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Fundamentalist or Evangelical?

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dms1972

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What is the difference between these two groups? I've been in churches, and had elders trying to instruct me, and they claim to be Evangelical, but I think they are closer to Fundamentalist.

Here a couple of things that makes me think they are fundamentalist, they seemed to not agree with and tried to steer me away from modern paraphrases like JB Phillip's Letters to Young Churches. They try to steer me away from pop/rock music, and some CCM. In their favor I suppose I could score them for showing an interest to get me on the what they believe to be the right path as it were. But its their claim to be evangelical? Maybe they are and maybe JB Phillips is questionable for some in the evangelical community? But I get the feeling a lot of stuff is going to be off limits for me if I submit to these sorts of churches. I like to know where they are coming from, what in their view a christian can and can't do, listen to, read etc. as some groups can be extreme in what they regard as worldly.

Is there anything in particular that distinguishes Evangelicals from Fundamentalists?
 
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2PhiloVoid

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dms1972 said:
What is the difference between these two groups? I've been in churches, and had elders trying to instruct me, and they claim to be Evangelical, but I think they are closer to Fundamentalist.

Here a couple of things that makes me think they are fundamentalist, they seemed to not agree with and tried to steer me away from modern paraphrases like JB Phillip's Letters to Young Churches. They try to steer me away from pop/rock music, and some CCM. In their favor I suppose I could score them for showing an interest to get me on the what they believe to be the right path as it were. But its their claim to be evangelical? Maybe they are and maybe JB Phillips is questionable for some in the evangelical community? But I get the feeling a lot of stuff is going to be off limits for me if I submit to these churches. I like to know where they are coming from, what in their view can and can't do, listen to, read etc. as some groups can be extreme in what they regard as worldly.

Is there anything in particular that distinguishes Evangelicals from Fundamentalists?
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Yes. One point of difference is that Fundamentalists tend toward a sort of interpretive reductionism resulting in a more legalisitic or rigid form of literal theologizing.

By contrast, Evangelicals, while also tending to hold firm to certain theological ideas that Fundamentalists hold to, tend toward a more contextualized sensibility, and this sensibility can loosen up the process of theologizing which then places evangelicals over a small spectrum or range of interpretive readings of the inspired Bible. Like Fundamentalists (e.g. Church of Christ, Independent Baptist, SDA, etc.), Evangelicals will vary with each other in their general readings between denominations, but overall they will still hold a conservative political position and still see the Bible as inspired or even inerrant and do so without 'selling out' too much toward liberal tendencies.
 
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ChubbyCherub

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I would say that I'm a mixture of both.

Fundamentalists are very literal in the way that they read and practice the Bible and, yes, many things would be 'forbidden' that are worldly including pop music, certain movies, certain ways of dress, drinking alcohol and/or drinking to excess, piercings, make up, playing cards, rolling dice etc.

Evangelism is also very biblical, as compared to other denominations, but are very heavily focused (IMO) in the way the bible can be practiced in the modern life. The above activities would not be encouraged if they distract from God but I don't see them as heavily discouraged and make up, piercings etc are definitely much more accepted.

I prefer Fundamentalism, because that is how I was raised and I do believe it is biblical, but it is not widely practiced locally so I am currently part of a non-denomination church which is sola scriptura in so much as the mission of Christians, the message of Jesus etc.
 
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BobRyan

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dms1972 said:
What is the difference between these two groups? I've been in churches, and had elders trying to instruct me, and they claim to be Evangelical, but I think they are closer to Fundamentalist.

Here a couple of things that makes me think they are fundamentalist, they seemed to not agree with and tried to steer me away from modern paraphrases like JB Phillip's Letters to Young Churches. They try to steer me away from pop/rock music, and some CCM. In their favor I suppose I could score them for showing an interest to get me on the what they believe to be the right path as it were. But its their claim to be evangelical? Maybe they are and maybe JB Phillips is questionable for some in the evangelical community? But I get the feeling a lot of stuff is going to be off limits for me if I submit to these sorts of churches. I like to know where they are coming from, what in their view a christian can and can't do, listen to, read etc. as some groups can be extreme in what they regard as worldly.

Is there anything in particular that distinguishes Evangelicals from Fundamentalists?
Click to expand...
1. Type this in your browser address/search box

"compare fundamentalist to evangelicalcompare fundamentalist to evangelical

2. As they note, fundamentalist is a subset of evangelical

My denomination is strongly aligned with both.

But we do not tell people not to read
J.B. Philips paraphrase. However we tell them it is a paraphrase and not a direct translation. Its like reading "one man's commentary" on the Bible
 
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dms1972

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2Philovoid, has mentioned the area of Biblical interpretation. There are a a couple of other areas where I find christians differ somewhat, one is to do with relations with the Roman catholic church, and other churches they regard in error. The other is worldliness, what is considered worldly, what you can listen to, read, going to the cinema etc. Some churches seem quite strict in this latter area. Is this something that can be the case with both evangelicals and fundamentalists?
 
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dms1972

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But we do not tell people not to read
J.B. Philips paraphrase. However we tell them it is a paraphrase and not a direct translation. Its like reading "one man's commentary" on the Bible
Click to expand...

Re: JB Phillips, and Letters to Young Churches. In that its not like a new translation (eg THE NIV), done by a team of experts across denominational boundaries. Phillips did offer his initial paraphrase of Colossians to CS Lewis to read and to get his opinion, who praised it and encouraged him to continue. I don't know if Phillips sought the opinions anyone else? But while I understand what you mean by "its one man's commentary", I think its more than a commentary, even though not a official translation.
 
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