Interesting, so those calling themselves “Evangelical” haven’t, even among themselves, sola scriptura, decided what that means.
Just as those calling themselves “catholic” and “Christian” and “Orthodox” and “apostolic” . . . . Agreement on terminology is rare because you and I do not get to decide who uses what terms to describe, define or denominate themselves by.
If Evangelical doesn’t mean evangelical, does reformed mean reformed, and congregational mean congregational? What about Christian?
It really depends on who you ask. Are liberal mainline Presbyterians who support universalism “Reformed”? Are Baptists who believe in TULIP but reject infant baptism “Reformed”? It really depends on who is the one defining the term.
How are you using congregational? Are we talking about the specific denomination of Congregationalists of New England that are the descendants of the Puritans and who gave birth to the Unitarians? Or are we using “congregational” in the sense of any church who adheres to congregational polity, where the congregation (not bishops or presbyteries) governs the church?
Is a Christian anyone who has been baptized in the Trinitarian formula or is it a person who has repented of sins and confessed faith in Christ’s death and resurrection? Once again, how these terms are used, depends on the ones using the terms.
Protestants don’t have a firm grasp on the terms they use and assign whatever they feel like, how is anyone else supposed to “grasp” what an individual group decides it wants a term to mean for themselves alone and doesn’t apply to anyone else? This is beyond absurd.
But this is language and human nature. You cannot control what people call themselves. People like to call themselves by terms that have meaning.
During the Reformation in the sixteenth century, Luther called his followers the
evangelische Kirche (evangelical Church). This term**
evangelische** (evangelical, “of the gospel”) was what Lutherans and later other Protestants called themselves. Therefore, in Europe, the term
evangelische became a term that equates to “Protestant” or more specifically to “Lutheran”. This is why many churches in America that are Lutheran or united Lutheran and Reformed designate themselves “Evangelical”.
The first usage has origins in continental Europe. Another usage of “evangelical” has origins in the Protestant Revivalism that marked both 18th and 19th century America and Britain. This
“Evangelicalism” stressed the need for conversion and was heavily influenced by German pietism, which stressed personal experience over participation in church ritual.
During the early 20th century, the mainline Protestant churches became hostile to Evangelicalism due to increasing theological modernism. This led to the Fundamentalist-Modernist Controversy and the rise of Christian Fundamentalism. By the 1940s, a group of evangelical leaders wanted to distance themselves from Fundamentalism and all of its cultural baggage so they began to call themselves “the new Evangelicals”. They created the National Association of Evangelicals and welcomed a broad range of “evangelicals” into the new coalition. They were led by Billy Graham.
The German language has a helpful way to distinguish the two usages.
Evangelisch refers to the more broader sense of “Protestant”. The word
evangelikal refers to Evangelicalism.
Evangelicalism is a broad movement. And no one on this thread has meant to imply that that all evangelicals teach total abstinence. But it is a common teaching and a common way of life.
You mean the “Evangelical Lutherans” are neither Evangelical nor Lutheran??
They are “Evangelical” in the Lutheran sense of that word. The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America chose their name because Lutherans had always called themselves “evangelical”. They did not choose that name because they wanted to be associated with Billy Graham or John Wesley or George Whitefield or Jonathan Edwards or Charles G. Finney or a host of other leaders of evangelical revivalism.
And the Sydney Anglicans are?
Evangelical, Reformed, and Anglican.
How about this famous “evangelical” (??) pastor Rev. Billy Graham, is he evangelical, mainstream, liberal, congregational - is he out of the loop: “I do not believe that the Bible teaches teetotalism . . . Jesus drank wine. Jesus turned water into wineat a wedding feast. That wasn’t grape juice as some of them try to claim.” (3. “Carter Will Restore Confidence, Graham Says,” Miami Herald [December 26, 1976], section A, p. 18.)
Abstinence from alcohol never defined Evangelicalism. No one on this thread has said it did. All we are saying is that it is a feature of many evangelical churches. Billy Graham is certainly an evangelical.
For your information, Rev. Graham also said the following:
It is my judgment that because of the devastating problem that alcohol has become to America, it is better for Christians to be teetotalers except for medical purposes. . . . The creeping paralysis of alcoholism is sapping our morals, wrecking our homes, and luring people away from the church. [Editorial, “Graham on Drink: Don’t,” Christianity Today (February 4, 1977): 63.]
It is one thing to recognize that the Bible nowhere says alcohol is sinful and another to advocate the large scale use by Christians. Billy Graham is distinguishing between biblical prohibition, but he is also saying that alcohol is often far more destructive in American society than it is beneficial. And in that way, he is squarely in the evangelical tradition.
I respect his ministry. Though St Paul was the Evangelical of all Evangelics 