How do evangelicals see themselves? How does an evangelical academic interpret the rise of the evangelical movement?

Some excerpts:

Why did this resurgence happen? It is possible to sketch some of the important forces at work, even if assessments of cause and effect and judgments about theological merit remain hotly debated, especially among evangelicals themselves. Here I briefly highlight two specific developments and three diffuse movements. I then consider one overarching characteristic of recent evangelical history that may explain a great deal about these unexpected happenings.

The two specific developments are ones that evangelicals did not seek and that some actively opposed. First was the ethnic transformation of the United States following the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965. Second was the successful implementation, through federal legislation and the courts, of civil rights.

1. Immigration reform. Since the loosening of immigration restrictions in 1965, the United States has once again become the most ethnically diverse nation on the planet. Conventional wisdom understands that the dramatically increased presence of Hindus, Buddhists, Muslims, and adherents of other faiths has created unprecedented religious pluralism. But as sociologist R. Stephen Warner has pointed out, the new immigration is surprisingly--even overwhelmingly--Christian. Warner has called the outcome of recent immigration "the de-Europeanization of American Christianity." Because so many of the Hispanic, Korean, Nigerian, Chinese, Eastern European, Filipino, Ghanaian, and Brazilian newcomers are evangelicals, often of a Pentecostal cast, the result has also contributed to the re-evangelization of America.

2. Civil Rights. The civil rights revolution began in African American churches during the 1930s and 1940s when more and more black Americans began to explore applications of biblical faith in an all-righteous God, which had sustained them through slavery and segregation, to the nation's structural racial injustices. After Brown v. Board of Education in 1954, white evangelicals mostly remained ambivalent. They could recognize strong biblical convictions in the black church folk who were driving the revolution. But they were frightened by elements like Gandhi's pacifism and the socialism of A. Philip Randolph.

Without much white evangelical support, the civil rights movement nonetheless moved ahead with passage of a federal civil rights bill in 1957. Then came the landmark legislation of the mid-1960s: civil rights (1964), voting rights (1965), and open housing (1968). By this time white evangelicals, even in the South, were beginning to accept the inevitability of civil rights for blacks, and a few intrepid evangelicals, such as Frank Gaebelein of Stony Brook School (and a CT co-editor), actively joined in the struggle (though, it must be acknowledged, with significant internal opposition at CT). It was, however, President Lyndon Johnson, Martin Luther King Jr., and a host of African American leaders and followers who pushed the revolution through.

The spinoffs for American evangelicals were immense. First, evangelical acceptance of civil rights did not mean that evangelicals accepted the means used to secure them--federal power, which soon expanded well beyond civil rights. Sociologists Robert Wuthnow and Steve Bruce have demonstrated how resentment against intruding national authority--especially on sexuality, the family, and public schools--fueled evangelical attachment to the Republican Party, as putatively the party of small government.

But once legally enforced racism was gone, the great impediment that had restricted the influence of Southern religion was also gone. Stripped of racist overtones, Southern evangelical religion--the preaching, the piety, the sensibilities, and above all the music--became much easier to export throughout the country. Billy Graham had earlier shown how attractive a non-racist form of affective Southern evangelicalism could be. As historians Grant Wacker and Darren Dochuk have demonstrated, evangelical sons and daughters of the South (Pat Robertson, D. James Kennedy, Jerry Falwell, Anita Bryant, even Jimmy Carter) found it much easier to export the gospel sensibilities of their region once the battle for civil rights was won.

For reviving and defining American evangelicalism as a whole, the infusion of new adherents from overseas and the expansion of Southern influence to the nation have been pivotal. [      ]

It is exceedingly difficult to know whether cultural, political, and demographic revival also means spiritual revival. Historically, evangelicalism has had integrity when it maintains the substance of classical Christian faith; it has exerted influence and enjoyed a broad appeal when it responds effectively to impulses within its host cultures. When evangelicals think only about honoring their heritage, they easily lose sight of the gospel imperative to evangelize and to be salt and light in the world. Conversely, when they think only about effective witness and responding to urgent psychological needs, they easily lose sight of the gospel imperative to preserve the truth in righteousness.

In some earlier eras, the balance of theological integrity and cultural sensitivity moved mountains. At other times, loyalty to traditions led to separatistic stagnation, or lust for cultural relevance perverted the gospel into Christianity-lite.

During the first half of the 20th century, the stress had shifted toward preserving traditions. At the middle of the 20th century, evangelicals began to move back toward a balance.

But have evangelicals today moved too far? Has an overemphasis on preserving tradition been replaced by an overemphasis on connecting to the culture? For such supremely important questions, it is, of course, too early for a historical assessment. When the balance shifts too strongly to one without the other, it is merely sounding brass and a tinkling cymbal. But an evangelical resurgence that balances traditional faith and cultural relevance sounds a trumpet of salvation to the world.