Evangelicalism formed in response to fundamentalism. It founded itself upon the belief that Christians ought to engage both politics & culture for the purpose of being salt & light in the world.

Many evangelicals are now trying to pretend the movement can’t be defined.

Faced with the repercussions of a morally illegitimate president that THEY helped to elect & COUNTLESS disaffected congregants whose spirituality has been destroyed by the movement’s thirst for cultural & political power, many evangelicals are trying to evade responsibility.

They are doing this by saying, “What IS an ‘evangelical’ anyway? I don’t even know what that means. Whatever kind of evangelical you’re talking about, it doesn’t apply to ME. Does it even apply to anybody? ”

By making the very concept of an evangelical undefinable, bad actors are attempting to make it impossible to name the abuses of the movement. Perhaps you’ve said these things in good faith. That’s ok. That doesn’t mean YOU are a bad actor! But rest assured bad actors are at play.

If evangelicalism can’t be defined, then the abuses of the movement are just “bad apples” within Christianity that aren’t indicative of any real phenomenon that has actually taken place in the real world. It is a form of gas-lighting.

Evangelicalism IS a real movement that DOES exist in the real world. Millions of Christians were raised up within it and numerous colleges were founded as a result of it, including my own Alma mater whose mission was to “lead the nation and shape the culture.”

This is not even a dig against my Alma mater bcuz I had a largely positive experience there. This is just to say, what defines evangelicalism has ALWAYS been understood by the public as well as by the churches and people underneath it’s umbrella.

Now that evangelical leaders are turning into an embarrassment and laughing stock in the wake of fiascos like Jerry Falwell Jr., we don’t get to suddenly play dumb and pretend we don’t know what evangelicalism is.

Evangelicalism explicitly rejected the retreatist mentalities of fundamentalism by mobilizing Christians to influence the culture for Jesus. It did this by attaching “Christian values” to civic engagement.

It was responsible for creating one of the most influential political coalitions of the 20th century, the Moral Majority, transforming “traditional family values” into a religio-political football, and birthing mega ministries that vowed to exercise cultural power for Christ.

It’s biggest standard bearers united Christians from all corners of theological conviction. These figures include the likes of Carl F.H. Henry, Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, Chuck Colson, Franklin Graham, James Dobson, J.I Packer, Francis Schaeffer, John Piper, the list goes on.

From the beginning it was a diverse movement. This is what made it so formidable as a cultural force, in that it managed to unite my cessationist Reformed Baptist Church up in NY with the Pentecostal nondenominational mega church down in Texas.

Despite our differences, we could all agree that there was such a thing as “Christian values” defined in large measure by the “traditional nuclear family” & that we as Christians had a responsibility to exercise our influence to steer the country in the right direction.

Many churches and theological traditions united and continue to unite under the evangelical umbrella, but that does not mean evangelicalism is undefined and impossible to pin down. It was a clearly defined movement from the get-go and still is to this day.

Rest assured, evangelicalism is real. It’s abuses are real. It’s consequences are real. Do not let people try to convince you that it means different things to different people and so therefore we can’t talk about it in any definable way. We can and we should.

So resist the urge to deflect or self-defend by engaging in rhetoric that promotes the notion that evangelicalism can’t be defined. It can be & it is. We don’t get to play dumb just bcuz we’re embarrassed. Instead, we get to hold our leaders to account & force things to change.