Faith.In.Life

What Is An Evangelical?

Author’s Note: I will be releasing these sections in installments of about 1,000 words. I have a plan and have written more, but will release them on a weekly basis. Each section will build on the other. I would welcome any ongoing conversation during these installments that may help form the next section. At the same time, there will be a sense of the section being incomplete, and so you may think of things I actually already thought of, but that topic may not specifically come up until later on.

In order to deconstruct one’s faith to become the #exvangelical, one first must understand what a Evangelical is - and maybe more importantly, what it is not.

What It Is:

Faith Church is part of a greater denomination known as the Covenant Order of Evangelical Presbyterians.  In summarizing what is most important to us we say we are three key things:  Reformed, Evangelical, and Egalitarian.  The key aspect I want to talk to is what it is.  To me, it seems like we are far past due in defining the term Evangelical in a productive way so that whatever culture might define it as does not hijack a key component of the faith.  In seminary I came upon that some had dubbed Evangelism as the “E-word” as if it was a bad word and something people even within the church wanted to disassociate with.  After Donald Trump’s election in 2016 where the majority of those who claimed to be Evangelicals voted for him, the term became even more divisive.  However, at that point no one would be able to predict what would happen in the aftermath of the 2020 election where some self proclaimed Evangelical Trump supporters suggested that even the Bible itself predicted that Trump would return to office.  While I may be jumping to talking about what an Evangelical most absolutely is not, this highlights even more why we have to talk about what an Evangelical is (or at least what is a good and right definition).

The root of the word Evangelical is a Greek word  εὐαγγέλιον, or Euanglion.  One of the classic places this word is found in Paul’s writings in Romans 1:16-17 saying:

16 For I am not ashamed of this Good News (Euanglion) about Christ. It is the power of God at work, saving everyone who believes—the Jew first and also the Gentile.  17 This Good News tells us how God makes us right in his sight. This is accomplished from start to finish by faith. As the Scriptures say, “It is through faith that a righteous person has life.” 

Other translations will exchange “this good news about Christ” with “the gospel of Jesus Christ.”  The Oxford Dictionary clearly defines Gospel as:

1.  the teaching or revelation of Christ.

2.  the record of Jesus' life and teaching in the first four books of the New Testament.

An Evangelical than is two things:  One, someone who follows the teachings or revelation of Christ, whose life and teaching is found in actually the entirety of the New Testament.  And two, an Evangelical is then equally called to share the good news or Gospel of Jesus Christ to (as the Great Commission says) the ends of the earth.  Every other definition of what an Evangelical is has to be weighed with quite a bit of nuance and understanding.  That is, if an Evangelical follows the teachings of the New Testament then we are given a certain way of life conducive to being a Christ follower.  These expectations may overlap with certain politics, ethics, and beliefs.  However, this is not because our politics, ethics, or beliefs inform our Christianity, but rather our Christianity should inform and define everything we do and who we are (and are becoming).  In Rome at the dawn of the “Common Era” Caesar was Lord and defined one’s politics, ethics, and beliefs in order that everyone would succumb and even be slaves to that way of life.  For the Christ follower, or who could by definition be called an Evangelical - Jesus was Lord, not Caesar, and offers a new and different kingdom from any other that had ever been encountered.  

Yet, before moving on to what an Evangelical is not (or should not be), I want to say one more thing of what an Evangelical is.  The very nature of the Gospel is first and foremost an acknowledgement of our sinful inability to do any good apart from God or to somehow save ourselves “from this bodily decay.”  The Gospel then offers sinners salvation by grace alone through faith alone.  The very center of the Gospel is that through Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection we are saved despite what we have done or even what we will ever do.  One of the biggest complaints about Christians or Evangelicals is we are hypocrites.  I am not offering up an excuses for any sin Evangelicals and Christians may have done.  We should acknowledge sin for what it is and repent to do better.  Often times we as sinners will desire to do better, but we do not allow the Holy Spirit to do any necessary (and sometimes very hard) work in our lives to actually be“transformed by the renewing of our minds.”  We might even define being hypocritical as sinners who are also saved by grace.  Being sinful and being saved at the same time can both be true because the very Gospel of Jesus Christ is he has saved us while we were still sinners and enemies of God.  The Evangelical then has the challenge in front of us to continually be seeking out the mind of Christ, to constantly be formed more and more in His image.  That means that we have to repent of the things we have done because, in fact, they are things we never should have done.  We need to repent of what an Evangelical is not.