Reading Scripture and Church history reminds us that all human institutions can be easily corrupted. Sadly enough the Christian clergy for 2000 years have a spotty (if not sorry) record in this respect. “In 1983,” says Megan Basham, “theologian Francis Schaeffer grew alarmed by evangelical groups concerning themselves with fashionable issues like ‘unjust structures’ and inequitable wealth distribution rather than sinful human hearts. He had no doubt he was seeing capitulation to the spirit of the age. And he had no doubt where such socialist, utopian thinking would lead: ‘Here the gospel has been reduced to a program for transforming social structures. This is the Marxist line. It does not mean that those who take this position are Communists. But it does mean they have made a complete confusion of the kingdom of God with the basic socialistic concepts’” (p. xxv).
Megan Basham’s Shepherds for Sale: How Evangelical Leaders Traded the Truth for a Leftist Agenda (New York: HarperCollins, c. 2024; Kindle Edition) takes a careful look at the evangelical world and shows how its leaders have all too frequently followed the spirit of the age Schaeffer denounced. In the book’s epigraph she cites J. Gresham Machen, who said (in Christianity and Liberalism): “Presenting an issue sharply is indeed by no means a popular business at the present time.” Defining terms carefully and following logic is too often “regarded as an impious proceeding.” But, Machen insisted: “Light may seem at times to be an impertinent intruder, but it is always beneficial in the end. The type of religion which rejoices in the pious sound of traditional phrases, regardless of their meanings, or shrinks from ‘controversial’ matters, will never stand amid the shocks of life. In the sphere of religion, as in other spheres, the things about which men are agreed are apt to be the things that are least worth holding; the really important things are the things about which men will fight.” So Basham is ready to fight—and at times turns polemical. Consequently her book has elicited anguished cries from some of the individuals and ministries she assails, but she surely cites considerable evidence that should alarm us.
As a journalist Basham combines anecdotes with sociological data and theological concerns. As a Southern Baptist she tends to focus on America’s largest Protestant denomination (to be precise, a “convention”) and sides with Joy Davidman (C.S. Lewis’s wife), saying: “mustn’t the churches adapt Christianity to suit the ideas of our time? No, they must not. Our ideas are killing us spiritually. When your child swallows poison, you don’t sit around thinking of ways to adapt his constitution to a poisonous diet. You give him an emetic.” Basham interviewed dozens of people who “are ordinary Christians who feel confused and dismayed to see well-known pastors and ministry leaders letting the culture rather than Scripture dictate the content of their teaching. They see leaders insisting that Jesus requires them to get Covid-19 vaccinations and lobby for immigration bills, but doesn’t require them to speak clearly about sexual morality. They feel, frankly, like sheep without shepherds” (p. xv).
They feel this because many of their churches have been taken over by leftists (generally identifying themselves as “progressives”) determined to redirect their priorities. As soon as the Bolsheviks gained control of Russia a century ago they plotted a similar take-over in America. They planted agents in mainline Protestant churches to promote socialism under the banner of “social justice.” They considered America’s clergy “suckers” easily duped to advance the communist cause. Amazingly, an estimated 20 percent of Episcopalian rectors were “associated with communist activities” (p. xvii). Basham wants us to remember this history as we read her book. “You will see eerily similar parallels to events happening today. Secular, leftist organizations that have no interest in furthering God’s kingdom or seeing biblical morality enacted in the public square are funneling money into front groups with names like the “Evangelical Environmental Network” and the “Evangelical Immigration Table.” Well-known evangelical leaders, posing as representatives of average Christians in the pews, are once again publishing open letters in national newspapers on behalf of leftist causes” (p. xviii). Secular leftists know that large numbers of voters opposing them are evangelical Christians. To advance their agenda—e.g. climate change, LGBTQ rights, illegal immigration—leftists need to gain influence in these conservative churches.
Climate alarmism stands at the heart of the progressive agenda, though Evangelicals have shown little alarm at it. Given their biblical worldview, however, some can be enlisted in “creation care.” Thus the Evangelical Environmental Network came into being 30 years ago with a “mission: to win average churchgoers to the green cause by leveraging the influence of trusted institutions like Christianity Today and the National Association of Evangelicals” (p. 5). Targeting the educated elites in evangelicalism—university professors, denominational leaders, Christian publications—the EEN worked to make environmental concern a moral issue. A bumper sticker asking not “what would Jesus do” but “What Would Jesus Drive” gained momentary attention, leading Jay Leno to quip “that Jesus would have driven a dented-up pickup—he was a carpenter, after all’” (p. 8). A decade after its founding the “EEN received an influx of cash from left-wing donors that allowed it to found a new, more aggressive front organization. One of the funders was the Clinton Global Initiative—yes, those Clintons—which kicked in five hundred thousand dollars” (p. 9). The Hewlett Foundation donated another half-million. Subsequently the Evangelical Climate Initiative was launched and gained considerable publicity as well as enhanced renown for lobbyists such as Richard Cizik, who served as a vice president for the National Association of Evangelicals. Supporting the initiative were “various Christianity Today editors and writers,” Saddleback Church pastor Rick Warren, the presidents of the Council for Christian Colleges and Universities, and World Vision.
