What is an evangelical?
But is this definition enough to explain what evangelical Christianity is? I have often been burdened by the fact that we who profess to be born-again are often deficient in terms of giving a well grounded characterization of our theological standpoint as evangelicals.
I have often struggled with the definition of what an evangelical Christian is basically since I was young in the faith I have often come to a dismay of using the more common connotation 'born again' Christian, which in a way I believe falls short of what a Christian is by definition. Also because it falls short of what theological standpoint a Christian who professes to be a born again is.
I was reading about Anglican Theology on the internet right now, and have come across the evangelical wing of the Church of England and names like George Carey, J.I. Packer and N.T. Wright are mentioned but there is one more familiar name that's mentioned there it is John Stott whom I deeply admire basically for his book Basic Christianity which I was blessed enough to have read a few years back. In a 2006 interview by Tim Stafford of Christianity Today he gave this very insightful explanation about what an evangelical is:
"An evangelical is a plain, ordinary Christian. We stand in the mainstream of historic, orthodox, biblical Christianity. So we can recite the Apostles Creed and the Nicene Creed without crossing our fingers. We believe in God the Father and in Jesus Christ and in the Holy Spirit.
Having said that, there are two particular things we like to emphasize: the concern for authority on the one hand and salvation on the other.
For evangelical people, our authority is the God who has spoken supremely in Jesus Christ. And that is equally true of redemption or salvation. God has acted in and through Jesus Christ for the salvation of sinners.
I think it's necessary for evangelicals to add that what God has said in Christ and in the biblical witness to Christ, and what God has done in and through Christ, are both, to use the Greek word, hapax—meaning once and for all. There is a finality about God's word in Christ, and there is a finality about God's work in Christ. To imagine that we could add a word to his word, or add a work to his work, is extremely derogatory to the unique glory of our Lord Jesus Christ."
Evangelism Plus: John Stott reflects on where we've been and where we're going, Christianity Today October 2006
Click here to read the entire interview at Christianity Today
Donald G. Bloesch as a 'centrist evangelical'
My theological stance could be designated as centrist evangelical in the sense of remaining in continuity with the message of Holy Scripture and the wisdom of scared tradition. Being centrist must not be confused with taking the middle road between fundamentalism and liberalism. It embraces the truth in both camps and negates the untruth in these positions as well. Being a centrist evangelical means building upon the center or core of faith--the gospel of God's reconciling act in Jesus Christ attested in Holy Scripture and clarified by the fathers and teachers of the faith through the ages. But whereas the fathers and teachers are fallible, the Word of God in Holy Scripture is infallible. Yet this Word is not in propositional formula at human disposal but the reaching out of the hand of God upon the human heart and conscience.
Donald G. Bloesch, God the Almighty: Power, Wisdom, Holiness, Love. Down Grove, Illinois: IVP Academic, p 12.
Recovering God 's Story
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We live in a world where there are many stories—many ways that people interpret and therefore see the world. For example, just go back to the twentieth century and think about the stories that dominated
our world:
• Hitler created the story of Fascism and set out to rule the world through the Aryan race.
• Marx created the story of Communism and set out to rule the world.
• The Secularists created the story that there is no God and that we humans, left on our own in a cold and indifferent world, must learn to make our own way.
• Then came the new religions from the East. They said God is the world and the world is God. So they sought to narrate the world through a resurrected pantheism.
In the meantime, Christianity became increasingly privatistic. We stopped thinking about the story of God. The Christian convictions of Creation, Incarnation, death, Resurrection, and the return of Christ to establish a new heaven and new earth where Jesus is Lord over all creation as the story of the world was neglected. In place of the whole story we concentrated on this piece or that piece of the story. So the story of God as the interpretation of the world from its beginning to its ending simply fell into disuse.
Instead of focusing on God and God’s story, we followed the emphasis of the narcissistic culture and became interested in self. This concern for self was translated into the Christian faith, and into worship and preaching in particular.
For many the issue became “how can God help me?” How can God make my life better? How can I be filled with joy? How can I recover from a divorce? How can I get my life together and be productive? There is nothing wrong with these questions. People have to deal with these issues. However, the primacy given to these questions in recent years is narcissistic and not really what God’s good news is really about.
