long comment, Charles T. underscores the troubling point that most evangelicals are outside this world and don’t care about our culture and country. He writes:
LA wrote: “Is there a movement within Evangelical Christianity opposing this hyper-liberalism?”
After giving some thought to LA’s question, I must admit that I do not know of any serious opposition to evangelical hyper-liberalism.
There are of course various degrees of thought within the broad evangelical church, but there are many ascendant voices towards liberalism. There are many individuals within the evangelical church that oppose hyper-liberalism, but any opposition to the liberal way of thinking and theology is looked at as disobedience to the great commission. I know there are groups in the evangelical world that oppose hyper-liberalism. One that I know of for sure would be the The Chalcedon Foundation. Another Christian educational organization that surpasses evangelical shallowness is Ligonier ministries—a Christian organization based on the reformed faith. How actively opposed they are to certain movements, I cannot be sure of.
I read through Jacob’s essay on evangelicalism he posted several weeks ago (and the comments the essay generated). I must say that he hit the nail on the head with his description of evangelicals. The only thing in his essay that slightly surprised me was that Jacob notes these trends in the PCA church. I admire the PCA for their theology and their efforts to promote the Christian faith in this country, but it seems that the new trends are taking root there as well. There is a consistent theme that several posters have pointed out that exists in evangelicalism and that has to do with the detachment that many evangelicals feel toward the nation-state. This is especially true with American Christians. I have seen this up close among several of my evangelical friends. All that matters is a personal relationship with Jesus.
I think this detachment from cultural and civil affairs is wrong and completely ignores the history of Israel as described in the Bible. For example the Book of Judges clearly teaches how the Israeli nation survived this turbulent time. They had judges, i.e., people who governed the nation—tribes—of early Israel. Consider the following from the Book of Judges:
1. Ehud assasinated Eglon the king of Moab and then led Israel to rout Moab. Judges 3: 12-30.
2. Deborah and Barak led Israel against Jabin king of Cannan and Sisera the king of the Cannanite army. Judges 4-5.
3. Gideon led Israel against Midianite oppression. Judges 6—8.
We could go on with more stories, but I think the picture is clear. Israel fought with their enemies to preserve their culture, their way of life, their worship, their families, etc. In other words, they were engaged in building and protecting their own culture. They were not living a detached life based on a personal relationship with Jesus. Sarcasm intended. Many of today’s evangelicals, at this point, do not see the dissolution of the U.S. as problem because their primary allegiance is to the renenerated future kingdom the return of Jesus will usher in. Of course, Christianity does give comfort considering future things, but the dissolution of the U.S. is a grave problem in this present world since it will lead to much suffering for people in this country if current events reach their unfortunate conclusion. The nation-state is important because of its prominence in the Bible and the use the Lord made of Israel to reveal his glory to the rest of the world.
One more biblical reference that sums up my point: Nehemiah 4:14. Nehemiah encourages his people to resist those who hated them and opposed their culture: “And I looked and arose and said to the nobles and to the officials and the rest of the people, ‘Do not be afraid of them. Remember the Lord, who is great and awesome, and fight for your brothers, your sons, your daughters, your wives, and your homes.’” This was written after the return from Babylon and during the reconstruction of Jerusalem.
To sum it up, many of today’s evangelicals do not live in the real world. They are too spiritual to do that. And, of course, such detachment leads to the embrace of spiritual practices that have unusual consequences. To be fair, there are some evangelicals who embrace the U.S. as nation-state-savior. They go too far in the other direction. . The U.S. evangelical establishment encompasses many philosophies. So, when someone states they are an evangelical, it is difficult to accurately define what that means. But there is a good chance that many of them will be so heavenly minded, they are not useful for anything here on earth.