Mainline and Evangelical Lexicon Differences or Similarities
I'm actually creating this blog for the purpose of receiving responses. I want to hear from the people on the world wide web what they have learned about the differences in the lexicon or dictionary of evangelical and mainline Christians. From my experience dancing between and in both worlds, I have discovered that often these two practices of Christianity will talk past each other even when they are discussing the same thing. I think there are times when representatives of each perspective will agree with each other even though they don't really agree. There are other times where representatives will be having heated arguments and they are saying the same thing, but using different terms. So, I want to hear what you have heard - how do you translate the conversation?
For example. My evangelical friends may ask, "When did you accept Jesus Christ as your personal Lord and Savior?" While my mainline friends would ask, "When did your faith become your own?" or "Tell me about a time in your adult life when what it means to be a Christian changed for you."
Most everyone will acknowledge that they received some of God's grace through baptism, but it may be debated even within each community when and how God initiated that grace and how it was first received.
Another example may be in the disagreement over creation and evolution. Theologically, both evangelicals and mainline Christians agree that human life was intentionally created by God and that humans are made in God's likeness. The acceptance of evolution is not necessarily the denial of the Genesis creation story nor is the confidence in a 6 literal days of creation a denial of the fact that in the public school this must be taught as one of many theories.
While some evangelicals will use the term "infallible" to describe the Bible, mainline Christians will not deny that the Bible is God's Word.
Both evangelicals and mainline Christians confess the gospel message. Evangelicals tend to focus on the eternal salvation aspect, while mainline Christians tend to focus on the temporal salvation aspect. Evangelicals tend to see salvation through the Four Spiritual Laws, while mainline Christians tend to see salvation through the coming of the Kingdom of God. For evangelicals salvation comes through the action of acceptance of Christ as Savior of one's soul. For mainline Christians salvation comes through the action of responding to the reality that Christ is the Savior of the world.
Also evangelicals tend to say "God's Kingdom," whereas mainline Christians tend to say "Kingdom of God."
So, what have you seen in the differences and similarities between the mainline and evangelical lexicon/dictionary?
Where do you agree/disagree with what I have already brainstormed here on this blog?
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