The Courage to Be Protestant: Reformation Faith in Today's World

by David F. Wells

This book is a jeremiad against "new" versions of evangelicalism - marketers and emergents - and a summons to return to the historic faith, defined by the Reformation solas (grace, faith, and Scripture alone) and by a high regard for doctrine.

Wells argues that historic, classical evangelicalism is marked by doctrinal seriousness, as opposed to the new movements of the marketing church and the emergent church. He energetically confronts the marketing communities and their tendency to try to win parishioners as consumers rather than worshipers, advertising the most palatable environment rather than trusting the truth to be attractive. He takes particular issue with the most popular evangelical movement in recent years - the emergent church. Emergents, he says, are postmodern and postconservative and postfoundational, embracing a less absolute understanding of the authority of Scripture than traditionally held.

The Courage to Be Protestant is a forceful argument for the courage to be faithful to what Christianity in its biblical forms has always stood for, thereby securing hope for the church's future.

Genres: Theology, Cultural, Christian, Christianity, Church, Ecclesiology, Nonfiction

253 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 2008

About the author

David F. Wells (PhD, University of Manchester) is the Distinguished Senior Research Professor at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary.

In addition to serving as academic dean of its Charlotte campus, Wells has also been a member of the Lausanne Committee for World Evangelization and is involved in ministry in Africa.

He is the author of numerous articles and books, including a series that was initiated by a Pew grant exploring the nature of Christian faith in the contemporary, modernized world.

Reviews

[Douglas Wilson · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fitting contribution to Wells' ongoing demolition of the pretensions of contemporary evangelicalism.

[Drew Norwood · Rating 4 out of 5]

The fifth volume in Wells’ series on modern evangelicalism. Wells is an important voice for our time and should be read widely by pastors and church leaders. He equips you to understand our current evangelical climate, and with this book he excoriates two divergent streams of evangelicals—the “marketers” and the “emergents.” (He also acknowledges that the term "evangelical" may need to be thrown out altogether, though there doesn't seem to be any positive term to replace it with).

The "marketers" Wells has in view are those (perhaps the majority of evangelical churches) who attempt to run the church like a business, with a lead pastor serving as CEO, church programs provided like products and services, etc. They are the ones "seeking to preserve the old evangelical message while delivering it in new ways. Its strategies have been borrowed from the corporate world. The key idea is that there is a market for the Christian message." Which is the problem. The Church calls sinner to repent, not customers to buy. The "emergents," a term most Christians are already familiar with, are opposed to the "marketers" and the "skinny Christianity with no depth and no mystery" it has produced. They have reacted against the byproducts of the marketers, the "emptiness, loss of personal connections in this monster-sized churches, and capitulation to consumerist modernity." But the emergents too have created serious problems. Their skeptical view of authority and tradition, their low view of Scripture and their low view of the church are all felt in numerous ways in our current setting.

These two streams have been around for a while now--they are by no means new (the book was published in 2008)--but the book is not yet outdated. These two groups are still leading and shaping churches. We all know the reasons why these church take this approach--they believe their strategies work and they believe these techniques are necessary to draw people I n the current environment. Their reasons are plausible, but dreadfully wrong. Wells helps show the consequences of their errant strategies and practices. But he goes further than that; he also shows a fuller, richer, deeper view of the Church.

"The church is not a business, not an experiment, not a product to be sold. It is an outpost of the kingdom, a sign of things to come in Christ's sovereign rule. . . ."

[Alexandru Croitor · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book is a critique of Western evangelicalism, written in a very "rant-y" style. I mean, he is right, witty and at times, really insightful. However, not so much backing up for his statements so, many of the risen "whys", will just constitute a future problem that the reader has to tackle. It's clear that he is not just trying to be a curmudgeon and the very "basic-in-terms" style he has written shows that he's trying to challenge the way evangelicals began to "do church" in a very introductory manner.

His chapters on God and Jesus are great - Protestant to the core, clear and well-nuanced! Two books that can complement this one and will certainly help the curious reader are Trueman's The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self: Cultural Amnesia, Expressive Individualism, and the Road to Sexual Revolution (for a deeper dive into the Self discussion) and Horton's Christless Christianity: The Alternative Gospel of the American Church (for an extended discussion on seeker-sensitive Christianity etc.)