Strangely absent from the list of the initiative’s signers were actual climate scientists such as Professor Cal Beisner, who has devoted a lifetime to studying climate change and established the Cornwall Alliance for the Stewardship of Creation which includes NASA climate scientist Dr. Roy Spencer and environmental economist Dr. Ross McKitrick. They drafted a deeply sourced response to the EEN, providing a “detailed, relevant research.” They “did not deny that global warming was occurring. But the Cornwall Alliance demonstrated how much uncertainty remained about the degree to which it was human-induced, and they denied that it was an extreme problem requiring an extreme solution, “’Foreseeable global warming will have moderate and mixed (not only harmful but also helpful), not catastrophic, consequences for humanity—including the poor—and the rest of the world’s inhabitants,’ they wrote.” Certainly Christians should be good stewards and love their neighbors, but the alliance signers rejected the assertion that believers should be “spiritually guilted into” supporting government programs such as the green new deal (p. 24). To Basham: “What we see is that from the earliest stages of the creation care movement, it has never been simply an effort to encourage personal righteousness or reflection on how individual Christians might steward the earth responsibly or practice conservation in our own spheres of influence” (p. 24). It is, quite simply, an effort to enlist Evangelicals in a leftist endeavor to change the nation’s energy policies.
So too there was a concerted effort to enlist evangelicals in the Democrats’ open borders position in order to love one’s neighbors. A 2020 article in the Baptist Press, “the house organ of the Southern Baptist Convention, published a lie.” The article claimed that a report linking the Evangelical Immigration Table with George Soros was untrue. In fact, Basham found, Soros had poured millions of dollars into the organization. “This was not a small matter because, largely under the direction of, first, Richard Land, and then Russell Moore, the SBC’s Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission [EALC] had become a key leader in the EIT. Nor were Land and Moore alone. Leadership for a host of trusted evangelical organizations, including the Council for Christian Colleges and Universities, the NAE [National Association of Evangelicals], World Relief, InterVarsity Christian Fellowship, Focus on the Family, Prison Fellowship Ministries, and the Wesleyan Church, had joined hands with the EIT. If it was being bankrolled by Soros, they would all have a lot of explaining to do” (pp. 33-34). Though rank-and-file Evangelicals were more concerned about “better border security” than “creating a path to citizenship,” their spokesmen championed open borders as a way of following Jesus. Eric Metaxas briefly supported the EIT but soon became critical of its agenda, saying: “‘It’s disturbing that some Christians seem quite happy to twist the scripture that says we are to ‘care for the strangers and aliens among us’ into a carte blanche invitation to enact dramatically destructive immigration policies, as though painting a smiley face over the monstrous reality of encouraging vicious drug cartels and child-sex traffickers. It’s hard to overstate the blasphemy of using God’s Word in that way’” (p. 50).
As a journalist Basham is deeply distressed by the influence of leftist “money men” on Christian media. For many decades Christianity Today served as the flagship for Evangelicalism. Reflecting the views of Billy Graham and Carl F.H. Henry, the magazine adhered to strongly traditional theological and ethical positions. Since the dawn of this century, however, progressives have taken control of the publication. Subscriptions have declined rather dramatically, but financial support from foundations such as the Lilly Endowment have kept CT afloat—and the values of such foundations seem to shape those of the editorial staff. Indeed: “a quick look at public campaign records shows that when it comes to political donations, Christianity Today’s heart is most certainly with the party of abortion and the LGBTQ agenda. Between 2015 and 2022, the outlet’s staff and board members made seventy-four political donations. Every single one went to Democrats” (p. 75). Inasmuch as some of the donors were on the editorial staff this was a serious violation of journalistic ethics! But, amazingly: “Five different editors at Christianity Today contributed to Democrats (and only Democrats) between 2015 and 2022, including news editor Daniel Silliman” (p. 76). Sad to say, numbers of other evangelical publicans have also drifted away from their roots, tacking to the winds of contemporary culture.
