Baptist News Global
Sections
  • News
  • Analysis
  • Opinion
  • Curated
  • Storytelling
    • Faith & Justice >
      • Charleston: Metanoia with Bill Stanfield
      • Charlotte: QC Family Tree with Greg and Helms Jarrell
      • Little Rock: Judge Wendell Griffen
      • North Carolina: Conetoe
    • Welcoming the Stranger >
      • Lost Boys of Sudan: St. John’s Baptist Charlotte
      • Awakening to Immigrant Justice: Myers Park Baptist Church
      • Hospitality on the corner: Gaston Christian Center
    • Signature Ministries >
      • Jake Hall: Gospel Gothic, Music and Radio
    • Singing Our Faith >
      • Hymns for a Lifetime: Ken Wilson and Knollwood Baptist Church
      • Norfolk Street Choir
    • Resilient Rural America >
      • Alabama: Perry County
      • Texas: Hidalgo County
      • Arkansas Delta
      • Southeast Kentucky
  • More
    • Contact
    • About
    • Donate
    • Associated Baptist Press Foundation
    • Planned Giving
    • Letters to the Editor
    • Advertising
    • Ministry Jobs and More
    • Transitions
    • Subscribe
    • Submissions and Permissions
Donate Subscribe
Search Search this site

Al Mohler decries “Gungor” controversy

OpinionAlan Bean  |  September 16, 2014

Michael Gungor

Michael Gungor

By Alan Bean

Al Mohler has adapted nicely to our twenty-first century media revolution.  He even doespodcasts.

Al isn’t hip.  Not even a little bit.  But he talks about hip people, albeit with disapproval.

I can’t imagine the venerable Roy Lee Honeycutt or Duke McCall (Al’s predecessors at the helm of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky) dissecting the theological errors of pop artists, but Al is willing to have a go.

Take Gungor, for instance.

Who, or what, is “Gungor” you ask.

First, Gungor is a guy (Michael Gungor) and second, Gungor is the musical ensemble Michael formed with his wife, Lisa, and a few others.  The couple moved to Denver in 2007 and started a church for creative types like themselves.  If you want a taste of their music, here’s a taste:

According to Wikipedia, the album and the song “Beautiful things” (released in 2011) “were nominated for the Grammy categories Best Rock or Rap Gospel Album and Best Gospel Song, respectively.”  Relevant, a magazine for hip young Christians, has produced a number of YouTube videos if you want to hear more.

The lyrics to “Beautiful Things,” reveals the wistful, longing, questing tone of Gungor’s music.

All this pain
I wonder if I’ll ever find my way
I wonder if my life could really change at all
All this earth
Could all that is lost ever be found
Could a garden come up from this ground at all

You make beautiful things
You make beautiful things out of the dust
You make beautiful things
You make beautiful things out of us

Michael Gungor is an evangelical Christian . . . of sorts.  He loves Jesus and doesn’t think it’s much of a stretch to believe that Jesus turned water into wine or healed the sick.  In other words, he’s no hard-science rationalist.

But, like millions of young, educated Christians his age (he was born in 1980), Michael Gungor has thought long and hard about the Bible and has reached some tough conclusions.

Specifically, he doesn’t think he can hold onto Jesus without relaxing his grip on some of the Bible’s nasty bits.  You know, the smitings and blood-soaked massacres that God commands, or the notion that the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ would sweep away thousands of innocent people in a flood that covered the highest mountains.

It isn’t just that Noah’s flood is hard to reconcile with the universal consensus of the scientific community; it’s also hard to square with the compassion and infinite forgiveness of Jesus.  If the man from Nazareth truly is the human face of God, there’s a disconnect here.

And then there’s the fact that the early chapters of the Bible (what C.S .Lewis called “the parables of Genesis”) read like ancient folk tales or “myths”.  They aren’t mythical in the sense that they aren’t so; but they are much closer to poetry than prose.

When Gungor sings “you make beautiful things, you make beautiful things out of dust,” he is affirming the God of the Apostle’s Creed: the “Maker of heaven and earth.”

But if you ask how God made the world and all that dwells therein, Gungor would direct you to the scientists (who are making shocking discoveries about the wonders of God’s creation on a daily basis) and to poets who reckon with the wonder the rocks and skeletons reveal.

Al Mohler action figure

Al Mohler is not impressed.  There is a biblical worldview and a scientific world view, he says, and we must decide which has the upper hand.  Mohler isn’t anti-science, but when scientific consensus and the revealed, inerrant, infallible Word of God are at odds, Christians go with the Good Book.  Every time.  Simple as that.

We know the Bible is true, Al says, because it is the very Word of God, and God doesn’t lie.  We know the Bible is the Word of God because the Bible itself says so.

