Reclaiming Evangelical: Faith Beyond Politics ► David Guretzki

Brian Stiller

Hello and welcome to evangelical 360. My name is Brian Stiller, Global Ambassador for the World Evangelical Alliance and host of this new podcast series. On evangelical 360, I interview leaders, writers and influencers about contemporary issues which are impacting Christian life around the world. My hope is that it will not only be a global meeting place where faith is explored from different perspectives, but that each person listening will come away informed, encouraged, challenged and even inspired.

Today on evangelical 360, my guest is David Guretzki, the President and CEO of the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada. David Guretzki is not only the spokesman for evangelicals in Canada, but serves the global body called the World Evangelical Alliance, which represents over 600 million Christians worldwide. You may wonder about those identified as evangelicals. Can they be trusted or is their faith to be believed? Has this Christian community been compromised by being identified with the political movement, especially as seen in the US? I think you’ll be interested in hearing him respond to my questions as to why it matters to keep the name evangelical. David, welcome to evangelical 360.

David, wonderful to have you here today. We have a lot of conversation on Evangelicals globally and nationally and I’m sure people will want to poke the elephant in the room, which is how did Evangelicals become politicized. I want to come back to that, but before we move into those questions, I’d like to go to the global context, the World Evangelical Alliance, which is this global body that represents 25% of Christians worldwide. You’re involved in that. Can you give us a description of what it is, where it came from and how your leadership in Canada fits into the overall picture?

David Guretzki

It depends on how you define it. There’s a global definition that’s often been adopted. It kind of talks about the evangelicals as people of the book, people who believe in the Bible, people who believe in the need and centrality of Jesus for salvation, the need for conversion and I think that’s often a very common central point for evangelicals a warm conversion to Jesus Christ and then, of course, an active sharing of one’s faith. And so there’s been different streams of evangelicals throughout the years and the centuries. But I think that’s spread globally and a lot of that does actually stem out of the Protestant Reformation and later movements, and so now it’s a global movement. There’s people all around the world who would call themselves evangelical. I also say that there’s probably all kinds of people around the world who wouldn’t necessarily call themselves evangelical, but probably we would see them as kin with us. They’re brothers and sisters in Christ. They have affinity to the priorities that evangelicals have.

Brian Stiller

Of the 2.4 billion Christians, we know that 1.2 are Catholic, Roman Catholic. About 500 million belong to the World Council, and of those 500, 300 million are Orthodox, and so evangelicals make up of about 600, 650 million. So how is it organized globally? 

David Guretzki

Very loosely, I would say. Right now, in terms of the global organization, of course the main body would be the World Evangelical Alliance, of which of course you’re a part. But there’s no formal leadership quite in the same way as some of the like in Roman Catholicism or in the Orthodox Church. There’s not a global hierarchy. It’s more organized in terms of a fellowship, a kinship, a spiritual kinship. We’re talking at least about 140, 145 nations around the world that would be organized at a national level, with some kind of national association of evangelical churches and denominations and organizations within each of those countries. And the World Evangelical Alliance, as I see it, is the alliance of alliances, I call it. It’s an alliance of national alliances around the world, of which the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada is part.

Brian Stiller

So as president of Evangelical Fellowship of Canada, what makes up the evangelical community within Canada?

David Guretzki

From the organizational perspective, we at the EFC, the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada, we gather together nationally, you know, about 48 or so denominations. We have about 70 organizations, evangelical organizations. We have a bunch of post-secondary schools and a bunch of independent congregations that might not be part of a larger denomination. Here in Canada the word evangelical is actually getting very difficult to clarify. Who calls themselves an evangelical?

Our own research here at the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada we tend to look at three factors of identifying who evangelicals are and it’s interesting that those three circles affiliation, self-identification and beliefs and practices there’s definitely overlap. But sometimes you’ll have someone who self-identifies as an evangelical but they may not actually score high on the belief and practice scale or they may not even be connected with an evangelical denomination or an evangelical church. So I think in the ideal where all those three kind of converge becomes really, I think, the core of the evangelical movement. But it’s not simple Right now. We would say that, depending on, again, how you use those scales of identification of evangelicals we’re looking at, somewhere between 5 to 8% of the Canadian population would identify as evangelical.

Brian Stiller

So why does it matter to be an evangelical, that the evangelical church grow or be sustained in this country or any other?

David Guretzki

The word evangelical, literally means, biblically, the good news, the good news of Jesus Christ. And for me, as an evangelical, it’s not just simply an adoption of a belief system. God has given us the good news of Jesus Christ, not just for the benefit of those who believe in him, but for the whole world, that there’s benefit for creation, there’s benefit for nations, there’s benefit for our justice system and our educational system. Wherever the gospel is being proclaimed and practiced, it’s good for everyone, even for those people who aren’t necessarily part of the movement. So in this, secular age.