[Peter LeDuc · Rating 3 out of 5]

A thoughtful critique of how we do church in our (post)modern society and a call to return to a simple, ordinary dependence on God and His Word in our worship, mission, and message.

[Peter Jones · Rating 5 out of 5]

I began at the end of Wells' five volume set on American evangelicals. The book was superb, though dated in a few places. I expected to read this book and find a critique of all those folks "out there." But instead I was convicted of how many areas I have bought into postmodern thinking. My desire for comfort, ease, the enthronement of self, and my too low view of sin all became clearer as I read the book. As the Stones say, "You can't always get what you want but if you try sometimes well you might find you get what you need." The book wasn't necessarily what I wanted or expected, but it was what I needed. For me it was more mirror of my thought than microscope to examine the culture.

[David Westerfield · Rating 5 out of 5]

In The Courage to be Protestant, David Wells notes there are three major groups splintering within the evangelical church now that threaten the entire movement's original cause (though one of them is remaining faithful and seeks to preserve it). There are smaller groups that are splintering of course, but the focus is on the three major movements. The word "evangelicalism" is rooted in the word "evangel" which means Gospel. This was the fundamental basis upon which the phrase "evangelical" came into existence, starting either during or right before the times of the Puritans (based upon the fact that John Owen and Jonathan Edwards used the term themselves in their writings). Now though, things are taking a drastic turn; a turn, in fact, that has not been witnessed in its entire history since the Reformation.



These three distinct groups that are "emerging" (no pun intended) are the Truth-lovers, those who hold a historic protestant understanding of the Gospel as recovered in the Reformation (though all of these people are not necessarily Reformed); the Marketers, that is those who hold to using corporate marketing techniques to, in a sense, manipulate people into the church (marketing primarily to an aging baby-boomer generation); and the Emergents, those who believe it is necessary to adapt and morph Biblical, theological and historical understanding to our postmodern culture in an effort to win them for Christ (marketing themselves primarily to my generation).



While not doubting the good intentions and desires of the Marketers and Emergents, Wells brings stinging indictments that reveals their shift on crucial doctrines of the Gospel itself, which Satan has historically used to tear the church apart from within and eclipse the Gospel, all in the name of Christianity. I have not been able to put this book down it is so good. It has really made me consider the need to be even more courageous (yet loving) to hold fast to historic Protestantism (that is the Gospel) in the face of those, even within our churches unfortunately, who employ worldly means to bring people in and in some cases attempt to save themselves through their own doing and "Jesus' help".



Within the Marketing and Emergent movements, everything under the sun (including substitutionary atonement even! Check out Al Mohler in this sermon) is being redefined outside of historic, Biblical definitions, but is instead defined upon what our culture thinks, says and wants. However though, in a lot of cases, historic doctrines are held, yet pastors and teachers seem to be ashamed of them and lighten them up significantly, or just never speak about them in the pulpit at all. Are you ashamed of the doctrines of hell, wrath, sin, justice, predestination even? Jesus Himself spoke more about hell than anyone, yet some teachers would make Jesus out to be this guy who spoke some hippie love language.



Shouldn't we possibly be willing to talk about that which is uncomfortable (sin and wrath in particular) because it is a prerequisite for getting the Gospel right? Isn't that why people hate us Christians to begin with, precisely because the Gospel is an offensive message to sinful man? And if our message is not met with a good level of opposition, could there possibly be something wrong with our message? It's the truth, is it not? The Marketers sure do seem to be ashamed of these hard truths though. Are you ashamed of the Bible speaking in terms of absolute truth? The Emergents clearly are, because a majority of people in our culture now are not sure there is any absolute truth, and the Emergents are folding to the pressure to be culturally relevant. They therefore shape their message to fit what the culture wants.



This book is a clear wakeup call for the evangelical church to recover it's Gospel-roots as its primary focus and not shift on Biblical language, so that we may preserve the movements' initial cause: the glory of God and the Gospel through which people may be reconciled to God. Either we recover our roots and threads that hold us together, or the historic evangelical cause will be lost. Unfortunately, David Wells believes the movement may already be lost and so it may be time to just move on and start a new movement of Gospel-centrality in the church, for both salvation and progressive sanctification (for growth in our faith). To me, it seems that a new movement is already under way with the advent of the "truth-lovers". David Wells, summed up, puts it like this in the book:



"It would be quite unrealistic to think that evangelicalism today could look exactly as it did fifty years ago, or a hundred, or five-hundred. At the same time, the truth by which it is constituted never changes because God, whose truth it is, never changes. There should therefore be threads of continuity that bind real Christian believing in all ages. It is some of those threads, I believe, that are now being lost....I do not know what the evangelical future will be, but I am certain evangelicalism has no good future unless it finds this kind of direction again."





