiced in community rather than earned in belief.” This is another straw man. Orthodox Christians believe that salvation is the free gift of God by grace in Jesus Christ. It is not earned, nor could it be. Salvation is received through faith.

He writes, “Many of us were taught that salvation was mostly about where we’d go after death. Progressive Christianity is more interested in how we live now.”

The Bible speaks of the afterlife regularly. Paul teaches that without the resurrection, Christians are to be pitied. The resurrection is not a possible side effect of a relationship with a God who is more interested in how we live in this life. The resurrection is the lynch pin of the faith. To claim that God is more interested in this life, in “how we live now,” is to be close cousins to the prosperity religion types.

What is Justice

The lynchpin of Sandlin’s faith, however, is in point 5. He writes that justice, “…is the lens through which we understand faith.” Justice here is loosely defined as everyone thriving and the exclusion of no one. This version of justice has more in common with the postmodern philosophical tradition than the biblical version of justice. Here, the issue is inclusion versus exclusion. Anyone with some philosophical training would recognize it as applied Marxism. In Marxism, the issue is the haves and the have-nots. In this version of justice, the issue is the included and the excluded.

Other Religions

Sandlin’s final point is that other religions hold wisdom too. As is his pattern, he vaguely notes that Christian leaders led some believers to fear other religions. Perhaps that is true. On the other hand, believers in Jesus Christ have long conversed with philosophical and theological traditions outside the faith. Seeing other religions as interesting is one thing. Failing to share the Gospel with their adherents, however, is disobedience.

Doctrines

In his postlude, he writes, “Because progressive Christianity isn’t about having all the right beliefs [sic]. It’s about showing up, choosing Love, and joining the ongoing work of making the world (and ourselves) a little more whole.” What exactly is “showing up”? What exactly is “choosing love”? These are little more than meaningless progressive euphemisms. They may make people feel better, but, like with most euphemisms, they betray a lack of thought. In the end, progressive Christianity is just that. It makes a certain segment of people feel better about themselves, gives them the power to ignore Scripture passages they do not like (including ones related to human sexuality), and substitutes happy euphemisms instead of the faith that was delivered to the Church.

Orthodox Christianity

Orthodox Christianity, in comparison, is the confession of Jesus Christ as Lord, reception of His forgiveness of sin through faith, being transformed by the power of the Spirit, serving the Lord with one’s life, longing for eternal life, and awaiting the redemption of creation.

In one sense, I’m grateful for Sandlin’s article. His clear articulation of progressive Christianity shows why it must be rejected. To put it directly: the differences between what he articulates and orthodox Christianity are so stark that they cannot be thought of as the same faith.

As I have argued elsewhere, this is a new religion borrowing some of the language of the Christian faith.

Post Script

Thanks for your patience. It has been a long time since I have written, and I hope to write more regularly now. I have not forgotten that I need to write the next part of the ” Women in Ministry ” series. With the SBC annual meeting occurring now, and the SBC debating the issue again, it is worth revisiting the issue.

* I’m using the term “orthodox” to mean “right believing,” not Eastern Orthodox Christianity. I could have used the term “traditional Christianity” or biblical Christianity.

Also by Layne Wallace

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