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Though Rabey and Unger demur from offering a grand summary at the end, a core picture of evangelicalism does emerge. We see a movement marked first, by its evangelistic activism, and second, by this activism's twin (sometimes, the authors imply, its evil twin): a chameleon-like skill in adapting to cultural trends in order to spread the gospel.

Both of these powerful forces drove major changes in the movement's identity during the '60s and '70s, so it is no surprise to find their epitome in 1970. That year saw the release of D. James Kennedy's famed manual, Evangelism Explosion. The authors editorialize that though the book has helped thousands of evangelicals reach millions with the gospel, "the program exhibits problems that have bedeviled many of the mass evangelism campaigns that became increasingly popular during the 1960s and 1970s: it converted Christianity into a commodity and marketed it like any other consumer product, emphasizing its immediate benefits and downplaying its long-term costs." Rabey and Unger link this commodification to Bill Bright's "Four Spiritual Laws" tract, which they call "the most widely distributed document in evangelical history."

Other, much more positive benefits have accrued from this evangelical penchant for culturally strategic "gospel activism." One is the movement's (improving) record of cooperation both within its boundaries (chap. 8 on the National Association of Evangelicals, chap. 18 on the founding of Christianity Today) and without (chap. 45 on recent efforts to find common ground with Roman Catholics). Another is the sheer creativity and multiplicity of the ways evangelicals have "done church" (chap. 1 on the founding of Pentecostalism, chap. 20 on the charismatic movement, chap. 27 on the Jesus People, chap. 48 on "postmodern" modes of ministry to "Generation X").

In the end, evangelical readers of this account needn't always like what we see. In fact, we should be suspicious if we do. But unless we know our genealogy—the peculiar mix of theological nature and cultural nurture that make us who we are—we are doomed to do the things we do in darkness. This book ushers evangelicals towards the bright exit of that tunnel of history-blindness.

Chris Armstrong is managing editor of Christian History magazine.

Copyright © 2002 Christianity Today. Click for reprint information.

More Christian History, including a list of events that occurred this week in the church's past, is available at ChristianHistory.net. Subscriptions to the quarterly print magazine are also available.

Christian History Corner appears every Friday at ChristianityToday.com. Previous editions include:

A Protestant Bishop Speaks Out on the Stakes of Public Education | Why concerned parents should read the 17th-century Moravian educational reformer Jan Amos Comenius. (August 30, 2002)

Spurgeon on Jabez | What history's most prolific preacher said, in 1871, about the Prayer of Jabez (Aug. 23, 2002)

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September (Web-only) 2002, Vol. 46