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| No Place for Truth or Whatever Happened to Evangelical Theology? | 
 enlarge | Author: David F. Wells
Publisher: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company
Category: Book
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Avg. Customer Rating:  15 reviews
Sales Rank: 99188
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 330
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1
Dimensions (in): 9 x 6 x 0.9
ISBN: 080280747X
Dewey Decimal Number: 230.046
EAN: 9780802807472
ASIN: 080280747X
Publication Date: June 1993
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Product Description
David Wells has uttered a cry of the heart in summoning the evangelical church to renewal and escape from the cultural captivity he fears is overtaking it. His sweeping analysis examines the collapse of theology in the church, in the academy, and in modern culture, raising profound questions about the future of conservative Protestant faith.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 10 more reviews...
 Are we in trouble? April 17, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Although written almost two decades ago this book still hits home. In "No Place For Truth" David Wells describes what he and many others see as the decline of evangelical theology. Starting with a historical outline of the possible causes then analyzing trends in twentieth century thought Dr. Wells points out how modernity has changed evangelicalism into something more like 19th century theological Liberalism (not to be confused with today's political liberalism), than our evangelical forbears. What he describes is churches not only empty of theology, but hostile to it. The remainder of the book is about the dangers of this situation to the spiritual state of the Church. This is not alarmist propaganda that looks for scapegoats in the culture around us. Instead, Dr. Wells' criticism is with evangelical institutions, theologians, seminaries, and churches. Written in a firm but not combative style Dr. Wells paints a picture that will be familiar and alarming to many. Thankfully, in the years since this book was written the tide has begun to turn, but the leaders of today who are reforming evangelicalism often cite this book as a catalyst for the changes we see today.
This is the first book in a series. Thus it is mostly concerned with identifying the problem with the work of proposing changes reserved for later volumes. Read this book!
 A call to Repentance June 23, 2007
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
This is a book that really sets out to accomplish a monumental task. It attempts to grapple with the broad questions of why theology and objective truth are so absent in the evangelical church today, and what has been the affect of modernism on the church. Due to the vast scope of this undertaking, the analysis can become somewhat unwieldy at times. However, while drawing in analyses from many angles, Wells maintains a sharp and accurate analysis of the problem. It ends up being too much information to soak in by reading it only once through. I found this also to be true of his other book in the series "Losing our Virtue: Why the Church Must Recover it's Moral Vision."
Wells vigorously argues that the evangelical church's chasing after "relevance" has rendered it weak and irrelevant to the culture. He shows how theology is essential to the life of the church, and properly belongs to the church, not merely to academia. The disconnection of theology from the church has cut the church free from its moorings, and set it adrift in a sea of fads and relativism. Theology no longer unifies and defines the church, he says, and instead the church mimics modernism. It does this by patterning itself after the business models of capitalism; preaching borrows heavily from psychological and therapeutic language and concepts, and the Gospel of Jesus Christ is lost or diluted for a "self-help" gospel replacement.
One of the interesting parts of the book was the discussion of the American tendency toward two ideals--individualism and conformity, which might at the surface seem at odds with one another, yet are held in tension in our culture. The church has been heavily influenced by these concepts as well. He also clearly refutes the idea that the exclusive claims of the Bible about salvation through Christ alone are just part of the "parochial" or simplistic worldview of the Biblical writers. He shows clearly how the ancients were very much in tune with pluralism, and that it was not foreign to them. Yet the Biblical writers clearly rejected pluralism in favor of the exclusive claims of the One and Only true God. After a thorough critique of the loss of truth in the church, Wells does offer a positive answer to how the church can recover from this crisis. He points us back to the Word of the Eternally Holy God, who alone can accomplish a Reformation of the church by the restoration of the Word and the objective truth of that Word in the theology that properly belongs in and with the church. A recovery of the understanding of God's holiness will restore to us the proper biblical understanding of sin and grace, rather than therapeutic understandings that modernist Christianity has put forth. Hopefully the church at large in America will hear Wells' call to repentance and reform
A magisterial analysis! September 4, 2006
12 out of 12 found this review helpful
This is a provocative, demanding and rewarding book that attempts to grapple with some of the central challenges of Christian thought and life in a modern or post-modern world. Looking through Amazon and one or two other online sites, it is clear that many readers have also read Mark A. Noll's The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind. I have too; and by way of introduction to David F. Wells' book, it is worth making brief reference to the other.
Both books touch on similar subjects, though with different emphases. Both are concerned with the decline of what Noll calls "the life of the mind" within American evangelicalism; and both are concerned with how authoritative Christian thought can be sustained in this modern or postmodern world. I suspect that Noll's book has proved the more popular, even if the only direct evidence for that is the number of customer reviews on this site: 29 for Noll; 12 for Wells. And both books were published a year apart -- Wells in 1993, and Noll the following year. With a title like that, Noll was always going to be onto a winner!
