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Evangelicalism and its first cousin, fundamentalism, have famously been at odds with a modernism that has either treated the idea of God as a fairy tale or an evil. As a consequence, our relationship with modernity has largely been reactive and defensive. While much of evangelicalism is still in this pitched battle, we fail to realize we are in the window of time between modernity's flat-lining and its obituary being posted in the newspapers. The death of the highest modernist ideals is not widely realized, but evangelicals should recognize it and change our posture from reactive to constructive, because we find ourselves in a culture with an empty stage and an open microphone.

In a conversation with Christianity Today, McLaren said our current approach to the age reminded him of a friend who worked in Washington as a spy. "He saw everything through the lenses of the Cold War—who was good, who was bad, and what his mission was," McLaren said. "When the Cold War ended, he was lost. His worldview no longer served him well in a new climate, and he didn't know how to adjust. We evangelicals tend to be that way at the death of modernism."

At the same time, contemporary evangelicalism is deeply steeped in and shaped by the modernist mindset—Christ molded by modernity. We are far more acculturated to modernity and shaped by its values than we appreciate. We run our churches with the efficiency of the industrial age. We market our messages and conduct our services in the spirit of capitalist consumerism.

In the modernist exaltation of knowledge, we teeter on a biblicism that sees the Christian faith as a religion of a book rather than a relationship with the Triune God and our neighbors. We often make the Bible the foundation and center of our faith. But, as Neo tells Dan, "the Bible never speaks of itself this way." It speaks of Christ as the foundation of the church; thus we are historically known as Christ-ones.

Dan and Neo take up other important issues like the nature of the Kingdom of God, what the gospel is, and how few Christians really understand the importance of such questions. They wrestle with how we approach theology, believing it should be more narrative than propositional, both true and beautiful. This is a book for people who believe we cannot expand the Kingdom of God by doing more of the same but who are unsure how things should change in our changing times. It is also a book for people disillusioned or discouraged with the current state of evangelicalism.

"It's a hopeful book," McLaren says, "for people who ask, 'Can I still call myself a Christian if I don't buy the whole package of what many call Christianity today, which includes a lot of modernity and has little to do with authentic Christianity?' "

McLaren's book is not intended as a definitive list of what evangelicalism needs to be vital in this new age. It is a discussion starter, and it helps the reader understand why the discussion is needed and where it should go. Our glorious, sacred mission will be better for the engagement this book initiates.

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June 10 2002, Vol. 46, No. 7