I am looking forward to reading D. A. Carson's new book "Evangelicalism." Evangelicalism is neither dead or over but many are seeing great glaring problems or holes in the bottom of the boat that desperately need to be fixed. One of the reasons I understand Carson wrote the book was his disagreement and critique of Mark Noll's book "Is the Reformation Over?" Noll in contrarian fashion answers with a "yes" and a No." Yes in the sense of how Catholics and Protestants understand the gospel and salvation (justification by faith) but no in the sense that the Protestant vision of scripture checking tradition and gospel checking contemporary practices of the church are still needed. I suspect Carson still views the Catholic Church vision on salvation as still defective but I will have to wait and see?
What Reformation churches need to come to terms with (and this is not just a Catholic critique) but self-criticism from within it's own ranks is how the Reformation shifted theology from the early church focus on Christology to Soteriology (Salvation) and how the gospel has also mutated and shifted from the story of Israel, Jesus, and the church to the a simple four or five point exercise called "the plan of salvation" or what Scot McKnight calls "the gospel of Soterians."
Christianity today in the Western Church has become a gospel of salvation without discipleship and a private enterprise disconnected from real life (the sacred and secular split). What we continue to see is what Bonhoeffer called "cheap grace" or what others call "powerless Christianity." Either way the corporate dimensions of faith, the heart of discipleship, and transformation and missions must once again come to the forefront of Western Christianity if it is going to go out with a bang and not simply more and more disappear with a whimper.
What Reformation churches need to come to terms with (and this is not just a Catholic critique) but self-criticism from within it's own ranks is how the Reformation shifted theology from the early church focus on Christology to Soteriology (Salvation) and how the gospel has also mutated and shifted from the story of Israel, Jesus, and the church to the a simple four or five point exercise called "the plan of salvation" or what Scot McKnight calls "the gospel of Soterians."
Christianity today in the Western Church has become a gospel of salvation without discipleship and a private enterprise disconnected from real life (the sacred and secular split). What we continue to see is what Bonhoeffer called "cheap grace" or what others call "powerless Christianity." Either way the corporate dimensions of faith, the heart of discipleship, and transformation and missions must once again come to the forefront of Western Christianity if it is going to go out with a bang and not simply more and more disappear with a whimper.
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