However, I suspect that one of the reasons for these differing figures is that Wells writes from a different perspective, one that ultimately makes more demands on the reader. Another might be that Wells' position is subtly yet noticeably more pessimistic. Noll is an historian who is eminently capable of working in theology; Wells is a theologian who is eminently capable of working in history. One only has to look at satellite television to realise which of these subjects is the more popular; and I hope that nobody reading this review imagines that Christian television has any connection with theology!
One of the great strengths of this book is that it approaches its subject with the very breadth of thought that both authors find wanting in evangelicalism in general. While its focus is on North America, it spreads its net wide; and Wells is especially good at teasing out subtle relationships between culture and religious thought. It also manages to be at once highly opinionated, generous in spirit, full of subtle humour, and intensely passionate.
How's this for a start? When, in his Introduction Wells asserts his "disbelief in much that the modern world holds dear" (p. 10), he also says that while he feels he must use this pugnacious style, he intends "no disrespect either for the reader or for the modern world. After all, I work for the one and must live with the other. The pugnacity is only in the appearance, not in the intention. The problem is that even the mildest assertion of Christian truth today sounds like a thunderclap because the well-polished civility of our religious talk has kept us from hearing much of this kind of thing." He then draws on John Kenneth Galbraith and G.K. Chesterton, to demonstrate a point that has nothing of religion or theology in it -- at first. So when the theological point arrives, it has force: "Evangelicals are antimodern only across a narrow front; I write from a position that is antimodern across the entire front. It is only where assumptions in culture directly and obviously contradict articles of faith that most evangelicals become aroused and rise up to battle 'secular humanism'; aside from these specific matters, they tend to view culture as neutral and harmless. More than that, they often view culture as a partner amenable to being coopted in the cause of celebrating Christian truth. I cannot share that naivete; indeed, I consider it dangerous. Culture is laden with values, many of which work to rearrange the substance of faith, even when they are mediated to us through the benefits that the modern world also bestows upon us."
This epitomises Wells' ability to lay a profoundly humane groundwork for a theological starting-point, and then for an entire historical and theological argument; and that is one of the main reasons why this book is such a compelling indictment of contemporary evangelical theology. Or perhaps I should say non-theology; for that is what Wells finds everywhere -- though like Noll, he finds the malady less prevalent outside the USA.
Beavers who are over-eager might get impatient at Wells' methods. Indeed, I suspect that at the root of one or two of the more negative responses this book has received, there lies a typically modern impatience. But for those willing to take time, there are rewards a-plenty. For example, the opening chapter's title is "A Delicious Paradise Lost." The Eden-like innocence belongs to the town of Wenham, Massachusetts, in the two hundered of so years after the town's foundation in the 1630s by a group of puritans of English descent. Less than ten years later an English visitor described the place as "a delicious paradise" which he would choose "above all towns in America to dwell in." Via authoritative comparisons with contemporary towns in Britain and America (the book has plenty of informative footnotes and cross-references), Wells charts Wenham's growth, which was very slow. He embraces the role of the church as a building and as community of believers (and a community which included many who were nominal believers); he shows how, as people of differing religious backgrounds moved into the town, they interacted with the dominant puritan heritage; and he follows the lives of a number of prominent figures, notably the schoolteacher. This was a community defined partly by its strong sense of place, and partly by its awareness of how people lived together -- or how they should live together. Of course, it wasn't really Eden. But until well into the 19th century it was so utterly different from the modern world that we might imagine it to be such.
In a series of similar historically rooted pictures, Wells shows how those qualities disappeared, to be replaced by transience, by superficiality. In one of his many virtuoso analogies, he shows how Truman Capote (1924-84) was transformed by publicity "from an author of some initial repute into a personality. . . He bonded briefly with his devotees, but the bond was synthetic. In this new world, the statues are made of celluloid, not of stone; here the achievements are those of personality, seldom of character. . . This is experience without community. It is the experience of mankind in the mass, bereft of the forces that once drew it into centers of human fraternity and organization." Gloomy stuff! But it has precision and insight.
All this proves to be an essential preliminary for the theological discussion that makes up by far the larger part of this book. The theological discussion is fed from the ground up, by being rooted in the communities in which theology should, and at one time did, hold its discourse. The third chapter takes its title, "Things Fall Apart", from Yeats' poem The Second Coming (yet another example of the broad synthesis that characterises this book), and charts the decline of theology from its place as the "queen of sciences" to an irrelevance, even in the evangelical world to which Wells and most of those who will read his book belong.
Wells explains, with a magisterial grasp of history, culture and theology, how the decline of evangelical theology in the last two hundred is a direct result of the church's engagement with the world and its prevailing culture. It is a striking demonstration of the adage that the church rarely now turns the world upside (Acts 17:6); rather, the world has turned the church upside down. Hence the title: the church has been so concerned with accommodating itself to the world that it has forgotten how to sustain the mission God intended it to have to the world.
