There were a series of posts a few months back discussing the usefulness of the term "evangelical." An article in USA Today last week raised some interesting ideas.
I don't like language that doesn't communicate because, after all, that is it's purpose.
USA Today asked whether the E-word can be saved.
Although 38% of Americans call themselves evangelical, only 9% actually agree with key evangelical beliefs, says research firm the Barna Group. In a surveys of 4,014 adults nationwide, conducted over four months in 2006, "one out of every four self-identified evangelicals has not even accepted Christ as their savior," says George Barna.How you see "evangelical" depends on where you stand, says the Rev. Mark Coppenger, founding pastor of the Evanston (Ill.) Baptist Church and former spokesman for the Southern Baptist Convention.
When evangelical has become a subjective term, depending "on where you stand," the term has lost its usefulness. A term is only helpful if it actually helps someone identify what a person believes. If evangelical doesn't even narrow down that someone has accepted Jesus as Savior, then the term is not helpful.
That is the kind of thing the term was coined to identify - a set of doctrinal beliefs. It was very helpful at one time, distinguishing some Christians from the fundamentalist and liberal movements they did not agree with. The term was useful when it identified a Christian who believed the inerrancy of God's Word and who was still engaged with culture. Evangelicals were just that, evangelistic because they believed the truth of Christianity was for all people.
It seems to me that the term began to get diluted when more conditions got added on, starting in the 80s with the political engagement of the Moral Majority. Since them the term has become much more identified with a political perspective than a theological one. The problem is that Christianity doesn't necessitate a political platform, only some theological fundamentals. There's an important and fine line there where Christianity is specifically defined and then we have to allow someone their freedom to work out the implications of what they believe. I'm just uncomfortable with a term that seems to imply that Christians must have a certain political agenda or that a political platform is essential to being a Christian.
The theological clarity of the term has gotten lost in the political activism it's come to represent.
I think the term should be retired because it's lost its theological precision and is now a vague political term that doesn't really lend to insight or understanding
Here are a couple of good suggestions that communicates something helpful:
"When I travel, I call myself a 'creedal Christian' now," says Francis Beckwith, president of the Evangelical Theological Society and a professor at Baylor University in Waco, Texas....Coppenger still calls himself evangelical "to distinguish myself from the more liberal mainline Christian groups." But, he adds, "I'm more inclined to call myself a 'Christian,' 'Bible believer,' 'Baptist,' or 'Southern Baptist.'
