Soong-Chan Rah, The Next Evangelicalism: Freeing the Church from Western Cultural Captivity (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Books, 2009). $15.00, 228 pages. While reading The Next Evangelicalism by Soong-Chan Rah, my emotions went through three stages: anger, acceptance, and ambivalence. First, anger: The thesis of Rah’s book is that the evangelical church in America must be liberated from its “Western, white cultural captivity” and replaced by “the next evangelicalism,” which is multicultural. According to Rah, Western, white culture is individualistic, consumerist, materialistic, and racist. And it pervades Anglo evangelicalism, both in America and wherever Anglo evangelical influence has spread. The Anglo … Continue reading “The Next Evangelicalism” by Soong-Chan Rah

Manfred T. Brauch, Abusing Scripture: The Consequences of Misreading the Bible (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2009). $18.00, 293 pages. The first article of the Assemblies of God’s Statement of Fundamental Truths concerns Scripture: “The Scriptures, both the Old and New Testaments, are verbally inspired of God and are the revelation of God to man, the infallible, authoritative rule of faith and conduct.” This “high” view of Scripture is a hallmark of theological conservatism and unites the Assemblies of God with the larger evangelical community. It also differentiates the Assemblies from the mainline Protestant community, which—under the influence of biblical … Continue reading Abusing Scripture by Manfred T. Brauch