As I stated in Part 1 of my series on Progressive Christianity, this movement isn’t just another interpretation of faith—it’s a direct challenge to biblical truth. It twists God’s Word, questions long-held doctrine, and reshapes Christianity into something unrecognizable. It’s Carnal poison.
You might think this is about politics. It’s not. While self-identifying Progressive Christians do tend to vote for Democrat policies and candidates, a large number of those who consider themselves the Christian Right (and vote accordingly), are being taken in by this ideology without even knowing it
Progressive Christianity has infected nearly every denomination, reshaping core beliefs into a Christless religion—or at least one without the real Jesus. This unbiblical movement is a serious threat, because its teachings can sound fair and right to the world, but contradict God’s truth.
Here are five ways Progressive Christianity has redefined our core doctrines:
1. Creation:
Christians believe that God created the universe—that He is transcendent, immanent, and omnipresent, existing beyond time itself, that He created the world in 6 days, and on the 7th day He rested.
But many Progressives believe in Darwin’s Evolution – the millions or billions of years of mother nature to eventually form what we see today. Many also hold to a belief called Panentheism, meaning God poured Himself into all matter. In other words, He is contained in every cell, every blade of grass, and that we – all human beings saved or not – are also divine. (That is actually a New Age belief.)
However, Scripture is clear—God is the Creator, not part of creation. While the Holy Spirit indwells born-again believers, that does not make us divine. We are not God.
As for Adam and Eve, most progressive thought leaders deny they literally existed, or will say it doesn’t matter if they did. But not only did Jesus refer to Genesis many times as literally true historic events, our faith stands and falls on whether Christ died for our inherent sin.
2. Original Sin and the Fall:
Christian doctrine states that we are in a fallen condition by default – inherited by our ancestors all the way back to Adam – we call this our human sin nature – even babies know how to sin. But Progressives say our nature is inherent goodness.
In progressive churches, you’ll often see a move away from using the word sin or even calling sinful behaviors sinful. It’s not nice; It’s such a harsh word. it’s not compassionate. Instead, progressive Christians often teach that it’s not sin that separates us from God, but our own self-imposed shame — that we simply need to realize that we were never separated from God in the first place, or that we are beloved and accepted just as we are.
The Bible says our hearts are wicked, and no one is without sin – not one. But when we put our faith in Christ, he gives us a brand new heart and begins to shape us into His image.
3. The Bible
We believe the Bible is 100% true, without error, and our ultimate authority on what we believe. That the 40-plus authors of the Bible came from many different backgrounds but were all writing under the influence of God to communicate His nature and character and holiness.
Progressives see the biblical writers as sincere, but limited in their understanding and sophistication. They were just trying to make sense of God within their own time and culture. Instead of recording God’s actual words, they believe these writers simply wrote down their own thoughts about Him.
As a result, Progressives can more easily cherry-pick verses they like and discard the rest.
2 Timothy 3:16 says, “All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.”
When it comes to prophecy in Scripture, many Progressives believe biblical accounts were passed down and altered over time in the telling—much like a game of Telephone. Because of this, they often deny or downplay events like the virgin birth and even the resurrection, treating them as symbolic life lessons rather than actual historical events.
They often state the need to make God’s Word inclusive, because we want everyone to feel included, so we’ve changed or ignored God’s definition of what is sinful. Some bibles even have removed “he and she,” for more non-gender specific terms. Once you do that, truth is whatever you want it to be.
4. The Cross:
The Bible tells us that Jesus’ death paid the penalty for our sin once and for all. Many progressives reject this, and teach that there is no such thing as propitiation, or substitutionary atonement. But if you do a search for the word Propitiation, it pops up all over the old and new testament. Here’s one example: 1 John 4:10 In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
Many progressives outright deny this doctrine, and have said that the idea that Christ had to die as a sacrifice for our sins is cosmic child abuse, invented more than a thousand years after the cross.
5. Salvation:
We believe that salvation is from God alone. His children will live with Him forever in His Kingdom. Those who reject Him will suffer the penalty of sin which is God’s wrath, and will live eternally in Hell.
Many Progressives believe that God saves everyone, and that there is no Hell, and a loving God would never send anyone there. This is the lie of Universalism. That everyone UNIVERSALLY goes to heaven. Jesus says no one comes to the father except through Me.
Many Progressives teach that we all go to heaven because basically, we’re all decent loving people at heart. You just have to be a good person. You can believe what you want to believe. This isn’t Christian at all. But classic Unitarian Universalism. I know Unitarianism because for the first 14 years of my life, I was steeped in it. Every Sunday we’d go to the Unitarian church in St. Paul. And there, the adults would ponder the questions and theories of the world, and never arrive at any kind of answer. They didn’t want answers. It was all about the seeking, and there was no place for absolute truth. All doctrines of Christianity were rejected, especially the idea that Jesus was somehow God, or, the exclusive, only way.
When I asked my Dad about Jesus. “ What do we believe about him, Dad? He just smiled and said, “what do you want to believe?” That’s what Progressive Christianity is like – creating your own doctrine to match what YOU feel is right and good. You don’t have to deal with the hard things like the coming wrath or repentance for sins. Easter can be about springtime and renewal, peace and social justice.
Obviously Unitarians aren’t Christians. They believe in a different Jesus and a different gospel. But their progressive beliefs have infiltrated many modern churches. If church leaders aren’t focused on Jesus Christ, what do you suppose they are preaching instead?
They are preaching Works. That might sound strange, but Progressive Christianity is a works-based religion based on doing good in society. They often talk of feeding the poor and welcoming the refugee, and yes, those things are good and noble. As Christians we need to be the hands and feet of Jesus. Loving our neighbor might look like bringing them a meal, or praying with them in a hospital, being there for them in a time of need.
But in a Progressive Christian church, loving your neighbors more often means Social and Political activism, where you need to make your community and your world a better place. What does Activism look like in a Progressive Church?.
WORKS. Here are four main focus areas of their advocacy/activism, in no particular order because individuals and churches might place a higher value on some of these:
- Social Justice
- Environmentalism
- The “Woke” Gospel
- Feminism/Abortion
In Part 3 of this series, I will flesh out each one of these areas and show how these focus areas come straight from the Marxist ideology, and why putting Jesus’ name on Marxism has been a powerful strategy to deconstruct the Church.
And if you don’t go along, you become the enemy in its crosshairs.
Please look at our White Paper on Progressive Christianity, and check out my new series on Progressive “Christianity” to learn more.
