It is not be an overstatement to say that evangelicals are experiencing a “sea change”””a paradigm shift””in their understanding of conversion and redemption, a shift that includes the way in which they think about the salvation of God, the nature and mission of the church, and the character of religious experience. Although there is no one word to capture where evangelicals are going in this regard, there is a word that captures what they are leaving behind: revivalism.
It’s striking how the connection of all the Anglicans to baptism isn’t made. I note this sentence: “There were voices in the past that questioned revivalism: C S. Lewis, always adored by evangelicals, was seemingly oblivious to the language and categories of revivalism.” Well, yeah, because he was an Anglican, and to an Anglican the logical end point is baptism and thus incorporation. It’s funny this should come up now seeing as how in two Sundays I’ll be preaching on the Ethiopian eunuch, and we know what his reaction is to conversion.