Nowadays, you have everyone from the Oneness Pentecostals to Joel Osteen being called evangelical, yet Osteen is clear that he never wants to speak on anything negative, even if it is true, because it would offend people. Osteen is a Pelagian in his teaching of how people are saved, heresy condemned by an ecumenical early church council, The Council of Orange, in 529 A.D. And then T.D. Jakes does not believe in the Trinity, he's a Modalist/Sabellian, two heresies, both of which were condemned in the third and fourth centuries. These teachers not only deny historic ecumenical, early church doctrines on the nature of Christ, God, sin (doctrines that even the Roman Catholic Church holds, whom we Protestants have crucial disagreements with over the nature of salvation), but these guys also specifically deny the roots of evangelicalism in not preaching orthodox, Gospel truth. Yet they are called and labeled evangelical! And then if you criticize what they are teaching, that they are in error, in any fashion, you get labeled a bigot, most specifically within the church! There is something seriously wrong with that.



This is a totally unqualified quote with no backing or proof anyone actually said it, but it honestly would not surprise me with the way things are shifting in evangelicalism. Someone told me that a lady had left a Roman Catholic church to go to one of the nearby "evangelical" mega-churches (remaining anonymous) because, "They didn't teach the Trinity there and I just can't believe in that." If this is true (which again, not sure it is), volumes can be said about the methodologies employed at the church, the messages being communicated, the lack of clear truth that isn't being taught, and most of all, the fact that there is no Gospel whatsoever (the root of evangelicalism), amongst a host of other things.



As those who hold to the historic truths of Christianity as particularly recovered in the Reformation, we must be willing to take abuse for the sake of Gospel-truth and not shift on those doctrines clearly shown to us in the Scriptures. That does not mean we have to stand up and be jerks toward those who differ. In fact, if this just makes you angry and you know you'll just be mean, please keep quiet. Rather, we should lovingly confront error with the timeless truth of the Scriptures that has been passed down throughout the ages. This book is a proclamation and warning call to hold fast to what is true, even though our times dictate for us to shift our positions. David Wells says, "It takes no courage to sign up as a Protestant." However, to be a theologically historic Protestant is increasingly taking more guts. Lord, help us to hold fast to what is true by Your Spirit.

[Justin Daniel · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'll begin this by saying, this is by far one of the best books I have ever read. I have, for awhile now, contemplated the misdirection of the American Evangelical movement. We are a culture that is obsessed with self: Jesus came to die for MY sins; God wants ME to be happy, healthy, and wealthy now etc. But this is all a farce. The concept of the Gospel does not point to man or self, but to God. Not only this, but we have become the most technological civilization there has ever been at any point. The world is connected by the push of a button; we have hundreds if not thousands of 'friends' on Facebook; one can know within minutes the latest news stories on the opposite coast and on the other side of the world. But instead of becoming more connected, we have privatized our lives so that community is becoming non-existent. One no longer knows those in his local community which normally would encourage accountability, but this is quickly disappearing. This is a foundation we have built for ourselves: one that rests on emotionalism, felt-needs, a lack of doctrine and other factors that have invaded our churches. And this my friends, is why the American Evangelical church is dying.



Wells contributes this slow death to three movements: the marketers, the emergents, and the postmodernists. He begins the book with "the Lay of the Evangelical Land," and in the first sentence shocks the reader with this:



"It take no courage to sign up as a Protestant. After all, million have done so throughout the West. They are not in any peril. To live by the truths of historic Protestantism, however, is a entirely different matter. That takes courage in today's context."



