Several of you sent me links to a quote from National Association of Evangelicals President Leith Anderson saying that yours truly was 1) somehow like Hugo Chavez (??) and 2) was in the midst of my own personal evangelical collapse. (”Autobiographical.” Unfortunate word choice.)

I decided not to respond, mostly because I know that keeping up the hype that there are 35 million actual evangelicals (as opposed to about 15 million evangelicals and a lot of wallpaper) must be time consuming.

But I will say this: the implication that my evangelicalism is collapsing is an unfortunate thing to say about anyone you don’t know. Maybe President Anderson needs to contact me and let me know where this autobiographical collapse is occurring. What “current events” took control of my mind and led me into panic mode? Am I under surveillance by the NAE? Can they read my mind? Hand me some tin foil…quick!

You see, the fact is that I’m more evangelical and Protestant than ever, and I’m more optimistic about being evangelical than ever. Just because I think the balloon is deflating doesn’t mean I am not optimistic about the great things that are happening.

I agree with President Anderson in all the points he makes regarding the next ten years of evangelicalism world wide. I don’t think his spin, however, has much to do with what I wrote, but then there’s no evidence in his comments that he ever got near part III of my CSM piece, where I say exactly what he said. He can work it out with the ARIS study. My conscience is clear. [Continue reading]

UPDATE: All Comments are in moderation.

UPDATE II: Readers might also enjoy “A God Shaped Void? Maybe Not.” From May ‘06.

Nica Lalli is an unbeliever, and she’s feeling good about it. It seems that her team is growing. In fact, it’s the fastest growing “religion in town:” no religion.

(Lalli recently wrote on the challenge of being an atheist parent.)

Gone are the days when a high school or college atheist felt alone. Now close to 1 in 5 Americans are on the “godless” plan.

The ARIS study (see link in the post or this link at USA today) says that those with “no religion” have doubled in less than 20 years; growing by almost 10% a decade. Look at America in 2050 if that growth rate continues at even half that speed: a third of the country will be “godless.” [Continue reading]

UPDATE II: Creech has sold over $220 of beads, string and trinkets since I lost my salvation. You people are awesome. His kids may be able to have shoes for Easter.

UPDATE: Humor on board. Beware if not using proper gear.

In a shocking demonstration of intolerance toward those whom God has just made differently, the Episcopal diocese of Rhode Island has defrocked a minister who is both a Muslim and a Christian. You can read the shocking story for yourself .

The Episcopal church continues the persecution of those invisible minorities in its midst; those who find the doors of ministry closed to them simply because they affirm both Allah and the Holy Trinity as being one and the same.

Protests outside TEC headquarters seemed to bring no reaction. The church turned a dull, deaf ear to a pastor who wanted to do nothing more than affirm that both the Nicene Creed and the Koran were her true guides for life. [Continue reading]

UPDATE: What matters more? Being recognized by the ECUSA or the Anglican Church in Africa?

The Falls Church has a new daughter congregation and is starting more: A story of church planting in the new Anglican communion in Virginia.

This story of a commitment to church planting among the newly freed Anglicans in Virginia makes me very, very happy. This is the antidote to the coming evangelical collapse: church planting and a lot of it.

Listen my confessional, Reformed, Lutheran, Anglican, etc brothers and sister: this is what must happen. Church planting that plants churches that plant churches. It will revitalize your church. It will put your priorities right. It will make the process of discipleship and Christian education come into sharp focus. It will keep your leaders from becoming ecclesiastical vegetables. It’s a very good thing. Do it. [Continue reading]

It seems to me that evangelicals need to say one thing, do one thing and be one thing. But what?

In lieu of an answer like, “the Gospel,” another option is to try to say many things, do many things and be many things, all from a standard that varies from group to group, even person to person.

It’s a very bad solution. Look out your window and that cacophony you hear is evangelicalism doing whatever it does.

Let’s address this two ways:

Start with David Head’s amazing, wonderful concluding post in his “Recovering From Theological Genocide/Suicide” series at his blog, Ponder Anew. This is a post about that “one thing” I’m talking about: the Gospel; but not just “about” the Gospel. It’s a thorough and liberating one-note composition on “What do we do now?” David has a great gift of prose, but also a fine gift of positive application, something deeply needed in the blogosphere. [Continue reading]

Dr. Chuck Kelley at New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary spoke this week on the problems with Southern Baptist Evangelism and our churches in general. It’s a heartfelt, quite moving and well-thought out talk; a mixture of our revivalistic side and the scholarly, historical side. You can and should listen here. The message starts after the music (maybe ten minutes) but the music’s great.

(My comments should be understood as the positive engagement of one Southern Baptist, and nothing more.)

I appreciate Dr. Kelley’s passionate engagement with the issues that are troubling Southern Baptists right now. He represents a constructive voice and I would encourage other Southern Baptists to listen to him.

I agree with some of what Dr. Kelley is saying in this message.

