He grew downward in humiliation before God, and he grew upward in his adoration of Christ.

Handley Moule captures the essence of Simeon’s secret of longevity in this sentence: “‘Before honor is humility,’ and he had been ‘growing downwards’ year by year under the stern discipline of difficulty met in the right way, the way of close and adoring communion with God” (Moule, 64). Those two things were the heartbeat of Simeon’s inner life: growing downward in humility and growing upward in adoring communion with God.

But the remarkable thing about humiliation and adoration in the heart of Charles Simeon is that they were inseparable. Simeon was utterly unlike most of us today who think that we should get rid once and for all of feelings of vileness and unworthiness as soon as we can. For him, adoration only grew in the freshly plowed soil of humiliation for sin. So he actually labored to know his true sinfulness and his remaining corruption as a Christian.

I have continually had such a sense of my sinfulness as would sink me into utter despair, if I had not an assured view of the sufficiency and willingness of Christ to save me to the uttermost. And at the same time I had such a sense of my acceptance through Christ as would overset my little bark, if I had not ballast at the bottom sufficient to sink a vessel of no ordinary size. (Moule 134f.)

He never lost sight of the need for the heavy ballast of his own humiliation. After he had been a Christian forty years he wrote,

With this sweet hope of ultimate acceptance with God, I have always enjoyed much cheerfulness before men; but I have at the same time laboured incessantly to cultivate the deepest humiliation before God. I have never thought that the circumstance of God’s having forgiven me was any reason why I should forgive myself; on the contrary, I have always judged it better to loathe myself the more, in proportion as I was assured that God was pacified towards me (Ezekiel 16:63). . . . There are but two objects that I have ever desired for these forty years to behold; the one is my own vileness; and the other is, the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ: and I have always thought that they should be viewed together; just as Aaron confessed all the sins of all Israel whilst he put them on the head of the scapegoat. The disease did not keep him from applying to the remedy, nor did the remedy keep him from feeling the disease. By this I seek to be, not only humbled and thankful, but humbled in thankfulness, before my God and Saviour continually. (Carus, 518f.)

Please do read it all.

If you’re a preacher, Charles Simeon has influenced you more than you realise. Find out how: http://t.co/D9fE5aY4cv http://t.co/wEtSDLF4fh

— Moore Theological College (@MooreCollege) May 13, 2015

John Stott on Charles Simeon at Taylor University from Randall Gruendyke on Vimeo.

O loving God, who orderest all things by thine unerring wisdom and unbounded love: Grant us in all things to see thy hand; that, following the example and teaching of thy servant Charles Simeon, we may walk with Christ in all simplicity, and serve thee with a quiet and contented mind; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.

"The preacher has invariably proposed to himself three things:I. Unity in the design II. Perspicuity in the arrangement III. Simplicity in the diction." —Charles Simeon https://t.co/bGDFVmIq2N

— Paterson (@shawnpaterson) October 26, 2026

For Christianity Today to publish such a speculative piece, boosting material that was initially made public with a clear political agenda, seems in tension with the magazine’s own editorial philosophy as of 1970 that it is wrong “to gossip about things of which we are not certain.” According to a new report from Ruth Graham at the New York Times, the erstwhile flagship journal of American evangelicalism has been declining in more ways than one. To its critics, “Elliotgate” is one more sign that the magazine has lost its way, against the chaotic backdrop of mass layoffs and a waning subscriber base. But former deputy editor Bonnie Kristian, who edited Austen’s piece, has defended it as important and conversation-driving. Whatever the article’s merits, the magazine handled the backlash unprofessionally, leaving Austen unaware of the temporary choice to pull it.

Some of that backlash has itself been less than helpful. In a column for WORLD, Denny Burk, president of the Council on Biblical Manhood & Womanhood, rightly noted how thin Austen’s evidence is. But he has treated her claim that same-sex attraction isn’t itself a sin as an endorsement of “Side B,” the view that gay Christians should embrace their orientation in various problematic ways while remaining celibate. The two ideas are not the same. One can grant that same-sex attraction is itself not a sin while holding that it is “objectively disordered”: something to be resisted, not adopted as a public “identity” in the manner of modern sexual politics. This conflation has been a persistent blind spot in the evangelical approach to the issue, missing areas of concern for evangelicals and Catholics alike.

Still, Burk’s instinct is not entirely misplaced. Austen says plainly that Elliot’s story “should inform the church’s treatment of Christians who experience same-sex attraction,” and Side B proponent Wesley Hill’s praise for the piece suggests how it is likely to be read. Austen’s remarks seem to gesture beyond simply separating temptation and sin, implying that double standards toward opposite-sex and same-sex attraction are automatically bigoted and normalizing a broader church culture of “coming out of the closet” beyond a close circle of friends and counselors. This is not an especially helpful word for evangelicals, who if anything could benefit from more discretion and less “tell-all” culture when it comes to sexual temptations of any variety.

Read it all.

