The Courage to Be Protestant

by Wells, David

• ISBN13: 9780802840073
• ISBN10: 0802840078
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2008-04-01
• Publisher: EERDMANS

Summary

"It takes no courage to sign up as a Protestant." These words open this bold new text - the summa of David Wells's critique of the evangelical landscape - leaving no doubt that Wells is issuing a challenge to the modern church.This book is a broadside against "new" versions of evangelicalism as well as a call to return to the historic faith, one defined by Reformation solas (grace, faith, and scripture alone), and to a reverence for doctrine. Wells argues that the historic, classical evangelicalism is one marked by doctrinal seriousness, as opposed to the new movements of the marketing church and the emergent church. He energetically confronts the marketing communities and what he terms their "sermons-from-a-barstool and parking lots and apres-worship Starbucks stands." He also takes issue with the most popular evangelical movement in recent years - the emergent church. Emergents are postmodern and postconservative and postfoundational, embracing a less absolute, understanding of the authority of Scripture than Wells maintains is required. The Courage to be Protestant is a dynamic argument for the courage to be faithful to what biblical Christianity has always stood for, thereby securing hope for the church's future.

Table of Contents

Preface	p. xiii
The Lay of the Evangelical Land	p. 1
The Map	p. 2
Doctrine	p. 2
Culture	p. 3
Classical Evangelicals	p. 4
The Beginnings	p. 4
Two Weaknesses	p. 7
Doctrine Shrinks	p. 7
The Church Vanishes	p. 10
Marketers	p. 13
Emergents	p. 15
Conversing Together	p. 15
Being Open	p. 17
The Fall of the Empire	p. 18
Are You an Evangelical?	p. 18
If Not Evangelical, What?	p. 19
Christianity for Sale	p. 23
Thank You, Corporate America!	p. 25
Getting Up to Business Speed	p. 25
Marketing Megachurches	p. 27
Sale: Prices Slashed!	p. 28
Catering to the Customer	p. 28
A Moment's Reflection	p. 31
Wal-Mart Churches	p. 36
Down with the Traditional Church!	p. 39
A Word of Praise	p. 41
Evangelical Stagnation	p. 42
Engaging Culture	p. 44
Excuse Me!	p. 44
Wrong Result	p. 44
Wrong Calculation	p. 48
Wrong Analogy	p. 50
Wrong Customer	p. 54
The Bottom Line	p. 57
Truth	p. 59
The Self Is Disconnected	p. 60
Our Modernized World	p. 63
Craft	p. 63
Community	p. 64
Family	p. 65
The Changing World Inside	p. 67
We Live Alone	p. 67
Postmodern Selves	p. 69
Power	p. 71
What Is Truth?	p. 72
Christian Truth	p. 75
Biblical Baseline	p. 75
Muddled Emergents	p. 77
Biblical Heartbeat	p. 80
Evangelical Adventures	p. 85
Truth Engagement	p. 89
A Better Way Forward	p. 92
One Truth	p. 93
Integrity	p. 95
God	p. 97
The Lost Center	p. 99
Thinking Biblically	p. 99
Evil	p. 100
Sin	p. 102
The Culture's Answer	p. 104
Emptiness	p. 105
The Gathering Storm	p. 105
Postmoderns Emerge	p. 107
Nothing Makes Sense	p. 109
God Dies, We Die	p. 111
Reinvented Selves	p. 112
God and Modernity	p. 116
Being Recentered	p. 116
Being Private	p. 118
The Inside God	p. 120
What Does Nearness Mean?	p. 121
Misunderstanding God's Nearness	p. 123
The Outside God	p. 124
God Above	p. 124
God as Holy	p. 125
And So ...?	p. 126
There Is a Law	p. 127
There Is Sin	p. 128
There Is a Cross	p. 129
There Is Conquest	p. 130
There Is Obligation	p. 130
Self	p. 135
In Pursuit of the Self	p. 136
The Nation Signs On	p. 138
Virtues to Values	p. 143
Virtues	p. 143
Values	p. 146
Character to Personality	p. 147
Personality Emerges	p. 147
Self-Marketing	p. 148
The Commerce of Images	p. 150
The Fallout	p. 151
Nature to Self	p. 153
Nature	p. 153
Nature Dies	p. 154
Self Emerges	p. 155
Rights	p. 156
Loss	p. 160
Guilt to Shame	p. 162
Shame	p. 162
Guilt	p. 162
Healing Ourselves	p. 163
A Different Universe	p. 165
Rupture	p. 166
Reconciliation	p. 168
It's Not Just about Me	p. 169
About the Salt	p. 170
Where We Stand	p. 172
Christ	p. 175
Christian and Pagan Paths	p. 176
From Below	p. 179
The Facts	p. 179
The Church's Failure	p. 180
The New Journey	p. 182
Secular but Spiritual	p. 186
How Spiritualities Work	p. 187
Nature	p. 188
Sin	p. 191
Speaking	p. 191
From Above	p. 192
Above but Incarnate	p. 193
Christ's Descent	p. 193
An Age Dawns	p. 194
Above and Reigning	p. 197
In Christ Alone	p. 198
Does This Preach?	p. 202
Christ's Rule Now	p. 204
Church	p. 209
Trouble in the House	p. 210
Middling Standards	p. 210
Be Appealing!	p. 213
Losing the Church	p. 214
My Critics	p. 217
The Church's Two Sides	p. 218
Visible and Invisible	p. 218
What Is Hidden	p. 220
Forget Rethinking the Church	p. 222
Distance and Impact	p. 223
Marks of Authenticity	p. 226
Word of God	p. 226
Sufficient	p. 226
Doctrine	p. 228
Preaching	p. 229
Sacraments	p. 233
Discipline	p. 237
Into the Depths	p. 242
Who Builds the Church?	p. 242
God is Sovereign	p. 244
We Are Captive	p. 245
Means of Growth	p. 245
Let God Be God over the Church	p. 246
Index	p. 249
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