Fault Lines
Fault Lines: The Social Justice Movement and Evangelicalism’s Looming Catastrophe
By: Voddie T. Baucham Jr.
[Fulfilling “A book written by a POC (person of color)” as part of the 2021 Fall Reading Challenge.]
“Love your brothers and sisters enough to contend with them and for them.”
“Why are people so up in arms and claiming we’re teaching/preaching/perpetuating Critical Race Theory?! We don’t even know what it is! We just want all people to feel loved and accepted and to fight for justice!”
This may be a sentiment you’ve voiced yourself or have heard recently. [Check out Cynical Theories for the best comprehensive discourse on Critical Theory]
Voddie Baucham, black pastor and professor, has written this book to expose the fault line that exists in the world today that is sure to widen and do damage to our society and our churches.
This particular fault line is the ideology of Critical Race Theory (CRT) and Intersectionality (I). Fault Lines exposes how prevalent and subliminal this ideology is in our culture and how we operate out of it, a lot of times without even knowing.
The concept of ‘social justice’ has picked up steam in the recent years.
Baucham says, “I believe that the current concept of social justice is incompatible with biblical Christianity… Our problem is a lack of clarity and charity in our debate over the place, priority, practice, and definition of justice.”
Accepting the risk of being attacked by people accusing him of “‘being a sellout,’ ‘trying to curry favor with white people,’ not being informed about the struggles black Americans currently face, or just not understanding ‘the black perspective,’” Baucham boldly steps out in love to call his brothers and sisters in Christ to keep God’s Word at center, to take every thought captive, and to “love the truth more than we love our friends, our reputations, or our platforms.”
This review could go on forever with all the meat he packs into each chapter so I’ll keep it short (so you can read the whole book yourself).
He doesn’t shy away from any hard question and talks about things like white privilege and white guilt, systemic racism, police brutality, personal responsibility, the impossibility of equal outcomes, the fact that disparities do not always mean discrimination, the idea that black voices should be elevated above other forms of knowledge, crime, the victimhood mentality, education standards, punishment disparities on drugs, abortion, the BLM movement, and the 2008-2016 elections, to name a few— and addresses them all with recent examples and statistics.
He reminds us that racism cannot be a gospel issue. Antiracism tells us it is an unending fight. The Gospel says that the Good News is Jesus Christ already paid for our sin and we are free from its chains— it is finished! There is no salvation or forgiveness in antiracism, only law. The Gospel says we are saved by grace through faith, not by works so that no man may boast. The biblical Gospel is at odds with the ideology of antiracism which burdens people with not only their own sin, determined merely by the color of their skin, but also the sins of their ancestors.
With every chapter, Baucham brilliantly dispels the lies and manipulations of CRT/I and turns us back to what Scripture says. I believe everyone should read this book.
It would seem that one of the main reasons reviewers don’t like this book is because of the ‘calling out’ Baucham does of very prominent evangelical leaders. I, too, was uncomfortable when, at the beginning, he placed Tim Keller, The Gospel Coalition, Together for the Gospel, 9Marks, and the Southern Baptist Convention on the ‘wrong side’ of the fault line. He goes on to quote people like David Platt, John. O, and John Piper saying things that align with CRT beliefs.
But after reading this book I don’t interpret his purpose and tone the same as the critical reviewers.
Baucham is very clear that he calls these people his friends and he loves them. He does not call their theology into question or declare them heretics. He is clear that he doesn’t believe them to be actively embracing CRT/I ideology and makes clarifying descriptors—like ‘When he said this’ he was aligning with their narrative— and does not do the labeling other reviewers claim he does. I found him to be charitable and gracious. Plus I’ve read recent books by several of these leaders and can attest that they still hold high the Word of God and His Gospel.
“There are groups and ministries that have embraced CRT, and those are problematic. But there is a larger group that is sympathetic to it because of their desire to fight what they see as a problem of racial injustice. Most of the groups I will mention in this book fall into the latter category.”
I believe he is presenting these examples to show how dangerous and sneaky this philosophy is. If these solid theologians are unwittingly playing along with this narrative, how much more susceptible are their flocks.
Baucham is pleading with pastors to protect their churches from this wolf in sheep’s clothing that is leveraging Christians’ love for one another and their desire for justice to force them into a false dichotomy of justice: Either you agree with and espouse our definitions, histories, and paths to justice or you are anti-justice.
Fault Lines is a loving warning to friends of the dangers and implications of falling prey to the CRT/I belief system and showing the trajectory that puts you on as the fault line deepens.