The good news is that God the creator has a plan for his universe. That plan has been revealed in Jesus Christ, whose incarnation, death and resurrection, and coming again constitute not only God’s story, but in reality the story of the world.
Now, here we are in the twenth-first century. We battle with contending stories of the world. Communism is still a way to view the world. Atheism lurks in the corner. Eastern religions are still attracting many people. And now the terrorists are saying, “We will take over the world and bring you all under Shira Law. You will become enslaved by our laws, and we will terrorize you until you succumb.”
In the meantime, the world is up in flames, so to speak. Europe is under attack. Africa is in a tailspin with Aids, poverty, and genocide. In a world that is disintegrating, somebody is going to narrate the world. Christians can’t narrate the world with a privatistic, narcissistic religion. So Christians must once again become united, not in whining about their pain and brokenness, but in a hope for the future because they are recovering God’s story.
In worship we reenact and proclaim that story. We tell and enact the meaning of the world because we proclaim the truth of the world.
The truth is, God created everything.
The truth is, we fell away from God through the sin of rebellion.
The truth is that God has become involved in the history of the world to rescue the world and restore it.
The truth is that God has rescued the world from the inside. He became one of us in the Incarnation. He died for us as our sacrifice, saving us from sin. In his resurrection, he destroyed death and began a new creation. He is Lord over all creation, and at the end of history he will destroy the presence of evil in this world and reign forever in the new heavens and the new earth.
When we worship together we are recovering God’s story. This story is much bigger than our individual lives. It is more than a narcissistic preoccupation with self. It is all about God who in Jesus Christ and by the Holy Spirit has won back the world for God. When we worship we reenact and proclaim God’s story to the eternal praise of God.
True worship puts you into God’s story. It changes your life because it puts your day-by-day experience of life—the disappointments and the things that make you soar—into the perspective of God’s story. It reminds you of the true story of the meaning of the world and puts into perspective the place your life has in the grand story.
Find your place in God’s story of the world which worship proclaims, and learn to interpret the struggles of your life within the big picture of God’s story.
more information on this can be found at the AEF Center website
An 'Evangelical Manifesto'?
In a nutshell: Evangelicals are Christians who define themselves, their faith, and their lives according to the Good News of Jesus of Nazareth.1
I am one of those people on the evangelical world who have come to the conclusion that there is an urgent need to rescue evangelicalism from the politics of the Religious Right, this is quite an encouraging piece for kindred souls out there who are as discouraged as I am with how so-called 'American evangelicalism' has tarnished its witness to the Gospel of Christ.
below are some interesting takes on the said Manifesto:
Faith and Theology Blog
also please do find time to read it here
Note:
1An Executive Summary of AN EVANGELICAL MANIFESTO, The Washington Declaration of Evangelical Identity and Public Commitment , May 7, 2008; Washington, D.C. p
T.F. Torrance's Urgent call to the Kirk
I have read this a few weeks back, and after a while of reflection this letter by T.F. Torrance rings more true to me as I in a way I feel as though my local community of faith is also in dire need of renewal.
The letter below is taken from T.F. Torrance Theological Fellowship
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This letter was written by T.F. Torrance when he was Moderator of the Church of Scotland in 1997. He and three others circulated it to all the clergy. It reveals something of the heart of his theological work as a ministry in service of the Church of Jesus Christ.
Urgent Call to the Kirk
We believe that the Church of Scotland is in deep spiritual crisis.
There are certainly encouraging signs of renewal in many parishes and presbyteries, where there is an increasing concern for the spiritual needs of people within the Kirk and for the mission of the Gospel to those outside its institutions, for which we rejoice. But taken as a whole and on a national level the situation in the Church of Scotland is very discouraging. Erosion of fundamental belief has sapped its inner confidence, discarding of great Christian convictions has bereft it of vision and curtailed its mission, detachment of preaching from the control of biblical Revelation has undermined its authority as the Church of Christ, neglecting in teaching the truth of the Gospel has allowed the general membership to become seriously ignorant of the Christian Faith. With this loss of evangelical substance the Kirk fails to be taken seriously, while increasing stress upon formal and socio-legal structure has the effect of making the institutional Church get in the way between Christ and the people of the land.