In The Trouble with Elliotgate, Bethel McGrew examines the controversy surrounding claims about Elisabeth Elliot’s sexuality and Christianity Today’s handling of the resulting article.McGrew critiques the evidence behind the speculation, considers the broader tensions within evangelical debates over same-sex attraction and sexual identity, and questions whether publicizing such uncertain personal claims serves the Church or its readers.To read the piece, visit https://t.co/R5binXKe9Y

— First Things (@firstthingsmag) October 25, 2026

Of all the predictions Alexis de Tocqueville made while surveying the youthful United States, one of the boldest concerned religion. Notwithstanding Protestantism’s apparent American dominance, the Frenchman prophesied that Roman Catholicism would be the long-term victor in a democratic age. “Our posterity will tend more and more to a single division into two parts,” he wrote in Democracy in America, with “some relinquishing Christianity entirely, and others returning to the bosom of the Church of Rome.”

The last few years have given that prediction new life. From the spate of traditionalist-inclined college converts to the heretofore secular humanists who have thrilled to Pope Leo XIV’s critique of artificial intelligence, it often feels like Catholicism is the strongest religious alternative to post-Christian tribalism, nihilism, and transhumanism. Writing for the Catholic magazine Commonweal, Wesleyan University’s Daniel Steinmetz-Jenkins, himself a non-Catholic, envisions “a Catholic century,” in which the church’s thought becomes a “default option” for people seeking the common good amid liberalism’s crisis and AI-driven dehumanization.

As a Catholic I have a similar reading of the intellectual situation. But it’s also essential to look beyond the intelligentsia to assess the health and future of religion. And in the wider culture, the form of Christianity that’s most adapted to late-modern America is clearly not the Church of Rome. It’s evangelical Protestantism. The vibes of a Catholic moment are real enough, but evangelicalism’s resilience is our era’s more fundamental fact.

You can see that resilience across almost every means of measurement: conversion rates, retention rates, identification rates, church attendance, intensity of belief. A recent overview from Ryan Burge, the religion data analyst, showed that evangelicals have maintained a roughly steady share of the U.S. population since the 1970s, while both Catholicism and the so-called “mainline” denominations (Congregationalist, Episcopalian, Presbyterian, and so on) that once dominated American Christianity have seen marked decline. In the 2020s, evangelicals are more than twice as likely to attend church weekly as Catholics. They are also twice as likely to describe religious faith as “very important” in their lives.

Read it all.

For all the buzz around a ‘Catholic century,’ evangelicalism is the denomination best placed to thrive in contemporary America. https://t.co/e3hTYPNEmb

— The Free Press (@TheFP) October 22, 2026

Last year, leaders of the evangelical publication Christianity Today summoned the entire staff to a hotel ballroom in the Chicago suburbs for a meeting about their future.

The publication’s chief operating officer, Nicole Massie Martin, opened her presentation with a Bible verse from the Old Testament about rejoicing even in dark times, “though the olive crop fails and the fields produce no food.” Then Thomas Addington, the interim president, delivered a blunt message: Christianity Today’s reputation as a staid voice of intellectual centrist evangelicalism — embodied by its proximity to Wheaton College in Illinois — had to change.

Christianity Today needed to be less like Wheaton and more like TikTok, Mr. Addington told his staff, according to several people who attended the meeting. Warning that layoffs were coming, he ended his presentation with a prayer. A senior editor left the room in tears.

Fourteen months later, more than half of the 79 employees at that time have either been laid off or resigned, including an editor in chief and four of the company’s longest-tenured journalists.

Read it all.

Christianity Today has seen about half its staff quit or laid off in the last 14 mos. Former employees told me that new business leaders have intervened in editorial decisions & are effectively abandoning the outlet’s commitment to independent journalism. https://t.co/Q4Iy7v5mQB

— Ruth Graham (@publicroad) October 21, 2026

Meanwhile, the publication itself sent out a news release earlier this month headlined “Christianity Today Announces New Editorial Leadership Team as the Ministry Celebrates Its 70th Year.

That release noted:

CT president and chief executive officer Nicole Martin announced the appointment of Erik Petrik as chief content officer and incoming editor in chief. Petrik, who previously served as chief creative officer at CT since 2020, is the founder of CT Media, where he executive produced CT’s acclaimed podcast series The Rise and Fall of Mars Hill. Petrik’s stint at CT has also included developing other popular podcast programs, including The Bulletin, Be Afraid, Wonderology, Being Human, and more; leading CT’s award-winning visual rebrand; and expanding the organization’s work across print, digital, audio, and video.

Petrik’s background spans journalism, film, pastoral ministry, and entrepreneurship. Study at Dallas Theological Seminary under evangelical stalwarts like Howard Hendricks and Darrell Bock informed his time as an ordained clergyman. Later at DTS, he helped pioneer spiritual formation as a field of study. Petrik has written, produced, and directed thousands of creative projects and is one of the founders of bulb Digital Portfolios, providing multimedia digital portfolios for the education market. He and his wife, Kelli, live in Colorado and have five adult children.

“With a media landscape dramatically changed over the last decade and promising more changes ahead, it was hard to imagine that we could find a leader with expertise in print, film, podcasts, church engagement, and art direction. But that’s what God has given us in Erik Petrik,” Martin said.

This transition follows the leadership of Marvin Olasky as editor in chief. Olasky, who stepped out of a previous retirement to serve the ministry at a crucial season of transition, will retire from CT in mid-October.

