No Better Time to Be Evangelical

There’s Never Been a Better Time to Be an Evangelical Christian

Just before Christmas, New York Times columnist Ross Douthat responded in his newsletter to the continuing controversy about the Francis papacy in a surprising way.

What was surprising here is not that Douthat, a convert to Catholicism, would write about the church’s stormy politics; he does so all the time. Also not surprising is his almost-despair about the Francis papacy; he is almost surely the most widely read Roman Catholic critic of the pope.

Surprising, though, was his conclusion: that there’s never been a better time to be a Roman Catholic. Over the past year, I’ve come to a similar conclusion: that there’s never been a better time to be an evangelical Christian.

Douthat gets to his conclusion the long way around. He writes about his own conversion into a church led by Pope John Paul II and then Benedict XVI, when the Catholic future seemed to be trending toward even more of the kind of conservative Catholicism that drew Douthat in the first place.

He had come to the Times expecting to be a defender of the church—but then the terrifying scope of the sexual abuse crisis became clear. Then the pope resigned, followed by all of the ambiguity as to where the church would now be headed on matters such as marriage, family, sexuality, and even the authority of the papacy itself.

Douthat poses the anguished question, “Who would choose to be a Catholic at a time like this?”

In this, Douthat argues that conservative Catholics such as himself are perhaps sympathetic to the plight of the more liberalizing Catholics during the John Paul II era, who were often asked, If you don’t like the direction of the church, why not just become an Episcopalian?

Whatever the current tumult of the church, Douthat argues, these progressive Catholics truly believed that the reform they sought was God’s will and that they would be vindicated in the long run. The same impulse is present, he writes, in those dismayed by the confusing state of the church now.

Douthat argues that what’s evaporated is not a Catholic view of history or of its own authority but the flawed-from-the-first assumption that Rome would be a “safe harbor” from modernity or a “fortress against the struggles of the age.”

“When I meet people who are becoming Catholic now, at a time like this, the fact that those struggles are present inside the church does not seem to especially bother them,” Douthat writes. “They’re used to struggle and uncertainty, they don’t expect a simple refuge, and they recognize that any space of real spiritual power—which the Catholic Church still is, I promise—will inevitably be a zone of contestation as well.” Douthat argues that this has always been the state of the church “from the beginning, from failed and feckless popes all the way back to failed and even treacherous disciples.”

The real question, he writes, is whether the Christian story is true. If it is, then the church will emerge intact from this crisis as it has all of those before, Douthat concludes. “And whether you’re a liberal, a conservative or just a believer trying to stay out of the crossfire, you should feel confident that what happens inside Roman Catholic Christianity will show some of those ways through.”

Far be it from me as a low-church Protestant to give counsel to Catholics about their struggles. As Pope Francis would say, “Who am I to judge?” But nor can I, being what Douthat calls the “stringent sort of conservative Protestant,” see in any of it “simple vindication for Calvin or Luther or their contemporary heirs.”

For an evangelical—especially an American evangelical—to show any sort of triumphalism in light of some other group’s identity crisis would be, at best, an inability to read the room, and, at worst, the kind of blindness that Jesus told us can only come for those who insist they can see (John 9:41). When it comes to the crises of evangelical Protestantism, though, I am in a very similar place to Douthat. I truly believe there is no better time to be born again. Here’s why.

Though not Roman, all of us profess to be “catholic,” in that we believe the church will ultimately endure through any “dangers, toils, and snares”—not to mention the abominations that make desolate—that the gates of hell (or the judgment of God) might muster. And, in addition to that, there are certain emphases that evangelicalism has brought to the broader body of Christ that should cause us to expect, and to endure, times like these.

The word evangelical is contested, of course, but sometimes we act as though this is a recent revelation. Evangelical is, quite intentionally, not an institution or an ideology. It describes instead a renewal movement that emphasizes and underscores certain aspects of universal Christianity—aspects that are maybe best described as the personal.

Jesus told us, “You must be born again,” and revival movements have warned that implicit faith in a church—much less national, ethnic, or political identity—is not enough. The question “Do you have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ?” might sound clichéd and might carry the baggage of a certain hyper-programmed sort of salesmanship, but that doesn’t mean it’s not true.

At its best, evangelical Christianity reminds the world and the church that the Good Shepherd doesn’t just see the flock but the one sheep lost in the woods. “God so loved the world” (John 3:16) is an important truth. So is “Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her” (Eph. 5:25). But we also need to hear and believe that Jesus “loved me and gave himself for me” (Gal. 2:20, emphasis added).

Even our view of biblical authority—often derided as naive and literalistic—is an emphasis on the personal. The issue isn’t just the objective truthfulness of the Scriptures (although that’s a necessary condition), but the question of actually personally reading, hearing, and living the Word of God. Under that is a confidence that God—as in the days of Josiah—can speak with the voice that creates life and new creation, even when the structures and institutions have fallen away.