1) I agree that the SBC is in decline. By his own numbers 89% of our churches are not growing. Most of those churches are facing a generational horizon and many are not going to see 2025.

2) The task of growth by conversion evangelism and new church planting is paramount. It must be a priority at every level of Southern Baptist life. [Continue reading]

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I’m stealing this from Tim Brister, but it’s such a great quote for this web site, that I had to have it in the archive.

John L. Dagg was one of the first systematic theologians that Baptists produced. His Manual of Theology is a pastoral work that all Baptists should own. At the end, in a section on The Duty of Baptists, this quote sets him apart from so many in our tradition, and expresses my heart.

“It is our duty to promote the spiritual unity of the universal church, by the exercise of brotherly love to all who bear the image of Christ…We yield everything which is not required by the word of God; but in what this word requires, we have no compromise to make. We rejoice to see, in many who do not take our views of divine truth, bright evidence of love to Christ and his cause. We love them for Christ’s sake; and we expect to unite with them in his praise through eternal ages. We are one with them in spirit, though we cannot conform to their usages in any particular in which they deviate from the Bible. The more abundantly we love them, the more carefully we strive to walk before them in strict obedience to the commands of our common Lord. And if they sometimes misunderstand our motives, and misjudge our actions, it is our consolation that our divine Master approves; and that they also will approve, when we shall hereafter meet them in his presence.”

- John J. Dagg, Manual of Church Order (Harrisonburg, VA: Gano Books, 1990; originally published 1858), 303-04.

UPDATE II: Trevin Wax agrees and disagrees with Scot.

UPDATE: Now tell me again, where are they keeping that secret book?

Justin Taylor finds the characterization of the neo-reformed as fundamentalist inaccurate, to say the least.

‘Twas not so long ago, on a Calvinistic web site you’ve all visited, that one could hear a serious call to present one’s reformed credentials if one planned to be part of the discussion.

‘Twas also not so long ago, on more than one Calvinistic web site, that a person disagreeing with the main points of the host would be asked to answer “What is the gospel?”

And ’twas not so long ago, that I said, “I’m not a Calvinist,” an announcement that has now earned me at least a weekly email or two telling me that I am about to leave the faith or become a Roman Catholic.

In my own journey, I had happy days as a Calvinist. My days at Southern Baptist Founder’s Conference meetings as a “Timothy George” type SBC Calvinist were good times. Then there were the bad times. Posts about me at certain flaming blogs. Days of posts about me after the word went out through certain Calvinistic chat rooms that I was leading my audience outside of accepted boundaries. Letters to publishers and my employer, and weirdness on comment threads where my name was invoked as “emerging” and “apostate.”

When I finally swore all this off, it wasn’t to become an Arminian, or a Catholic or a one man band. It was to get the heck away from whatever was/is going on among the newly energized reformation police. [Continue reading]

Cardinal Cormac Murphy O’Connor has an opinion piece in the Times that affirms the Roman Catholic position: faith and science have no problems, and evolution and Christianity are compatible.

This week we will be celebrating the 200th anniversary of the birth of Charles Darwin, one of Britain’s most extraordinary scientists. His theory of evolution, one of the greatest discoveries of all time, gives us a way of understanding the connectedness of all life and the uniqueness of human life within it. Together with other branches of scientific exploration, evolution begins to unfold and illuminate the interplay of forces that make our universe such an extraordinary dynamic reality. In this sense, science is itself a journey of learning and exploration. This I find exciting and humbling.

Towards the end of his life Darwin wrote: “It seems to me absurd to doubt that a man may be an ardent Theist and an evolutionist.” The science opens me not only to puzzles and to questions about the world I live in; it leads me to marvel at its complexity. Here, I find science is a good friend to my faith. It also calls me to a journey of learning and understanding. One of the things that mars our culture is the fracture between faith and science. It impoverishes our inquiry into the realities that make up our life and world. This is a false opposition.

Apart from whatever I may think, it will do all evangelicals good to read what a Cardinal of the Roman Church has to say on an issue that, frankly, drives evangelicals nuts.

I’ve never quite figured out how the Catholic position on science is so progressive, but when it comes to Marian dogmas and how Mary’s house wound up in Italy, Catholics sound like Baptist fundamentalists protesting that the Creation Museum is too liberal, but I don’t have to understand hard things. I just like everyone to see that you don’t have to keep hitting yourself in the head over these issues of faith and science.

I’d also like to know if there are any creationist evangelicals who have converted to the RCC and embraced this view of science, evolution and origins.

I appreciate the good work of David Sessions at Patrol Magazine. He’s breaking new ground everyday. If you want the same beat as Relevant, but with more intelligence, wit and edge, hit Patrol and make it a regular feed.

Patrol editor David Sessions takes on my “Coming Evangelical Collapse” in a sizable column. You’ll find his responses articulate and provocative. I’m honored by his attention to my prognostications.

I think David and his commenters miss a few things, particularly in what exactly I am predicting. (I am NOT predicting the END of evangelicalism,) but it’s quality work. Take your time and take it in.