“When we asked Marvin to help as editor in chief last year, I was hoping he would give us at least six months of his one-of-a-kind expertise,” Martin said. “I was overjoyed that he instead gave us eighteen and that he accomplished so much in that time.”

While the release touted a “new editorial leadership team,” Petrik was the only person mentioned by name. The magazine’s positive spin on the changes failed to mention the layoffs of key journalists such as Olsen and the talented Harvest Prude, Christianity Today’s national political correspondent for the past three years.

Daniel Silliman, Christianity Today’s former senior news editor, left the magazine late last year, publicly voicing “both practical and philosophical” disagreements with its leadership. 

Read it all.

(Weekend Plug-in/@bobbyross) 🗒️ Does Old-Fashioned Reporting Matter To Christianity Today? Some Say No 🔌 https://t.co/Q4EOF2Og50

— Religion Unplugged (@ReligionMag) October 16, 2026

The presence of evangelical Christianity in Chile continues, new official records are showing.

An example is a review of Chile’s Official Gazette carried out by the Chilean news outlet Ex-Ante. It shows 82 religious organisations registered officially with the state in just three months: 36 in June 2026, 28 in July, and 18 in August.

These data amount to an average of nearly one new Protestant church per day, in addition to a further 16 that amended their statutes during the same period. They are spread across 13 regions, although they are concentrated in the centre and south of the country.

Read it all.

One in six people (16.3 per cent) in the country identify as “evangelical” or “Protestant”. A government plan to promote Christian centres with a social impact in neighbourhoods shows the growing public presence. https://t.co/LAmeN20a6B

— Evangelical Focus (@Evan_Focus) October 14, 2026

Best-selling British author Os Guinness never planned to be a writer. America helped make him one, with a little help from Switzerland. Since then, hundreds of thousands of readers have turned to the Christian public intellectual to understand both their walk with God and their place in the world.

Guinness’s 1998 title The Call, perhaps his most widely recognized book, helps believers discover their God-given purpose in life. The Global Public Square (2013) addresses religious freedom and the role of faith in society. And A Freedom Like No Other, published this year, continues his esteem of the American republic and its constitutional liberty.

But this liberty is also at risk, Guinness cautions. A visit to the US in 1968 began his intellectual relationship with America, as he traveled from Harvard to Berkeley amid political assassinations, race riots, and a liberal counterculture upending traditional values. And as he interviewed leading figures from the right and the left, he came to a startling conclusion.

“I hardly met any evangelicals who really understood what was going on,” he said in a 2025 interview.

Guinness’s travels led to his first book in 1973, The Dust of Death, a critique of cultural trends in the 1960s. For a man who never planned to be a writer, he proved prolific in the decades that followed, penning more than 30 titles.

Read it all.

Os Guinness Still Challenges Christians to Think

The tumult of the 1960s sparked a literary journey that hasn’t stopped for the prolific social critic.https://t.co/XnmWTZZodU

— Christianity Today (@CTmagazine) September 30, 2026

It was in 1787 that he first decided to put down a motion in the House of Commons about the slave trade. This nefarious traffic had been going on for three centuries, and the West Indian slave-owners were determined to oppose abolition to the end. Besides, Wilberforce was not a very prepossessing man. He was little and somewhat ugly, with poor eyesight and an upturned nose. When Boswell heard him speak, he pronounced him ‘a perfect shrimp’, but then had to concede that ‘presently the shrimp swelled into a whale.’ In 1789 Wilberforce said of the slave trade: “So enormous so dreadful, so irremediable did its wickedness appear that my own mind was completely made up for the abolition…. let the consequences be what they would, I from this time determined that I would never rest till I had effected its abolition.

So abolition bills (which related to the trade) and Foreign Trade Bills (which would prohibit the involvement of British ships in it) were debated in the commons in 1789, 1791, 1792,194, 1796 (by which time Abolition had become ‘the grand object of my parliamentary existence’), 1798 and 1799. Yet they all failed. The Foreign Slave Bill was not passed until 1806 and the Abolition of the Slave Trade Bill until 1807. This part of the campaign had taken eighteen years.

Next, soon after the conclusion of the Napoleonic wars, Wilberforce began to direct his energies to the abolition of slavery itself and the emancipation of the slaves. In 1823 the Anti-Slavery Society was formed. Twice that year and twice the following year, Wilberforce pleaded the slaves’ cause in the House of Commons. But in 1825 ill-health compelled him to resign as a member of parliament and to continue his campaign from outside. In 1831 he sent a message to the Anti-Slavery Society, in which he said, “Our motto must continue to be PERSEVERANCE. And ultimately I trust the Almighty will crown our efforts with success.” He did. In July 1833 the Abolition of Slavery Bill was passed in both Houses of Parliament, even though it included the undertaking to pay 20 million pounds in compensation to the slave-owners. ‘Thank God,’ wrote Wilberforce, that I have lived to witness a day in which England is willing to give 20 million pounds for the abolition of slavery.’ Three days later he died. He was buried in Westminster Abbey, in national recognition of his FORTY-FIVE YEARS of persevering struggle on behalf of African slaves.

