Losing Our Religion: An Altar Call for Evangelical America

Russell Moore has had an inside view from top leadership circles to the stresses of the regular lay member of evangelicalism and this book is an assessment of what he has seen. (Much of Moore's insight is from a Southern Baptist experience specifically, but I'm a Mennonite and so much of it sounds familiar to me, that I expect this to be very widely applicable to American Christians)The book is organized in 5 sections around things Evangelicals have lost: Credibility, Authority, Identity, Integrity & Stability.As always Moore is very quotable, here are some random from my highlights:-"...denomination[s] find most hateful to God the sins that least tempt its members, while those sins that are the most popular become redefined & even sanctified."-"The cross was the losing side of a culture war."-"having multiple pastors tell me, essentially, the same story about quoting the Sermon on the Mount, parenthetically, in their preaching — "turn the other cheek" — [and] to have someone come up after to say, "Where did you get those liberal talking points?" And what was alarming to me is that in most of these scenarios, when the pastor would say, "I'm literally quoting Jesus Christ," the response would not be, "I apologize." The response would be, "Yes, but that doesn't work anymore. That's weak." And when we get to the point where the teachings of Jesus himself are seen as subversive to us, then we're in a crisis."A significant part of my rating of books is how often I need to stop and highlight. On that rating this book gets a 5 star. But I noticed another rating vector I haven't notice on other books (than the Apostle Paul & the problem of finding a period to end on...) I found myself starting to highlight great sections on my Kindle Fire, and often having difficulty knowing when to stop sliding my finger on the glass...Moore combines reasoning that cuts through the obfuscation, insights that seem self-evident when not overpowered by ideology and down-home evangelical anecdotes that delivers a pretty heavy, truthful, prophetic message in a package that is very accessible.This is a message American Christians need to hear.

“If we wanted to find Jesus, we would have to lose our religion.” That is the first line of Russell Moore’s 2023 book, “Losing Our Religion.” Dr. Moore speaks from the point of view of evangelical leadership, but also as a contrarian, standing up to the status quo of much of the modern evangelical church that in a sense has lost its way both through cultural inculcation and political conflation.Unfortunately, those on either side of the culture wars within church, those who need to hear what Moore has to say, are the ones that will tend to reject to book out of hand. Those who hold strongly to the belief that the church must be in the political fight to save our way of life think they already know where he stands. Progressives, who may merely laugh or cry at it all, do so at their own risk because his points are just as relevant for them. Set aside your ingrained cultural proclivities and hold onto your belief in the truthfulness of the Bible long enough to get to the end of the book.[Update: As an elder in my church, I purchased the book as part of research for our leadership board to write and publish a position paper on the relationship of the church to politics. Like most churches, the combination of Covid and the political climate in America weakened the sense of community that should exist within a local body of believers. Not even the pastoral staff agrees on these subjects, so the paper (we have written on other topics) will act as a guide for counseling, teaching, and preaching on the subject if/when appropriate. For a deeper and more theological perspective on this issue, I can highly recommend "Five Views on the Church and Politics," published by Zondervan and also available on Amazon.]In this book Moore brings his voice from over the past several years into focus and is, in part, speaking his personal pain and, in part, attempting to speak prophetically to the American evangelical church. If you are really interested in what he has to say, you must read through the former to get to the latter, and, for the most part, it is worth it. Moore makes his point by making five core observations regarding the church’s current predicament and offers suggestions for individual believers to respond in a Biblical manner by answering a question he poses in each chapter. Here are the points and the questions. You can read his answers in the book and consider them accordingly.1. Losing Our Credibility: How Disillusion Can Save Us from DeconstructionWhen we protect the institution of the church as we currently maintain it, even despite its flaws and sometimes outright sinful behavior, and even when that becomes public knowledge, the credibility of the gospel we claim to proclaim is lost. So, what can you do to follow Christ in a time when the church seems to be losing credibility at a rapid pace?2. Losing Our Authority: How the Truth Can Save Us from TribalismChristian nationalism, even in its softest form, is at odds with the truth of Scripture. To the extent the church holds to this, and similar, errancies, and not the authority of Scripture, it loses its moral authority and becomes just one more tribe in the culture wars. So, what can you do as you stand firm in the gospel and hold to the truths of the Bible in a post truth culture?3. Losing Our Identity: How Conversion Can Save Us from Culture WarsWhile realizing that “nothing is new under the sun,” the