He then breaks down these three movements but has a consistent theme throughout his book: the lack of a doctrinal foundation. He says,



"What happened, though, was that this doctrinal vision began to contract. The goal that diversity in secondary matters would be welcomed quite soon passed over into an attitude that evangelicalism could in fact be reduced simply to its core principles of Scripture and Christ. In hindsight, it is now rather clear that the toleration of diversity slowly became an indifference toward much of the fabric of belief that makes up Christian faith... The erosion in biblical ways of thinking at first passed almost unnoticed. Nevertheless, after a while it was hard to miss the fact that this was happening. No doubt there were many specific causes. Campus organizations were undoubtedly reducing Christian faith to its most minimal form. And as serious biblical preaching in the churches diminished, ignorance of biblical truth became commonplace. But the largest factor in this internal change, I think, was that evangelicalism began to be infested by the culture in which it was living. And then Christianity became increasingly reduced simply to private, internal, therapeutic experience. Its doctrinal form atrophied and then crumbled."



He begins with the marketers: these are the "seeker-senitive's", those who place the idea of what people think before the Gospel message. For example, there was a church not long ago that sent out surveys to the local to community to find out what kind of music they liked and then, based on the outcome of the surveys, spliced the most popular music into their church service to appease people. He argues this mentality of turning the church into a business comes from our economic world where numbers (such as attendance and money) are placed in front of doctrine. When we begin to let the culture influence the church, the church will crumble, as Wells puts it here:



"The truth is that without a biblical understanding of why God instituted it, the church easily becomes a liability in a market where it competes only with the greatest of difficulty against religious fare available in the convenience of one's living room and in a culture bent on distraction and entertainment... The constant cultural bombardment of individualism, in the absence of a robust theology, meant that faith that had rightly been understood as personal now easily became faith that was individualistic, self-focused, and consumer oriented. That was the change to which the church marketers attuned themselves. Instead of seeing this as a weakness to be resisted, they used it as an opportunity to be exploited. Increasingly, evangelical faith was released from any connections with the past, from every consideration except the self, and was imbued with no other objective than entrepreneurial success. As the evangelical experience was thus cut loose, it became increasingly cultural, increasingly empty, and increasingly superficial."



Some churches have gone as far as leaving out key doctrines of the Gospel, such as the doctrine of sin, to cater to the "felt-needs" of the congregation. But the real irony is that Christians will flock to churches that have a strong doctrinal and preaching foundation:



"What were these people looking for in a church? If we believe all the church-marketing hype, we would have to conclude that potential customers wanted, above all else, not to hear issues of truth and belief. These should be avoided like the plague. These are matters, the prevailing wisdom says, that should be hidden from seekers because they are so dreadfully off-putting. Not so! In fact, go percent of those in Rainer's studies said the preaching was important to them, and not just any preaching. Almost the same percentage, 88 percent, said that what they came to hear was doctrine. The beliefs of the church were important to 91 percent. They wanted to know what the church believed. They wanted to have this laid out for them - with conviction. This was their preeminent concern. The next issue of importance, the friendliness of people, was far down the list - only 49 percent cited it. Is this such a revolutionary discovery? Should we really be so amazed that people would like to know what Christians think and whether, in this age of jaded, faded, transient beliefs, there actually is something that can be believed for all time?"



Wells next attacks the Emergents, those who believe that the social gospel runs supreme, or who believe in existentialism. In both cases, the priority of doctrine is neglected and human thought or reason is the ultimate end to the churches many problems.



Wells ends his book with a word of criticism he seems to get a lot: that it is great to diagnose what is wrong with the church, but how do we fix it? The point he makes is that if we believe that God is sovereign, it is in his will that we are to remain faithful to preaching and teaching the word of God and that he alone is able to make a change in the direction of the church.



I believe that my calling in this life is to enter into the ministry and begin to accept this great challenge: to remain faithful in the things God has given us and to pray that someday He will effect change. Whether I see the fruits of this labor is a non-issue as God is the one who has ultimate authority. This book was an eye-opening look on today's church in our self-absorbed culture and I recommend it to anyone who is involved in the church.

[Pig Rieke · Rating 4 out of 5]

In Wells’ book, the author provides a medical examine of the current state of evangelical churches in America. His diagnosis is not positive to say the least. Wells concludes that a number of factors within the evangelical movement have resulted in churches shaped by the world, deficient of Biblical teaching, and only tacitly hanging onto orthodoxy while denying it via their practice. In a post-truth Western world, churches have responded by becoming post-truth themselves. Rather than building foundations on the rock of Christ, churches have been willingly swept along with the currents of culture. The vast majority of the book looks to prove this thesis by showing the worldliness of many evangelical churches today. Wells solution to such a grave prognosis is a return to the beliefs that were so pivotal at the Reformation, i.e. a right understanding of the gospel and a right view of the Scriptures. In other words, Protestant churches need to become Protestant again.