— John R W Stott, Issues facing Christians Today (Basingstoke: Marshall, Morgan and Scott, 1984), p. 334

#OTD July 29, 1833:
Death of William Wilberforce, who had done much to end slavery in British possessions.

Persuaded to join the campaign against slavery and faced with evidence of its horrors, he wrote:

"So enormous, so dreadful, so irremediable did the [slave] trade's… pic.twitter.com/Noaw7qZQt2

— ☧ Today in Christian History (@HistoricalRook) July 29, 2026

Let thy continual mercy, O Lord, enkindle in thy Church the never-failing gift of love, that, following the example of thy servant William Wilberforce, we may have grace to defend the poor, and maintain the cause of those who have no helper; for the sake of him who gave his life for us, thy Son our Savior Jesus Christ, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Ghost, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

Politician William Wilberforce died #onthisday in 1833. He is remembered for taking up the cause of abolishing slavery alongside Prime Minister Charles Grey. He is buried close to the grave of William Pitt in the Abbey’s north transept, and his statue can be found in statesmen's… pic.twitter.com/mY5QlNaZfQ

— Westminster Abbey (@wabbey) July 29, 2026

What does the reordering of the Anglican Communion actually mean for Christians in the Australian Church? 

Archbishop of Sydney Kanishka Raffel on what it means for Anglican churches, clergy and church members in Australia.

We explore what ‘principled disengagement’ from the Canterbury Instruments will mean for Australian leaders and other Global Anglican Communion leaders. 

Plus an update on implementing the Sydney Diocean goal of seeing five percent saved through conversion growth each year.  

And Archbishop Raffel responds to criticism over his comments on Pauline Hanson, ‘We must reject hateful words and threats of violence.’ 

Watch it all.

The national director of the Church of England Evangelical Council (CEEC), the Revd John Dunnett, has resigned as an honorary canon of Chelmsford Cathedral over the decision to use prayers of blessing for same-sex couples at cathedral services.

Mr Dunnett was one of more than 150 signatories to a letter sent last November, after the cathedral’s decision to use the Prayers of Love and Faith was announced. The decision, they wrote, left them “feeling disenfranchised from the life and worship of the Cathedral”.

The other signatories have not been made public, but Mr Dunnett said that they comprise priests, churchwardens, PCC members, and diocesan-synod members.

The letter called on the Dean, the Very Revd Dr Jessica Martin, and the Bishop of Chelmsford, Dr Guli Francis-Dehqani, to reconsider the decision — “and hopefully reverse it”. In a reply sent last month, the Bishop and Dean declined to do so, Mr Dunnett said.

Read it all.

The national director of the #ChurchofEngland Evangelical Council (CEEC), the Revd John Dunnett, has resigned as an honorary canon of #ChelmsfordCathedral over the decision to use prayers of blessing for #samesex couples at #cathedral services#churchnewshttps://t.co/U4zeRkVKn0

— Church Times (@ChurchTimes) February 4, 2026

[JI] Packer and [Thomas] Howard touched on a still deeply-relevant historical truth: it is because Christian communities failed to nurture and transmit from generation to generation the full depth and breadth of the gospel in its intellectual rigor, illuminating every aspect of human life, that faith and reason came to be seen as opposites. Packer knew that especially among North-American evangelicals, anti-cultural and anti-intellectual sentiments disillusioned many younger Christians who hungered for a holistic, integrative view of faith and life. Packer sought to recover a broader Christian vision grounded in the Christ who became human so that we could become fully human by union with him. “To be fully Christian,” Packer wrote, “in other words, is to live; it is to be fully human.” And this is the message taught to us by the Scriptures and the Christian tradition. We hear this message from “some of the most luminous and titanic minds ever to appear on the human scene, as well as from peasants, shopkeepers, kings, hermits, Easterners, Westerners, Africans, Americans, and people of all other sorts and conditions.” And they all share this vision of what it means to be fully human because they know “that to have followed Christ the Savior is to have been brought to wholeness, freedom, and joy,” albeit often through great struggle and pain. These Christians all believed that in Jesus the Christ, God became “the second Adam,” not so that “they could escape from their humanness” but, on the contrary, so that they could “become human” since Christ was “the perfect example of all that humanity was meant to be.”

Needless to say, Packer (and Howard) were not promoting nineteenth-century Protestant liberalism, which offered Christ as universal example of humanity attainable through rational reflection. Rather, they restated classic Christianity in emphasizing that only through union with Christ will we enter into the fullness of our humanity whose inherent dignity and worth everyone possesses by virtue of being made in God’s image. It is only through participating by grace in the humanity Christ accomplished in his passion, resurrection, and ascension, that human beings are freed from the power of sin and death, so as truly to enter into a life without fear, becoming free to serve others in love. 

