American evangelical history has been, it seems largely, driven by revival events. Whether Wesleyan, Moody, fundamentalist, or the Jesus movement, it seems that our culture has run on a roughly 40-year cycle of events. Moody, 1890ish; fundamentalists, 1930ish; Jesus movement, 1970ish. Then there are the small-event, the miniscule revivalists. These are the ones who have evangelistic parties instead of crusades and tents. Campus Crusade. Young Life. Roll your own.
I used to think that there was a revival due us. Unless one is willing to consider that the Purpose Driven movement was some sort of revival, I was quite mistaken. The fact that none has come has me worried. But I am not worried about when it will come. Rather, I am worried about the character of our evangelical Christianity.
There is no forthcoming coming revival. I was wrong.
The liberals are shrinking yet we sit and act smug because we are stagnant instead of shrinking.
American Christianity seems dead. No, it is not dead because of doctrine. We have so much good theology available that one might think this was the birthplace of Christianity. It is not about generosity or character. Our social involvement and willingness to meet the needs of the world around us is unmatched in human history. It is not necessarily about sin in the church. There is a lot of it and we often fail to deal with our secret sins. But Corinth had the same issues yet saw the blessing of God. American Christianity is not dead because it has no heart. While Rome cannot provide a decent salvation doctrine and evangelicals and fundamentalists are all split up doing their own things, all are yet fully engaged in their own outreach endeavors.
Perhaps is it only our unmitigated arrogance.
I fear that Josh McDowell is on the right track. This may be America’s last Christian generation, at least for a long time. All we seem to have done is postpone our acknowledgment of judgment.
Does anyone besides me think that American Christianity is in real trouble?
February 28th, 2010 | 5:39 pm | #1
American Christianity is, at best, spinning its wheels. And so I share your concerns. But we should keep in mind a global perspective, as we know God is at work not only in America, but throughout his world. And when it comes to revivalism, the world is seeing profound revivalist movements at work–evangelical, Anglican, Catholic, and certainly charismatic/Pentecostal.
So, I’m torn. I see–and hear–of God working through his church worldwide, but I too am concerned about the status of American Christianity. It may be, as you say, in part due to our “unmitigated arrogance,” or perhaps due to other things as well, such as a lack of an ecumenical spirit with those with whom we share our creedal faith.
Consider something like abortion. It’s been a long haul (nearly forty years), but we see the tide turning–slow though it may be–as younger generations are becoming more and more pro-life. And consider the cooperation between evangelicals, mainline conservative Protestants, and Catholics that has helped these changes come about.
Could the same type of ecumenical work help when it comes to a new resurgence of Christian faith in America? I don’t know. In the end, we’ll stay faithful to the work God has given us, and wait for his spirit to lead.
Provocative post, and a good read. Thanks.
February 28th, 2010 | 6:49 pm | #2
That’s so depressing, but I live with this fear too…and I honestly mean that it’s a fear. I read the latest polls and get really down over them.
February 28th, 2010 | 8:11 pm | #3
In part, this concern is why I started blogging, because if things do not change the Church is in real trouble.
Francis Schaeffer warned of a coming Evangelical disaster if Christians did not stop compromising and accommodating biblical Christianity to the spirit of the age. That spirit is Liberalism, recycled ancient paganism dressed up in “justice” speak: gay rights, reproduction justice aka abortion, and now nature worship via global warming alarmism.
My church is preaching through Isaiah right now and King Massasseh killed Isaiah for confronting the idolatry of the nation, and particularly the priests of God who had raised detestable idols in God’s Temple. These idols lead, and necessarily so, to evil fruit being produced, and ultimately the persecution of the faithful. Today, we have a modern day King Manasseh in the White House. If the Liberal agenda was successfully implemented, it would mean that the sin for which Christ died would be an unquestionable public right. And those who preach the repentance from such sin would mean those Christians would be persecuted, which means Jesus Himself would be persecuted by those claiming to be Christian.
It is a tragedy within American Christianity that we learn from a recent poll that still 35% of those who say they are born again support President Obama. So yes, we are in desperate need of a revival and the Christian Church in America is in real trouble if it does not take the false and idolatrous religion of Liberalism seriously.
February 28th, 2010 | 9:00 pm | #4
Are we are talking about professed Christians, or the authentic bible-believing variety? There is and always has been tares mixed in with the wheat. I’m encouraged that Christ has continually through history been building His one true church, and the gates of hell will not prevail against it.
February 28th, 2010 | 9:06 pm | #5
Paul,
and the gates of hell will not prevail against it
Generally, but not specifically. I think we are equally short-sighted if we take this as protection against anything bad happening to us.