This calls for our repentance. The hungry sheep look, up and are not fed; the flock of Christ is scattered and the membership of the Kirk steadily diminishes; a damaging cut-back in churches and worshipping communities takes place; there are fewer and fewer pastors to care for the flock and to seek and save the lost. There is a drastic slump in the position of the Kirk as a ‘National Church’, for, while eighty per cent of the people believe in God, only one-third are on the roll of any Church. and less than twenty per cent are on the roll of the Church of Scotland.
We call upon the Kirk to commit itself afresh to Jesus Christ and his Gospel and to carry out an evangelical rebuilding of its faith, life and mission.
Jesus Christ and his Gospel must be brought back into the centre of the Church and all its life, thought and activity, for he is the sole source of God’s incarnate self-revelation, the unique way to God the Father, the only ground of salvation and the one foundation and norm of the Church. The Spirit of Jesus Christ alone can quicken and renew the Church and make it one body with Christ.
The Truth of Jesus Christ and his Gospel as mediated through the Holy Scriptures must be given its rightful place in the preaching and teaching of the Church, and be allowed to exercise its divine power and authority in cleansing and unifying the mind of the Church and its ministry at all levels.
Missions and evangelism must be given priority and a controlling place in all the worship, life and activity of the Kirk. The re-evangelisation of Scotland is absolutely imperative. It is above all in the regular on-going evangelism of the parish and pastoral ministry that the crucified and risen Jesus Christ is mediated to the people. This will require many more ministers or pastors of the flock steadily at work throughout Scotland, the opening of centres for worship and mission, but it will also mean the emergence of a new kind of elder who will take his or her place in the evangelistic and spiritual mission of the Church, and an engagement of every congregation in the urgent task in winning back the three million people of Scotland to Christ and his Church.
The Church’s evangelistic message must recover the New Testament stress upon personal faith and commitment to Jesus Christ as Lord and Saviour, upon the universal claims of the Gospel of Christ crucified, risen and coming again upon human society and the whole world of humanity and indeed upon the physical creation as it is disclosed through our science. Every encouragement must be given to renew the prayer life of the Church in which all members engage in regular intercession for the salvation of mankind. This will require regular Bible study throughout the Kirk and the steady rehabilitation of evangelical belief, matching renewed proclamation of the Gospel and the teaching of the Truth as it is in Jesus. We respectfully invite the Moderator at the General Assembly, and throughout the year, to lead the Kirk in prayer and intercession for a renewal of the Church and the conversion of Scotland.
This call for a repentant return of the Church of Scotland to Christ clothed with his Gospel is unashamedly evangelical and theological, for the grave crisis facing the Church is essentially spiritual. Only through spiritual and evangelical renewal will the Church of Scotland meet the compelling claims of Christ upon it to carry the Gospel to the millions in our own land who have not been gathered into the fold of Christ but who are desperately hungry for the bread of life.
Benedict XVI and evangelical conversion
“ Are we not perhaps all afraid in some way? If we let Christ enter fully into our lives, if we open ourselves totally to Him, are we not afraid that He might take something away from us?...And once again the Pope said: No! If we let Christ into our lives, we lose nothing, nothing, absolutely nothing of what makes life free, beautiful and great. No! Only in this friendship do we experience beauty and liberation....When we give ourselves to Him, we receive a hundredfold in return. Yes, open, open wide the doors to Christ – and you will find true life. ”1
He also stated this in his God is very much at work in our world today:
"We are all called to open ourselves to this friendship with God... speaking to him as to a friend, the only One who can make the world both good and happy... That is all we have to do is put ourselves at his disposal...is an extremely important message. It is a message that helps to overcome what can be considered the great temptation of our time: the claim, that after the Big Bang, God withdrew from history." 2
This is a welcomed gesture, since talk of having a personal relationship with Jesus Christ is mostly discussed among Protestant Evangelical circles leaning towards Billy Graham's call for all of us to: “accept Jesus Christ as our personal Lord and Savior”.
1http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/homilies/documents/hf_ben-xvi_hom_20050424_inizio-pontificato_en.html
2http://www.ewtn.com/library/curia/cdfjosma.htm