Not too long ago, Andy Stanley explicitly denied the authority of Scripture and implicitly denied the infallibility of Scripture. He claimed that the foundation of Christianity was not the Bible, and suggested that the Bible contains historical inaccuracies and even called it indefensible (More can be read about this here). This past week, he opened up his sermon by saying,
“If somebody can predict their own death and then their own resurrection, I’m not all that concerned about how they got into the world.”
The birth of Christ is a pretty big part of Christianity. In fact, it is crucial to the Gospel. Had Jesus not been born, then He would not have lived a perfect human life and He would not have died His atoning death on the Cross. If the Incarnation did not happen, Jesus would not be fully God and fully man. If the Virgin Birth did not happen, then prophecy would have failed and Jesus would be tainted by Original Sin. The whole nativity is a crucial part of Christianity. However, Stanley continued,
“Christianity doesn’t hinge on the truth or even the stories around the Birth of Jesus.”
If this were the case, the Bible would not have bothered to explain His birth. This devaluing of Jesus’s birth and its impact on Christianity is a result of his low view of Scripture and its authority. While Stanley claims that Christianity hinges on the resurrection and not the birth (Which is a false dichotomy), he fails to recognize that the Resurrection would not have happened without the birth. Neither would the death, the atonement, or the forgiveness of sins.
[Contributed by Brandon Hines]