Brian Stiller

What does the message that the evangelical church stands for, why does it matter and how can it speak into the secularity of today?

David Guretzki

If by secularity we mean no religion whatsoever for some people that’s what secularity means then there’s really no kind of transcendent hope.

There’s nothing greater to look towards, nothing greater to guide our lives. I think that that kind of approach just leads a culture into a culture of relativism. It leads us into a culture where everybody just kind of does what they think is best and hopes that we can kind of get along. But there’s really no reason why my way or your way should be better than anyone else’s. And so I think that the gospel brings with it a recognition of the creator, who’s actually become incarnate. He’s actually come in the body in Jesus Christ. He’s met us in the person of Jesus Christ and asks us to participate in the communion that we can have with God, that we can have with God, and with that communion comes hope, comes hope for living not only just not in the eternal life and the life hereafter but a life that’s more abundant here and now, and so the other elements that have been powerful in their social movements over the last few years around marriage and sexuality.

Brian Stiller

How does an evangelical theology and church stand with those kind of forces pressing our culture into enormous change?

David Guretzki

So I think that we have to resist sort of this sense of kind of retaking a culture, as if somehow we can retake culture through efforts of transformation and so on. I think it’s much more about demonstrating, both in our families, in our communities, a countercultural way of living in the way of Jesus right and live out something different from the rest of the culture, without necessarily trying to take over or trying to impose sort of a Christian framework or a theocentric kind of framework. But we have to realize that just because we’re evangelical and just because we’re Christian doesn’t mean that there aren’t other people in society, including from other religions. We live in a multi-religious world and a multicultural world that, even though they may not share our Christian framework or our Christian foundations as found in scripture, there’s a sense of commonality about, for example, the value of human life, even from people who aren’t necessarily Christian. I think evangelicals need to understand that we’re often co-laborers or co-belligerents with people who actually share the same view, even though they might share for different reasons.

Brian Stiller

Some time ago, you wrote about the issue of abortion, which, of course, continues to be a major social, political, intellectual, moral argument from both sides and all kinds of positions in between, and you talked about pro-life needing to redefine itself as whole life. What did you mean by that?

David Guretzki

So I think what’s happened, especially on politicized types of events like pro-life has become so centered in upon the laws. Sometimes the push becomes so strong on trying to get legislation in a particular direction that we forget that underlying the desire to have access to abortion is a whole host of other kinds of life issues. More recently, I’ve talked not only about being pro-life but being pro-person, that it’s not just a principle that we’re protecting, a principle of the sanctity of life, although I do believe life is sanctified because it comes from God. But each and every individual is created in the image of God and thereby, as God’s image bearer, is honored by God and is worthy of protection. But that’s a whole life process.

Beyond that, sometimes the legislation, for example with abortion, is so focused in on upon the single issue that we sometimes don’t see the paradox on how we might be speaking into other issues where life is cheapened, but we’re not actually saying anything about those issues. For example, there’s still many people who are trafficked and find themselves in situations where their lives are shortened, where people are losing their lives daily because of illicit drugs and use of drugs. And if we’re really truly pro-life, if we’re really truly about the person, the human person created in the image of God. Our concern has to extend to all of those issues as well, not just to a single legislative issue or public policy issue.

Brian Stiller

Historically, the evangelicals, I suppose, maybe epitomized by a person like Billy Graham, has been about the message of personal conversion. But now, as I listen to you talk about primarily social, medical issues, is there a shift within the evangelical community to speaking and engaging in these? Is that a change from the past or is it an add-on?

David Guretzki

I think that, historically, if you look back into the history of evangelicalism, even look back deeper into the history of the church, the church has always been about both, and it’s about word and deed. And all that we do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord, jesus Christ. And as I’ve interacted with our global brothers and sisters throughout the world, this kind of bifurcation between, well, is the gospel word or is it action? For many of them that’s just a foreign concept. It’s like why does it have to be one or the other, is it not both? And I think that the New Testament is very clear that new life in Christ is absolutely necessary, but once we’re back into communion with Christ, we’re also back into communion with his body, the church, and that the church’s task is to care for one another, to love God and to love our neighbors. It’s a whole package for me.

Brian Stiller

Okay, David, let me come back and poke that elephant in the room. Over the last few years, especially in North America, there’s been a politicization of the name and the idea of evangelical and by many evangelicals and we’re talking about the US and over the last few years there’s been the rise of a theology called Christian Nationalism, which looks to impose on the culture the Christian message, because you believe that the country was founded to be Christian. How do you in Canada understand that and how do you relate that to the Canadian constituency, realizing that it is an American phenomenon but it certainly washes over the border? How do we respond to the idea that we make this country Christian?