intensity of today’s culture wars, fueled by identity politics and social media, can cause believers to identify with a tribe and bring their tribal faith with them to church, rather than identify as believers, and parse the truth – if any – out of the rhetoric. So, what should you do to hold fast to the kind of conversionism that can counteract the ever-heightening culture-warring and ever-expanding political idolatries of the moment?4. Losing Our Integrity: How Morality Can Save Us from HypocrisyWhen we fail to believe and live the true Biblical gospel – exchanging it for a lie of some sort, the world sees the gospel as a lie. Believing in and living out the True gospel of Scripture creates integrity both in us individually and within the church and gives credibility to the culture around us of what we say whether they like hearing it or not. So, if you want a different path forward, what should you do?5. Losing Our Stability: How Revival Can Save Us from NostalgiaLooking back is never the answer, but it can provide encouragement. Illustratively, while Samuel’s Ebenezer was a remembrance of God’s provision and salvation, the pillars of smoke and fire were evidence of God’s leading to the fulfillment of His promise, followed in faith because they led those loved by God one day at a time. Fear should not destabilize us into returning to the past but energize us to follow the God who cares and knows. So, what can we do in the face of the crumbling of American Christianity?Moore’s Conclusion?American Christianity is in crisis. The evangelical church is a scandal in all the worst ways, and we bear the responsibility for that (elsewhere he has apologized for the part he played in that within his own denomination); some of us even contributed to it. We cannot simply “will it away” by shrugging our shoulders and saying, “That’s just the way people are.” The fact is, “Jesus Saves,” even if those words are associated with bad behavior.American evangelicalism may or may not be there for the future, but someone will be. As long as there’s a church (and there will be until Jesus returns), there will be people within it reminding everyone else that the Sprit blows where He wills, and that there’s hope, no matter how far gone a person goes, to be born again.

Russell Moore is the executive editor of the magazine Christianity Today, a minister, and was in a leadership role in the Southern Baptist Convention until he was pressured into leaving as a result of his refusal to endorse Donald Trump and his unwillingness to sweep under the rug the numerous allegations of sexual abuse within the Southern Baptists. Although he maintained his beliefs he said that he was losing his religion. This book explains what he means when he says Evangelists are losing their religion and explains why many people are leaving a church that seems to have turned its back on things that had made it Christian. His key message is that "only when something is lost can it be found."His prose style is like drinking from a fire hose with extremely dense paragraphs. Those paragraphs have so many things worth noting that my Kindle copy now is filled with highlights. The book is not only valuable for Evangelists or Baptists, it is valuable for any church goer in America. Also, many of its lessons can be applied to non-religious situations as well.The book is divided into sections describing what is being lost and why. The end of each section includes suggestions for compensating for these loses.Losing our Credibility. The section begins with a reference to the R.E.M. song "Losing My Religion" that had been posted by a woman who said that she was not losing her faith but was afraid she was losing her church and did not believe that her church believed what her church had taught her.Losing our Authority. This section talks about tribalism and includes statements like "we are called not just to argue about what is true, but to say things we know to be false, just to prove that we are part of the tribe to which we belong." He continues saying that "What a movement rooted in power instead of truth actually wants are people who are willing to accept seemingly crazy ideas .... and to change them at a moments notice." He then emphasizes the "the evangelical culture of the past half century has focused comparatively little on judgement for the hearer, and much more on a different kind of fear - the imminent threat from one's neighbors or culture."Losing our Identity. This section is focused on culture war issues that consume the evangelical community at the expense of the more religious issues. He sees a worldwide trend evolving towards a "post-Christian right" where culture war issues supplant the religious ones with religious symbols used for "shoring up an ethnic or national identity."Losing Our Integrity. In 2016, the author had published comments saying that "Trump was morally unfit for leadership." These comments resulted in furious responses from people who were willing toss aside moral judgements in order to support a member of the tribe. He later realized that this willingness to excuse moral failings started long before the 2016 election and could be found in the willingness of so many church leaders to excuse moral failings of all types in their leaders.Losing our Stability. This section discusses the ideas of revival versus reformation to reset the moral compass of the church. He concludes by saying that American Christianity is in crises. The church is a scandal in all the worst ways. We bear responsibility for that." concluding that we need to "Make Evangelism Born Again."