In fact, that’s what’s happened again and again. The Wesleys never “won” a battle for the Church of England. But even in the coldness of that Laodicean time, hearts were “strangely warmed” and a revival emerged, a revival that, as is often the case, wasn’t a comeback of institutions but a bypassing of them to reach people—one sinner at a time.

Whether in an established church or outside of it, evangelicalism at its best has reiterated that a government or a culture can neither establish nor impede the gospel.

That’s really relevant today, a time when some secular leftists think they can nudge religion out of existence. And on the Right, what is Christian nationalism but an attempt at an established religion—just established by the angers of populist mobs rather than by the traditions of parliaments or kings?

That doesn’t happen with a strategy or a blueprint. Indeed, personal renewal and church revival—what we might say evangelicalism at its best has aspired to conserve—nearly always start with despair and perplexity.

Can these bones live? How can a man be born when he is old? The answers seem both obvious and daunting. That’s why Jesus said, “The wind blows where it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going” (John 3:8). Much of evangelical Christianity, at least in America, is beclowned and bewildered, deceiving and being deceived. That’s true—and should not, at least for evangelical Christians, be at all surprising.

But even when we are taken by surprise, and even when so many churches and institutions stumble in the dark—in the absence of a lampstand they don’t even remember to miss—Jesus still says, “Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with that person, and they with me” (Rev. 3:20).

In fact, evangelical Christianity ought to be made of the people reminding everyone else that trends do not define the future. The trend of an individual life is always bad, after all. The gospel does not improve the trend—it interrupts it: “I once was lost, but now am found, / was blind, but now I see.”

All kinds of imbalances can happen. Evangelicalism can devolve into individualism and pragmatism, but the reason evangelicalism—whatever it calls itself—bursts out so often in the history of the church is that it speaks to those who’ve lost faith in their own effort or in the efforts of some institution they trusted.

Reinhold Niebuhr wrote, “It is wholesome therefore for the Church to stand under the stinging rebuke ‘God is able of these stones to raise up children unto Abraham,’ a rebuke in the form of a statement of fact which history has validated again and again.” In fact, the Bible tells us, that very rebuke is good news (Luke 3:18) because those “stones,” over and over again, are the tax collectors and sinners everyone else has given up on, who have given up on themselves.

Revival tents can collapse. Cathedrals can fall. But if the tomb in that garden is really empty, if those women weren’t lying, there will still be a church—even if every other hope gives way. And in that church, there will still be people saying, “Jesus loves me, this I know / for the Bible tells me so.” Maybe the deadest, most cynical, most hostile person you can imagine—maybe even you?—might be the one leading that cry.

In a time of justice-seeking without forgiveness, of self-actualization without new creation, people are longing for something many of them don’t even know to call “grace.” When they find it, they will be amazed. So should we.

We are born again at the right time. “Behold, now is the favorable time; behold, now is the day of salvation” (2 Cor. 6:2, ESV) might just be another way of saying this: There’s never been a better time to be an evangelical Christian.

Rethinking the Sabbath

In Sydney Pollack’s film Tootsie, the character Julie Nichols (Jessica Lange) reassures a (she thinks) female friend that her invitation to hang out for the weekend is not just because her boyfriend can’t get free. “I’ve always hated women who treat other women as stand-ins for men,” Nichols says. I kind of feel like that when it comes to the question of Sabbath. I’ve always resented people who treat the Sabbath as a stand-in for “work-life balance.”

How many sermons have we heard and self-help books have we read that interpret “Sabbath” primarily in terms of the need we have for rhythms of relaxation in order to keep plowing ahead? I suppose it’s my instinctual revulsion at instrumentalizing revealed religion as a means to an end. It’s akin to my aversion to people commending religion because religious people are happier or live longer—which hardly fits with the Sermon on the Mount as a motivator for believing it. The Sabbath is much more than a recharging.

That said, I was reminded this week that though the Sabbath is more than that, it’s not less.

I was talking to Seth Kaplan about his book Fragile Neighborhoods: Repairing American Society, One Zip Code at a Time for an upcoming episode of The Russell Moore Show. Kaplan—a fascinating and insightful conversation partner—invited me to spend a Saturday with him and his Jewish religious community for their celebration of the Shabbat, the Jewish Sabbath. That’s because I told him I was moved by his book’s description of their way of recognizing this day of rest and worship.

“Streets become full of people walking—to a neighbor’s house, a park, a prayer service, a celebration,” Kaplan writes. “Whenever we walk somewhere (or just sit outside), we meet many familiar faces and easily get caught up in conversations.”

“As a friend remarked when visiting on one Shabbat, the scene resembles a time before automobiles, television and apps dominated daily life,” Kaplan notes. “This way of life works to bond the community in a way that other neighborhoods cannot easily reproduce. As a result, there is a sense of trust, willful interdependency, and security that is too often missing in contemporary America.”

In response to that moving picture, I told Kaplan that it reminded me of something my own Rabbi once said: “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath” (Mark 2:27). The creation order of rhythm and rest points beyond itself, but one of the reasons for Sabbath ought to be to remind us of our creatureliness, of our need for God and for one another—the givenness of life and of the real-life communities in which we are placed.