[Jake Moore · Rating 4 out of 5]

David wells provides a excellent insight into how marketing, post modernism, and Americanism has impacted the western church. While this books was written about 10 years ago it still speaks volume today on seeker friendly and emergent churches. Wells is reformed and you can see it when he gets into more theological topics, like God’s sovereignty which is the part i enjoyed least. I still highly recommend this book to anyone, especially who are going into ministry as a career.

[Isaac · Rating 3 out of 5]

Wells is a keen observer of society and a trusty advocate for the classical spirituality of the Reformed church. His concern that worship and preaching be kept pure and wholesome is refreshing and needed.

The book comes across a bit dated, as the predicted parties of the prognosticated fracture of evangelicalism are less relevant today: "Marketers" and "Emergents" have their descendants in the current milieu, but they are not as dominant as Wells predicted.

The outcome of much observation and commentary is very simple and answered well by the confessional church, which Wells is careful(?) not to commend explicitly in favor of an unstated ecumenism. I would have liked a bit more bite to the conclusion.

[Philip Brown · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent defence of propositional truth.

[David Pulliam · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book has aged well but Wells goes on a lot of diatribes about the corrupt nature of American culture and anything left-wing.

[Kent · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book helpfully charts the splintering of evangelicalism into truth-lovers, marketers, and Emergents. The author suggests that much of our loss of voice today has to do with the fact that we have become sola scriptura in profession only, but in reality we have become sola cultura. The magnificent world that humanity has built today is ironically a place that is inhospitable to the human soul. And unfortunately, the church, instead of calling, men and women forth out of that culture, has instead sought to become more like the culture, the same culture that wreaks havoc on the human soul.

The church must recover the centrality of doctrine, absolute truth that comes to us from the outside, from above, from God, not that we intuitively discern. The church must also recognize that it is God who builds his church, both quantitatively and qualitatively. We are called to sow and water, but God is the one who brings the growth. Don't rethink how to do church! God is the one who sets the goals and methods of the church in Scripture, not business manuals, marketing savvy, or cultural norms.

These were some of the author's points that I appreciated. There were others.

[Josiah Richardson · Rating 4 out of 5]

In one sense, this was a response to Weigel's "The courage to be Catholic" as Wells begins by telling us why he is unapologetically Protestant. At the same time, it was a critique of modern Evangelicals who have lost what it means to be protestant. What are we protesting after all?

I was thinking to myself the other day that evangelicals get a lot of bad press, some justified and others not so much. But I wondered whether or not if a typical news reporter could even define what an evangelical is, much less what they believe. Evangelical has become synonymous with the term "Christian" even through *evangelical* Christian is a modifier to the Christian.

I think this may have been what Wells had his sights on here when he talks about protestantism. Many don't even know what that means anymore, much less would they even affirm it if they did know. But being protestant requires courage because the world is not protestant, it is in fact complacent and Jello-spined. Many take the moniker for themselves to simply expose or take advantage of the protestant population as a whole.

As usual, Wells is straight the point, witty, and knows his stuff. This was a good read and I commend it to anyone who hasn't read it and those who have forgotten what they read.

[Colin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Gold. Insightful and biblical, winsome and vital - very much a book for Christian leaders and thinkers (and churchgoers) to challenge the cultural defaults of consumerism, pragmatism and therapeutic-ism (!) and to do the hard work that's needed to see where we need to reclaim the biblical distinctives that ought to form the foundation for what church and worship and a Christian worldview are as well as what they spawn. Challenging, inspiring and a great book to share and discuss. Plus if you read this one you get a summary of Wells' earlier trilogy - a bonus for lazy readers! (My first review with the word "spawn" in it. Urgh.)

[Todd Miles · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wells has done it again with his clarion call to the Church to avoid being captured by the spirit of the age. Most importantly, he demonstrates effectively that both the Mega-churches guided by marketing and the emerging churches, guided by their values are all capitulating to the culture, rather than steadfastly clinging to the gospel. This is a powerful book and a must-read for any and all in church leadership.

[James Ruley · Rating 4 out of 5]

This helpful work by David Wells discusses the development of modern evangelicals. He discusses three groups: the traditional evangelicals, the marketers, and the emergents. After explaining the worldview embraced by each group, and the techniques they follow, he discusses how a proper understanding of God, Christ, self, sin, and the church should drive us away from man-centered methodology for growing the church.

