LEIGHTON FORD correctly declares that the Christian is true to his calling only when he is engaged in evangelizing the world about him. He quotes Archbishop Temple by saying, "The church is the only organization on earth which does not exist for the sake of its members." 1 There has been a tendency among some in recent years to downgrade evangelism. But a new day is dawning for gospel outreach.
The signs are unmistakable that there is a remarkable upturn in public interest in, and response to, evangelism today. In 1971, 12,000 students spent their Easter holiday at a week-long intervaristy missionary conference at the University of Illinois. One of the greatest convocations of its kind was held in the month of June, 1972, in the city of Dallas. Nearly 80,000 you people from 75 countries came together for a festival known as the "Jesus Festival," sponsered by Campus Crusade for Christ. In 1973 the National Evangelistic Campaign known as "key '73" involved several major rallies throughout the country and was supported by nearly 140 Protestant denominations, as well as American Catholic bishops.
The conservative evangelical churches are gaining at a rate of 3 percent a year, while liberal religious bodies are stagnate or declining. The mainline ecumenical churches are suffering special losses, particularly in Sunday School membership. For example, in the past five years the Methodist Church lost more than 500,000 members. The same -denomination saw its Sunday School enrollment drop from 7,303,873 to 5,924,464 within a recent four-year span. In the past two years the United Presbyterian Sunday Schools suffered a 245,000 decrease in membership. 2
Evangelical resurgence or renewal of interest is seen in awakening programs within established denominations such as The Fellowship of Witness in the Episcopal Church. The Lutherans have established a movement known as Alert, and the Fellowship of Concerned Churchmen has been organized in the United Church of Christ. The Presbyterian Lay Committee and Presbyterians for Biblical Concerns are two movements that recently have given new impact to evangelism in that denomination. The Methodists have adopted a program known as The Good News Movement in Methodism.
To this last might be added the burgeoning of the evangelical student groups such as the Inter- Varsity Fellowship, coupled with the Campus Crusade, and the renewed vigor of radio and television programs. We Seventh-day Adventists have launched an ambitious program known as MISSION '72, MISSION '73, MISSION '74, and MISSION '75, with the public phase of MISSION '75 emphasizing the health approach to evangelism.
"Third force" churches include such groups as the Pentecostal and Holiness churches, the Plymouth Brethren, the Bible churches, the Church of God, the Seventh-day Adventists, and the Churches of Christ. Actually, this so-called "third force" comprises the growing edge of Protestantism today. This is especially evident in those countries and nations out side the borders of the United States.
Dean M. Kelley declared: "People today are yearning for a clear purpose in life, for definite answers to the riddle of existence. They are more engrossed in the quest for meaning in life than in social re form; conservative churches seek to meet these deep spiritual needs, while liberal churches seem to be more interested in working for social change." 3 But when we have said this, evangelicalism must face some very real dangers.
Dangers Faced
When evangelicalism becomes respectable and even fashionable, then the temptation to accommodate to the values and goals of the world becomes almost over whelming. That such accommodation is present in many evangelical circles should remind us that the current renewal of religious conservatism is not without its dangers. Unfortunately, many who have decried a principle of civil religion are seemingly blind to the threat of a militant secularism that seeks the removal of religious values and concerns entirely from the public domain.
Among the specific pitfalls which evangelicals must guard against is the heresy of easy salvation, or what Bonhoeffer called "cheap grace." Too often in the ranks of evangelicalism, salvation is made to appear almost too simple, as a momentary experience instead of a lifelong struggle. Grace is free, but it is also costly. It demands from its beneficiaries their very lives.
Repentance is commonly preached, but it is sometimes forgotten that true revival entails repentance for social as well as personal sins. The revival among mankind today demands more than just mere lip service.
The contemporary charismatic revival contains much that can be commended. But too often in this movement people seek for Pentecost without first bowing before Calvary. Faith is widely viewed as simply a preparation for the baptism of the "Holy Spirit," which is seen as proof or evidence of the presence of God in one's life. This is not to deny the truth that there are special blessings of the Holy Spirit consequent to conversion. One must not rest content with the indwelling of the Spirit, but one should go on to be completely filled with the Spirit's power.
There is reason for concern when we seek for the security of evidential signs of the gift of the Spirit, particularly if it is believed that without these evidential signs one does not receive the pardoning grace of God.