February 28th, 2010 | 9:21 pm | #6
Collin,
I think any person who seriously studies scripture would understand that we are sufficiently warned the we will suffer if we pursue the Kingdom (Matt 24). So that was not my intent in quoting Jesus as He is speaking to Peter.
I was responding to the question;
Does anyone besides me think that American Christianity is in real trouble?
Well are we are talking about self-professed Christians, or the authentic bible-believing variety?
February 28th, 2010 | 9:37 pm | #7
Paul,
I don’t think it matters. Not all believers are obedient and success is never guaranteed. Churches everywhere have been judged or have failed for a variety of reasons.
February 28th, 2010 | 10:23 pm | #8
Great and very provocative post, Collin.
My answer to your question is, “American Christianity has been in trouble since before Finney, but by God’s grace even fundamentalism and liberalism could not shutter it.”
My question back atcha is this: “What do you mean by ‘Christianity’? Is that a sociological term, or is it a theological term — and does it matter which one we pick?”
February 28th, 2010 | 10:25 pm | #9
I personally do not think all of American Christianity is in trouble. Most of the time when folks make such a claim they have in mind a quite narrow slice (usually what they know about).
Even in the selective treatment of what counts as a “revival,” one can see a quite narrow perspective. For example, there is nothing about the charismatic movement that began in 1962 and continues to this day impacting all kinds of churches in all different kinds of denominations; there is nothing about the 109 Council of Christian Colleges and Universities with all of their students and faculty; there is nothing about African-American churches that continue to grow.
It may be better to say that there is a serious realignment going on in significant parts of American Christianity, but American Christianity is alive and well.
February 28th, 2010 | 10:33 pm | #10
With all due respect I think it is of great importance. Many self-professed Christians believe that the abundant life that Jesus spoke of, meant that we are not called to suffer, and that the abundant life means we are not to struggle or experience discomfort. Thus many Christians never risk discomfort for the advancement of the Kingdom. I believe there are two views of the Christian life;
1. As being on a cruise ship to Mazatlan
2. Or being a solider rescuing prisoners of war.
And how you view your role in the Kingdom will have a profound effect at helping Christ build His church.
February 28th, 2010 | 11:03 pm | #11
Some data about the concerns can be found here, at Evangel.
March 1st, 2010 | 5:58 am | #12
What is the difference between a fad and a revival?
March 1st, 2010 | 6:50 am | #13
Revival will include Lutherans, too.
March 1st, 2010 | 7:06 am | #14
AMERICAN Christianity? Is it mistaken to even look for such an entity? One certainly wants the best for one’s country and so one wants America to participate in Christianity, in some sense. And, there’s the quip about America being a Nation with the soul of a Church.
However, the State is no replacement for the Church and for us to seek “American Christianity” is provincial if not heretical.
March 1st, 2010 | 7:34 am | #15
Evangelical Protestant Christianity IS in big trouble in America – precisely because it is a departure (a radical departure in many of its “camps”) from the One Apostolic Church founded by Jesus Christ. This is the Roman Catholic Church where the fulness of Christ subsists and valid Sacraments are available for the conversion and healing of souls!
I’m a former Evangelical Protestant of over 2 decades during adult life. I came home to the Catholic Church in 2006-2007 and have never been the same!
In is Lent and I’m posting on a Blog affiliated with First Things – an entity founded by Father Richard John Neuhaus, himself a covert to the Catholic
Church.
Our separated brethren languish outside of the fulness of Christ’s Church like prodigal children as I once did. Please come home to your Father’s table.
Pax Christi,
Brian
March 1st, 2010 | 7:50 am | #16
Thomas,
By “American Christianity” I did not mean “the Christianity of being American” but “the segment Christianity influenced by the American lifestyle.”
March 1st, 2010 | 8:06 am | #17
Collin,
Yes, I recognize the distinction; however, the segment of Christianity influenced by the [modern] American lifestyle should get out more lest it conflate mere national fad with the Church (however defined).
March 1st, 2010 | 9:53 am | #18
I’m thinking that a very large part of the problem is located in the notion of “American Christianity.”
Democracy and capitalism are not part of the faith once delivered to the saints, but one would be hard pressed to come to that understanding by listening to most of what passes for “American Christianity.”
March 1st, 2010 | 10:10 am | #19
Matt.16:18 “And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it.”
Christ has been building His church, each day since He ascended, that is what He did yesterday, and what He is doing today and what He will be doing Tuesday. I have the faith to believe He will accomplish that what has proclaimed he would do. He is building His ONE true church to present to Himself as His bride and the gates of hell will not, and cannot stand against Him.
As I stated before there has always been the weeds mixed in with the wheat, but Christ said not be alarmed.
Matt.13:27-30
27″The owner’s servants came to him and said, ‘Sir, didn’t you sow good seed in your field? Where then did the weeds come from?’