[Scott · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great summary of the previous 4 books Wells has written on culture. I think "Above All Earthly Pow'rs" is his best, and since it was such a paradigm shifting book for me, I confess that I didn't find the same passion in this volume than AAEP. Still, Wells is a great writer and The Courage to be Protestant is a great condensed version of his thought.

[Paul · Rating 5 out of 5]

Definitely one of the top books this year.

[Todd Stockslager · Rating 3 out of 5]

Review title: From freedom to courage

Capping off a series that started with J. Gresham Machen's Christianity and Liberalism from the 1920s and Karl Barth's The Humanity of God from the 1950s is this survey by Wells of his last four books on modern Protestant theology in the "postmodern" world of the 21st century. The decline in the Christian doctrinal maturity of both churches and believers is so sharp and sudden since Machen and Barth that a theologian of orthodox Christianity like Wells is no longer emphasizing freedom, but calling for courage to stand firm against the culture, the world, and the culture of the world inside the church itself.

Wells spends a lot of time documenting the boom in evangelical Christianity after World War II, and the growth of megachurches, parachurch organizations, and church marketing techniques beginning in the 1980s. He also quotes anecdotal evidence along with statistical surveys showing both an increase in general "spirituality" at that same time period while there was a corresponding drop in orthodox Christian beliefs amongst those who self-identified as Christians. What is the correlation between these trends toward growth in numbers and decline in knowledge of God and the Bible? When churches turned to marketeering, they turned away from preaching the Bible in any serious, balanced, and orthodox way. Churches, says Wells, were just giving their "customers" (members) what they wanted: feel-good self-help spiritual pep talks. Doctrine and expository preaching would just turn people off and drive "customers" away.

Essentially Christianity in America and the affluent developed world has abandoned the doctrine of centuries that Machen and Barth were defending. Wells, writing in the early 21st century, can no longer find an orthodoxy to defend, rather he must find a path to its recovery. With the church joining the world and the culture in glorifying the self and not the God who created the soul, individual Christians claiming a saved soul do need courage:

Does it really demand that much courage for us to be counter-cultural enough to live this out? Or are we just so muddled, so besotted by the thought of our own success, so fearful of offending others, that we just cannot bring ourselves to say what is true?. . . . A renewed Protestantism, one that looks like it has in its high moments in the past, will have about it a joyous sense of knowing God, of knowing him through his Son, of being able to live in his world on his terms and celebrating his sovereign rule over all of it. . . . It will be sinewy and tough. It will not cave in intellectually to all the fads and rackets of our time. It will have an infectious joy in doing what is right. . . . This is something the self movement can only dream about. (p. 174)

Wells does a good job documenting the downslide in doctrine and the downside of the self-help culture, and describing the demanded courage of his title. Because his antidote is nothing more than the orthodoxy of the last 500 years of Protestantism, he spends little time describing it, which means that his analysis is heavily negative, which makes for heavy reading most of the way. There is not much here to cheer either the mind or the soul. It is needed nourishment with no dessert.

So from the dawn of the 20th century, Machen looked back at a trend to soften Christianity, from the middle of the century Barth looked to restore the freedom of Christianity to celebrate both the undivided humanity and deity of Jesus, and from the beginning of the 21st century Wells looks to recover an abandoned Christianity in the churchs that still carry its name. Through those decades, God and the Bible have not changed, only man's mind and perceptions of them. That is the good news Christians can take away from this series.

[Christopher Humphrey · Rating 4 out of 5]

David Wells has an ability to size up the intersection of the Church and culture like few others. In "The Courage to be Protestant: Reformation in Today's World" Wells provides an update of his original 2008 release of the same primary title (although the subtitle has changed). And to make it a bit more confusing, this volume is a more popularized version of Wells' well-received previous books: "No Place for Truth: Or Whatever Happened to Evangelical Theology" and "God in the Wasteland: The Reality of Truth in a World of Fading Dreams." Both of these volumes are highly recommended.

Having appreciated Wells' previous books I was interested in this popular rehash, which has been recently updated. I was not disappointed with the results. Wells has a way of sizing up the culture vis-a-vis the current evangelical milieu (whatever Evangelical is at this point) and holding forth the eternal truth of God's Word in a Jeremiad without sounding brusque. This is a unique gift, and a necessary one as the "Evangelical" Church slides down the cultural sliding board in an ever-more-out-of-control manner.