David Guretzki

You said poke the elephant. I think it’s more like poking the bear, but I’m not sure. So from a biblical perspective, I would suggest that when the Apostle Paul says that in Christ there’s neither Jew nor Greek, for example, let’s start right there. He’s not saying that Jewishness or Greekness disappears when we come into Christ, but it’s not the first order of who we are. It’s not the first order of our identity. It’s not whether we’re a Canadian Christian or whether we’re an American Christian or a Brazilian Christian or a Mexican Christian. It’s not about our nationality or our ethnicity. It’s certainly not about the color of our skin. It’s certainly not about our economic status. You know, slaved or free. Paul also says even male and female is not the first qualifier of who we are in Jesus Christ. So I think, starting right from that perspective we have to get this right is that the only real qualifier that matters is ultimately is whether we’re in Christ.

Brian Stiller

David, the word evangelical has been bandied about in many ways politically most recently, largely supportive of Donald Trump and his presidential ascendancy some years ago and his attempt to re-ascend now. Is the word evangelical worth saving? What is it to you?

David Guretzki

That’s a fantastic question. It’s probably one of the more common questions that I’ve had to field. Is the word worth saving? I have to say I start from the biblical perspective. Like the word itself is a biblical word, we have to at least acknowledge that it comes directly from a biblical word, euangelion, which means the good news of Jesus Christ. It’s kind of like saying is a biblical word worth saving? And I have to say yes, of course it’s worth saving. I also ask the question if not evangelical, what other word would we use? We could use the word Jesus follower, we could use the word Christian, we could use the word Orthodox, but all of those actually have other kinds of connotations and kind of different uses as well. So it’s by no means.

One of the difficulties of the word is that it’s been associated with particular kind of political ideologies and that’s definitely a problem Western if not North American issue that more broadly within the world it seems like evangelical actually has a not a pristine, but has less of a direct connotation. Of course that is changing, but certainly it’s connected to our political situation here in North America. In response to what do we do with it? I think what we have to do is, rather than asking ourselves how we rebrand ourselves or re-identify ourselves, my nervousness of doing that is to say, in doing that, what are we running away from?

And while it’s true that there’s all kinds of people who might call themselves evangelical with which I have no desire to agree on some of those issues, I think it comes back to owning what the word has actually stood for and how it’s been used and how people who have identified as evangelical haven’t always done the right thing. We have to corporately own that. There have in fact been things done, been done in the name of evangelical that haven’t aligned with the gospel of Jesus. But rather than running away from it and distancing ourselves from our own history, I think we need to repent of it. But repentance is at the core of the gospel. We have to repent of them. Sometimes that means we’re going to have to lament. It also means we’re going to have to name these things and take ownership of these things. So I’m still unconvinced that we should jettison the word. I think we need to keep using it, model new ways of showing what evangelical is, being committed to the life of the gospel and resisting those ideologies that are used when associated with the word.

Brian Stiller

It’s interesting there’s a poster called Ryan Burge who has noted that in the US, both Jew and Muslim and atheists a small percentage identify themselves as evangelical, which means the word has become a political term.

David Guretzki

I remember reading one of those articles from Ryan Burge where he noted that a Muslim calling himself evangelical, he discerned that this meant that they’re thoroughly devoted to their faith.

It wasn’t necessarily that they were voting for a particular political party, but you’re absolutely right.

As I understand it, certainly in the US there seems to be a high correlation between calling yourself an evangelical and voting for a particular party, and I think there is that correlation, and so that means that the word evangelical has become more of a sociological term rather than a it’s a term committed to a particular political stance or political ideology than it is a term evangelical being someone who’s a follower of the Lord Jesus Christ and who believes in the need for coming under the authority of scripture and being transformed. So it’s complex, for sure. I think that we do have to remember that both Canada and US have such different histories. Like the US has such a longer, they certainly have a longer political history. I’m not saying that here in Canada we’re free of those influences. Of course we know that Canada is heavily influenced by American media. We know that American thinkers are quite influential amongst Canadians, but I think there is a different sociology at work here in Canada, david let’s look at the Canadian constituency for a moment.

Brian Stiller

We know historically that Canada is basically a Catholic country. 47% of Canada has been Catholic or self-identified, and you said that maybe up to 8% would be evangelical and you would have your mainline Protestants as some percentage as well. How do evangelicals operate within that religiously pluralistic world?

David Guretzki

Well, the first thing to say there is that again, even within our polling here at the EFC, we even see that there are people within those traditions the Roman Catholic tradition, the Anglican Church of Canada, for example, hold to many of the similar kind of beliefs and practices that evangelicals would hold to. Yet there’s others who have distanced themselves completely from the language of evangelical, perhaps because of the association, the political association that there is, especially to our neighbors to the south, with a large number there. But of course even there in the south there’s lots that you know they’re evangelical but they don’t necessarily see that as a political affinity. So these categories, I think, are getting fuzzier. Even here in Canada, for example, amongst the Roman Catholic Church, there’s often much more affinity with some of the moral and social stances that evangelicals take than even amongst some of the more Protestant denominations, where they’d be quite different from evangelicals.