28″ ‘An enemy did this,’ he replied.
“The servants asked him, ‘Do you want us to go and pull them up?’
29″ ‘No,’ he answered, ‘because while you are pulling the weeds, you may root up the wheat with them. 30Let both grow together until the harvest. At that time I will tell the harvesters: First collect the weeds and tie them in bundles to be burned; then gather the wheat and bring it into my barn.’ ”
I’m a little concerned Collin about your reply in comment #7, that you don’t think it matters which church we are talking about, self-professed Christians or the one true church that Christ is and has been building.
March 1st, 2010 | 10:21 am | #20
Collin: “While Rome cannot provide a decent salvation doctrine and evangelicals and fundamentalists are all split up doing their own things, all are yet fully engaged in their own outreach endeavors.
Perhaps is it only our unmitigated arrogance.”
Balderdash.
It seems like unmitigated arrogance to claim that “American Christianity” has unmitigated arrogance.
March 1st, 2010 | 10:54 am | #21
Collin,
I just want to be clear that I believe there is only ONE true church, it’s the group of people who’s names are written in the Lamb’s book of life.
It has nothing to do denominations, or buildings where people gather, it is the ones who have, and will trust Christ’s death on the cross as the atonement for their sins, and are called according to His purpose and will.
And no, I’m not worried about that church.
March 1st, 2010 | 2:02 pm | #22
Many of us have a tendency to overreact to all sorts of things — the result of a certain lack of wisdom — and I think this is a case of overreaction. One and only one thing deserves predictions of doom for Christianity in America: rejection of the gospel of Christ. This is what Schaeffer, and Machen before him, were warning against.
Many evangelicals since Machen, including the one who wrote this post, have succumbed to a tendency to predict doom for Christianity on the basis of admittedly bad things which are not a rejection of the gospel of Christ. If the gospel of Christ is still preached and embraced in an area — decisive evidence of the powerful work of the Holy Spirit — what basis is there for predicting “doom” for Christianity in that area? Is the Spirit so easily defeated?
The bad things we notice, supposing they are in fact bad things for which the church is blameworthy, are always symptoms of the fact that the sanctification of God’s people is not complete yet on this earth. That shouldn’t be surprising, much less a reason for worrying that Christianity in America is “doomed.” We should react to these bad things with restraint, noticing them and dealing with them, while at the same time acknowledging the amazing and powerful works that God does in people’s lives all the time, all around us.
March 1st, 2010 | 4:41 pm | #23
I don’t know about American Christianity. But I am really despondent over American Evangelicalism. It is not the movement I grew up with. I am not even sure it is a movement anymore. The Word of Faithers have eaten into it and are maybe the biggest movers and shakers to now call themselves “evangelical.” Most of the intellectual fire power in the movement was in the hands of the Calvinists and (sorry Frank) they don’t seem to be satisfied with being “Mere Evangelicals” anymore; they seem to be intent on being Calvinists first and foremost. (Think Sproul, Piper, MacArthur.) The old guard in Focus on the Family, IVCF, Campus Crusade, Chuck Swindoll, etc. don’t seem to count much anymore. Too many evangelicals hate Chuck Colson for his ECT work, forgetting everything els ehe had done. I now hear self-proclaimed evangelicals even saying that Billy Graham got it all wrong, not just in his later years, but from the very get-go. The mega-church movement made us stupid and the church growth movement made us elitist — a very dangerous combination, by the way. We have no unity. We are losing members to heterodoxy. Those of us who are left are following personalities and not divine callings. Where we go from here, I don’t know.
March 1st, 2010 | 6:53 pm | #24
My Epiphany
Last week something finally clicked for me. Looking back I can see God calling me to it, but it finally really broke through a few days ago. What’s true for me may be true for others, so I’ll share.
I am Anglican. I was raised Pentecostal, but when I became serious about my faith around age 19, I began to study apologetics and theology. I soon found myself changing my beliefs and began to church hop. Over the last 13 years I’ve been a Calvinist, an attender of a Calvary Chapel, a Lutheran, a Catholic, and a serious reader of Orthodox theology.
I have my convictions, but what happened recently put it all into perspective: worship God. I know it’s an obvious point. People like me can be pretty hard-headed. I can talk about God. I can write about Him (like I’m doing now). I can theorize, philosophize, theologize…I can even apologize. Worship…I think I tend to avoid it.
What if we worshiped more? More faithfully, more consistently, more wholeheartedly…
I’ve come to the starting point of wanting God more than I want my ideas and thoughts about Him. I hope I’m not self-deceived. Even I’m wrong about where I am, I am not wrong about worship. If the Bible tells us to do anything, it’s worship.
