(Blog) Moralistic Therapeutic Deism: I Think We're in Trouble - Part 5 - Ep. 985 - September 29, 2026

Moralistic Therapeutic Deism: Opinion Over Scripture

You can know the right Christian words and follow religious customs while your heart remains far from God. That warning is central to Alan Smith and Jeff Rowland's discussion of moralistic therapeutic deism (MTD), a faith centered on being good, feeling good, and keeping God at a distance until help is needed.

In Part 5 of their series on The Smith and Rowland Show, they examine how personal opinion can gain more authority in a believer's life than Scripture. Their concern begins with a familiar practice: attaching God's name to what people already think church and Christianity should look like.

When Personal Preferences Become Religious Authority

The article Alan and Jeff discuss makes a pointed observation: people can use God's name and follow religious customs while allowing human assumptions to shape their lives.

Jeff sees a pattern in that statement. Someone forms an opinion, gives it religious authority, and then tries to make Scripture support it. Over time, the opinion becomes a custom that people treat as God's requirement.

The examples are familiar parts of church life: how music should sound, what a church should look like, how people should dress, how they should sing, and what preaching should sound like. In each case, a person's preferences can become the standard against which everyone else is measured.

Jeff connects this tendency with psychology, the desire for control, and pride. These influences can persuade people that their judgment carries more weight than anyone else's, including the authority of God's Word.

The concern is the authority assigned to those preferences. When people put God's name on their own expectations, they can misrepresent Him. Jeff calls that a profaning of God's name because it presents human opinion as something God has commanded.

Why Believers Can Mistake Opinion for Truth

A lack of sound teaching leaves people to figure faith out

Alan believes many people fall into this pattern because they don't know better. They're trying to do what looks Christian, but they haven't received the preaching and teaching that would help them understand biblical faith.

He also raises a more serious concern: some people may be attempting to live a Christian life without having been born again. As a result, they remain dependent on their own understanding.

During the conversation, Alan estimates that 50% to 60% of the church is affected by MTD and that 70% to 80% isn't receiving the preaching it needs. Jeff thinks the first figure could be higher. They offer these numbers as their own assessments of church life.

Both men place much of the responsibility on preachers and teachers. People need the truth explained, rather than being left to decide what Christianity looks like to them.

Some people resist Scripture when it challenges their views

Jeff also identifies people who struggle to accept a biblical teaching because it conflicts with what they already believe.

Their response amounts to saying that God couldn't have meant what Scripture says, because accepting it would require them to change their thinking. In that situation, personal opinion becomes the authority used to judge the passage.

Even here, Jeff connects the problem with inadequate teaching. People who place their opinions above Scripture may have reached that position because no one has helped them understand and submit to God's Word.

Good Preaching Helps People Understand the Bible

When Alan calls for better preaching, he makes clear that he isn't asking for legalistic shouting. He wants teaching that explains Scripture and helps people retain what they hear.

His preference is strongly expository. As an illustration of that emphasis, he suggests a topical sermon might be one out of twenty messages, with the rest devoted to teaching through Scripture.

Expository preaching takes a passage, chapter, or book of the Bible and explains what it says in context. Because the preacher follows the text, the congregation encounters the range of subjects the passage addresses.

Topical preaching begins with a subject. Alan doesn't reject that approach, but he worries that it often gravitates toward feel-good messages. He also recalls a Barna survey that associated a lack of expository preaching with shallow Christian understanding.

Jeff adds a definition from a conversation with a friend. The friend admitted he didn't know as much about the Bible as he should, yet said he recognized good preaching when someone gave him God's Word and helped him understand it.

That is the goal both hosts affirm: preaching that puts the Bible into people's understanding, rather than leaving them with disconnected topics or memorable delivery.

Topical Teaching Can Address a Congregation's Needs

Jeff gives topical preaching a place within the work of pastoring. He points to the biblical listing of apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and teachers, noting the close connection between pastors and teachers.

A congregation has its own needs and expression within the larger body of Christ. The church at Corinth differed from the church at Ephesus. Likewise, a pastor today teaches a particular group of people at a particular point in their spiritual growth.

A congregation may need a series on prayer, for example, because prayer is important to where the Holy Spirit is leading it. Jeff sees that kind of focused teaching as part of pastoral responsibility.

