One of our Biblical and Theological Studies faculty, Dr. Ken Stewart, has recently co-edited The Advent of Evangelicalism: Exploring Historical Continuities, with Dr. Michael Haykin of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. The book is an anthology of essays by a distinguished group of scholars continuing the important discussion which was particularly energized by David Bebbington’s 1989 book Evangelicalism in Modern Britain: A History from the 1730s to the 1980s.

Bebbington’s principal aim was to present the rise and meaning of evangelicalism within its contemporary and wider historical and cultural context, and his central thesis is “that evangelical religion is the result of transatlantic revival in the 1730s, and that it took a cooperative attitude toward the Enlightenment rather than a contradictory one.” This main idea, simple in such brief presentation here, bears breadths and depths of significance as Bebbington unpacks the key characteristics of evangelicalism as he sees it: conversionism (emphasis on conversion), activism (emphasis on active witness), biblicism (emphasis on the authority of the Scriptures), and crucicentrism (emphasis on the centrality of the cross). Bebbington’s “quadrilateral” definition of evangelicalism in these terms has become the accepted view of virtually all subsequent descriptions, so much so that it is regularly referenced without citation.

Bebbington’s analysis has raised numerous important questions, including the one that is the primary interest of the authors in Dr. Stewart’s and Dr. Haykin’s volume. As foreward writer Timothy George of Beeson Divinity School puts it: “To what extent does evangelicalism of modern/postmodern times (say, from the conversion of John Wesley through to the era of Billy Graham) represent continuity or discontinuity with the preceding Christian story?” Bebbington’s work gives the nod to discontinuity, regarding evangelicalism as a significantly novel adaptation to changing conditions and changing opportunities. Others, including those in this volume, believe in various ways that Bebbington has overstated his case, and that important and deep continuities exist between evangelicalism and its older roots. George himself affirms that evangelicalism…

…is best understood as a renewal movement within historic Christian orthodoxy…shaped by the Trinitarian and Christological consensus of the early church, the formal and material principles of the Reformation, the missionary movement that grew out of the Great Awakening, and the new movements of the Spirit that indicate ‘surprising works of God’ are still happening in the world today.

The essays of the volume address this important question through examinations of (1) the historical connections between the Enlightenment and evangelicalism; (2) continuity/novelty in geographic regions, e.g. the British Isles, America, and Holland; (3) continuity/novelty across historical eras; and (4) continuity/novelty in doctrine. While acknowledging that Bebbington has significantly expanded our appreciation for key factors of the emergence and dynamism of evangelicalism, the authors give convincing reasons for evangelicalism’s place of belonging in the theological and missional stream of the early church and the Reformation.

Why is this important for us and our work at Covenant College? If Bebbington is right, then it becomes quite difficult to connect contemporary evangelical identity to older Christian roots. Evangelicalism becomes more identified with its ingenuities and idiosyncracies rather than with the community of all God’s people in all times and places. This leaves our generation’s evangelicals, including those of us who consider ourselves evangelical and Reformed, without that ancient legacy which both inspires faith and ministry and also provides necessary review and correction of current beliefs and practices.

Are there aspects of contemporary evangelicalism that we should consider outside the mainstream of historic, faithful, biblical Christianity? Of course there are, and there have been such in every generation throughout church history. The important point here is that we can embrace a truly evangelical identity consistent and in fact flowing through our Reformation roots and convictions, through our lineage across the earlier centuries of church history, and from our fundamental grounding in the text and story of the Holy Scriptures. At Covenant College, our evangelical faith is Reformed faith, and our Reformed faith is biblical faith, passed on faithfully across the generations and now to us. We delight to own this ancestry and in our day to give our voices and lives in witness to this faith once for all delivered to the saints.

Professors Stewart and Haykin, along with all the authors of The Advent of Evangelicalism, have done us biblical, Reformed, evangelical Christians a great service. They give us confidence that we are standing on the solid ground of historic, biblical Christianity as we serve Jesus Christ and his church faithfully and fruitfully in the ever-changing contexts of our lives.