When I was in seminary way back when, I read Donald Dayton’s Discoveing an Evangelical Heritage. Dayton reminded evangelicals that their 19th century forebears were social activists that supported the abolition of slavery, women’s rights, labor reform and other causes now deemed “liberal” or “progressive”. Dayton’s thesis was that what became the “social gospel” movement was rooted firmly in an earlier form of evangelical piety.

I recently read D. G. Hart’s The Lost Soul of American Protestantism which makes a similar argument: the progressive liberalism of mainstream Christianity and the social conservatism of evangelicalism are both children of what he calls Anglo-American revivalism that began with the Great Awakenings. Revivalism itself was the child of continental pietism.

The sort of religion heralded by the revivals of the First Great Awakening is chiefly responsible for the triumph of a utilitarian view of faith. The itinerant evangelists of these revivals, as well as their successors, transformed Christianity from a churchly and routine affair into one that was intense and personal. The conversion experience marked the beginning of this new form of faith. But it was only the start. True converts were expected to prove the authenticity of their faith through lives that were visibly different from nonbelievers. Indeed, the demand for a clear distinction between the ways of the faithful and those of the world not only propelled many of the social reforms associated with evangelicalism but also provided the foundation for viewing Christianity in practical categories. If faith was supposed to make a difference in all areas of life, not just on Sunday but on every day of the week, it is not wonder that the emphasis in Protestant circles shifted from church forms of devotion to one that should be seen in personal affairs, community life and national purpose. In other words, the cycle of revivals throughout American religious history, inaugurated by the First Great Awakening, secured the victory of pietism within American Protestantism. Like its European antecedents, American pietism dismissed church creeds, structures and ceremonies as merely formal or external manifestations of religion that went only skin deep. In contrasts, pietists have insisted that genuine faith was one transformed individuals, starting with their heart and seeping into all walks of life.

Hart also argues, however, that historians have ignored a “third way” within American Christian history. Hart identifies this stream as confessionalism.

Confessional Protestants resisted revivals in large part because the methods of the evangelists and the piety expected of converts were generically Christian – sincerity, zeal and a moral life. As a result, revivalism did not respect but in fact undermined the importance of creedal subscription, ordination and liturgical order. In a word, confessionalists opposed revivalism because it spoke a different religious idiom, one that was individualistic, experiential, and perfectionistic, as opposed to the corporate, doctrinal and liturgical idiom of historic Protestantism.

The pietists, Hart says, won. Confessionalism lost and persevered primarily in small, ethnically based denominations.

One way to measure this defeat is to ask any American Protestant if the Apostle’s Creed, the real presence of Christ in the Lord’s Supper or the ministry of the local pastor is as important as personal times of prayer and Bible study, meeting with other Christians in small groups, witnessing to non-Christians, or volunteering at the local shelter for the homeless.

Pietism fit America. Hart’s history of pietism and American culture is a great read.It's particularly interesting to discover that before 1960, it was the mainstream or progressive side of the aisle that most saw itself aligned with American history and values.

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Mark Galli writes in Christianity Today:  Are We Transformed Yet? Why the spiritually mature don't talk about how God has made them spiritually mature.

An excellent article, on where the focus of the church ought to be.

In his recent book on "justification," N. T. Wright complains that we have taken a perfectly good Biblical word with a limited set of meanings and tried to use it do describe the whole of the Christian theology and life experience. You can do that, he says, but you need to realize that your meaning of the word "justification" encompasses a lot of things for which the Biblical authors used different words - or didn't think about at all.

I feel much the same about the word "mission."

Mark Roberts is a Presbyterian pastor whose postings I read regularly. In a series of posts revisiting John Stott's Christian Mission in the the Modern World, Roberts says something with which I disagree:

“Mission” describes rather everything the church is sent into the world to do.

Now the word "sent" there does imply mission of some sort. Based on Robert's excerpts, however, Stott's concept of mission includes everything that Christians - corporately and individually - in the church and in the world - are to be and do. Coming out of evangelical Anglicanism, Stott has an admirable purpose: to convince Christians that being a "missionary" isn't the only important vocation for serious, committed Christians. So far, I agree. But not every Christian virtue, aspiration, function and practice is best described as the mission of the Church.

First of all, to speak of the mission of the Church is to speak of the mission of the corporate body. "Church" and "Christian" are not interchangeable words.

Secondly, not every virtue or practice is part of the corporate mission, as important as important as these virtues and practices may be.

The other world in which I live - the Army - knows something about mission statements. We live by them; they focus our actions. The Army values are Loyalty, Duty, Respect, Selfless Service, Honor and Personal Courage. But courage is not the Army's mission. Neither is respect is not the Army's mission. We live by these values as we accomplish the Army's mission. Our individual  actions and organizational functions contribute to the mission. Our "off duty" life also has an impact on the mission. None of these things, however, is the mission itself.

"Mission" is not, by the way, a New Testament word. The New Testament frequently speaks of being sent, but it does not use the word "mission" in connection with that activity. Most translations describe Paul's journey as a "mission" in Acts 12:25, but the word is "diakonia," probably better translated as "ministry" or "service."

Within the church, I think it is best to use the word mission in its ordinary sense, to give focus to our actions. The more domains we try to incorporate into our concept of mission, the less helpful the word becomes.

I first read Dietrich Bohnoeffer's writings when I was a high school student 38 years ago. My worn-out copy of Life Together (Gemeinsames Leben)  dates to 1978, my first year in seminary. Its words were foreign and almost incomprehensible to my Baptist ears, but even then I thought "wow." My appreciation of Bonhoeffer's words grows deeper every time I read this beautiful little text. Bonhoeffer's first chapter on "Community" starts with standard Reformation language regarding our righteousness in Christ. He proceeds to draw out from that, however, an understanding of the Christian life that turned my understanding of Christian piety upside down. The later chapters of Life Together describe what we might call spiritual disciplines that belong to Christian discipleship. You'll never understand what Bonhoeffer says about things like prayer, confession, communion, work and service, however, unless you first grasp the foundation that he lays in his chapter on community.

I revisited Bonhoeffer's chapter on "Community" in Life Together after writing this week's post on "Ordinary Christianity." It was obvious to me how much this little book has come to color not only my understanding of Christian community, but of Christian holiness as well.

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Who said this about love and perfection?

Moreover, this holiness of life is comprehended under the two heads above mentioned. “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength, and thy neighbour as thyself.” First, our mind must be completely filled with love to God, and then this love must forthwith flow out toward our neighbour. This the Apostle shows when he says, “The end of the commandment is charity out of a pure heart, and a good conscience, and of faith unfeigned,” (1 Tim. 1:5). . . . For complete perfection, nothing more can be required than is expressed in these passages of Moses and Paul.

John Wesley said there was but a hair's breadth difference between him and John Calvin in many things. Is this Wesley, or Calvin?

Here are two ads from the United Methodist Church, the denomination in which I am ordained as an elder and endorsed as a chaplain. The campaign is called "Rethink Church".

By way of contrast, here are also two ads from the Catholic Church's "Catholics Come Home" campaign that has resulted in 95,000 inactive Catholics returning to active congregational involvement.

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