With the presidential campaigning the term “evangelical” has been thrown around rather loosely and has many of us believing that the American public has come to interpret that term differently today than they once have.

Like the definition of “marriage” in the public eye, the definition of “evangelical” appears to be changing, too. In recent years I have used the term “biblical” to replace the term “evangelical” in a lot of my conversations, because a claim of being a Christian doesn’t necessarily mean what it use to.

The term “evangelical” as become synonymous with the term “mainline” when describing a Christian belief, but as you know mainline Christianity is not often biblical Christianity.

An “Evangelical” comes from the Greek word used in the Bible to define the gospel and gospel evangelism. I have used and sometimes still use the term “Evangelical” to define my own beliefs and that of our fellowship because of its signature definition is being a biblical born-again Christian, as compared to a nominal identity with Christianity.

At one point “Evangelical” meant a Bible believer who is not a “Charismatic” believer. The term “Charismatic” has been and still is defined as Christians who traditionally holds a belief in exercising the spiritual gifts – namely speaking in unknown tongues – as a defining trait of their worship and beliefs.

Evangelicals, on the other hand, have traditionally been the Christians who hold to conservative Bible teaching as the defining trait of their worship and beliefs. (I probably should point out that one who identifies as a Charismatic also holds to the Bible as the word of God, but in practice emphasis the importance of signs, wonders, and spiritual gifts, while one who identifies as an Evangelical may hold to a degree of belief in spiritual gifts, but in practice emphasis the study of the Bible.)

So, having said all that…I want to let you know that you can download a 10-page PDF from our site titled “Four Foundations of Evangelical Theology.”

When you click on the link above or here the 10-page PDF written by Dr. Mark Bailey and Dallas Theological Seminary will automatically download in a new browser window.