March 1st, 2010 | 7:46 pm | #25
Bob Sacamento: “Most of the intellectual fire power in the movement was in the hands of the Calvinists and (sorry Frank) they don’t seem to be satisfied with being “Mere Evangelicals” anymore; they seem to be intent on being Calvinists first and foremost. (Think Sproul, Piper, MacArthur.)”
The term “evangelical” is yucky nowadays for a lot of people, whether Christian or not.
Hence, Sproul, Piper, and MacArthur (and others) are distancing themselves from the term. It’s too far-ranging.
So I think Sproul, Piper and MacArthur are wise to get away from a term that is increasingly vacuous.
March 1st, 2010 | 8:34 pm | #26
I would suggest that the most obvious in your face testament as to how sick USA Christianity has become is the fact that many “conservative” Christians now essentially uncritically endorse the rantings of Russ Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, Ann Coulter, Sean Hannity etc etc.
To the degree that they seldom if ever differentiate themselves from, or criticize these ranting ratbags, they are in effect fellow travelers of the agendas of these ratbags, and what they are appealing to, AND invoking.
The dreadful (and some time soon) politics of mass scapegoating. If we only rid the USA body politic of the “cancer” of liberalism, then everything will be hunky dory again.
March 2nd, 2010 | 1:23 am | #27
“The liberals are shrinking yet we sit and act smug because we are stagnant instead of shrinking.”
Whose this “we” you’re talking about?
Are you projecting?
A strawman caricature, perhaps?
An assertion without an argument, without evidence really.
March 2nd, 2010 | 7:40 am | #28
John,
Parting with the current turn of Leftist liberalism would not be bad. And, yes, Beck and Limbaugh are hardly representative of an evangelical theology or ethic. Beck’s persistent Mormon apocalyptic flavor is especially disturbing.
TUD,
I was speaking of evangelicals in general.
March 2nd, 2010 | 7:54 am | #29
http://ewtn.edgeboss.net/download/ewtn/audiolibrary/jh_02082010.mp3 – Info about Dr. David Anders’ – former Evangelical Protestant and Church History/Theology scholar of very high regard.
March 2nd, 2010 | 10:31 am | #30
“Perhaps it is our unmitigated arrogance.” Now, what does that mean? You identify what you consider the “problem,” yet fail to explain what you mean by the terms.
March 2nd, 2010 | 10:49 am | #31
The next big revival will be Evangelicals becoming Catholics through the Personal Ordinariate structure now on offer to faithful Anglicans.
March 2nd, 2010 | 10:51 am | #32
I think we have another customer for FIRST THINGS ad space.
March 2nd, 2010 | 11:40 am | #33
I think Eastern Orthodoxy will continue to grow, too.
March 2nd, 2010 | 12:41 pm | #34
William Harnist: ““Perhaps it is our unmitigated arrogance.” Now, what does that mean? You identify what you consider the “problem,” yet fail to explain what you mean by the terms.”
I make the same point in comment #20.
March 2nd, 2010 | 12:55 pm | #35
I think evangelicals need to re-conceive our desires and goals in the context of a long-term vision of the Church. For too long have we been ordered by a spirit of the age (the same that has infected our familial, economic and political lives) that elevates short-term thinking and behaviors rather than fostering generational relationships, practices, and institutions that embody and image forth the true nature of reality and history.
For example, our pastors are very busy and worried about evangelizing the current generation, but don’t see how short-term “successes” in “relevant” evangelism can undermine the evangelism of future generations. With good intentions, evangelical leaders use up the linguistic and cultural “capital” built up over time by our ancestors in the faith, of whose imperfect, yet holy lives we are ashamed in our political correctness, resources that establish a backdrop of divinely created order and justice which presence is necessary for the Gospel of mercy to even be intelligible, much less persuasive.
If the churches of evangelicalism desire to be relevant beyond this current generation, they should begin or continue to devote and sacrifice their resources to wide-spread and deep Christian education for the first 20 years of every child’s life. Other institutions of the media, arts, business and politics are also critical, but the best necessary investment is in education because wisely educated Christians will have the resources to reorder those other institutions over time.
The goal is obedience to God’s command and our mission not simply to make converts, but to make disciples for the long haul unto the eschaton. It’s easier not to have to think about long term consequences that will arise after a generation’s passing, but it is not faithful.
I fear is that we’re too busy to make inconvenient changes in our priorities and lives that are necessary for the Kingdom of God to spread over the long term in the world we live in today.
March 2nd, 2010 | 3:56 pm | #36
Thank you orthodoxdj for your thoughts.
March 2nd, 2010 | 4:27 pm | #37
KipBin,
God bless you.
March 5th, 2010 | 8:32 pm | #38
[...] Things – In Search of the Next Revival? – we don’t need another stinking revival. We need to go back to the [...]
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