What is ‘modern evangelicalism’, exactly? I am tempted, in reading many critiques (especially from the pens of less careful ‘emergent’ authors) that it does not really exist - a red herring perhaps (to avoid more significant theological questions), or a strawman at best, in the shadow of which the ‘alternative’ shines all the brighter. It would seem that everything bad about modernity (and revealingly, the peculiar sins of postmodernism are immediately absolved, or apparently written off as mere ‘piccadillios’, if recognized at all) rolled up into a fundamentalist, literalistic whipping boy (the kind of provincial, backwoods Christianity we all love to hate - the last thing, btw, that fundamentalism could be accused of by their contemporary opponents was being ‘too modern’). But, who fits the bill of ‘modern evangelicalism’, perjoratively understood (besides the obvious targets no one takes seriously). Was Carl F.H. Henry a ‘modern evangelical’? F.F. Bruce? J.I. Packer? John Stott? D.A. Carson? I say this in part in response to Daniel’s less than generous comment: “If your relationship with “modern evangelicalism as an intellectual […] movement has always been strained,” Andrew, it’s probably because it’s not much of a movement on the intellectual level…” Though, having said that, there is some kernal of truth to it. Evangelicalism, as an Anglo-American, modern phenomenon, finds its roots in the piety of the holiness and puritanical traditions (which, btw, are not all that horrible, if you actually read them).

Secondly, so much of emergent writing (I’m thinking particularly of McLaren’s works) is predicated on false dichotomies. Amen to Paula’s comment: “…it doesn’t seem to me that being part of the community of believers and having a personal relationship with Christ are mutually exclusive.” Btw, individualism, i.e., egotism, is no less front and center in postmodernity (in this case, more accurately, hypermodernity), despite all the talk of ‘community’. Community becomes the community I choose, the social reality I construct or desire to be constructed (and self-constructed within); the community I desire to be part of, which is usually eclectic, and at points relative to my cultural location, exotic, rather than the community I’ve received through my own heritage and history (e.g., ‘modern evangelicalism’ for many of us). Another false dicohotomy: personal salvation categories versus redemptive-historical categories. So Andrew writes, “In other words, the question ‘Are you sure that you are saved?’ reflects the over-subjectivized, over individualized bias of modern evangelicalism.” Really? Why then were pre-Enlightenment theologians so occupied with the question? Here is where many so-called ‘postmodern Christians’ want to have their cake and eat it too. In defining themselves as postmodern (as though being postmodern is better than being modern), and that in contradistinction to modernism, philosophically and sociologically defined, they then move on to critique reformational understandings of Scripture, salvation, theology proper, etc., from this vantage point. The problem? Luther was not a modernist, nor was Calvin a student of the Enlightenment. ‘Individualism’ in soteriology, if that is even an accurate appellation here, goes back at least as far as Augustine’s famous autobiography, and, I would be prepared to argue, finds resonance in the epistles of Paul (e.g., “the Son of God who loved ME and gave himself up for ME…”). Rather than pinning the sins of hypocrisy, hyper-punctilious concern for orthodox formulations and other theological shibboleths while yet ignoring orthopraxis and love (which is the goal of all true orthodoxy, 1 Tim. 1:3-5), and naive realism, with its absurd expectations of scientific certanity, on ‘modern evangelicalism’ (whatever that is), we need to recognize the sins in ourselves, e.g., the emergent propensity for armchair philosophizing versus faithful action, the dangerous dismissal of historic orthodoxy in the name of ‘post-foundational’ epistemology, as in the naive embrace of the postmodern incredulity toward metanarrative and ‘true knowledge’ (which is certainly a biblical category), such that ambivalence is raised to the status of a virtue, and an endless indecision (in dialogue, of course) a sure sign of ‘authenticity’. One is reminded of a prophetic Chesterton quote: we are quickly entering a day and age when men will be too ‘humble’ to believe in the multiplication table. Anyway, let’s get real. Let’s actually be authentic - be honest with ourselves and Scripture, handling it with integrity. On that note, I say ‘amen’ to Andrew’s comments: “But that does not exempt us from the struggle to understand ourselves, our world, and the Word of God better.”