In all of his writings, including Knowing God, Packer promotes Christianity as a culture-generating force that humanizes all of life. He was critical, however, of contemporary Christian trends that merely mirrored culture, and warned that the humanizing power of the gospel required a Christianity nourished in the fullness of an authentic biblical faith, which places the living, cosmic Christ at the center of all human experience. With this vision, Packer joins giants in the faith like the second century church father Irenaeus, who believed that Christ “recapitulated” every dimension of humanity in himself, making “one new humanity” (Ephesians 2:15), beyond ethnic, racial or other divisions of any kind. Packer believed that schooling in classic Christianity of the kind I have outlined was vital for returning the church to the kind of life-giving, humanizing witness required for today. For the sake of this witness, the church should be unified across confessional boundaries, which is arguably the main reason for Packer’s signing of the “Evangelicals and Catholics Together” (ECT) initiative in 1994.

The humanizing power of the gospel required a Christianity nourished in the fullness of an authentic biblical faith.Packer signed the document because he believed it to be “vital for the health of society in the United States and Canada that adherents to the key truths of classical Christianity—a self-defining triune God who is both Creator and Redeemer; this God’s regenerating and sanctifying grace; the sanctity of life here; the certainty of personal judgment hereafter; and the return of Jesus Christ to end history—should link up for the vast and pressing task of re-educating our secularized communities on these matters.”

It is this Christ-centered, and therefore humanistic, unifying theology that I also recall from my encounter with Packer. I first met him in 1994, when I was a UBC graduate student in comparative literature. By this time, I had become intensely interested in Reformation history and literature, particularly the connections between the English Calvinist non-Conformists and the German Lutheran tradition. To supplement my UBC offerings, Packer had agreed to a guided study on Puritan literature, with an emphasis—no surprise!—on John Bunyan, Richard Baxter, and John Owen. During this course, I was inspired by what I would call Christian humanism at its best: deep learning founded on a classics degree (Packer could cite Latin passages from Luther, Erasmus, Calvin, or Augustine at will, and he also commanded classical rhetoric and poetics) combined with Christ-centered theology and a strong concern for humanizing culture. This is the Christian humanist Jim Packer I recall and whose Christian humanist outlook I intend to honor as I take up the Packer Chair this fall. 

Read it all.

'#JIPacker and [Thomas] Howard touched on a still deeply-relevant historical truth: it is because Christian communities failed to nurture and transmit from generation to generation the full depth and breadth of the gospel in its intellectual rigor, illuminating every aspect of… pic.twitter.com/LNueG7mvqP

— Kendall Harmon (@KendallHarmon6) November 22, 2025

‘He stood for many years alone, he was long opposed, ridiculed, shunned, his doctrines were misrepresented, his little peculiarities of voice and manner were satirized, disturbances were frequently raised in his church or he was a person not taken into account, nor considered in the light of a regular clergyman in the church.’

-–as quoted in William Carus, Memoirs of the Life of the Rev. Charles Simeon (New York: Robert Carter, 1848), p.39

O loving God, who orderest all things by thine unerring wisdom and unbounded love: Grant us in all things to see thy hand; that, following the example and teaching of thy servant Charles Simeon, we may walk with Christ in all simplicity, and serve thee with a quiet and contented mind; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.

13 Nov 1836, Charles Simeon, evangelical Anglican clergyman, died, aged 77. Educated @Eton_College & @Kings_College. Vicar of Holy Trinity Cambridge for 54 years. One of founders of @cmsmission, @CMJ1809 & @biblesociety. Set up trust to appoint vicars to parishes that continues. pic.twitter.com/S5QNw1jUSY

— Revd Nicholas Pye (@RevdPye) November 13, 2025

When Ms. Harmon prays, she does so like she’s talking to her best friend. She turns to God for everything from small things – “I really want my baby to sleep tonight” – to big things, like where to buy a house or how many children to have.

A friend gave her a box that says “Give it to God” on the cover, and she writes her prayer items on sticky notes to place inside. The list ranges from praying for friends who are trying to conceive or who are looking for a job, to her own highs and lows with postpartum anxiety and depression.

Ms. Harmon’s current church, about an hour north of Denver, is about half young married couples. Her moms’ group is about 30 to 35 women. There’s no substitute for church in person, she says, pointing to the Bible chapter in Hebrews that encourages Christians to be in community.

“Doing life with other people is so rich,” she says. “I see why He calls us to that.”

Read it all.

Ms. [Bekah] Harmon’s current church, about an hour north of Denver, is about half young married couples. Her moms’ group is about 30 to 35 women. There’s no substitute for church in person, she says, pointing to the Bible chapter in Hebrews that encourages Christians to be in…

— Kendall Harmon (@KendallHarmon6) November 5, 2025

After months of speculation, the Church of England has finally appointed a new Archbishop of Canterbury. The first woman in the post, she is the current Bishop of London and as such has already played a senior role in the Church for several years.

Her theological training and ministerial experience are minimal. She was enrolled on a local ordination course rather than at a theological college and served a couple of part-time curacies before being very briefly rector of a parish church. She was soon promoted to the episcopate as suffragan bishop of Crediton, but her main achievement appears to be that she was a competent administrator in the National Health Service. Is a track record like that promising for a future Archbishop of Canterbury?

The short answer must be no.