However, the same timely instruction can arise while preaching through a Bible book. The pastor may not have planned to reach a particular passage on a particular Sunday, but Jeff believes the Holy Spirit can arrange that timing.

Alan agrees while emphasizing that God also had a purpose in the way He gave Scripture. Its sequence and context deserve attention. A topical series can address a present need, but it must remain faithful to what the biblical passages actually say.

Practical Application Must Begin With Biblical Context

Jeff asks whether MTD has grown partly because Bible teaching has become so focused on practical application that it skips the passage's meaning in its original context.

A preacher may draw out something useful or even true while misapplying the Scripture used to support it. Without an understanding of the passage itself, listeners have little foundation for recognizing the difference.

Jeff describes sermons in which a preacher reads a biblical text, delivers a message unrelated to it, and never returns to explain the text. Listeners can leave assuming the passage teaches what the preacher said, even though the sermon never established that connection.

Alan sees another danger in this approach: a preacher can place more confidence in his own ability to persuade people than in the Word of God's power to change their hearts.

That returns the conversation to its central concern. Human assumptions shape lives when a preacher's opinions carry God's name but don't arise from God's Word.

Both hosts insist that topical preaching must be contextual. The subject doesn't excuse the preacher from explaining the passage and staying within its meaning.

Scripture Does More Than Meet an Immediate Personal Need

Alan challenges the expectation that every church service must provide a message that feels directly relevant to the listener's current circumstances.

Someone may arrive asking whether God has a word for them that day. Alan's response is that the reading and preaching of Scripture already gives them God's Word. Its value doesn't depend on whether they immediately recognize a personal application.

A sermon may not appear to address a particular situation in someone's life. Even so, Alan believes a supernatural transaction takes place as that person sits under the preaching of the Word.

More can be imparted than the listener recognizes at the time. Therefore, a message shouldn't be judged only by whether it supplies an immediate answer or produces a desired feeling.

This is part of his concern about making everything in church about the individual. Scripture teaches believers who God is and forms their understanding beyond the needs they brought into the room.

Isaiah 29:13 Brings the Heart Into Focus

Alan and Jeff connect their concern with Isaiah 29:13:

"These people come near to me with their mouth and honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me."

The warning reaches beyond outward religious behavior. A person can say the right things about God while remaining distant from Him.

Both hosts apply that warning to themselves. Alan admits that he can hold God too far away, which connects with the deistic part of MTD. He also acknowledges the appeal of thinking more highly of his own morality than he should and enjoying encouragement that makes him feel good.

They aren't presenting themselves as people untouched by the problem. Their concern includes how much MTD may be present in Alan, in Jeff, and in anyone listening.

For them, the phrase "their hearts are far from me" identifies the central problem. MTD describes a form that spiritual distance can take.

The passage also warns about worship shaped by human rules people have been taught. Alan connects that warning with a religion whose main instructions become "be good," "be nice," and "feel good about yourself." Religious language can remain intact even as the heart moves away from God.

Harshness and Flattery Can Both Misrepresent God's Heart

Severe preaching can become a performance

Alan describes an older internet preacher who has gained attention through a harsh manner. Although the man appears to regard himself as a strong, old-fashioned preacher, Alan hears meanness and sees a message centered on the preacher's own image.

The hosts illustrate the difference with a familiar account of two men preaching the same message about hell. One communicates that he doesn't want his listeners to go there. The other sounds as though he does.

The subject and words may be similar, but the hearers recognize a difference in the preacher's concern for them. Harshness alone doesn't establish faithfulness to God.

Pleasant language can leave people in sin

Jeff also warns about the opposite problem. A preacher can use beautiful, poetic language about love while leaving people in their sin.

In that case, the message may sound caring while failing to reflect God's heart. The hosts argue that language claiming to express love can become harmful when it withholds the truth people need.

Both examples return to Isaiah's warning. Words can sound religious, logical, or even true without expressing a heart connected to God.

Preaching God's Love Includes Repentance

The conversation prompts Alan to examine his own preaching. He acknowledges that he may have spent more time warning about sin and end-times matters than teaching about the love of God.

He isn't calling for more feel-good sermons. Instead, he recognizes that constant warnings can leave an important part of God's character underexplained.

