Further, as the movement continued and founded its own schools, many of its chief leaders were influenced by the eschatology of Clarence Larkin and C. I. Scofield (dispensa-tionalism), and saw the many aspects of dispensationalism (God dealing with man in different time periods in distinctly different ways, with all except the last ending in failure; a secret rapture or removing of the church from the earth so God can resume His original plan of establishing a Jewish, earthly kingdom, etc.) as being essential to being a true believer.

Modern fundamentalists, typically demand a very literal interpretation of Scripture, are usually quite skeptical of modern translations of the Bible, not to mention modern biblical scholarship in general, and many adhere to strict behavioral and lifestyle practices, such as women wearing only dresses, no pants. On the other hand, evangelicals are more accepting of modern biblical (evangelical) scholarship and modern biblical translations, while at the same time rightly criticizing what they perceive to be weaknesses in that same scholarship and many modern translations of the Bible. For example, a well-schooled evangelical knows there is no such thing as a perfect translation of the Bible. Even though he or she may regularly use the NIV, RSV, or NASB, they know that at certain points these translations have weaknesses.

Further, unlike fundamentalism, modern evangelicalism has been more willing to deal with the societal problems that the fundamentalists simply evaded or denied. As alredy noted, fundamentalism condemned the preaching of what it termed the "social gospel." Indeed, even today, those who apply biblical teaching to social injustice are usually viewed as being part of the "evangelical left" (i.e., Ron Sider. Jim Wallis).

Both fundamentalists and evangelicals have their own weaknesses. We have noted some of the problems of modern evangelicalism. As for fundamentalism’s inherent weaknesses, the reader should turn to Philip Yancey’s Soul Survivor: How My Faith Survived the Church (Doubleday, 2001). Yancey grew up in a fundamentalist church in north Georgia. On the inside front flap of the book there is this blurb from the publishers:

Philip Yancey, whose explorations of faith have made him a guide for millions of readers, feels no need to defend the church. "When someone tells me yet another horror story about the church, I respond, ‘Oh, it’s even worse than that. Let me tell you my story.’ I have spent most of my life in recovery from the church."

The "church" Yancey has in mind is the fundamentalist church he grew up in, which was marked by, among other things, a significant amount of racism and legalism, two of the weaknesses that tended to plague fundamentalist churches in the early and mid-20th century, and are all too often still found in many fundamentalist churches today.

The link between fundamentalism and modern evangelical-ism is well-illustrated in the life of Wilbur Smith. In Evangelical Roots: A Tribute to Wilbur Smith, edited by Kenneth Kantzer (Thomas Nelson, 1978), Harold J. Ockenga notes in his essay that Smith moved from fundamentalism, to evangelicalism, and finally to neo-evangelicalism, without deviating from his original doctrinal beliefs. Smith taught at Moody Bible Institute, Fuller Theological Seminary, and Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. But in light of the continuing theological weakening of modern evangelicalism, Smith was the exception to the rule.

Thus, from one perspective, all seems to be well with modern evangelicalism. For example, in the 2002 work of James Penning and Corwin Smidt, Evangelicalism: The Next Generation (Baker), the authors summarize their studies of students at nine evangelical colleges, concluding their evidence strongly indicates the younger generation of evangelical college students "continue to express a relatively high level of ortho-doxy with regard to historic tenets of the Christian faith" (66), while at the same time acknowledging the diversity that "has always been present with American evangelicalism" (172).

But from another perspective, all is not well with modern evangelicalism, not according to observers like George Barna, Ray Comfort, and Ron Sider. One of the reasons Ray Comfort wrote How to Bring Your Children to Christ (Genesis Publishing, 2005), was bascially the same reason Donald Sloat wrote The Dangers of Growing Up in a Christian Home (Thomas Nelson, 1986), namely, the fact that the vast majority of children raised in evangelical churches and homes do not continue to walk with God. Comfort says in his book currently 88% of children raised in evangelical homes leave church at the age of eighteen never to return. In What Did Jesus Do? (Genesis Publishing, 2005), Ray Comfort once again affirms what many evangelicals have experienced is false conversion in their response to a "message of salvation with no reference to repentance or future punishment, calling sin ‘faults, short-comings, and bad behavior’" (Comfort, What Did Jesus Do?, 13).

Ron Sider flatly states "the gospel of individual self-fulfillment now reigns" (Sider, The Scandal of the Evangelical Conscience, 85) in modern evangelicalism, and near the end of his most recent book, Above all Earthly Pow’rs: Christ in a Postmodern World (Eerdmans, 2005), the fourth and final volume in his commentary on modern Western culture, David F. Wells critiques contemporary evangelicalism, saying churches that market themselves as relevant and seeker-sensitive, may in fact be growing in size, but they are doing so "at the expense of the truth of the gospel." Regrettably, many modern evangelicals don’t seem to be aware of the theological consequences of reducing the "offense" of the gospel in order to gain worldly (numerical) success.

Thus, Bill Hybels, Rick Warren, Joel Osteen, Bruce Wilkinson and many others like them may fall into the outer bands of the so-called diversity of evangelicalism, but on closer examination, their theological foundations are definitely not classic or traditional evangelicalism. Further, if Sider, Comfort and others are right, we should be concerned about our children and youth in terms of passing on our doctrinal heritage and beliefs.