Read it all

💬"Everybody in the Church of England will be polite to her, but few will listen to whatever she has to say…"

📢Gerald Bray on the announcement that Sarah Mullally is to be the new Archbishop of Canterbury: https://t.co/ZKEEYPdOoT

— Evangelicals Now (@EvangelicalsNow) October 3, 2025

The question of who qualifies as an evangelical and how many evangelicals exist worldwide continues to puzzle scholars, church leaders and mission researchers alike. That was the central theme of a Sept. 2 webinar hosted by the World Evangelical Alliance and released publicly Sept. 5, featuring two leading voices in global religious demography.

Dr. Gina A. Zurlo, editor of the World Christian Database and a lecturer at Harvard Divinity School, and Jason Mandryk, longtime editor of Operation World, outlined both the difficulties and the necessity of measuring a movement that is increasingly diverse and shifting rapidly toward the Global South.

Both experts agreed that unlike Catholicism, Orthodoxy, or even Pentecostalism, evangelicalism has no universally agreed-upon definition. This makes the task of counting adherents unusually complex. Yet, they stressed, reliable figures are crucial for understanding how Christianity is changing worldwide.

Mandryk opened with a blunt assessment: “There is no such thing as the evangelical.”

Read it all.

Data from 2 studies show evangelical Christianity’s center of gravity has shifted from the US & Europe to African, Asian & Latin American regions.

Estimated to be approaching 1 billion globally, the evangelical population in China has now surpassed the UShttps://t.co/6B8knAxydH

— Julie Roys (@reachjulieroys) September 10, 2025

Let thy continual mercy, O Lord, enkindle in thy Church the never-failing gift of love, that, following the example of thy servant William Wilberforce, we may have grace to defend the poor, and maintain the cause of those who have no helper; for the sake of him who gave his life for us, thy Son our Savior Jesus Christ, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Ghost, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

Today in the Anglican tradition we thank God for William Wilberforce, an evangelical Anglican, slave abolitionist, founder of the CMS and RSPCA. Wilberforce understood Christianity as inseparable from justice! In a world of growing hate, let us remember and mirror his good works pic.twitter.com/i5RhLQwRva

— Victor-Joseph ❤️‍🔥🕊️ (@Anglicanvictor) July 30, 2025

The reason I do not hesitate to call my experience representative of a multitude of people is that how Packer reached me was the printed word. This is the story of Packer’s life and ministry. Packer never held a prestigious professorship at a famous university, nor did he fill a high-visibility pulpit permanently. Furthermore, he lived before the age of social media and the instant dissemination they confer. When I interviewed Packer for my biography of him, he affirmed his steadfast refusal throughout his life to cultivate a following.

Additionally, Packer was a soft-spoken and unassuming man. No assignment was too small or humble for him. During one of the summers that the ESV translation committee met in Cambridge, England, Packer accepted an invitation to speak to a group of local young people in a church member’s living room. One of the translators and his wife smuggled their way into the meeting. They later reported that the living room was so crowded that some of the young people sat under a table.

In view of this absence of ordinary channels for becoming widely known, how is it possible that surveys of influential evangelicals conducted early in the present century found Packer near the tops of the lists? The answer is that J. I. Packer achieved his prominence through the printed word and its uncanny ability to reach ordinary people in the ordinary circumstances of life. Some of Packer’s books, such as his first book (Fundamentalism and the Word of God), began as a series of addresses to students and lay people. His signature book Knowing God, which sold a million and a half copies, began as a series of articles on basic Christian beliefs for a religious magazine. J. I. Packer is a classic case of someone who was faithful in little and thereby found himself set over much. I cannot think of a better validation of the effectiveness of Christian publishing than the career of J. I. Packer.

Read it all.

#OTD July 17, 2020:
Death of J.I. Packer evangelical theologian, cleric and writer in the low-church Anglican and Calvinist traditions. He was considered one of the most influential evangelicals in North America. Known for his best-selling book, Knowing God, written in 1973,… pic.twitter.com/AXFXN4x828

— ☧ Today in Christian History (@HistoricalRook) July 17, 2025

After that he started preaching through the New Testament one book at a time, beginning with the Gospel of John and then moving to Peter’s first and second epistles. MacArthur spent 30 hours a week preparing sermons and delegated almost all other pastoral responsibilities to the church’s elders and lay leaders. 

The church grew rapidly. Grace built a new building that could seat 1,000 in 1971 and expanded again in 1977, tripling in size. It became the largest Protestant church in Los Angeles by the end of the decade.

The demand for recordings of MacArthur’s sermons also exploded. Church members sent out 5,000 tapes every week, then 15,000, then 30,000. By the end of the ’70s, more than 100,000 Christians around the country were receiving MacArthur’s recorded sermons every week. The church also launched a separate ministry, Grace to You, to broadcast MacArthur’s messages on Christian radio.

“John’s ministry proves how timeless preaching can be when it is merely sound, clear biblical exposition,” Phil Johnson, executive director of Grace to You, said in 2011. “If the aim of preaching is the awakening of spiritually dead souls and the cleansing and transformation of lives spoiled by sin, then all that really counts is that the preacher be faithful in proclaiming the Word of God with clarity, accuracy, and candor.”

Read it all.

Expository preacher John MacArthur died Monday at the age of 86.