When Michael Gungor accepts the miracles of Jesus while questioning the historicity (and the ethical implications) of Noah’s flood, Mohler accuses him of arbitrary and illogical thinking.  Dispense with an inerrant Bible, Al says, and you have no philosophical foundation for accepting anything the Bible says.

All or nothing at all.

Mohler doesn’t argue that the Biblical worldview is demonstrably superior to the scientific alternative.  He’s a “presuppositionalist” who believes our fundamental, a prioriassumptions predetermine our conclusions.  Start with God’s word and you get a biblical worldview; start with science, and you get a scientific worldview. Small wonder that the God of the Bible and the men in lab coats sometimes disagree, and when they do, eternal destiny hangs in the balance.

Mohler doesn’t argue with scientists, or the vast majority of theologians and biblical scholars who claim to be cool with science.  These people don’t pay his bills.  Al’s bills are paid by simple folk who love God and have never been forced to grapple with the theological implications of the scientific method.

A quarter of the American population believes the sun revolves around the earth, so Al has a considerable constituency.

I’m not saying that Al Mohler is simple, or that he’s a con man sayin’ what he knows ain’t so.  His theology is what happens when you spend a quarter century in an environment where no one is allowed to consider alternatives to “the biblical worldview”.

Most of us don’t live in that world.  Like Michael Gungor, we want it all: the Bible, the poets, and the best science our little minds can grasp.

Like Gungor’s song, our pendulum swings between “Could a garden come up from this ground at all?” and “you make things beautiful!”  We want  to hold the anguished question and the ringing affirmation in holy tension.

If Al Mohler’s logic works for you, that’s fine. If you are young, restless and reformed, go for it.  By all means.

But millions of young people aren’t prepared to choose between secular scholarship and the Bible.  The crisis might come in high school, or it may wait until college; but sooner or later, our sons and daughters confront questions about God, faith and the Bible that never came up in Sunday School and were never addressed from the pulpit.  Convinced that the Church has no answers, they are walking away, millions of them, and they’re not coming back.

Al Mohler has nothing to say to these kids; he might as well be speaking in tongues.

But some of them will listen to Gungor.

I hope they do.  But pop singers, however gifted, can’t do the heavy theological lifting for the church.

Al Mohler has a point, after all.   It isn’t hard to find churches that have abandoned their erstwhile allegiance to an inerrant Bible and Four-Spiritual-Laws evangelism, but what do they offer as a substitute?

Thin gruel, mostly.

Typically, denominational training materials avoid hard questions that easily translate into controversy and cancelled orders.

The adult Sunday school classes created for the rebels and eggheads drift from “The Gnostic Gospels”, to “Zealot: the Life and Times of Jesus of Nazareth”, to the latest self-help guide for the spiritually inclined.

It’s all great fun, but such classes rarely coalesce around a gospel consensus; a few hearty conclusions about how Jesus impacts life in the real world.   The traditional language of faith no longer speaks to us and we have little to put in its place.

And Al Mohler is right about the need to make fundamental choices.  But the question isn’t whether or not we take the scientists seriously.  God wants to know if we take Jesus seriously.

Do we?

We need a new orthodoxy

. . . that begins and ends with Jesus and the kingdom he proclaimed

. . . that values truth wherever it is found

. . . that is simple, honest and humble.

Michael Gungor may not have all the answers we seek; but he shows us how to ask the right questions.

Share this:

  • Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
  • Click to print (Opens in new window)
  • Click to email a link to a friend (Opens in new window)
  • More
  • Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Reddit (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Tumblr (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Pinterest (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Pocket (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Telegram (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on WhatsApp (Opens in new window)

OPINION: Views expressed in Baptist News Global columns and commentaries are solely those of the authors.
Tags:Al MohlerSouthern Baptist ConventionDuke McCallSouthern Baptist Theological SeminaryBlog PostsMichael GungorRoy Lee Honeycut
More by
Alan Bean
  • Get BNG headlines in your inbox

  • Featured

    • First they came for them, then they came for us

      Opinion

    • U.S. immigration policies are harming persecuted Christians, evangelical leaders warn

      News

    • Hispanic students report highest levels of discrimination in some educational institutions

      News

    • Idolatry is alive and well today

      Opinion


    Curated

    • As psychedelic-assisted therapy grows, so does interest from a new group: chaplains

      As psychedelic-assisted therapy grows, so does interest from a new group: chaplains

    • Victims march to Rome to demand ‘zero tolerance’ on church abuse

      Victims march to Rome to demand ‘zero tolerance’ on church abuse

    • AI Has No Place in the Pulpit

      AI Has No Place in the Pulpit

    • This Christian text you’ve never heard of, The Shepherd of Hermas, barely mentions Jesus − but it was a favorite of early Christians far and wide

      This Christian text you’ve never heard of, The Shepherd of Hermas, barely mentions Jesus − but it was a favorite of early Christians far and wide