Jeff responds that God's love leads people to repentance. In his view, faithful preaching about that love must include repentance. Otherwise, the message leaves out the response God's love calls forth.

Joy rooted in what Jesus has done

The hosts also make room for genuine joy and encouragement. Feeling good isn't itself the problem.

Jeff says he feels good about Jesus and what Jesus has done for him. His joy comes from having a Savior who died for him, covered his sin, and removed its charge against him.

That places the source of encouragement in Christ's saving work. The therapeutic tendency in MTD makes personal well-being a governing aim, while Jeff describes gratitude grounded in redemption.

The distinction matters because a Christian message can bring comfort while also naming sin and calling people to repentance.

Christian Vocabulary Cannot Replace Knowing Christ

In Matthew 7:21, Jesus warns that not everyone who says "Lord, Lord" will enter the kingdom of heaven. The hosts also discuss His words to people who invoke His name yet hear, "I never knew you."

That warning concerns people who believe they belong to Christ. They know the words, use His name, and participate in religious activity, but their confidence doesn't match their relationship with Him.

Jeff cites a conclusion from the 2005 book discussed in connection with MTD:

"Christian vocabulary cannot take the place of knowing and obeying Christ."

Knowing the terminology of church life cannot establish what that terminology describes. The hosts connect assurance with knowing and obeying Christ, rather than familiarity with Christian expressions.

Alan and Jeff want that warning to prompt honest examination, including their own. Their concern is whether people have received the reality of salvation or become satisfied with a substitute that sounds Christian.

Receiving Christ Begins With the Need for a Savior

Alan explains that being born again involves a spiritual transaction that neither a preacher nor a listener can manufacture.

The response he describes is to receive Christ, repent of sin, and acknowledge the need to be saved. Humanity needs a Savior, and His name is Jesus.

Jeff states the gospel plainly: Jesus was born of a virgin, lived a sinless life, died on the cross, was buried, and rose again for salvation. Trust belongs in Him.

The hosts also offer reassurance. When someone says they have repented and trusted Christ, Alan responds with congratulations, and Jeff celebrates that person as part of God's family. Their warning about false confidence doesn't prevent them from affirming faith in Jesus.

At the same time, they see value in examining themselves along the way. Saying the right words and receiving Christ shouldn't be confused with one another.

Jeff closes his appeal by describing Scripture as the uncovering of God's plan for humanity and His plan to redeem humanity. He urges listeners to trust Jesus and let God's holy Word guide their lives instead of allowing personal opinion to govern them.

Three Responses the Hosts Emphasize for Believers

Listen carefully without searching every sermon for heresy

The article closes by calling believers to pay attention to what their churches teach. That requires careful listening without treating every sermon as a hunt for error.

The questions it raises are concrete:

• Is God presented as sovereign, personal, and saving, or mainly as a distant source of help?
• Does the teaching name sin as sin and teach repentance?
• Is Jesus proclaimed as the Savior whose death and resurrection are the basis of salvation?

These questions address the substance of the teaching rather than the preacher's style.

Pray for pastors to teach the full gospel

The article also recognizes that church leaders may have absorbed MTD without intending to change the faith they preach.

Because of that, the response includes prayer for pastors. The hosts emphasize asking God to give them courage to teach the full gospel, including truths that may not draw larger crowds.

This returns to their earlier concern about inadequate teaching. Pastors need courage to let Scripture govern the message, even when the message challenges what people prefer to hear.

Read Scripture beyond daily encouragement

Finally, the article calls Christians to read the Bible as more than a source of encouragement for the day.

Scripture tells readers who God is, who they are, what God has done in Christ, and how He calls them to respond. Encouragement belongs within that larger account of God and redemption.

This way of reading allows the Bible to shape a believer's understanding. It also challenges the habit of looking for verses that defend opinions already held.

Let God's Word Govern Faith

Christian language and religious customs can coexist with a heart that remains distant from God. Alan and Jeff's concern is that personal preferences can acquire religious authority while Scripture receives less influence over daily life.

Their discussion brings the focus back to knowing and obeying Christ. Faith rests in the Savior they proclaim, and God's Word must remain the authority that teaches believers who He is and how to respond to Him.

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