Evangelical Diffusion or Disintegration?

Will the evangelical faith remain a meaningful, cohesive movement in the 21st century given the global spread and internal diversity it has achieved? Or will it fracture into divergent tribes and trajectories?

This is the question at the heart of Brian Stanley’s far-reaching history of English-speaking evangelicalism in the second half of the 20th century. The book covers the fifth evangelical “age” or generation, after its birth with the awakenings of Whitefield, Edwards, and the Wesleys in the 1740s; its expansion, maturation, and social conscience with Wilbeforce, Finney, More, and Chalmers; its ecclesial dominance in the English-speaking world with Spurgeon and Moody; and its disruption by the fundamentalist-liberal debates and the birth of Pentecostalism in the early 20th century. The stage here is no longer transatlantic or even Western, like in previous ages, but global, as the seeds of the missionary movement have blossomed into vibrant indigenous movements, and advances in transportation and communication have rendered evangelicalism a global family.

Read Full Article »
Comment
Show commentsHide Comments

Related Articles