At the core, Wells argues that the Church has chased after culture like an advertising executive would, with the hope that the Church might entice the world to stick their nose under the proverbial tent. But as Wells argues this has never worked, and it never will work. Instead, what is called for is an unapologetic, firm (but winsome) stand for the reformation truth in a "here we stand" posture. The "seeker sensitive" model is a patent failure--indeed it is hard to hold one's self out for those not seeking. The "attractional model" is weak and ineffective at producing "deny yourself, take up your cross" disciples. Instead, what is needed, and what will work, is the faithful preaching of God's Word in the context of a loving, faithful community.

I especially appreciated Wells chapter on the Church. I agree with Wells that all of the tried-but-failed models of ministry are a sad lack of faith in the power of God, the power of God's Word and the continuing ministry of the Holy Spirit. The world simply needs the Church to be the Church. Read the book of Acts, read the pastoral Epistles and adhere closely to the eternal Word of God, which was written by the Eternal God. Trust in the Spirit of God to work, and be amazed at the results.

Wells, as a Doctor of the Church, has written an apt prescription. The Church would be wise to heed the warnings and proceed accordingly. Happy reading!

[Jonathan Klimek · Rating 4 out of 5]

David Wells in his book, The Courage to Be Protestant highlights the history and present state of evangelicalism and then exhorts the Pastor to return to the historic and doctrinally sound Solas of the Reformation, especially Sola Scriptura in contrast to Sola Cultura—showing that God’s Word is often in sharp antithesis to what is regarded as “normal” in today’s culture (p. 4). He explains that postmodernism, individualism and liberalism has resulted in a diminished interest in the Word of God in the life of the church (p. 4). We need to call people to deny self (cf. Luke 9:23) in contrast to individualism (p. 9); teach doctrine, in contrast to the Emergents (p. 18); teach total depravity, in contrast to avoiding the word “sin” (p. 24, 30–31) or referring to sin as “emotional deficits” (p. 133); teach the Truth which can be known and understood, in contrast with Postmodernism which states that it is uncertain, elusive, out-of-reach (p. 53); teach the need to be God-centered, in contrast to the Individualism of today which is self-centered (p. 70). It is not surprising that the world doesn’t think they are in need of reconciliation with God (p. 137).
In light of the age that we live in, understanding that the congregation are going to have a natural bent towards that which meets their individual likes and preferences, that which entertains, that which is comfortable, that which boosts their egos, I need to be all the more careful to ensure that I don’t appeal to those seeker-sensitive cravings (p. 117) and market myself (p. 119), but rather preach the Word of God faithfully. When joining an existing church, I need to ensure the elders are Biblically qualified and not in those positions because of their attractive personalities (p. 122); that the church submits to and has placed herself under the authority of Scripture (p. 194); administers the sacraments (p. 203); disciplines the unrepentant (p. 204).
This book has been very enlightening and helpful to know what I am up against as I pursue Pastoral Ministry. I am thankful that God’s unchanging Word is sufficient.

[Randy Corn · Rating 5 out of 5]

I picked up this book because David Wells had been invited to be the speaker at the annual Leadership Conference. He was to address many of the themes within the book and so I decided not only to attend the conference, but to read the book and really enter into the meat of what was being discussed. I have to say that while I enjoyed the lectures, I was not as enthralled with the book as I had hoped I would be.

This book is something a distillation of Wells earlier books. They are all commentary on the contemporary evangelical world. While the demeanor of the books is not pessimistic, it is clear that Wells is no fan of what we see in the contemporary evangelical world. As he sees it there have been two approaches, both seriously flawed, to making the church “relevant” to the contemporary culture. These are the marketers and the emergents. Wells sees both of these as reflecting more the generational biases of their advocates than the truth of the gospel.

I suppose my major complaint with this book was that the author could have been much more direct in making his points. At least that is the way it seemed to me. Still, it was a good exercise to read a book that is perhaps a bit beyond me. I am not sure that I followed the reasoning all along the way, but it was fun trying.