"Instant Sanctification"
The idea of instant sanctification is another doctrinal deviation of which we need to be careful. For sanctification is indeed the work of a lifetime. John Wesley (whose ideas on sanctification have made a definite impact upon modern holiness and pentecostal movements) assured his hearers that the only perfection attainable in this life is a relative perfection, one in which we must still seek for the mercy and the power of God. According to him, even the most saintly Christians can never be free from involuntary transgressions. Dr. Donald Bloesch writes: "Dr. A. W. Tozer, one of the guiding lights of the Christian and Missionary Alliance, was constantly alert to the peril of instant salvation by trying to pack all of salvation into one experience, or two. The advocates of instant Christianity flaunt the law of development which runs through all nature. They ignore the sanctifying effects of suffering, cross carrying, and practical obedience."4
Rationalistic Biblicalism
Another factor which we, as evangelical Christians, need to be concerned about is cultural accommodation of a rationalistic Biblicalism in which an appeal is made to the axioms of formal logic on the evidences of the senses to buttress the claims of Biblical faith. Hand in hand with rationalistic emphasis often goes an antitheological bias. In conservative circles one can detect a notable dependence on the findings of psychology and secular philosophy, while in secular liberal theology an appeal is made to sociology and political science. Yet theology, the doctrinal exposition of Holy Scripture, is often regarded with distrust. This betrays a markedly cultural orientation in which the authority of reason is substituted for that of revelation.
A great many conservative evangelicals today are exceedingly troubled by the lack of solid, theological substance in evangelical writing, and some also have grave reservations about an apologetics that builds up a criterion held in common with secular thought. For instance, Elton Trueblood has criticized the Jesus Movement for its privatism and individualism that prevented it from rendering a potent social witness. Bloesch says, "A genuine gospel will always be concerned with human justice rather than the mere cultivation of a warm inner glow." 5
In thinking of modern-day evangelical techniques and concepts, it would be well to remember that in spite of all the emphasis on mass crusades and great rallies and the measurement of a successful evangelist and evangelism in such terms as crowds, budgets, conversions, and decisions, that Jesus sometimes fled from the crowds. His ministry, as well as that of His apostles, was very free from ostentation and flamboyancy. Christ's ministry was very simple. He spoke simply.
When one is incapable of adapting his method of labor to changing circumstances, he often times hinders not only his own larger achievements but he also retards the work of Christ in that place for many years.
It is well for the evangelist, be he minister or layman, to remember that the only basic difference between a grave and a rut is its depth. We are too far along in the timetable of history to be content with narrow plans. The future calls for larger visions, bigger dreams, and more ambitious ventures.
One Absolute—Hard Work
We now come to one absolute. It is unavoidable. Hard work. Evangelism has nothing in it that will commend it to the indigent, lazy, or slothful Christian. When it is stripped of its public glamor, when the first initial publicity has been forgotten by the faulty memories of a fickle crowd, evangelism exacts a concentration of physical energy and endurance hardly required by any other form of work. Many an evangelist has closed a strenuous, weary day utterly spent in body and exhausted in strength. It is not a task for the loafer or experimentalist who is constantly searching for the easy life.
Sacrifice and toil are the common expectancy of the evangelist. Like the family physician, he be comes a servant to circumstances. Rest is interrupted, and mealtimes are frequently shuttled through the day in dangerous variance. The evangelist's family life is often one of thwarted plans and sudden readjustments. And yet for all of it the evangelist is unhappy, restless, and unspeakably distressed unless he is in the midst of just such conditions.
In the closing hours of earth's history, evangelism is not a question of convenience, finance, institutions, social conditions, or political fortunes. Rather, it is a matter of divine injunction. Evangelism is to occupy more time, more energy, greater planning, and far more general participation by church members as time goes on and days become more perilous. It is alarming, therefore, to see that evangelism has in some places gone almost into eclipse. This is not God's order. It never was in God's plan that evangelism should be of secondary consideration. It becomes a primary function of the church, more urgently as time moves toward its mighty crescendo than at any other time, even including Pentecost!
We must, therefore, do our work in such a manner as to command continuing interest and appreciation by the best and broadest cross sections of community life. This means breaking with tradition at times. We cannot keep the truth from the people by refusing to bring it into the vernacular of the day. The heart breaking results of narrow, provincial planning, limited budgets, critical analysis of methodologies, must all give way to larger, broader, penetrating evangelistic concepts.
Modern revivalists of various religious persuasions prove handsomely that men and women of every walk of life are ready for moral rearmament when the church is willing to keep pace with the thinking of the generation to which she is beaming her message. The evangelist cannot rest content in the knowledge of results achieved at past performances. Continual development of ideas, plans, and the breaking of traditional concepts of methodologies have always marked the advance of the gospel evangel.
Adapted from Principles and Methodologies of Christian Evangelism, author's dissertation for the Doctor of Sacred Ministry degree, Howard University, Washington, D.C., May, 1974.
1. Leighton Ford, The Christian Persuader (New York: Harper & Row, 1966), p. 45.
2. Donald C. Bloesch, The Evangelical Renaissance (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdman's Publishing Company, 1973), p. 14.
3. Dean M. Kelley, Why Conservative Churches Are Crowing (New York: Harper & Row, 1972).
4. Bloesch, op. cit., p. 20.
5. Ibid., p. 22.
