Evangelicalism: Warts, Wrinkles, and All

“Some of my friends believe we should abandon the word evangelical. I do not. I simply yearn for us to live up to the meaning of our name.” ~ Philip Yancey

If only we would live up to the meaning of our name…

Sadly many with the label of "Evangelical" do not. So we have within the broader tent of Evangelicalism those with the "clowns and dancing bears wearing tutus" mentality towards worship.

But should that stop us individually or corporatly as a church from striving to actually live up to the best of the meaning of the label "Evangelical, minus the accouterments of cultural evangelicalism such as "clowns and dancing bears wearing tutus" that we can very well do without?

One of the bright spots in my own experience has been in rediscovering over the past 10 years a vibrant Evangelical Biblical theology, (Russell Moore, D.A. Carson, Walter Kaiser and others,) that flamed a fire in my soul that had been deadened by previous involvement in a narrow theologically self-focused reformed puritanism…

Let popular Evangelicalism go the way of all flesh. That does not at all mean I or anyone else will have to give up the core Evangelical theology we find in the Bible. It does mean we may find a better, more positive way of expressing it.

I am driven back to the personal historical fact that, warts, wrinkles and all, the Evangelical church was in the providence of God my spiritual mother, that church He used to bring me to faith in Himself…