Adrian Warnock has posted an interesting article on his blog commenting and annotating Ed Stetzer’s views on the current state of the evangelical movement:

Stetzer showed a remarkable grasp of the modern evangelical movement, among which he moves remarkably freely as a friend of many from remarkably different streams. Ed speaks to a broader Christian constituency than anyone else I can think of. I should also mention also that in private conversation this past weekend, Ed stressed to me the importance of each of these groups continuing to feel passionately about their distinctives.

Interestingly enough the first thing that came across to me in the article was Ed’s comments on the collapse of methodological consensus:

Ed began by explaining that there has been a collapse of the methodological consensus. Over the last few decades it is no longer the case that an Anglican church looks like an Anglican or Baptist like a Baptist. Now you have moderators. Eg “Purpose driven,” “moderately reformed,” or “missional.” It is now the case that a Lutheran church that is Purpose Driven will be more similar to a Pentecostal Purpose Driven church than another Lutheran. Thus, a lot of affinity is atheological, rather it is about what ministry you receive.

The article then goes on to discuss the various broad streams that make up the contemporary evangelical movement:

1. Traditional

2. Pentecostal

3. Pragmatic

4. Younger

The younger evangelical stream is then broken down into the following:

1. Hyper-contemporary

2. Emerging

3. New Reformed

The emerging stream is also broken down further into the following streams:

Relevants A lot of this is just about being relevant. Appropriate to the culture. Same understanding of the gospel but engage in a different way. 

Reconstructionists want to change the way we do church. They believe in the gospel. Believe in conversion. But believe that much of what had been done in church harms the gospel. So we see, House Church, Missional,  incarnational models. The reality is indeed that many churches do need to change.   

Revisionists like Maclaren want to rethink the gospel want a bigger gospel, more societal. Some want to ditch the idea of gospel as a transaction altogether.

Read the full article here.