He said the most important mark of his ministry was that he explained the Bible with the Bible.https://t.co/qUiMDTIxLW

— Christianity Today (@CTmagazine) July 15, 2025

Instead, a thoroughly biblical understanding of epistemic humility means rejoicing in a relationship with the eternal God and trusting that his vast and timeless knowledge far exceeds our own. I may not be certain about many things, but I have decided to follow Jesus, the only begotten Son of God, because he has given me good cause to trust him. In fact, I would do well to trust him more than I trust myself.

Jesus himself presents a remarkable example of this kind of humility. He alone had every right to approach life with absolute unmitigated certainty in the fullness of his knowledge, and yet he sought the will of his Father and submitted to the uncertainties of life in human form. Luke tells us that he “grew in wisdom,” listening to the priests and asking questions as a boy (2:52). He taught with divine authority but openly confessed that there were things he did not know which he left in the capable hands of the Father (Matt. 24:36).

If our Lord Jesus possessed and expressed this kind of humility, what excuse do we have?

In light of all this, I feel I can answer my student’s question with a bit more confidence. Yes, a Christian should have an open mind, if the term is rightly understood.

Read it all.

“What if there is no contradiction between unshakeable faith and intellectual humility?” asks Benjamin Vincent. https://t.co/DQi1yAUUwa

— Christianity Today (@CTmagazine) March 24, 2025

McCartney said Promise Keepers grew out of tension in his own life. His zeal for success as a football coach came into conflict with his desire to be the husband and father he felt God wanted him to be. His struggle to reconcile those tensions led him to launch the ministry that fused evangelical spirituality, big-tent revivalism, sports celebrity, and therapeutic masculinity—and to eventually walk away from coaching while he was still at the top of his game.

He was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 2013. But his greatest legacy was as a Christian. While many Christian football coaches came before him and many after, few burned as bright as McCartney or extended their influence as wide.

“Bill McCartney’s absolute commitment to Jesus Christ was and is a beacon for all of us,” Bill Curry, a coaching contemporary, told Christianity Today. “We will always remember and do our best to honor his memory.”

McCartney died on Friday, January 10, at the age of 84.

Read it all.

Bill McCartney led the Colorado Buffaloes to a national title and started a movement urging men to take responsibility for their faith, families, and communities.

The football coach died on January 10, at the age of 84.https://t.co/EcpYlsfejr

— Christianity Today (@CTmagazine) January 15, 2025

Five Grammys. Sixty Dove Awards. Fifty No. 1 radio hits.

Steven Curtis Chapman is not lacking in industry honors. But this week the Christian music veteran is getting a little extra special recognition. On Friday, he’s going to be inducted into the membership of the Grand Ole Opry. 

After nearly 40 years in the industry, Chapman’s entry into the country music institution is a full-circle moment. He first performed on the storied Nashville stage as a 19-year-old aspiring musician, just starting his career. Now, he will have a permanent place there.

The Grand Ole Opry, a live radio program broadcast from Nashville since 1925, has a rich history, featuring some of the biggest names in country and popular music—artists like B. B. King, Mahalia Jackson, and The Beach Boys have all appeared as guests. Membership is a lifetime invitation to be part of the regular roster of Opry performers. There are currently only 74 members, including Dolly Parton, Reba McEntire, Garth Brooks, Luke Combs, and Lainey Wilson. 

Country artist Ricky Skaggs surprised Chapman with the membership announcement during a live show at the Opry in July. Chapman will be the first contemporary Christian music (CCM) star to become a member.  

Read it all.

Thanks to my friends at @CTmagazine for this great article!https://t.co/OhokiVeeFe

— Steven Curtis Chapman (@StevenCurtis) October 31, 2024

[On] October 31, Reformation Day, evangelicals in Argentina [had] an extra reason to celebrate, as their country officially recognizes the National Day of Evangelical and Protestant Churches.

A bill calling for this recognition was approved by the lower Congreso de la Nación chamber, the Chamber of Deputies, last year. In April, the bill was unanimously approved in the Senate Chamber and then signed by president Javier Milei. 

“Today we are not celebrating a religious holiday,” said Christian Hooft, who leads ACIERA (Alliance of Evangelical Churches in the Republic of Argentina), at an event celebrating the day last Monday. “We are celebrating the historical identity of the faith of millions of Argentine citizens.”

Argentina’s evangelicals have long sought this recognition. The country’s Supreme Court has ruled that the country has no official or state religion, and its constitution guarantees freedom of religion, but it also states that “the federal government supports the Roman Catholic apostolic faith.”

Read it all.

Argentina has officially moved to celebrate the National Day of Evangelical and Protestant Churches.

Church leaders are grateful for the government recognition—and seeking to give back.https://t.co/GeWeJuLxga

— Christianity Today (@CTmagazine) November 1, 2024

In a significant interview on the Rest is Politics Podcast England’s Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby, has denied the teaching of the Bible, and the teaching of his church. 

It is Archbishop Welby’s most public betrayal of his ordination and consecration vow to ‘banish error and to uphold and defend the truth taught in Scripture.’

Archbishop Welby’s comments came on the eve of an important House of Bishops meeting in the UK, which considered a request from a group called The Alliance, consisting of 2360 clergy whose churches represent 42% of the Church of England’s Sunday attendance, and who hold to the Bible’s teaching on sexuality.