Ich werde das Bild nie vergessen: Inmitten des tobenden Pöbels, der an diesem unseligen 6. Januar das Kapitol stürmte, steht ein Kreis junger Männer, in ekstatisches Gebet versunken: Sie flehen Jesus an, er möge diejenigen segnen, die hier einen blutigen Staatsstreich (fünf Tote, zahlreiche Verletzte) versuchen, angestiftet von einem Mann, der ihnen als Auserwählter Gottes gilt. Neben ihnen in trauter Gemeinsamkeit ein Plastik-Schamane mit Büffelhörnern und Pelzkostüm und rabiate Rüpel in Guerilla-Uniform.Und ein Galgen für den Vizepräsidenten, der sich während seiner ganzen Amtszeit als überzeugter und untadeliger "wiedergeborener Christ" erwiesen hat, weil er sich weigerte, Gesetz und Verfassung zugunsten des "Auserwählten" zu brechen.Kritik am amerikanischen Evangelikalismus kam jahrzehntelang, wie zu erwarten, von aggressiven Atheisten und der nur an kurzlebigen Skandalen interessierten Main Stream-Presse. Man entrüstete sich über den einen oder anderen sündigen Televangelisten, und das wars dann auch schon. Seit die religiöse Rechte in Amerika aber den schier unglaublichen Fehler begangen hat, Donald Trump nicht nur als Präsidentschaftskandidaten zu unterstützen, sondern als "Gottes Auserwählten" zu propagieren, kracht es ernsthaft im Kirchengebälk. Ginge es nur um ein politisches Amt, könnte man sagen: Naja, Heilige sind Politiker allesamt nicht. Aber hier geht es um mehr als vier Jahre Präsidentschaft. Die Evangelikalen lieben Trump nicht "trotzdem", sondern "weil". Und die Gretchen-Frage lautet nicht mehr: "Glaubst du an Jesus Christus?" sondern "Hältst du es mit Donald Trump?"Es ist kein Geringer, der in diesem Buch ein gnadenloses Bild des Situation zeichnet: Russell Moore, ehemaliger Pastor der streng traditionalistischen Southern Baptists und Co-Herausgeber der renommierten Zeitschrift "Christianity Today", rausgeschmissen, weil er sich weigerte, das Goldene Kalb zu umtanzen. Er tut es "sine ira et studio", ohne Zorn und Geifer, in einem zurückhaltenden Ton, unterstützt mit reichlich Grundlagenmaterial von christlichen und nichtchristlichen Fachleuten - er ist keine verbitterte Ratte, die das sinkende Schiff verlässt, sondern hält tapfer an seinem Glauben fest, überzeugt, "Jesus derselbe bleibt, gestern, heute und in Ewigkeit".Kein Buch, das man nebenher schnell mal durchlesen kann. Man sollte auch einiges an Informationen über das amerikanische Christentum parat haben, um zu verstehen, worum es geht, wieviele Holzkäfer da seit Jahrzehnten in den Stützpfeilern der Kirchen bohren. Unter diesen Voraussetzungen ist das Buch ein wertvoller Beitrag zur Zeitgeschichte.