Right before lunch, I read a New York Times article entitled “On a Christian Mission to the Top.” The article discusses the increasing wealth and social power of evangelical Christians, symbolized by their recent fervor for proselytizing that bastion of the wealthy secular establishment, the Ivy League. Evangelicals, it seems, are no longer the poor and disenfranchised—they now rival mainline Protestants like Presbyterians, Episcopalians, and Methodists in their ability to put money behind their values. And they are putting money into the Ivies, where the next generation of the elite is emerging.

In past posts, I’ve alluded to my own connections to evangelical Christianity. I was raised in a Pentecostal denomination, and went to a college whose student body largely consisted of evangelicals. My ancestors joined the Pentecostal movement when its main adherents were the poor—my mother’s family hails from eastern Tennessee, in the heart of rural Appalachia.

I have a huge respect for what that strain of Christianity gave my family, for it spoke their language in a way that the mainline Protestant elite could not. When the wealthy sent their children into the coal mines and stripped their land, the Church of God told these poverty-stricken people that God did see them, did love them, would give them a reward in heaven if they lived for Jesus. The power and hope of that message still lingers in my own faith journey, even when I do not identify with aspects of that tradition.

So I wonder about this upward mobility in evangelical Christianity, this attempt to forge a beachhead in the Establishment. As evangelicals move up in their earning power, will they fall into the trap that so many Christians before them succumbed to? Will they forget their roots in the experience of the marginalized and instead emphasize dogmas that fail to speak to those most in need? Will they become heady with power and forget the Gospel?

Historically, Christian faith has most thrived when it has been on the margins. Only there, with its very survival in question, has the gospel of Jesus Christ spoken with crystal clarity to the world. The Roman government’s martyrdom of early Christians only encouraged those who responded to the message. We hear of the amazing growth of house churches in China. And among the poor, the concept of a born-again, personal relationship with a Jesus who suffered speaks volumes to those who experience alienation at the hands of the Establishment.

All of us, whether we consider ourselves progressive mainliners, evangelicals, or something in between, need to consider our relationship to the powerful. Are we on the margins? Are we talking about the God who loves all of us, the God for whom the last shall be first and the first last? Are we placidly part of the institution, or are we speaking prophetically to it?

And perhaps the most intriguing question of all: what does it mean to be countercultural? According to the New York Times article, countercultural is to eschew kissing your girlfriend until you ask her to marry you. Some of our hippie friends would say it is to smoke lots of pot and rag on the government. But do either of those constructively challenge human beings to rise above the cycles of violence and greed that define us, to live into a truly Christ-centered vision of all people in shalom?

So the evangelical movement will win the Ivy League for Christ. I sincerely hope it doesn’t lose its own soul in the process.

“He said also to the one who had invited him, ‘When you give a luncheon or a dinner, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors, in case they may invite you in return, and you would be repaid. But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind. And you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you, for you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.’” --Luke 14:12-14

Kelsey

Hi Kelsey,
I enjoyed your comments about Evangelicals, the rich and poor, the elite and those without power. I also enjoyed hearing a bit more about your past. That was beautiful. I am an Evangelical or orthodox, maybe biblical is a better word. It seems to me that if Jesus is your Lord and Saviour you go where he calls you. To some he calls into soup kitchens and to care for the poor and needy, those without power. But the elite and powerful and even the intellectual can be poor too. They may be crying out for a relationship with God. So some Christians are called there. I love the story of David Brainerd (1718-47)who left the university to care for and tell the good news of Jesus salvation to a native American tribe. He died very young but he gave everything for Jesus Christ.
Blessings
Viola Larson

I concur with Viola's comment. When you consider the impact Ivy League grads have, it makes sense to seek to bring the gospel there. I invite you to check out my comments on the NYT article