The Making of Evangelical Spirituality

Book excerpt: How did it come to be that evangelicals expect individualized, extrabiblical revelation from God? What has happened culturally, historically, and theologically to make this the ubiquitous assumption of evangelical spirituality? The Making of Evangelical Spirituality is a compound of history and theology applied to the subject of evangelical spirituality—specifically, the phenomenon of evangelicals thinking “God spoke to me” in a still, quiet voice. The story is complex, multifaceted, and urgently in need of telling. Few Christians know the history of the spiritual expectations heaped upon them. Few know the individuals who gave shape to evangelical spirituality, spiritual chieftains who were often guided by uniquely ephemeral, social, and cultural forces. There is no towering figure like Martin Luther that stands as the lone front man for the esoterica of evangelical spirituality. Instead, it’s the osmosis of many fascinating people struggling through life in the storm of worldly and cultural momentum. This book is the story of those hermits, monks, reformers, heretics, politicians, outcasts, and preachers who gave shape. Failure to tell the story now risks it becoming just another part of historical compost, threatening to make evangelicals forever ignorant of what they are tossing into the garden of their soul.