So...Are YOU an Evangelical?

I suppose I should have seen it coming, but it caught me by surprise. I mentioned to a couple of the fellows in my Evangelical Theology class that I was reading the recently released book Four Views on the Spectrum of Evangelicalism. I expected them to respond by asking a probing, analytical question like, "Do you think that Kevin Bauder portrays the Fundamentalist option vis-à-vis the Confessional option with sufficient clarity to successfully salvage the label?" I was ready for that one. But that wasn't the question. The question was simpler:

"So...Are YOU an Evangelical?"

I found myself deploying evasive measures, kind of like when I'm asked, "Are you a fundamentalist?" It depends, I suppose, on what you mean. I'm not a Jack Hyles fundamentalist. And I'm certainly not a Terry McVeigh fundamentalist. Likewise I'm not a Roger Olsen evangelical. Nor do I identify with Karl Barth's self-denominated "evangelical" theology. I prefer terms that are less vulnerable to equivocation.

•       If you asked me about my religion, I'd say that I am a Christian: I hold to the absolute lordship of the Christian God as authoritatively mediated through the Christian Scriptures.

•       If you asked me with whom I am covenantally bound by mutual confession and with whom I will share the Table in mutual fellowship, I'd say I belong to a Baptist Church.

But evangelical? What exactly does that word add to what I've just said? Even if, for sake of argument, we could excise the aberrations that have multiplied under the evangelical umbrella, does the label now have any practical value? If the question is whether I ascribe to the minimalist creed of biblical inerrancy, justification by faith alone in Christ alone, and the reality of new birth that issues forth in Christian activity, then yes, I'm that kind of evangelical. Which is kind of like repeating my affirmation that "I am a Christian," except that now I have added the vital caveat, "and I really, really mean it."

But the word evangelical usually involves connotative meanings additional to this. Too often it goes something like this: "I adhere to the idea that the Gospel can be preserved in isolation from the rest of Christian orthodoxy, without any necessary reference to the Christian Church, primarily through transdenominational venues that rally around mere Christianity."   

I'm not aboard that cruise line, because I'm not exactly sure where it's docking next. But I'll be in church on Sunday. Hmmm. A churchman. Now there's a useful label. 


MAS