Since at least the 90s the expression “culture war” has described the conflict between Christians and other conservatives on one hand and Leftists and progressives on the other over the nature of our society on issues deeper and more important than politics — in other words, culture. These issues have centered around abortion; pornography; homosexuality, including homosexual “marriage”; transgenderism; sexual and racial quotes; DEI in the military; and much else.
With notable exception conservatives have lost the culture war even as they have won political victories. The Leftist social agenda continued virtually unabated during the George W. Bush and first Trump administrations. Still, Roe v. Wade was overturned in 2022, and the second Trump administration reversed DEI transgenderism in the U. S. military and much public higher education. Transgender genital mutilation received a strong push pushback even during the Biden administration. So there have been victories. On the whole, however, progressivism has progressed in its cultural victories. If you don’t believe this, ask yourself when the last time was that you heard even a stalwart national conservative politician speak out against homosexual “marriage” or demand legislation severely limiting abortion. In many ways progressivism has become the new conservatism; it is gaining victories and conserving them.
The prime reason for the consistent string of conservative defeats is the lack of the biblical gospel undergirding their approach. This idea deserves brief but careful explanation.
Creational, Non-Gospel Social Issues
The culture war clusters principally around issues relating to violations of creational norms: egalitarianism in marriage and society, illicit sexual acts (that means: any outside marriage), and lack of legal protection for preborn and elderly human life (see my Creational Worldview: An Introduction). These were social issues not on the surface related to the gospel. Culture warriors were not battling for a pure gospel in the church but for creational norms outside the church, though of course the battle sometimes intruded into the church, which often capitulated to the sinful culture and its norms like “pro-choice” and homosexual routinization. This meant the gospel of Jesus Christ was at best a sideshow to the culture wars.
From one standpoint, this omission was understandable, since Leftism wasn’t specifically attacking the gospel but creation. You defend what the enemy is attacking, not what he isn’t attacking. Still, the 30-year sidelining of the gospel is now reaping severe consequences.
Natural Law versus Biblical Gospel
For one thing, the surprising revival of natural law theory among ordinarily biblical Protestants has accelerated this omission (see my article “The Historical Course of Natural Law Theory”). Is this revival a cause or consequence of the sidelining of the gospel? That answer isn’t clear (maybe both). What is clear is that the wholesale adoption of natural law and marginalizing of the Bible equally marginalizes the gospel. Why? Because natural law as the ethical component of natural theology is the attempt to frame an ethical standard specifically excluding Jesus Christ and the Bible. In short, there can be no gospel in natural law. One reason so many of the youngest culture warriors, particularly the Neo-Masculinists on the Reformed New Right, including the racists and antisemites (the Young, Reformed and Witless), rarely speak of or preach the gospel is because they consistently speak of and preach natural law. When your chief priority is to decimate egalitarianism and feminism and sexual perversion, the gospel is of little concern.
No Cultural Victory Without Gospel Victory
Second, there can be no cultural redemption apart from the redemption accomplished by Christ on the cross of from the empty tomb. The Christian worldview includes the creational worldview, and the creational worldview has the gospel at his heart. Indeed, the goal of the gospel is to restore and enhance creation.
The ultimate goal of the culture war is the pervasive establishment of the gospel of peace.
This is not simply a case of the frequent refrain, “Let’s just preach the gospel, and the culture will take care of itself,” the mantra of too many pietists. Rather, this is a case of recognizing that the gospel is at the heart of what changes the culture. The Great Commission is the Cultural Mandate adapted to a post-fall world.
The Culture Warrior’s Fool’s Errand
Finally, this means that trying to change politics and culture merely by restoring creational norms is a fool’s errand. The recovery of creational norms (by no means identical with natural law) is necessary, but not sufficient. The gospel itself restores creational norms in our world. This is one main reason Jesus Christ came and died on the cross and the rose from the dead. This is why Romans 8 says creation itself groans for redemption. Creation itself is redeemed by the gospel, though, of course, it is man himself that is the principal object of the gospel.
Our Task
What, then, is our task? Well, we preach the gospel of Jesus Christ and the salvation of individuals by Christ’s atoning work and received by faith (alone). The success of that gospel transforms not just individuals, but their institutions and its culture and gradually the entire world. The gospel does not stop with individual redemption, but it incontestably starts there.
Stated boldly: egalitarianism and radical feminism and homosexualization and transgenderism and statism and abortion culture cannot be overcome apart from gospel preaching.
War and Peace
The biblical culture war strategy preserves martial terminology. After all, St. Paul tells us that we are soldiers in the battle against the world, the flesh, and the devil (Eph. 6). Revelation 19 depicts our Lord as a great white horse rider slaying the nations by the word of his mouth, that is, by the gospel.
Alternatively, the Bible refers to the gospel of Jesus Christ as the gospel of peace (Eph. 6:15), and interestingly, this is the context that uses some of the most explicit martial terminology in the Bible. The gospel creates peace between man and man; between man and creation; within man himself; and, most importantly, between man and God. The ultimate goal of the culture war is the pervasive establishment of the gospel of peace. War is not inherently good any more than peace is inherently good. War in itself is dehumanizing, and peace with sin in a sinful culture is treason to God. The issue always is: the kind of war and the kind of peace.
This is why a restoration of a robust individual- and institution- and culture-transforming gospel message is the imperative of the hour.
Some of the most prominent Christian ministries of the last half century have not taken their cue from the gospel. We can think of James Dobson‘s Focus on the Family, an outstanding ministry accomplishing a great deal for God‘s glory and the restoration of marriage and the family as creational norms. This ministry was necessary, but not sufficient. Subsequent gospel decentering, however, has gone off the rails and today’s young “influencers” “pastoring” their digital congregations almost never refer to the gospel. They operate “natural” ministries. In fact, in some places it is not clear that these Reformed influencers are even leading Christian ministries. This is not to suggest a return to the truncated so-called “gospel-centered movement” of a quarter century ago. It is, however, to suggest that culture war must always be fought within the context of the gospel peace.
Conclusion
In the Bible and the Christian worldview, creation and redemption stand in an unbreakable continuum. Sever redemption from creation and you destroy the very context and goal of redemption itself. Sever creation from redemption and you cut off the lifeblood of the gospel, by which alone cultures can be redeemed.
Creation and redemption are always both/and, never either/or.✞
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