Please watch it all:

Note especially these sections–

“…the conservatives, the Bible people and the traditional Catholics won’t come under the jurisdiction, or if you like the false teaching bishops, but will come under a separate Province, separate episcopacy…” and that  “…first order difference requires first order differentiation…”

As well as

“… there’s still ongoing discussion- like the House of Bishops have always said we’ll need to give some kind of provision for those who in conscience can’t go along with this, but that process has really not got anywhere so even though we’re still charging down the direction of blessing for same sex unions a clear trajectory towards same sex marriage for clergy and standalone services, kind of pseudo-marriage services for same sex couples we’ve not had any real details about settlement and some kind of offer.”

“And anything that’s been on the table that the Bishops have discussed has been very much of a second order, so basically they’ve dismissed it. Many have said ‘look you don’t really represent very many, it’s just a few leaders and most people don’t really like this. You’re going to get much, much less, if anything it will be second order differentiation, so I don’t think they’ve really heard how many of us are out there and how seriously we hold this. We can’t accept less than we’re asking for.”

And, finally, this in reference to the completely avoidable and disastrous TEC situation:

“Some of us have been saying ‘look across the Atlantic – we’ve got to avoid an Episcopal style train crash which has led to a complete split with… a very large grouping of Orthodox Anglicans who are no completely separate from the Episcopal church and the cost has been massive emotionally, spiritually, missionally and there’s been to many who said that would never happen here but actually there’s a stronger Orthodox grouping here in the Church of England..” [hat tip: Anglican Futures]

“When I came to CHBC,” Dever explained, “I was very clear with them that I was happy for every aspect of my public ministry to fail, if necessary, except for the preaching of God’s Word.” The hyperbole was intentional. Dever wanted the church to understand the primacy of the preached Word in the congregation’s life.

“Preaching is central to the pastoral ministry,” Dever explained at the congregational Q&A in 1993. “A lot of churches in America don’t think that. I think they’re wrong.”

Dever began by preaching expositionally through Mark’s Gospel. From his time studying the Puritans, Dever realized that in a “Christian culture,” the way you preach evangelistically to self-conscious Christians who may not be converted is by constantly repeating the same truth in sermons: This is what a Christian is like. The Gospels provided the perfect lens to do so through Jesus’s words.

Read it all.

What are the marks of a faithful pastor?

Preach
Pray
Love
Stay

On the 30th anniversary of Mark Dever's installation as pastor of @CHBCdc, here are some reflections on how these goals have shaped Mark's ministry on Capitol Hill.https://t.co/rhunQTIFQm

— Caleb Morell (@calebmorell) September 25, 2024

“Ecclesiology has really become the driving doctrine,” said Holy Joys board member David Fry, who is also senior pastor of Frankfort Bible Holiness Church in Frankfort, Indiana. “We want to write theology for the church and developing healthier churches.”

Chris Lohrstorfer, associate professor of Wesleyan theology at WBS, said Wesleyan ecclesiology offers a vision of the church as a community. Many people, in recent years, have craved a community-oriented Christian life, he said, and that has only increased in response to what some experts have called an “epidemic of loneliness.”

“The Wesleyan understanding of church and Christianity is … what our society is looking for,” Lohrstorfer said.

Read it all.

Nearly 20 years after the rise of New Calvinism, a movement among today's young people is turning to Methodist tradition and Wesleyan theology. @CTmagazine reports: https://t.co/pKBkr936ce

— kate shellnutt (@kateshellnutt) September 17, 2024

In another investigation, [Marshall] Allen reported that Dignity Health, a large religious health system that described itself as carrying on “the healing ministry of Jesus,” had refused to cover the medical expenses of an employee’s three-month-premature baby. Dignity claimed the woman hadn’t filled out the necessary paperwork and that she bore sole responsibility for a nearly $1 million hospital bill, though she had enrolled her baby with the insurer from the NICU.

After Allen called the company with questions, Dignity reversed its decision and retroactively covered the baby, who survived.

“Some people might think that Christians are supposed to be soft and acquiescent rather than muckrakers who hold the powerful to account,” he wrote in The New York Times. “But what I do as an investigative reporter is consistent with what the Bible teaches.”

Allen argued that the Bible “teaches that people are made in the image of God and that each human life holds incredible value.”

A Christian journalist, he said, should be comforted by God to be a comfort to others. A Christian journalist should rebuke deception and unfair practices. A Christian journalist should get all sides of the story, in line with Proverbs’ call for hearing multiple witnesses. And a Christian journalist should admit and correct mistakes with humility. He also shared this vision of Christian journalism in lectures to journalism students at The King’s College.

“He saw this work as redemptive and Christian in nature,” said Paul Glader, a friend of Allen’s and a former journalism professor at King’s. “He did amazing work investigating the health care bureaucracy and bullies, seeking out answers and truth for the little guy—all of us consumers.”

Marshall Allen, a Christian muckraker who held the health care industry accountable, has died at age 52.

His obituary from @emlybelz:https://t.co/jKrQA3nle3

— Christianity Today (@CTmagazine) May 23, 2024