What is Evangelicalism?
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| CHINESE EVANGELIC CHURCH IN MADRID SUR (South Madrid) (Photo credit: Wikipedia) |
• Biblicism: the Bible is the only authoritative spiritual guide;
• Crucicentrism: Christ’s death on the cross is the heart of faith and life;
• Conversionism: repentance from sin and faith in Christ are essential to salvation;
• Activism: Christians must work together to spread the gospel to all nations.5
John Stackhouse Jr, of the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada, adds the following two criteria to Bebbington’s list of evangelical characteristics:
• Orthodoxy/Orthopraxis: Evangelicals subscribe to historic Christian doctrinal, ethical and liturgical tenets and practices;
• Transdenominational: Evangelicals partner with members of other churches in evangelistic, missionary, social and political activities.6
Second, according to the ISAE, ‘evangelical’ can also refer to a number of movements united as much by style as by belief or doctrine, and as such embraces a wide spectrum of people from Reformed to Pentecostal to Roman Catholic. Third, ‘evangelical’ can be used to describe certain publications or coalitions of men and institutions—such as the magazine Christianity Today and the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association—which sought a different path from the strident militancy and separatism of fundamentalism.7
Richard Lovelace says that ‘the evangelical impulse’ is ‘an urgent drive to proclaim the saving, unmerited grace of Christ and to reform the church according to the Scriptures’.8 In this he draws upon what are sometimes called the formal and material principles of the Reformation: the authority of Scripture alone, and salvation by faith in Christ alone.9
Yet another definition of ‘evangelical’ is provided by the 1846 constitution of the Evangelical Alliance, which adopted the following articles of faith: the divine inspiration of Scripture, the Trinity of persons in the Godhead, the depravity of man, the mediation of the divine Christ, justification by faith, conversion and sanctification by the Holy Spirit, the return of Christ to judge the world, the ministry of the Word, and the sacraments of baptism and the Lord’s Supper.10
According to David Wells, people in the twentieth century viewed the core of evangelicalism in three ways. Some defined it as ‘confessional’, that is, its centre is the confession of specific biblical doctrines. Some saw evangelicalism as an ‘organizational fraternity’, a broad coalition of churches, missions, ministries, media and businesses, loosely united for various common causes or joint enterprises. Still others saw its core as ‘charismatic’, not in doctrine or organization, but in its ‘spiritual intuition about the presence of the Holy Spirit’. The organizational and charismatic understandings of evangelicalism have taken the lead since the 1960s and 1970s, while the emphasis on the confessional definition has been relegated to the backseat.11
In answer to the question, ‘What is an Evangelical?’ the National Association of Evangelicals (NAE) in the United States states: ‘Evangelicals take the Bible seriously and believe in Jesus Christ as Saviour and Lord.’12 The NAE affirms a number of fundamental doctrines, but notably absent from this list is the doctrine of justification by faith alone.13
David Hilborn of the Evangelical Alliance in the United Kingdom says evangelicals are ‘ “gospel people”, committed to simple New Testament Christianity and the central tenets of apostolic faith’, who are unified by the Reformation principles of Scripture alone, grace alone, and faith alone.14
Beeke, J. R. (2012). What Is Evangelicalism? (pp. 9–12). Darlington, England: Evangelical Press.
