“The Christian life must be lived out among the regenerate in every area of activity until even the unregenerate are moved by Christian standards, acknowledging their force…To the extent that any society is leavened with Christian conviction, it becomes a more hospitable environment for Christian expansion…for it is the redemptive element that distinguishes Christianity, and it is the redemptive element that the jaded world culture so sorely needs.”
Carl F. H. Henry (1913-2003) the first editor-in-chief of Christianity Today in The Uneasy Conscience of Modern Fundamentalism (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1947) 71-73.
Today’s meditation recounts a leading voice in earlier history of the Evangelical Free Church of America who proclaimed Christian social engagement well before its time. I read Carl Henry this morning as I am at an EFCA conference in New Orleans and my prayer is for this movement (and all Christ-followers) is to find inspiration from leaders like Carl Henry to generously live out the gospel in every area of activity, because it is what our lost world so desperately needs.