[Josiah · Rating 4 out of 5]

This one took me a while to finish. I'd call it one of the more important/helpful books I've read in a while, but not one of the most enjoyable. I (personally) had to resist the urge to nod off during the parts explaining the philosophy of our post-modern age, psychologized world (no fault of the author's). But the point the author is making is super helpful and desperately needed. I would recommend it to anyone discouraged by the emptiness found in many evangelical churches today who knows something is missing but can't quite put it into words. As the author puts it:

"I believe that today there is a deep yearning for churches in which God is God... business savvy, organizational wizardry, cultural relevance are simply no substitute for this. Unless the Lord rebuilds the evangelical church today, as we humble ourselves before him and hear afresh his word, it will not be rebuilt. But if it is, then what we will see will be the true 'attractional church.'" (Wells, 213).

The best part of the book, in my opinion, is the first chapter, which is worth reading even if you don't finish the book. Essentially, evangelicals have forgotten what it means to be protestant. That's what we're missing, and that's why semi-monastic, emergent 2.0 solutions will fail. We need to get back to Sola Scriptura and the "big God" Christianity of Biblical faith.

[Mitch Bedzyk · Rating 5 out of 5]

After outlining the history and the present state of evangelicalism, David Wells presents a solid and biblical case for the church retrieving the historic and doctrinally sound faith of the Reformation (i.e. the five Solas) for our present, postmodern, highly individualistic culture. He issues a clarion call for the evangelical church to return to "sola scriptura" (Scripture alone) and abandon its allegiance to "sola cultura" (culture alone).

I wish I knew about David Wells' and his work when this book was in its first edition in 2008. Reading this book when it was originally published would have been an absolute game changer for my understanding of what the church should be, how it should look, what it should prioritize, and what it needs to be "healthy." His critiques of the attractional and emergent churches alone are worth the price of the book. Highly recommended

[Chris · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good read - very thought provoking. Wells does a good job of laying out the arguments, from a Biblical perspective, how individuals and the modern church have succumbed (mostly) to the pressures of postmodern and emergent thinking...and how these "belief" systems have systematically undermined and confused the original purpose of the Church (Acts church). As such, Wells lays out the argument - or more like a pleading - for the Church to return its Reformation roots and remember on whom (Christ) the Church was built. It's not about us, it's not for us, but rather Churches should exist for one reason only: to serve, worship, honor, and point to Christ. The Reformation triad needs to be brought back to prominence: "by grace alone; by faith alone; and by Scripture alone" (solas).

[Mark Seeley · Rating 4 out of 5]

I need to be reminded again and again what David Wells points out in this book -- that the truth confessed in the church is at odds with the assumptions of our modern/postmodern culture. This volume is a concise summary of what he laid out in his four volumes, "No Place for Truth," "God In the Wasteland," "Losing Our virtue," and "Above All Earthly Powers." But it has also been brought up to date. Wells summarizes the key themes he has been hammering away about for the last 20 or 30 years -- Objective truth, God's Holiness, the self in our therapeutic culture, the sufficiency of Christ and the calling of the Church. Here is a book that helps the Church to stand against the world while being at the same time for the world.

[Matthew · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wells gets straight to the point in his opening: “It takes no courage to sign up as a Protestant…To live by the truths of historic Protestantism, however, is an entirely different matter. That takes courage in today’s context.” The truths that Protestants have lived and died by have somehow become no more welcome within many Protestant churches today than in the outside, non-Christian culture. As Wells argues, those today who would seek to live by the distinctives of the theology of the Bible must have courage to stand not only against the world but against much of the church. An important read for the blighted day in which we live.

[Allyson Smith · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was an excellent analysis of the evangelical movement and the ways that our postmodern society has infected the American Church at large. Wells's distinctions between groups of evangelicals was extremely helpful in understanding how the movement has shifted so far away from the original intent. His critical analysis of the foundational points of evangelicalism helped me understand how we have reached this point and why it is time to abandon modern evangelicalism and recover historic protestantism. I also really appreciated how accessible his writing was to a newbie to the topic. I highly recommend this to every American Christian.

[Christian Cunningham · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book started off somewhat disappointing. The cultural analysis was accurate and helpfully thought through. However, it was largely repetitive and a little hard to follow in terms of organization. I was anxiously waiting for him to connect the solution of the modern church in the Protestant Reformation far earlier than he did. If you ignore the chapter titles and follow his argument, Wells is like an artist painting a massive landscape. Some brushes and strokes make little sense when not connected to the whole.

Overall, it is a good book, but my expectations were a bit changed as I read.