Wells shows how thought, including that of some greats of American theology, became gradually corrupted by this accommodation. Along the way the religious institutions have become corrupted too. One of his most devastating critiques is of the modern seminary. Great institutions like Princeton and Yale began with Christian values at their core, with subjects designed from a Christian perspective. But as these universities have become inexorably secularised, other institutions had to take over their role; and those in turn have been run off their feet to maintain recognition by the world. Many of the qualifications issued by modern Christian colleges, including doctorates, have very little real value: they merely provide a veneer of respectability so that being a pastor might appear to have the same worldly status as being a lawyer, an academic or a doctor. It is not just that there is little reflection: there is no time for it.
As for the corruption of the church's life . . . I'll leave you to read the examples Wells gives, which are shocking even to someone who knows something of what the God Channel and things of that kind spew out indiscriminately.
As I say, this is not an optimistic book. But it is honest. It offers few large-scale solutions. But it is a clarion call to those who read it, and who believe that we should indeed love the Lord our God with all our minds. If one follows Well's thesis through, it becomes clear that institutions are not readily amenable to reformation. But individuals are. Just as the Gospel began with individuals, so it will be with individuals that any reformation of theology will begin.
Makes You Think November 27, 2005
9 out of 9 found this review helpful
The following situations and beliefs are true in many Protestant/Evangelical churches today.
-`Worship' is the pinnacle of the church service. Worship is considered successful based on the feelings of those involved.
-Sermons are focused on self-gratitude and self-esteem rather than the Bible.
-Theology is considered a bad word, just a few rungs higher than Hitler.
-The Bible is used only to support a thought, belief or idea rather than our thoughts, beliefs and ideas being based on the Bible.
-The `experience' of God is more foundational than the truth of God.
-53% of those claiming to be Bible-believing, conservative Christians claim there is no such thing as "absolute truth."
The title of this book summarizes it well. The author's main point is that Evangelical churches have been heavily influenced by the culture and have thus lost the conviction that truth is absolute and theology is important. With this as a premise for the book, the author writes (sometimes painstakingly) about the process by which our Western culture has morphed into what it is today. With detail, the author then traces the history of Protestantism that later spawned Evangelicalism. Weaving it all together, the author presents how Evangelicalism has succumbed to a relativistic culture. And ultimately how this led to the death of theology.
How has all of this happened? The stated purpose of David Well's book is "to explore why it is that theology is disappearing. (emphasis mine)" No claim is made for the content of theology, or even for the poor quality of theology. This is not the intention of the book. The book reads more like a culture-write-up that a missionary would study before entering a field of service with anthropological insights into the behaviors of the Evangelical Christian living in the contemporary world. The `Western Christian' culture is thoroughly analyzed, especially in its esteem toward truth, and namely theological truth.
David Wells' writing style is unique. Unlike many contemporary authors (Christian or secular), Wells writes in a way that forces you to think. In many ways this is a positive. The reader must read the book slowly and thoughtfully in order to grasp the language that the author uses. But, it can also make for painfully slow reading. Perhaps this irritation found in the book is a result of the desire of our society for the instantaneous and the undemanding. With that said, I personally found myself getting bogged down in the author's writing style. Constantly I was forced to check the dictionary, and sometimes the dictionary didn't even help. This particular peculiarity of our society drives Wells' crazy, but he should realize that the readers of his book are products of the society that he is criticizing. If these people are the `mission field,' then they need to be reached in their heart language. The author should not compromise his academic standards, but a clearer `dumbed-down' writing style may have more effectively reached the church of today.
The content, or main message of the book is excellent. Christianity in the past 100 years can be compared to the frog in the boiling pot of water. Unknown to the church, just recently have we started to boil. There definitely is a problem but unless fixed, the church faces certain demise. The evangelical church today is a large, potentially powerful organization that has the ability to turn the world upside-down. Yet it remains largely ineffective and instead, the church has been turned upside-down by the world.
The manner in which Wells traces the history of both Western culture and Protestant culture is interesting and revealing. The book accomplishes its stated goal in explaining why these problems have come about in the Evangelical church of today. Personally, the book has produced an awareness in me regarding the direction and follies of today's church. And as a church planting missionary, I need to be careful in not carrying over these problems into churches in the Philippines.
Lastly, I believe there is a small danger in culture bashing. A large part of the book is dedicated to exposing the folly of today's society. While this is important (as reflected in Wells' second aspect of theology- reflection), it has its limits. The Bible is clear that the world is foolishness and that we should find our trust in the spirit and His words (see 1Cor. 2). Though the culture needs to be evaluated in light of Scripture, we should not expect the culture to change apart from the wisdom that the Spirit gives. The culture needs the reflection that Wells calls for, but it also needs to be reached. A reoccurring frustration with Fundamentalism (the assumed camp that David Wells is a part of) is that it does not reach out into the culture in which it exists. Because of their fear of contamination, effective reaching out is rarely done. Admittedly, reaching out is like playing with fire (which the church has clearly been burnt by). But this reaching out is necessary.
