This is the 4th and final portion of the article, "The Coming Evangelical Collapse". Up to this point, the author (Michael Spencer) has discussed the following:
- "My Prediction" (about what's on the horizon for evangelicalism)
- "Why is This Going to Happen?"
- "What Will be Left?"
"Is all of this a bad thing?
Is the coming evangelical collapse entirely a bad thing? Or is there
good that will come from this season of the evangelical story?
One of the most encouraging developments in recent evangelicalism is
the conviction that something is very wrong. One voice that has been
warning American evangelicals of serious problems is theologian Michael
Horton. For more than 20 years, Horton has been warning that
evangelicals have become something almost unrecognizable in the flow of
Christian history. From the prophetic Made in America to the incredible In The Face of God to the most recent Christless Christianity, Horton has been saying that evangelicals are on the verge of theological/ecclesiastical disaster.
Horton’s diagnosis is not, however, the same diagnosis as we saw in
the heyday of the culture war, i.e. that evangelicals must rise up and
take political and cultural influence if America is to survive and
guarantee freedom and blessing. Horton’s warning has been the
abandonment of the most basic calling of the church: the preservation
and communication of the essentials of the Gospel in the church itself.
The coming evangelical collapse will be, in my view, exactly what
Horton has been warning us about for two decades. In that sense, there
is something fundamentally healthy about accepting that, if the disease
cannot be cured, then the symptoms need to run their course and we need
to get to the next chapter. Evangelicalism doesn’t need a bailout. Much
of it needs a funeral. But not all; not by any means. In other words, the question is not so
much what will be lost, but what is the condition of what remains?
As I’ve said in the previous post in this series, what will be left
will be 1) an evangelicalism greatly chastened in numbers, influence and
resources, 2) a remaining majority of Charismatic-Pentecostal
Christians faced with the opportunity to reform or become
unrecognizable, 3) an invigorated minority of evangelicals committed to
theology and church renewal, 4) a marginalized emerging and mainline
community and 5) an evangelicalized segment of the other Christian
communions.
Is it a good thing that denominations are going to become largely
irrelevant? Only if the networks that replace them are able to marshall
resources, training and vision to the mission field and into the
planting and equipping of churches?
Is it a good thing that many marginal believers will depart, leaving
evangelicalism with a more committed, serious core of followers?
Possibly, if churches begin and continue the work of renewing serious
church membership?
Is it a good thing that the emerging church will fade into the
irrelevance of the mainlines? If this leaves innovative, missionally
minded, historically and confessionally orthodox churches to “emerge” in
the place of the traditional church, yes. Yes, if it fundamentally
changes the conversation from the maintenance of traditional churches to
developing new and culturally appropriate churches.
Is it a good thing that Charismatic-Pentecostal Christianity will
become the majority of evangelicals? Yes, if reformation can reach those
churches and produce the kind of unity we see in Wesley and
Lloyd-Jones; a unity where the cleavage between doctrine and spiritual
gifts isn’t assumed.
The ascendency of Charismatic-Pentecostal influenced worship around
the world can be a major positive for the evangelical movement if that
development is joined with the calling, training and mentoring of
leaders. If American churches come under more of the influence of the
movement of the Spirit in Africa and Asia, this will be a good thing. (I
recognize, btw, that all is not well overseas, but I do not believe
that makes the help of Christians in other cultures a moot point.)
Will the evangelicalizing of Catholic and Orthodox communions be a
good development? One can hope for greater unity and appreciation, but
the history of these developments seems to be much more about a renewed
vigor to “evangelize” Protestantism in the name of unity. For those
communions, it’s a good development, but probably not for evangelicals
themselves.
Will the coming evangelical collapse get evangelicals past the
pragmatism and shallowness that has brought about its loss of substance
and power? I tend to believe that even with large declines in numbers
and an evidence “earthquake” of evangelical loyalty, the purveyors of
the evangelical circus will be in full form, selling their wares as the
promised solution to every church’s problems. I expect the landscape of
megachurch vacuity to be around for a very long time. (I rejoice in
those megachurches that fulfill their role as places of influence and
resource for other ministries without insisting on imitation.)
Will the coming evangelical collapse shake loose the prosperity
Gospel from its parasitical place on the evangelical body of Christ? We
can all pray and hope that this will be so, but evidence from other
similar periods is not encouraging. Coming to terms with the economic
implications of the Gospel has proven particularly difficult for
evangelicals. That’s not to say that American Christians aren’t
generous….they are. It is to say that American Christians seldom seem to
be able to separate their theology from an overall idea of personal
affluence and success American style. Perhaps the time is coming that
this entanglement will be challenged, especially in the lives of younger
Christians.
But it is impossible to not be hopeful. As one commenter has already
said, “Christianity loves a crumbling empire.” Christianity has
flourished when it should have been exterminated. It has conquered when
it was counted as defeated. Evangelicalism’s heyday is not the entirety
of God’s plan. I think we can rejoice that in the ruins of the evangelical collapse
new forms of Christian vitality and ministry will be born. New kinds of
church structure, new uses of gifts, new ways to develop leaders and do
the mission- all these will appear as the evangelical collapse occurs.
I expect to see a vital and growing house church movement. This
cannot help but be good for an evangelicalism that has made buildings,
paid staff and numbers its drugs for half a century.
I expect to see a substantial abandonment of the seminary system. How
can a denomination ask its clergy to go into huge debt to be equipped
for ordination or ministry? We all know that there are many options for
education from much smaller schools to church based seminaries to
internet schools to mentoring and apprenticing arrangements.
I hope that many IM readers will be part of the movement to
create a new evangelicalism that learns from the past and listens more
carefully to what God says about being his people in the midst of a
powerful, idolatrous culture.
I’ll end this adventure in prognostication with the same confession I
began with: I’m not a prophet. My view of evangelicalism is not
authoritative or infallible. I am certainly wrong in some of these
predictions and possibly right, even too conservative on others. But is
there anyone who is observing evangelicalism in these times who does not
sense that the future of our movement holds many dangers and much
potential?"