It's a book that the Christian really needs to read.....Reading Evangelicals....How Christian Fiction Shaped a Culture and a Faith.....by Daniel Silliman. A selling point is that the author did not have a bias....and then spend a year or so trying to put together a book legitimizing that bias. He admits that he didn't know what an evangelical was when he started.....although he probably was one....and still didn't know when he finished. That on the face of it does not sound good....but the author is giving evidence and facts....and some pretty credible opinion..... and although few if any will say after reading the book that they now know what an evangelical is....just about all the readers can say that evangelicalism is a mess.
My wife and I owned a Christian bookstore about twenty years ago....for two years. I post a lot here on Christian bookstores.....and how with their demise our supply lines to growth in the church have been cut. Silliman's book is about half on the history of Christian bookstores and publishers....how they became a powerful influence....and how the brick and mortar stores died. The other roughly half of the book is on popular Christian fiction. It zeroes in on five books and the authors.....the authors being.....Janette Oke....Frank Peretti....Tim LaHaye.....Beverly Lewis....and William Paul Young....but each one of those author's works are tied to other well-known Christian authors of their time period.....so the reader gets a fairly complete history of what we Christians were reading for the past fifty years.
If you are not at least in your fifties....with four decades in the church....then you will not know first hand what Daniel Silliman is describing. If you are that old.....particularly about seventy....you will recognize everything he describes. Silliman is an editor at Christianity Today. He is not that old....but he did his homework....and what he does....he does very good.
I've done a lot of book reviews in these 13 1/2 years of posts....but I changed in how I do them. I find myself having no desire telling readers everything about a book or a movie. I'd now rather give an opinion on what the reader can learn from the book.....and if they want to learn bad enough....they'll put the effort in to read the book. Most today are not interested enough to read....and not particularly willing to spend the money.....but concerning the habits of the evangelical that Silliman writes about....back then....they did spend the money.....and they did read.
I will say this. You will not like what you read about us. I can attest that Silliman is correct in his descriptions because I lived it. He has it down pat. It's not a pretty picture. I'll say this also....Silliman weighs in on why Donald Trump became a favorite of evangelicals.
Where Daniel Silliman comes up incomplete.....is that he only writes about our fiction reading habits. Billy Graham is mentioned in one sentence....MacArthur or Sproul zilch. The author proved his point on the effects that our fiction reading had on the church.....but without the non-fiction.....which is what his book is....we get at the very best....half the evidence.....but still....if you acknowledge that in advance....Reading Evangelicals is more than well worth the read.....it's almost necessary.....to anyone who really wants to discern how we got where we are....in the church....and in America.
