My Evangelical Grief

Hello, I’m Shelly, and I have a lot of evangelical grief.

I don’t think I am alone in this. So, I thought I would write a blog post about it.

Perhaps in writing this, other people who feel evangelical grief like I do won’t feel alone.

And also, in writing this, maybe I will feel less alone.

I’m an evangelical Christian.

So I’m one of those folks who believes that Jesus died to free me (and everyone else) from sin and despair.

I know have been saved through God’s grace and love.

A while ago, a friend asked me why I am always so joyful.*

Well, first I told her that I’m definitely not always joyful and that I have bad days like anyone.

But I also told her that despite all the hard things going on in the world, I always know God’s love is like a deep ocean, underlying everything.

When I feel overwhelmed, I know I can always reconnect with that ocean of goodness, which is God’s light and love.

I am fortunate that growing up, I heard so many amazing stories that inspired my faith and increased my belief in the power of God.

If you’ll bear with me, I want to tell you three such stories.

I was about eight or nine when I first heard the story of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.

These three, young Jewish men were part of the Babylonian captivity.

This was a time in Israel’s history when the Israelites were seized by the Babylonians and carried off to live in a foreign land.

The Babylonians worshiped very different gods and were often hostile to the faith of the Jewish people.

Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego found favor with Nebuchadnezzar, the King of Babylon.

He was impressed with their wisdom and maturity and gave them high positions on his court.

Unfortunately, Nebuchadnezzar was also a narcissist, enamored with his greatness and power.

He eventually built a statue of himself and commanded everyone, on pain of death, to bow down to it.

Because of their faith in God, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego refused to bow down to Nebuchadnezzar or his statue.

And the king, accordingly, ordered that they be thrown into the fiery furnace to die.

But God preserved their lives, and King Nebuchadnezzar repented of his cruel idolatry.

I was amazed at these three young men who loved God so much that they defied the king and lived to tell about it.

I often compared this story to another similar story about the prophet Nathan.

He rebuked King David, who was supposed to be God’s servant, for secretly committing adultery.

Nathan also rebuked King David for then sending the husband of the woman he slept with into the front line of battle to die.

Stories such as this taught me that faith in God gives us the strength to speak the truth courageously when rulers abuse their power and abuse the people under them.

Another story that inspired me growing up was that of Mary Slessor.

She was a young, single Scottish woman who, at the age of 28, traveled to Nigeria to become a missionary.

Mary fell in love with the people there.

She learned their language, learned to eat their food, and made deep and long-lasting friendships with them.

Because of her love for the people and honor for their culture, she became greatly respected throughout Africa.

Mary even traveled alone to regions where male missionaries were killed.

Her strong reputation with the African people she served enabled her to work to protect women and children.

Specifically, she rescued hundreds of babies who had been left to die because of the practice of twin infanticide, common in parts of Africa at the time.

Through her love and courage, she helped to change this practice.

Mary Slessor’s story taught me that the most important way we teach people about Christ is by walking beside them and loving them.

Our words are important. But our love and our willingness to live humbly with people and understand their lives is what really makes the difference.

The third story that inspired me was that of Corrie Ten Boom.

Corrie Ten Boom lived with her family in Holland during the Nazi occupation.

This regime was marked by virulent prejudice against Jewish and African people, as well as other groups such as the Romani and people with disabilities.

The Nazi regime started imprisoning Jews and sending them to concentration camp. So, Corrie and her family joined the resistance to the Nazi regime.

They began hiding Jews in their house until they could be smuggled safely out of the country.

Tragically, Corrie and her father and sister were discovered by the Nazis.

They were arrested and sent to a concentration camp where Corrie’s sister and her father perished.

In the concentration camp, Corrie and her sister Besty (before Besty died) had constantly worked to show love to the other prisoners and even the guards.

Corrie’s story was especially powerful to me because she not only worked to protect the Jewish people.

She also actively worked to share God’s love with the people who imprisoned her because she knew they needed the love of God, too.

This story especially struck a chord with me because I grew up evangelical Quaker.

And I knew that my Quaker ancestors had helped slaves escape in the underground railroad.

They worked tirelessly to abolish slavery because they believed slavery and racism were a sin against God.

Interestingly, during the Civil War, Quakers also cared for wounded soldiers from both the North and the South that sought their help.

They did this because they knew that it is the love of God, not enmity or force or violence, that changes hearts and minds.

I tell these stories because they are stories that were especially formative for me in my evangelical upbringing.

But these stories also help to explain my evangelical grief.

It seems that currently, evangelicals (and I am speaking of white evangelicals because that is my background) have forgotten the lessons behind some of our most powerful stories.

And it seems like over the last few decades, we have become especially concerned with fighting people and expressing our disgust over lifestyles and behaviors we disapprove of.

We spend a lot of time avoiding discussions of racism from people who are most affected by it.

And we have also become obsessed with putting people in power, no matter how selfishly and cruelly they behave, as long as they say the things we want them to say.

In doing this, we have forgotten that God gives us the strength to speak the truth courageously when rulers command us to worship them and when they abuse people under their control.

We have forgotten that our willingness to live humbly with people, to love them, and understand their lives is what really makes the difference.

And we have forgotten that our job is to protect people from racism, prejudice, and hate.

We have forgotten that it is the love of God, not enmity or force or violence, that changes hearts and minds.

I have a lot of grief because I think we have forgotten our stories.

But I believe we can remember them again.

Let’s remember them together.

You might also like this post: Why I am a Christian but Not a Christian Nationalist.

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*I’ve changed a few details of this story to protect privacy.

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