God in the Wasteland: The Reality of Truth in a World of Fading DreamsDavid F. Wells's award-winning book No Place for Truth - called "a stinging indictment of evangelicalism's theological corruption" by TIME magazine - woke many evangelicals to the fact that their tradition has slowly but surely capitulated to the values and structures of modernity. In God in the Wasteland Wells continues his trenchant analysis of the cultural corruption now weakening the church's thought and witness with the intent of getting evangelicals to rethink their relationship to the "world." Wells argues that the church is enfeebled in part because it has lost its sense of God's sovereignty and holiness. "The fundamental problem in the evangelical world today," says Wells, "is that God rests too inconsequentially upon the church. His truth is too distant, his grace is too ordinary, his judgment is too benign, his gospel is too easy, and his Christ is too common." God has become weightless to the extent that the church no longer allows him to shape its character, outlook, and practice. Evangelicals have become heavily invested in the mind-set of modernity - a mind-set that Wells correlates with the biblical concept of the "world." They have become enamored of advanced management and marketing techniques, have blurred the distinctions between Christ and culture, and have largely abandoned their traditional emphasis on divine transcendence in favor of an emphasis on divine immanence. In doing so, they have produced a faith in God that is of little consequence to those who believe. An extensive survey of students at seven evangelical theological seminaries - the results of which are included in this book - indicates that the next generation of evangelical leaders is as caught up in these trends as the laity. Arguing that the church's diminished appetite for truth will not be restored without repentance and a fresh encounter with the holy God, Wells makes a compelling case for urgently needed reform in the evangelical church. Without such reform, he says, evangelical faith will be lost in and to the modernity that has invaded the church |
Contents
An Accident of Faith | 17 |
The Alternative to | 35 |
Clerics Anonymous | 60 |
Copyright | |
14 other sections not shown
Other editions - View all
God in the Wasteland: The Reality of Truth in a World of Fading Dreams David F. Wells Limited preview - 1994 |
God in the Wasteland: The Reality of Truth in a World of Fading Dreams David Wells No preview available - 1994 |
God in the Wasteland: The Reality of Truth in a World of Fading Dreams David F. Wells No preview available - 1994 |
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American anthropocentric argued asserts baby boomers Baptist Barna Barth become belief Bible biblical Calvin College century character Christ Christian faith Church Growth Church Growth movement consumer contemporary context denominations divine doctrine Donald McGavran Eerdmans evangelical evangelical faith experience external fact Father George Barna God's holiness gospel grace Grand Rapids Holiness-Pentecostal human immanence important inner Jesus John judgment Jürgen Moltmann knowledge less liberal lives look Marketing the Church matter meaning megachurch modern culture modern world moral nature Old Testament Olive Wyon P. T. Forsyth Paul percent percentages post-modern Pragmatism produced Protestant Protestantism providence psychological reality recovery groups religion religious revealed secular seminarians Seminary sense simply social society speak spiritual survey TABLE techniques Theology therapeutic things traditional trans transcendence truth understanding University Press values vision weightlessness William Word worldliness worldview worship Yahweh York