Brian Stiller

How in the world can you bring fellowship and unity within disparate groups? From Pentecostals to Baptists, that must be quite a meeting place. 

David Guretzki

It certainly is. And again, I think that the heart of what it means to be an evangelical is a recognition that we’ve met Jesus Christ personally. I really do believe that that’s at the heart of what it means to be an evangelical. We are ultimately and essentially desiring to be followers of Jesus and be transformed in our hearts and our minds as we follow him. I’m also finding this cross-culturally. I talk to Christians from other ethnicities and other nations who aren’t necessarily using the language of evangelical and sometimes they don’t even necessarily how we use that word. But I would say you know, they are our kin, they’re our spiritual kin, even though they might be using different language. Kin, even though they might be using different language.

Brian Stiller

David over the last couple decades, there’s been a growing recognition that, out of our European heritage, there’s been a brutality to the indigenous community which has brought us back to the place to ask what do we as the church today, recognizing the history of our past, maybe history of other denominations other than what you and I would be associated with, and yet, in a sense, we’re all implicated as Christians. So, where you stand today, as a national leader representing a reasonable percentage of Christians in Canada? What would you have to say to them and to us as to what they should understand and what we should do?

David Guretzki

I mean, it’s so complicated. I myself have struggled to know, like, how do we really engage in this? But what’s been so terribly refreshing for me in my conversations with Indigenous leaders leaders especially is their emphasis on walking together in relationship, recognizing our common fellowship of Jesus and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, recognizing that simply we’re brothers and sisters, recognizing, yes, that there’s been wrongs that have been done in the name of the church, and also recognizing and taking ownership. This is one thing that I know that Indigenous leaders, at least the ones I’ve talked to they’re not asking for us to fix things necessarily. They’re asking for us to own that.

In fact, some of these things have happened, and so it’s easy sometimes to say, well, I’m not from that denomination that was involved in the residential schools or I wasn’t there, or I didn’t have anything to do with it.

But if our theology is that there’s only one body in Jesus Christ, as the New Testament teaches, there’s only one body, one Lord, one Savior, one God and Father of all, only one body, one Lord, one Savior, one God and Father of all, if there is really only one true church, then, regardless of whether we were in that denomination or not, these were done. These things were done in the name of Jesus. And then I think for we as Christians, we have to look for those opportunities to develop a relationship with an Indigenous person and just say let’s get to know each other, let’s listen to one another’s stories, but let’s also recognize that we do have to own, as a movement, some of these things that happened as well and be humble. There’s a degree, a significant degree of humility and ownership that we have to have as we walk through these things. There’s no easy answer to that, but I think that’s what we have to do.

Brian Stiller

David, you’re a theologian, and you could take us to the ivory towers of your intellectual musings. But what is there about the evangel, the gospel of Jesus, that so speaks into today’s world, be it in Canada or Cambodia?

David Guretzki

I think, no matter where we’re at, whether we’re in Canada or Cambodia, there’s healing needed, there’s significant healing needed. Jesus is the healer of the world. I think evangelicals have talked often of Jesus being the Savior of the world, which is just absolutely biblically correct. But in our world, savior, I think, can have this negative connotation of someone coming in over top and kind of rescuing, and that’s kind of the language that sometimes the colonial message brought, that we’re here to rescue you from something, we’re here to be your saviors. And there was a confusion between what we were doing and who Jesus was. And that just speaks to me about what people are looking for. They’re not looking for a conqueror, they’re looking for someone who can heal the deepest wounds and the deepest relational wounds and the deepest spiritual wounds, and even the wounds within our very hearts and souls, the divisions that are within us. That’s the Savior that we proclaim, that’s the hope of the resurrection, that’s the hope of the return of Christ, the healing of the nations.

Brian Stiller

David, thanks so much for being with us today, and I hope people will go online and access Faith Today. It’s a marvellous magazine packed with the current issues challenging evangelicals around the world.

If you found this valuable, please take a moment to give us a review or a thumbs up. We would appreciate it if you would share it with your friends and colleagues as well. You’ll find links in the show notes of this episode for anything we’ve discussed today. If you haven’t signed up yet to receive my free Dispatches from the Global Village, it’s an opportunity to join me and meet leaders in many different countries around the world. It’s also a wonderful way to stay in touch with upcoming episodes and guests. Just go to brianstiller.com. Thank you for listening. Until next time.

Don’t miss the next interview! Be sure to subscribe to evangelical 360 on YouTube. See you there.