The popularity of evangelicals
If you go back a century or so, you discover that the evangelicalism of the time was no mass movement. Evangelicals were seen back then as intellectual troglodytes, afraid to examine their faith in the light of reason. Members of the Cambridge Inter-Collegiate Christian Union even refused to affiliate with the then massive, intellectually respectable, but liberal-tending Student Christian Movement (SCM), simply because the SCM wouldn't acknowledge the centrality of the atoning death of Christ. One useful account of this story can be found here.
All of this did nothing to help the popularity of the evangelicals. This was a good thing because it meant that evangelicals were quite clear about what they believed (because it was the cause of their unpopularity) and furthermore, it was a constant reminder that the Bible was true when it promised opposition.
For example, evangelicals learned first-hand the truth of Jesus' words in John 15:18? “If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you.” Likewise they understood the blessing of Matthew 5:11—“Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account.”
Now, however, it seems everybody wants to be an evangelical. In London, the Pentecostal Hillsong church are only too happy to claim to be evangelical. A contact was recently told by one of their spokesmen that they are seeking to be affiliated with the UK Evangelical Alliance, and that while valuing diversity, they would “more strongly identify with the evangelical wing of Christianity”. This despite the association of the Hillsong churches with an emphasis on health, wealth, physical wellbeing and all-round prosperity; this too in spite of the almost complete absence from their preaching and teaching of any mention of the cross of Christ.
The previously hard-edged definition of ‘evangelical’, championed by people like the Cambridge students against SCM, seems to have melted like an ice-cube in the warm sun of popular acceptance. Should we keep fighting for clarity? Maybe, maybe not. But whether or not we want to debate terms, the reminder Paul gives in 1 Corinthians is all important:
“...it pleased God through the folly of what we preach to save those who believe. For Jews demand signs and Greeks seek wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles” (1 Corinthians 1:21-23)
If we preach that message, we will be a stranger to popularity—but we will be no stranger to the Lord Jesus. We will be known by God, and we will have the joy of making him known to others.