In conclusion, this is a good book. The author does an excellent job of exposing the weaknesses in churches today, and he also does an excellent job of tracing the influences that weakened the church. Church leaders would do themselves well to read this book and take appropriate action in their churches and ministries.
 Popular evangelism May 16, 2005
3 out of 24 found this review helpful
People have a legal right to worship as they choose. It is human nature to make this decision based on Utility. The term utility is not used in David F. Wells' book titled No Place for Truth . In Microeconomics, utility is term to describe value. An individual chooses one item or activity over another because it brings a greater utility. Utility is an abstract concept of measure. It is a concept to explain how people make rational decisions based on cost (alternative product or activities one abstains from to get another product or activity. A unit of measure for enjoyment, security, friendship, belonging, comfort, and feeling of competence? People make a choice between churches based on what they can get out of it. This book tells why more and more people choose to attend churches that do not teach a comprehensive theology.
David Wells goes into great length to describe the limited choices people had a couple hundred years ago. He uses Winah Massachusetts for illustrative purposes. Church shopping did not exist. No one had the temptation to stay to watch football or This Week with George Stephanopolis. People tended to go to bed earlier on Saturday night, so less temptation to sleep in . Less distraction made for a more consistent church going public. Pastor did not have the pressure to alter their message for the fear that the parishioners would leave his church. The church building was the focal point of the town. The Pastor of a church was well respected in the town. David Wells goes nostalgic for the first hundred pages in this book. It seemed to go on and on how different society was.
How society has changed and in turn changed the character of the preached word in the Evangelical church? As transportation and communication became faster & dependable, the individual heard and saw more alternatives. The individual has had more ideas thrown at him and had a greater ease to attend other places of worship. When more people acted upon their new found alternatives, ministers altered their message to retain and attract new members. Slowly evangelical theology becomes something else; it no longer is the truth as told in the Bible.
What it means to be a Christian has changed. Christianity as taught by the Apostles after Pentecost. The time when the church became into being through the preaching of those who followed Jesus earthly walk. To be a believer meant to accept the teachings of Jesus. How did Jesus teach from the Old Testament? How did Jesus life on earth, death on a cross, and His resurrection bring the fulfillment of scripture? Theology came from the mouth of God . A confession is an exposition of God. This type of exposition includes how God acts in this world, how God influences the human race, the character of God, and the Will of God. Knowing God and obedience to God comes through theological understanding of God. One does not know truth unless one knows God. The Word of God is absolute truth. Jesus Christ is the only way to heaven. David Wells argues that there is no supposition in scripture that other religions have cloudy form of truth or attributes of God. Everything is not relative.
Theology has a confessional element. Statements that assert truths about God. One should reflect on these truths. Relate how one part of scripture pertains to or is made clear through another part of scripture. One should ponder how truth presented in the Bible corresponds to what is normative is society. Does what learns as common in society conflict with what the Bible teaches; compare what one confesses to what the World claims to true. David Wells argues today's Christians must not find much conflict if surveys are to be understood as accurate.
I get upset over details in my life. Yes I worry and get confused by the smallest problems that come my way. Yes I want to act calmer, feel more in control, and feel better about myself. Should I seek a church that makes me feel more competent, talented, and a person of value? Should a church be a place to elevate my self perception? Should I choose a church based on what it can do for me? Every individual wants to feel healthy and competent. For the most part people choose activities, clothing and food that makes them feel better about themselves. I eat chocolate;it brings a sensation of contentment. I enjoy the moment. Does one attend a specific church because that is where God wants him? Some go for a sense of belonging, others to network, and others for euphoria of the worship service. David Wells argues people choose what is exciting over what is true. The ultimate aim to know God, to be forgiven for ones sins, and to become Christ like are not sought by church attendees. Someone may want to become close to God, but yet not want to know the truth about God. No longer do people constuct their understanding of the World based on the Truth proclaim in God's Word.
Urbanization, technology, and mass media have effected how society and the individual perceive God. The Christian Faith is found margenalized. Paul Tillich's theology: "every person has objects and interests that are of ultimate concern. God or one's thoughts about God are to be manipulated. One chooses how one wants to understand the World and finds a god that fits into that philosophy. People choose not to believe in the transedent, a sovereign God nor the absolute word of the Bible. So call evangelicals do not want a god that intrudes into their life, a god that demands obedience, that has control over one's destiny, and bring down evil ultimately. Many want a god to be used for one's own convience. Such evangelical structure is not consistent with the Bible.
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