{"id":11155,"date":"2017-01-20T19:51:25","date_gmt":"2017-01-21T03:51:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dminlgp.com\/?p=11155"},"modified":"2017-01-20T19:51:25","modified_gmt":"2017-01-21T03:51:25","slug":"globalization-evangelicalism-can-we-just-call-them-christians","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/globalization-evangelicalism-can-we-just-call-them-christians\/","title":{"rendered":"Globalization? Evangelicalism? Can we just call them Christians?"},"content":{"rendered":"

In their book Global Evangelicalism: Theology, History and Culture in Regional Perspectives, Donald M Lewis and Richard V. Pierard examine \u00a0world evangelicalism. \u00a0 Their subject has many facets and is often described by scholars with these other words: \u00a0evangelist, evangelism, evangelical and evangelicalism. \u00a0 \u00a0Interesting to me is that all of the words, other than the last, are main stream words that have a meaning and the last one is what doesn’t really have much clarity to it. \u00a0 I believe that was the authors point. \u00a0 Even now reading a second book about this subject, I believe their subject matter is a complication of terminology that is confusing. \u00a0 To compare evangelicalism, in the introduction, to Islam is really confusing. \u00a0The terminology is what is most entangling.<\/p>\n

All of the introduction, is about the fact that no one adheres to the word evangelicalism. \u00a0 Christian, I believe is the word that they are looking for and that people adhere to. \u00a0 What have you become in Africa or Canada or Ireland? \u00a0An evangelical Christian? \u00a0 No, I believe that\u00a0a person who\u00a0accepts Christ becomes a Christian. \u00a0That is the word that would be their identification. \u00a0What if we were just simply to examine Christianity instead of another label? \u00a0All Christianity has to do with is someone being an evangelist, doing evangelism and becoming evangelical. \u00a0So I like the word\u00a0Christian.<\/p>\n

I did find it quite interesting that the beginning of the modern missionary movement doesn’t mention the word evangelical or evangelicalism instead it mentions Christian. \u00a0 In the 1800 Dr. Leonard Woods sermon he states ” The fervent Christian cannot rest. \u00a0His unalterable object is, that the knowledge of the Lord may fill the earth. \u00a0His heart beat high for the conversion of the world.” \u00a0 He then laid out 6 motives, that are still used today. \u00a0He did point out the difference between Judaism and the Christian message. \u00a0 Judaism is exclusive in attitude and Christianity is intended for all.<\/p>\n

The book then goes through all of the great missionaries who were evangelist. \u00a0Men and women who presented the good news of the Gospels as their duty not their denomination or identification. \u00a0These men and women were not developing an\u00a0organization but were laying the groundwork for reaching the lost around the world. \u00a0 This was their Christian duty not their evangelical duty. \u00a0They did evangelize the world. \u00a0This is my struggle with reading this book.<\/p>\n

On page 72, the authors simply say what I have been writing and thinking. \u00a0“Establishing what portion of Christians could be considered evangelical is highly problematic and depends a great deal on which definition one uses. \u00a0“A careful scholarly attempt to arrive at estimates of the number of evangelicals \u00a0and Pentecostals\/ neo-Pentecostals…” After wading through this confusion I did arrive at the fact that Pentecostals have effectively reached around the world by sharing the gospel.<\/p>\n

Globalization is the other word that these authors stumbled around on for a huge portion of the book. \u00a0What does globalization mean and from their view point it seems like it is a bad word. \u00a0Islam is once again the comparison and I don’t understand what the point is. \u00a0“The real globalizing forces behind Islam, ironically, are the identification of Islam with the global struggle against globalization and international migrations patterns. \u00a0The lack of a single holy language and a specific holy space are important factors in enabling the globalization of Christianity. ” \u00a0 So? \u00a0Christianity translates in every language and is able to be translated in the written form. ( This is something the modern missionary is doing on a escalated scale.) \u00a0These authors seem to fight against globalization as anything that is productive for evangelicalism (but for Christianity it has been the catalyst for salvation and life change.) \u00a0 So what is it? \u00a0 This sentence wraps up my confusion. ” It could be that in the future the forces of globalization will be associated with a different religion, or no religion; but globalization as historically experienced in the past five centuries has been significantly enmeshed with the history of CHRISTIANITY<\/strong><\/em>, while at the same time evangelicalism offers a counternarrative to the homogenizing effects of globalization.<\/p>\n

I may just be sick but I want to be associated \u00a0and identified with Christianity and missionaries making a global difference over the\u00a0past five centuries! (the organization that I am a part of is doing this exactly.) \u00a0I do not identify with being evangelicalism. \u00a0I would be identified as Pentecostal.<\/p>\n

So the way I see it. \u00a0We still send missionaries ( some white, some black, some native American, \u00a0some native to their own country and some who are going cross culturally) to evangalize the world. They share the good news of the Gospel with those who have not heard the good news. \u00a0 They translate the Bible into their own native language (called Fire Bibles) and establish Bible schools to raise up people from their own country to evangelize their own country. \u00a0Thus completing the call to discipleship not evangelicalism. \u00a0 Their financial support comes from local churches in the United States, \u00a0that support them and allow them to go be evangelists and to be involved in evangelism. \u00a0 Salvation that leads to conversion is the goal even at risk of personal harm and death. \u00a0Even in Islamic countries this is attempted.<\/p>\n

Who cares about labels?<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Christianity is the label. \u00a0 I again must be sick and trying to write this out. \u00a0Alignment with a label that is not completely identified with being Christian makes no sense to me. \u00a0\u00a0If Pentecostal Christian is the label that attaches me to the fastest and most effective organization, \u00a0that is growing spiritually and socially around the world, then attach that to me. \u00a0Something that has clarity and is not confusing to Christians and especially to those who are not saved. \u00a0 How is the world going to ever figure out this subject what confuses religious scholars and contradicts itself? \u00a0 Once again this comes to my mind: \u00a0the newly labeled “Nones” that we were introduced to in Oxford are not interested in things RELIGIOUS, (and I would see this conversation or argument about evangelicalism as highly steeped \u00a0in religion,) instead they are interested in things SPIRITUTAL. \u00a0 Something that has power and content attached\u00a0to it.<\/p>\n

Again I might just be sick and writing on heavy medication.<\/p>\n

Conclusion<\/p>\n

Be a Christian. \u00a0Be an evangelist. \u00a0Be about evangelism. Be evangelical. \u00a0Invite the lost to be saved. \u00a0Make disciples. Repeat.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In their book Global Evangelicalism: Theology, History and Culture in Regional Perspectives, Donald M Lewis and Richard V. Pierard examine \u00a0world evangelicalism. \u00a0 Their subject has many facets and is often described by scholars with these other words: \u00a0evangelist, evangelism, evangelical and evangelicalism. \u00a0 \u00a0Interesting to me is that all of the words, other than […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":72,"featured_media":11156,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[783],"class_list":["post-11155","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-lewis-and-pierard","cohort-lgp6"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11155","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/72"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11155"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11155\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11155"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11155"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11155"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}