Christianity Today’s WEBLOG from Friday has a number of links to excellent articles and essays online, such as Pastor James L. Evans’ balanced call to reconsider the value of a taboo subject (”CONSIDER TRACK RECORD OF SOCIAL GOSPEL“). Evans writes,


“Clearly there is a personal side to religious devotion. Spiritual truth and discipline begin as individual decisions, but they survive and thrive because of the support of a believing community. We may see ourselves as lonely pilgrims on a journey of faith, but if we look around, the traffic is pretty heavy on the road we travel.

“Frightening powers of hate and greed and prejudice thrive in our society and have an impact on us greater than our individual efforts to resist them. Only a force of equal or greater strength will be able to stare these demons down. I believe that force is found in a believing community committed to both personal piety and social justice.”

There’s also a link to an article from the Detroit Free Press that asks, “WHAT IS AN EVANGELICAL?” The author provides some good insight into the history and development of the term:


“The way ‘evangelical’ is used today was shaped in part by a coalition of Protestants — including the Rev. Billy Graham — who began calling themselves evangelicals to separate themselves from the Christian fundamentalist movement of the 1920s and ’30s. Christian fundamentalism began in the late 19th century among American Protestants reacting against all things modern. That movement was — and largely is — characterized by an anti-intellectual, separatist mentality that attempts to keep the church apart from culture. Graham and other post-World War II ‘evangelicals’ wanted to engage culture to spread the gospel.

“Today, ‘evangelical’ has as many intended meanings as there are evangelical congregations, which is why it’s so difficult to accurately count how many evangelicals there are. Different pollsters find different counts — between 7 percent and 47 percent — depending on how they define ‘evangelical.’ Most scholars say the evangelical population of the United States is about 25 percent.”

There’s a link to a quite interesting story about Rabbi Irving Greenberg (”YOUR MESSIAH OR MINE?).


“Noting the world’s 1.7 billion Christians and 14 million Jews, he said Jews must ask if ‘all of these people are stupid and so spiritually and intellectually unsophisticated that they can be sold a bill of goods.’

“In turn, Christians, he said, must inquire of Judaism, ‘If this religion was meant to be replaced, to go on and pass on, then how can one account for the fact that a religion that is 3,500 years old is not only alive but going through a great renaissance and rebirth with all its crises?’”

In a related but quite different vein, THE JERUSALEM POST calls attention to a soon-to-be-released by Knesset member and Rabbi MK Elon. The Post provides some insight into the rabbi’s view of evangelicals:


“‘The state hasn’t done enough to reach out to our strategic partners, the Christian lovers of Israel,’ Elon said. ‘Whoever knows the Bible is aware that our role is to be a light unto the nations, so it is our responsibility to reach out to the Christians as part of our redemption process.’

“Elon blamed the lack of outreach to Christians on a combination of the troubled history of Christian anti-Semitism, an exaggerated fear of missionaries and what he called ‘the cynical political reasons of people not on the Right.’ He said that as a rabbi, he had no problem talking to evangelicals, because ‘I am secure with my Judaism and I know who my messiah is.’”

One needs to be careful about confusing security and certainty with reality. (I have written HERE and HERE on the love affair of evangelicals with political Israel.)

Finally, THE CLEVELAND PLAIN DEALER reports on a survey that studied the effect of religious beliefs on behavior.


“A new study of more than 3,000 teenagers and their parents, the most comprehensive research ever done on faith and adolescence, finds a teen nation where more than four in five youths say religion is important in their lives. But the survey also indicated that many teens know little about their religion and many activities compete for their time.

“Among religiously active teens like Mike Laheta — those who attend services weekly and belong to a youth group — their faith appears to be making a significant difference in their behavior.”


2 Cor 1:13