Blessings and peace on David and crew.

Church of England Archbishop Rowan Williams has clearly lost his mind.

What he’s asking of churches is…..it’s…..well………

In these times when the church has the opportunity to show great film clips, debate homosexuality, have a kickin’ band and Comedy Central in the pulpit, Archbishop Rowan is suggesting….that…..

I can’t say it. It’s simply unthinkable in this day and age. With leadership like this, what is going to happen to the Church of England?

Thank God that evangelicals have leaders that are far ahead of this sort of insulting and out-of-touch thinking.

I’m not the usual blogosphere fanboy of John Macarthur. I appreciate the good contribution he made to my own life, especially right after seminary. Several of his books and talks are outstanding. I love his take on Church/State issues. (See his series on Titus.) I appreciate books like Ashamed of the Gospel and many others.

But I have a lot of disagreements, too. I’m not a dispensationalist. I don’t get his view of the relationship of faith and works at all. I think he’s got some law/Gospel issues, but so do a lot of us. I’m sure we’d disagree on plenty of other things. With whatever criticisms I have, and some of the critical comments I’ve made on here regarding his views on the Gospel and culture (that tie comment still gets me), I still count him as way up the list of good guys.

So this segment of Macarthur on TBN is something to be savored. Yeah, that TBN. Apostasy central. Kirk Cameron feeds him the ball and Macarthur dunks it more than once. Yeah, I don’t like Hard to Believe and there’s some quibbles here, but seriously folks, how many in the TBN audience get THIS Gospel presented to them? Ever?

When Macarthur explains how Christ is our substitute and our righteousness, it’s just perfect.

I have to wonder what the regular TBN cast of prosperity pimps was doing while this interview was happening. Macarthur tells more truth in this segment than you generally hear from that stage in a decade. [Continue reading]

Catholic convert blogger Bryan Cross asks “Where is the visible Church Christ founded?”

Bryan says a lot of good and truthful things. He’s a fine theologian and an excellent Roman Catholic apologist. If you are the person we’ve been discussing all week, remember: it’s this question that will drive you batty, so read at your own risk.

Or go a different way. A way that just might save your sanity.

British Lutheran blogger (and BHT fellow) John H at Confessing Evangelical gives the sane and Biblical Lutheran answer to the question, and links you to several of his previous posts on the subject.

if that doesn’t stop the voices in your head, here’s some medicine that really has helped me. Alastair at Adverseria has been on blog hiatus for quite a while, but back in the day he did some writing on “The Denominational Church” that rescued me from being sucked into the apologetic vortex.

An IM reader sent along this piece from the Nashville Tennessean newspaper on the current decline of the Southern Baptist Convention. There’s some rare honesty in this piece, and I hope SBC leaders are listening.

For example, Bill Leonard, one of my favorite professors from seminary days, talks about the SBC’s changing demographics. This really is the key to a lot of the story of post-war SBC numerical growth, and Southern Baptists need to stop avoiding this simple truth. I’ve never been a part of an SBC church whose primary source of baptism was anything other than the families of their own members. [Continue reading]

Hello Catholic friends. I’ve got a good one for you.

The passing of Fr. Richard John Neuhaus has been noted on many Protestant blogs, and, unfortunately, some of the commentary has been a far cry from the classy tribute of Paul McCain.

More typical is this post by Greg Gilbert, who can’t quite see how Fr. Neuhaus could become or remain a Catholic. But with the quoted material from 2001’s Death on A Friday Afternoon in mind, there’s “some hope” that Neuhaus was saved by believing the Protestant Gospel.

When I come before the judgment throne, I will plead the promise of God in the shed blood of Jesus Christ. I will not plead any work that I have done, although I will thank God that he has enabled me to do some good. I will plead no merits other than the merits of Christ, knowing that the merits of Mary and the saints are all from him; and for their company, their example, and their prayers throughout my earthly life I will give everlasting thanks. I will not plead that I had faith, for sometimes I was unsure of my faith, and in any event that would be to turn faith into a meritorious work of my own. I will not plead that I held the correct understanding of “justification by faith alone,” although I will thank God that he led me to know ever more fully the great truth that much misunderstood formulation was intended to protect. Whatever little growth in holiness I have experienced, whatever strength I have received from the company of the saints, whatever understanding I have attained of God and his ways—these and all other gifts I have received I will bring gratefully to the throne. But in seeking entry to that heavenly kingdom, I will, with Dysmas, look to Christ and Christ alone.

Then I hope to hear him say, “Today you will be with me in paradise,” as I hope with all my being—because, although looking to him alone, I am not alone—he will say to all.

Gilbert’s comments are also typical of the mindset of many young, restless and reformed, who believe the RCC is absent the Biblical Gospel.

So my Catholic readers, here’s your chance to speak directly to many young Protestants: Is the Neuhaus quote true to Roman Catholicism and what the church teaches, or is it an example of bringing the Protestant Gospel into one Catholic’s experience, but real Catholics know it’s not what the church teaches?