    Read Next:

    SoConCon links Focus on the Family with secular politics of Heritage Foundation and Koch groups

    NewsSteve Rabey

    More Articles

    • All
    • News
    • Opinion
    • Curated
    • First Fresh Expressions United Methodist gathering won’t go to Florida

      NewsCynthia Astle

    • 50 years later, Celebrate Life still is the wind we soar on

      NewsMark Wingfield

    • Christian legal group Alliance Defending Freedom allegedly ‘manufactured’ wedding cases to battle gay rights

      NewsSteve Rabey

    • Never say never: The Now and Forever Windows at the National Cathedral

      OpinionGreg Garrett, Senior Columnist

    • LBJ’s Great Society hurt Blacks more than slavery, Tim Scott declares

      NewsMark Wingfield

    • For the Bible tells me so: The Bible and the Civil Rights movement

      OpinionKaitlyn Schiess

    • Candidates seek to increase LGBTQ representation in public office

      NewsJeff Brumley

    • Templeton Foundation funds first-of-its-kind research into the religious ‘nones’

      NewsJeff Brumley

    • Listen to the woman: Cassidy Hutchinson

      OpinionJulia Goldie Day

    • Cats and dogs at Bubba-Doo’s

      OpinionCharles Qualls

    • Hispanic students report highest levels of discrimination in some educational institutions

      NewsMark Wingfield

    • Idolatry is alive and well today

      OpinionNapoleon Harris

    • Conspiracy theories link Jesus, JFK and Trump

      NewsSteve Rabey

    • First they came for them, then they came for us

      OpinionBill Leonard, Senior Columnist

    • Ministry jobs and more

      NewsBarbara Francis

    • U.S. immigration policies are harming persecuted Christians, evangelical leaders warn

      NewsJeff Brumley

    • The importance of remembering the March on Washington in 2023

      AnalysisJeremiah Bullock

    • Don’t call it burn-out

      OpinionTodd Thomason

    • SoConCon links Focus on the Family with secular politics of Heritage Foundation and Koch groups

      NewsSteve Rabey

    • Together for Hope names Appalachia director

      NewsBNG staff

    • Why potluck and Wednesday night dinners are important

      OpinionMaina Mwaura

    • Remembering BNG columnist Terry Austin

      NewsMark Wingfield

    • Are Americans ‘spiritual’ or ‘religious’ or both or neither?

      NewsJeff Brumley

    • Chi Alpha campus ministry leaders indicted in Texas

      NewsMark Wingfield

    • Why the Haitian shoe seller can’t sell shoes

      AnalysisCynthia Vacca Davis

    • First Fresh Expressions United Methodist gathering won’t go to Florida

      NewsCynthia Astle

    • 50 years later, Celebrate Life still is the wind we soar on

      NewsMark Wingfield

    • Christian legal group Alliance Defending Freedom allegedly ‘manufactured’ wedding cases to battle gay rights

      NewsSteve Rabey

    • LBJ’s Great Society hurt Blacks more than slavery, Tim Scott declares

      NewsMark Wingfield

    • Candidates seek to increase LGBTQ representation in public office

      NewsJeff Brumley

    • Templeton Foundation funds first-of-its-kind research into the religious ‘nones’

      NewsJeff Brumley

    • Hispanic students report highest levels of discrimination in some educational institutions

      NewsMark Wingfield

    • Conspiracy theories link Jesus, JFK and Trump

      NewsSteve Rabey

    • Ministry jobs and more

      NewsBarbara Francis

    • U.S. immigration policies are harming persecuted Christians, evangelical leaders warn

      NewsJeff Brumley

    • SoConCon links Focus on the Family with secular politics of Heritage Foundation and Koch groups

      NewsSteve Rabey

    • Together for Hope names Appalachia director

      NewsBNG staff

    • Remembering BNG columnist Terry Austin

      NewsMark Wingfield

    • Are Americans ‘spiritual’ or ‘religious’ or both or neither?

      NewsJeff Brumley

    • Chi Alpha campus ministry leaders indicted in Texas

      NewsMark Wingfield

    • This week’s BNG webinar: Amy Butler

      NewsBNG staff

    • A former victim of Boko Haram terrorism finds love in America; meanwhile, others remain in captivity 

      NewsAnthony Akaeze

    • Falwell accuses Liberty University of financial and sexual irregularities in legal filing

      NewsSteve Rabey

    • Samford students mark one-year anniversary with another silent protest for LGBTQ inclusion

      NewsMark Wingfield

    • Most Americans see immigration as a good thing, but Republicans disagree

      NewsJeff Brumley

    • United Methodist court exonerates suspended Latina bishop on four charges

      NewsCynthia Astle

    • Kate Campbell is glad to be back in the room where it happens

      NewsMaina Mwaura

    • In South Africa, fire deaths shine a light on immigrant churches in ‘hijacked’ slum buildings”

