Why Evangelicalism is almost certainly doomed Evangolic

1 of 2

http://ln.roon.io/why-evangelicalism-is-almost-certainly-doomed

March 20, 2014 7 minute read

Anyone care for a bold uninformed prediction? Yes? Okay, heres one: Nondenominational evangelicalism of
the Rick Warren, Mark Driscoll, Chuck Smith brand will shrink into almost total irrelevance over the next
sixty years. The American landscape will be littered with large, empty, tacky buildings and our greatgrandchildren will wonder at the fact that these vacant monstrosities were once filled with Christians.
Ok, why such a bold prediction? My hypothesis is that the megachurch non-denominational church culture
can only exist in a nation where there is a strong Christian consensus and church-going is a recognized virtue.
I.E. pre-9/11 America. This hit me a while back when I stumbled across a sermon series by Perry Noble where
the praise band opened with Rock and Roll by Led Zeppelin. As I shrank in horrified embarrassment from
my computer monitor I asked myself, who thinks this is cool? Certainly not anyone who actually likes Led
Zeppelin, rock and roll, or Christian worship as it has existed for the last two thousand years.
Then the lightbulb came on: This appeals to Christians! christians who know they have an obligation to go to
church but arent sure why; christians who are bored with their tiny, tired church and looking for a reason to
get out of bed on Sunday morning. I suspect if you took a survey of the crowd you would not discover many
recent converts but a large group of lifelong churchgoers poached from numerous small, unspectacular
congregations in the surrounding area. I bet if you asked them why they attend NewSpring Church they would
mention how funny Pastor Perry is or how much they like the music.
The one thing that this sunday morning performance isnt doing is reaching the lost. No heathen is waking up
on sunday morning saying Great Scott, I have a hankering to watch a bland rendition Led Zeppelin and a
mediocre standup comic push a moral message. Honey, get the kids in the car! These churches justify such
shenanigans in the name of reaching the lost but in reality they are only further isolating themselves. That
Led Zeppelin song is what preaching to the choir looks like in our day and age. Please do not miss the irony.
I submit that the patrons of the non-denominational evangelical movement are not pagan seekers but Christian
consumers looking to check the church on sunday box and not be bored while doing it.
Non-denominationalism is only appealing to people raised in a cultural context where denominational
distictives were actually something people deeply cared about. If Joe Baptist causes an uproar by marrying
Jane Catholic, then you have a ripe market for the kinder, vaguer face of non-denominational evangelical
Christianity where Loving Jesus is the important thing and not Presbyterian VS. Episcopalian polity.
NewSpring Church is only appealing to people who have been bored by church in the past.
But heres the problem, the generation that created Evangelicalism is vanishing. America is shedding its
Christian consensus at a shocking pace. If the surveys are to be believed, the next generation will be the most
secular to ever exist in this nation. The market that Evangelicalism fed off is aging and dying and
non-denominationalism didnt create the same religious angst that would make the next generation into buyers
of what its selling.
Quite simply, the fatal flaw of Evangelicalism is its inherent shallowness. Its a movement where a core value
is deliberate vagueness on issues that Christians have historically found important enough to fight about. This
might make a generation sick of arguing happy but if those divisive issues were actually important then
Evangelicalism bought its unity at a dear price.
Ask a first-generation Evangelical churchgoer for their testimony and what you will hear is remarkably
similar: Raised in a strict religious environment, probably Catholicism or Baptist. After a short period of

2/15/2015 4:10 PM

Why Evangelicalism is almost certainly doomed Evangolic

2 of 2

http://ln.roon.io/why-evangelicalism-is-almost-certainly-doomed

leaving the faith, they had a religious experience of some sort in which they encountered a vibrant, exciting,
less strict version of the faith of their upbringing usually appearing to them in the form of a revival, concert,
etc. And they happily returned to the kinder, hipper church never to look back. By I suspect that their strict
religious upbringing created the essential religious angst that drove them to their later conversion and embrace
of non-denominational evangelicalism. Non-denominationals carry around their denominational roots
unawares.
This is never more apparent in the methods that Evangelical churches use to try to pass on the faith to the next
generation. Instead of catechesis they engineer catharsis: camp revivals, youth rallies, alter calls, all attempts
to recreate the external context in which they, the previous generation, believe they came to the faith. But the
sad truth is that Evangelicals only have an experience to pass on to the next generation, not a faith.
The result is that the next generation of Evangelicals arent actually rejecting the Apostolic Catholic Christian
faith, theyre just outgrowing it like an adolescent crush. Theres no crushing law, no absolution, no remission
of sins, no baptism, no Eucharist, no priests, no creeds, no catechism, no confession. Theres no there there.
And so the Evangelical generation will walk away never having actually arrived at much in particular.
So what does the future of American Christianity look like? I think it looks very Roman Catholic,
Presbyterian, Anglican, Lutheran, and Baptist. When you enter a Christian church sixty years from now,
youll probably hear an organ instead of Led Zeppelin. At least I hope so.
You heard it here first, folks. If any of what Im saying remotely plays out, I expect to be remembered as a
prophet.
Like 1

Share Comment on Twitter

Feed
Levi Nunnink
@a_band
culturezoo.com
Evangelical Catholic. Episcopalian in Ecclesiology, Lutheran in everything else. I find your lack of assurance
disturbing. Attending: http://emmanuelgv.org/ in Grass Valley, CA and Living Savior Lutheran in Portland, OR
A few points on Real Presence The Evangelical Sacrament
Roon
Share
Tweet

2/15/2015 4:10 PM