I’m struck by something I heard somewhere, about how the poet David Whyte once said in a lecture, “We tend to only see people who are moving at the same velocity we are.” He was referencing the invisibility of the elderly, but the application is much broader than that. The speed with which we lead our lives is causing us to often not even see those who are moving at the same velocity, except as a blur.

While talking to Kaplan, I suddenly realized why after the Christmas holidays I feel more rejuvenated than ever. It’s not because I am doing less because, ironically enough, I am actually more creative and productive during that time than others. The reason is that it’s not just me stopping; everyone does.

A vacation or a sabbatical means there’s always the nagging question, “Does somebody need me?” or “Am I not doing something that someone is expecting?” The freedom from the apprehension of all that means I can get more done on my own work, and also that I can really connect with people I love, without the worry that I am keeping them from something.

It seems to me that that’s what God planned for us not once a year but once a week. The result shouldn’t be drudgery but joy—a joy that echoes the God who said all seven days are “very good,” and who said what was “not good” was that we might be alone.

Maybe Peer Pressure Wasn’t the Real Problem

Speaking of the Kaplan conversation, we ended up talking about something that has come up repeatedly in my conversations—with Jonathan Haidt, with David Brooks, and with many others: the way that disconnection (among other factors) has led to spiking rates of anxiety and depression among adolescents and young adults, as well as to “deaths of despair” among their often addicted elders.

As Kaplan points out, echoing Jean Twenge and others, the number of teenagers seeing their friends nearly every day has dropped by two-fifths in the last quarter century—a crisis that Instagram and BeReal cannot alleviate.

This reveals that, when it comes to the next generation, the church has spent almost a century worried about the wrong thing. We were warned constantly about the dangers of peer pressure. Almost every youth group in any congregation was about withstanding the temptations of our peers to immorality or apathy. That’s a real danger in any age, to be sure, for “broad is the way to destruction.”

But what many of us didn’t see coming was a day when the peer pressure would be the pressure of having no peers at all.

In the absence of the kind of relationship that can only be formed in, for lack of a better word, play, the heart hungers for connection—and tries to find it in online mobs or political tribes or social media spectatorship. A heart in that kind of distress often seeks to turn off despair with alcohol or drugs or something else, which, of course, only makes it worse.

We were right to hear the warning, “Bad company corrupts good character” (1 Cor. 15:33). Perhaps we should also have heard the warning, “If all were a single member, where would the body be?” (1 Cor. 12:19, ESV).

Every other week, I share a playlist of songs one of you says you’d want to have on hand if you were stranded on a desert island. I should not be left to my own devices (they come with prices and vices; end up in crisis) because I chose this week’s submission from reader Matt Williamson from Greenville, South Carolina.

Matt writes, “In honor of Taylor Swift wrapping up her 2023 shows on the Eras Tour recently, here’s my Desert Island Playlist combining two things I love: Jesus & Taylor Swift (in that order).”

“State of Grace”: A reminder, by title alone, of the grace we live in because of Christ.

“False God”: We should run from idolatry and particularly run from finding fulfillment in human relationships.

“Cruel Summer”: The line “Devils roll the dice / Angels roll their eyes” points to the bigger spiritual reality of the existence of angels and demons.

“Anti-Hero”: A case study on the total depravity within us all (“It’s me, hi, I’m the problem, it’s me”).

“Marjorie”: The line “What died didn’t stay dead” is true of Christ’s resurrection and a reminder of the saints that have gone before us.

“Haunted”: We may be haunted by our sins and past mistakes, but they’re forgiven at the Cross (n.b., also just a great hype song).

“Holy Ground”: A celebration of early love, which can never eclipse the love God has for us.

“High Infidelity”: A reminder of the difficulty that can come in a marriage (or serious relationship).

“We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together”: As we are freed from sinning and will be forever, so in the new creation.

“Now That We Don’t Talk”: The line “You part the crowd like the Red Sea” stands by itself here.

Thank you, Matt!

Readers, what do y’all think? If you were stranded on a desert island for the rest of your life and could have only one playlist or one bookshelf with you, what songs or books would you choose?

For a Desert Island Playlist, send me a list of up to 12 songs, excluding hymns and worship songs. (We’ll cover those later.)

For a Desert Island Bookshelf, send me a list of up to 12 books. If possible, include one photo of all the books together.

Send your list (or both lists!) to questions@russellmoore.com, and include as much or as little explanation of your choices as you would like, along with the city and state from which you’re writing.

Quote of the Moment

“Give me words, I’ll misuse them
Obligations, I’ll misplace them
’Cause all religion ever made of me
Was just a sinner with a stone
Tied to my feet
It never set me free

It’s gotta be
More like falling in love
Than something to believe in
More like losing my heart
Than giving my allegiance
Caught up, called out
Come take a look at me now
It’s like I’m falling,
It’s like I’m falling in love.”

—Jason Gray, “More Like Falling in Love”

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Onward,
Russell Moore