      NewsRay Mwareya

    • Finding a pastor today is nothing like it was 30 years ago, consultants caution

      NewsJeff Brumley

    • SBC expels Oklahoma church over pastor’s racial impersonations

      NewsMaina Mwaura

    • Never say never: The Now and Forever Windows at the National Cathedral

      OpinionGreg Garrett, Senior Columnist

    • For the Bible tells me so: The Bible and the Civil Rights movement

      OpinionKaitlyn Schiess

    • Listen to the woman: Cassidy Hutchinson

      OpinionJulia Goldie Day

    • Cats and dogs at Bubba-Doo’s

      OpinionCharles Qualls

    • Idolatry is alive and well today

      OpinionNapoleon Harris

    • First they came for them, then they came for us

      OpinionBill Leonard, Senior Columnist

    • Don’t call it burn-out

      OpinionTodd Thomason

    • Why potluck and Wednesday night dinners are important

      OpinionMaina Mwaura

    • American idols: Andrew Whitehead on American faith and Christian nationalism

      OpinionGreg Garrett, Senior Columnist

    • Creating inner peace

      OpinionPhawnda Moore

    • ‘Nobody wants to be an addict’

      OpinionTambi Brown Swiney

    • Men and congregational singing: The rest of the story

      OpinionCharlie Fuller

    • Things Christians need to know, for our own sake, about Yom Kippur, Judaism’s Day of Atonement

      OpinionKen Sehested

    • The real religious crisis in America

      OpinionMartin Thielen

    • Fear of dancing and the courage to be serious

      OpinionGreg Jarrell

    • Ken and Angela Paxton do a little sidestep — while quoting Bible verses

      OpinionRodney Kennedy

    • This is why people are leaving the church

      OpinionJulia Goldie Day

    • Criticism of Andy Stanley is rooted in father wounds

      OpinionRick Pidcock

    • What do we mean by ‘affirming’?

      OpinionRobert P. Sellers

    • How long before a revolution?

      OpinionJamar A. Boyd II

    • On death

      OpinionGlen Schmucker

    • Al Mohler vs. Andy Stanley: What’s really going on?

      OpinionMark Wingfield

    • More religion in public schools raises concerns about religious liberty

      OpinionBryan Kelley

    • In biblical truth-telling, we need to mind the gap between clergy and laity

      OpinionMark Wingfield

    • A ‘sad day’ for America?

      OpinionRodney Kennedy

    • As psychedelic-assisted therapy grows, so does interest from a new group: chaplains

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • Victims march to Rome to demand ‘zero tolerance’ on church abuse

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • AI Has No Place in the Pulpit

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • This Christian text you’ve never heard of, The Shepherd of Hermas, barely mentions Jesus − but it was a favorite of early Christians far and wide

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • Greek court: Orthodox students cannot be exempted from religion classes

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • Why separating fact from fiction is critical in teaching US slavery

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • Everything is political, oh my! Why churches should build better capacity for political dialogue

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • Pastors Wonder About Church Members Who Never Came Back Post-Pandemic

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • Meeting between Jewish leaders and Benjamin Netanyahu broaches judicial overhaul — and gets personal

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • West Side Story: Diverse NY Church Represents 5 Continents

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • National Cathedral windows shift from themes of Confederacy to racial justice

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • Culture War Is Not Spiritual Warfare

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • AI won’t be replacing your priest, minister, rabbi or imam any time soon

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • Who is Siggy Flicker, the ‘Real Housewife’ behind Trump’s Rosh Hashanah message condemning ‘liberal Jews’?

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • Ideological rifts among U.S. bishops are in the spotlight ahead of momentous Vatican meeting

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • Two mainland China bishops to attend big Vatican meeting after tensions

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • Nazi Germany had admirers among American religious leaders – and white supremacy fueled their support

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • How Japanese American Pastors Prepared Their Flocks For Internment

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • Belly dancers, terrorists or taxi drivers: Arab American comedians spoof stereotypes

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • Freedom struggles of China’s Christian rights lawyers

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • ‘Holy Food’ explores American history and religion through food

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • Connecting With the Good News Generation

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • What’s the news impact of the intense racism investigation at Wheaton College?

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • Who was Hardeep Singh Nijjar, the Sikh activist whose killing has divided Canada and India?

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    • Riding a wave of converts, one group aims to fuse Orthodoxy with Southern values

      Curated

      Exclude from home pageBNG staff

    Conversations that Matter.

    © 2023 Baptist News Global. All rights reserved.

    Want to share a story? We hope you will! Read our republishing, terms of use and privacy policies here.

    • Facebook
    • Twitter
    • Instagram
    • LinkedIn
    • RSS