In a chapter showing “how the government used pastors to spread Covid-19 propaganda,” Basham details the unprecedented capitulation of churches to the state. She became “incensed at how the Southern Baptist Convention’s lobbying arm” promoted virtually all the positions set forth by Anthony Fauci and many of the nation’s governors. Fauci’s emissary to evangelicals was National Institutes of Health director Francis Collins, widely respected for his Christian testimony. (Unknown to many Evangelicals, Collins supported racial quotas and the LGBTP agenda in the NIH, requiring “scientists seeking NIH grants to pass diversity, equity, and inclusion tests” (p. 107}). An organization he founded, BioLogos, “released a public statement titled ‘Love Your Neighbor, Get the Shot’ in favor of vaccines, masks, and lockdown orders” (p. 95). Ask no questions, just do it! Ignore, for example, the fact that many of the various governments’ edicts could be seriously challenged, as did the “tens of thousands of epidemiologists and public health scientists, including a Nobel Prize winner. As the pandemic progressed, they also spoke out against mask and vaccine mandates and called for more serious consideration of vaccine injuries and risk” (p. 96). One of the authors of the Barrington Declaration, Jay “Bhattacharya told me that while he had long admired Collins before the pandemic, today he believes the former NIH director abused his position both as a public health official and as a trusted Christian voice,” helping sideline any opposition the Church might have mounted (p. 99). In a 2020 interview published by Christianity Today, famed New York Presbyterian pastor Tim Keller joined Collins in condemning “churches like John MacArthur’s Grace Community Church, which defied Covid lockdowns and resumed meeting after two months, represented the ‘bad and ugly’ of good, bad, and ugly Christian responses to the virus” (p. 104). Megachurch pastor Rick Warren condemned “the unlovingness of Christians who questioned the efficacy of masks, specifically framing it as a matter of obedience to Jesus” (p. 105).
Turning to a truly sensitive subject, racism, Basham challenges the “social justice” positions of some prominent Megachurch pastors such as J.D. Greear, a recent president of the Southern Baptist Convention. “Their sermon style tends to be similarly informal, rarely taxing attendees’ attention by” exploring theology. Rather, “a new form of spiritual jargon—words like hegemony and cultural representation—has peppered their preaching. Out of the pulpit, many have taken up the same social activism that” led to the removal of statues of Thomas Jefferson and Patrick Henry. “National outlets like PBS and the Washington Post had fawned over Greear” for doing things such as “retiring the 150-year-old presidential gavel that had belonged to Robert E. Lee’s chaplain and the founder of the first Southern Baptist seminary, John Broadus, a man Charles Spurgeon once called the ‘greatest of living preachers.”’ Greear also tried, unsuccessfully, to “change the SBC’s name to “Great Commission Baptists” as part of what the media called as a ‘racial reckoning’ that would give the denomination a ‘global’ identity” (p. 125).
Unsurprizingly, the Critical Race Theory pastor Greear seems to endorse is taught in some of the SBC’s seminaries and evangelical universities. For example, Ibram X. Kendi, a noted spokesman for CRT, was asked to address a conference for the Council for Christian Colleges and Universities, even though he espouses “liberation theology, which mainstream evangelicalism has long acknowledged to be both heretical and Marxist” (p. 131). In 2021, “Billy Graham’s alma mater, Wheaton, held a racially segregated graduation ceremony for minority students, calling it a ‘Racial and Cultural Minority Senior Recognition Ceremony.’ It also removed a nearly seventy-year-old plaque honoring one of its most famous sons, Jim Elliot, a 1950s missionary who was martyred while witnessing to an Ecuadorean tribe, because the inscription described his murderers as ‘savage’” (p.. 133). Even Campus Crusade (now called Cru) was accused by some whistleblowers of drifting “‘away from the Great Commission it had always zealously pursued in favor of ‘an agenda of social justice, liberal theology, and CRT.’ A 179-page report presented detailed and well-documented evidence that Cru had begun importing CRT-derived teachings in 2015, ‘embracing a secular system of ideas that divides humanity into victims or oppressors’” (p. 135).
To Basham: “Where Christianity teaches that mankind’s greatest need is salvation from his sin, CRT teaches that it is power over his oppressors.” Whereas the Bible divides people into “sinners and saints,” CRT advocates position them as “victims and oppressors.” “CRT encourages collective grievance in the first group and collective guilt in the second, without ever dealing with the individual heart. Rather than embracing unity through Christ, it encourages division through ethnicity, pitting groups against one another. Rather than goodwill, it instills suspicion and bitterness, encouraging its devotees to read bias and secret aggression where none may have been intended. Dr. Gerald McDermott, the Anglican chair of divinity at Samford University’s Beeson Divinity School, rightly called it a ‘new religion’ that ‘encourages people to practice what Jesus condemned, judgment of another person’s thinking and character . . . This is racism by another name. It is also sinful judgment’” (pp. 130-31).