He says,
“This book is, among other things, a plea to the Church. I believe we are being duped by an ideology bent on our demise. This ideology has used our guilt and shame over America’s past, our love for the brethren, and our good and godly desire for reconciliation and justice as a means through which to introduce destructive heresies. We cannot embrace, modify, baptize, or Christianize these ideologies. We must identify, resist, and repudiate them. We cannot be held hostage through emotional blackmail and name-calling. Instead, we must “See to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the world, and not according to Christ” (Col 2:8)”
We don’t have to operate out of their false dichotomy. We are called to biblical justice and we can resist ideologies that twist, reject, or downplay the power of God’s Word.
I loved this book.
I learned so much and many of my perceptions and thoughts about current people and events were corrected through the research he diligently shared.
Some say that Critical Theory and Intersectionality are just analytical tools to help us understand the world better, but Baucham does a convincing job of laying out how these ideologies function as its own religion with their own ‘priesthood’ and ‘canon.’ We would be naive to think we could use them as tools yet keep them from distorting the truths of the Bible.
Beyond his intelligent presentation on all these facets of a complicated topic, I really appreciated him taking his fault line metaphor all the way to Solid Ground. Many books don’t offer much hope or many solutions and you come away feeling a bit discouraged.
But Baucham knows the power of the sovereign Lord!
“Nevertheless, Critical Social Justice will not have the last word. God’s Church will neither fall nor fail. It is “a pillar and buttress of the truth” (1 Pt 3:15), and God’s Word “is firmly fixed in the heavens” (Psalm 119:89)”
“I know God will save His people and vindicate His name. I also know that He will do it through Christians who heed the call to “Remember the Lord, who is great and awesome, and fight for your brothers, your sons, your daughters, your wives, and your homes” (Neh 4:14)”
As Baucham reiterated several times throughout his book. He is not trying to remove the divide— that is not possible. The fault line is there and it will most likely get worse— he has identified the two sides and now we need to decide which side we are going to be on when the chasm widens.
Further Reading
I have read many books on this topic and (as of this writing) this one is in my top 4 books on understanding social justice, CRT/I, and the interaction it has with society at large as well as the church specifically. I feel like I highlighted the whole book!
My other top 3 are:
Confronting Injustice without Compromising Truth: 12 Questions Christians Should Ask about Social Justice by Thaddeus Williams
Cynical Theories: How Activist Scholarship Made Everything about Race, Gender, and Identity— and Why This Harms Everybody by Helen Pluckrose and James Lindsay
The Coddling of the American Mind: How Good Intentions and Bad Ideas Are Setting Up a Generation for Failure by Greg Lukianoff and Jonathan Haidt
Baucham emphasizes the importance of broad reading and I concur. We can’t read in an echo chamber. Here are all the other books I’ve read on this topic. (The ones I found problematic I mark with an *)
The Secular Creed: Engaging Five Contemporary Claims by Rebecca McLaughlin
Bloodlines: Race, Cross, and the Christian by John Piper
Blackout: How Black America Can Make Its Second Escape from the Democratic Plantation by Candace Owens
What is the Mission of the Church: Making Sense of Social Justice, Shalom, and the Great Commission by Kevin DeYoung
How to Fight Racism Young Reader’s Edition: A Guide to Standing Up for Racial Justice by Jemar Tisby*
The Color of Compromise: The Truth about the American Church’s Complicity in Racism by Jemar Tisby*
Generous Justice: How God’s Grace Makes Us Just by Timothy Keller
The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self: Cultural Amnesia, Expressive Individualism, and the Road to the Sexual Revolution by Carl Trueman
Divided by Faith: Evangelical Religion and the Problem of Race in America by Michael O. Emerson*
How the Nations Rage: Rethinking Faith and Politics in a Divided Age by Jonathan Leeman (Dealing with divisions in the church that are often caused by differing opinions on social justice)
The Intolerance of Tolerance by D.A. Carson (Another word that has been redefined and how it influences our exchange of ideas)
Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption by Bryan Stevenson
Fortitude: American Resilience in the Age of Outrage by Dan Crenshaw (Again, a secular book not social justice specific but focuses on relevant things like overcoming obstacles, being unoffendable, and fighting rage with clear-headed question-asking.)
Talking to Strangers: What We Should Know about the People We Don’t Know by Malcolm Gladwell (This looks at why we assume certain things about certain people and the psychology involved with interacting with strangers— the balance between proper suspicion and just paranoia)
Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation by Kristin Kobes Du Mez*
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