When #MeToo claims flooded the nation several years ago churches came under the radical feminist spotlight and leftist leaders embraced “MeToo’s dogma that any nebulous definition of power that can be ascribed to men erases agency (and thus responsibility) on the part of women” (p. 158). The stage was set in 2011 when Arne Duncan, President Obama’s education secretary, “began to give hyperbolic speeches decrying the campus ‘rape culture’ that had given rise to a ‘plague’ of sexual assaults and an ‘epidemic of sexual violence’” (p. 150). No evidence was given to support this, but it became something of a mantra that would impact churches as well as schools. In 2019 Russell “Moore unexpectedly changed the theme of the ERLC’s 2019 conference from ‘Gospel Courage’ to what he claimed was the SBC’s ‘Abuse Crisis’” (p. 169). Subsequently, delegates to the annual convention established an abuse task force to investigate and expose incidents of sexual abuse in local churches. The results were published in a “Guidepost Report.” The secular media referred to it as a “bombshell” revealing not “a few bad apples but was a ‘diseased orchard’” (p. 175). In fact, the report showed that in 21 years there were 409 accused abusers who had some connection with the SBC churches. Basham says there were probably a million people working in SBC during these years, and “even assuming that every accusation is true (and there’s no reason not to assume that nearly all are), this is, in truth, an astonishingly low rate.” After a six month investigation Houston Chronicle reporters found the same thing. Still more, the Guidepost report found “only two alleged abusers were . . . currently serving in Southern Baptist churches.” “By comparison, Chicago Public Schools is made up of 39,000 employees. Yet students lodged 470 complaints of sexual abuse against school staffers in 2022 alone” (p. 176). Basham in no way minimizes the harm done in sexual assaults. She simply demands the facts be told. And the fact is there is no “plague” or “epidemic” of sexual assaults in the SBC.
Since the turn of the century, with amazing rapidity America’s mainline churches (the “seven sisters”) endorsed the homosexual agenda. By-and-large, conservative Evangelicals have retained a traditional sexual ethic, condemning same-sex practices. But there has been a well-funded LGBTQ effort to get them to be “inclusive.” The Arcus Foundation spent millions of dollars “”challenging the promotion of narrow or hateful interpretations of religious doctrine’ within every major Christian denomination.” This included giving $2,000,000 to a group seeking to “secure the full participation of people of all sexual orientations and gender identities in the United Methodist Church,’ the last of the mainline denominations still resistant to full affirmation of the entire rainbow panoply” (p. 203). These activists succeeded, leading to a large exodus of traditional Methodist congregations from the denomination. Some prominent megachurch pastors, such as Andy Stanley (son off the legendary Charles Stanley), have endorsed the LGBTQ agenda. Stanley not only pastors a huge Atlanta church but influences hundreds of pastors through his publications. In a private meeting in Phoenix, AZ, he urged pastors to be more welcoming, saying he encourages “gay couples in his congregation to commit to each other” and get “married in their churches” (p. 199). At a 2022 conference he praised LGBTQ persons who attend church for having “more faith than I do” and dismissed the “clobber passages” of Scripture generally cited to condemn same-sex activities. “Stanley had already preached messages about needing to ‘unhitch from the Old Testament,’ seeming to suggest he was laying the groundwork for more liberal theology” (p. 200). Here’s the truth,” Basham says, “countless tentacles of gay and transgender ideology that have invaded evangelical institutions,” including World Vision and scores of Christian universities, including Baylor, Azusa Pacific, Wheaton, and Calvin. Since 2019 Christianity Today has published gay-affirming articles.
Concluding her treatise, Basham confesses to living a wayward life in her early years, addicted to sex and drugs. During these “wasteland years” various folks, including empathetic Christian psychologists tried to help her. “But focusing on my upbringing and childhood experiences did nothing to help break the stranglehold of my sin” (p. 235). What she needed was not therapy but clear doctrinal teaching, calling her to repentance and righteousness. Reading The Vanishing Conscience by John F. MacArthur she at last confronted the truth that would transform her. At the same time she found the works of Charles Spurgeon, who staunchly opposed socialism in his day. In fact: “‘He savaged it.’ Over a period of years, the Prince of Preachers unhesitatingly taught that Marx’s ‘religion’ desired to ‘supplant’ Christianity” (p. 239). In the last days of his life, Friedrich Engels (co-author of the Communist Manifesto) said that the man he most disliked was Spurgeon. To follow in Spurgeon’s steps, opposing the socialists now trying to subvert Evangelicalism, Basham has written this work. Read it not as the final revelation or a scholarly analysis but as an impassioned call by a well-informed journalist.