As CEO of the United Kingdom’s Evangelical Alliance (EA), Gavin Calver sometimes compares the organization to the polarizing British breakfast spread Marmite: You either adore it otherwise you hate it.
The EA hears plenty from its critics, taking hits for stances on issues like transgender identity, and is asking on Christians who love them from a distance to really join.
“We’re asking, ‘Will you please stand with us as someone who loves Marmite, not dislikes it?’” Calver said. “In our culture, it makes it a little bit lighthearted, however it needs little or no explaining. People get it quickly.”
More churches, organizations, and individuals are responding to the decision, and after record growth previously yr yr, the tally of dues-paying individual members recently topped 23,000. The total is a signal of the group’s influence to government officials and societal leaders, allowing the EA to represent evangelicals more effectively in the broader culture.
Many of the brand new individual members signed up when EA representatives spoke at member churches, a lot of the recent growth “reflects the constituency we have already got,” in response to Calver. Still, the EA’s membership is becoming more ethnically diverse and trending younger, he said, with most of its growth happening “beyond the southeast of England where we were strongest to begin with.”
Calver recently spoke to CT about his vision for the EA, why so many latest members are signing up now, and the way evangelicals within the UK are staying united despite their differences.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
For readers outside of the United Kingdom, could you give a temporary overview of the UK evangelical landscape?
The UK evangelical landscape is kind of diverse. For example, 25 percent of UK evangelicals are people of color. Within the Evangelical Alliance membership alone, there’s 80 different streams, networks, and denominations of church represented.
One of the good joys in my job is I get to evangelise in a number of these places, and the primary worship song on a Sunday morning tells you where you might be: how charismatic an environment, how free an environment.
We have egalitarians in addition to complementarians inside our membership. There’s a fantastic diversity inside it. … Like many evangelicals globally, Bebbington’s quadrilateral form of sums us up: Hold firm to Scripture; the death and resurrection of Jesus; we’re eager to see people converted, to succeed in the lost; and we would like to be lively in making the world like the dominion.
You recently shared that the EA had hoped to recruit 3,000 latest individual members during its past fiscal yr (which concluded at the tip of March), but that membership had actually increased by over 5,000, the fastest growth for the reason that Nineties. What aspects do you’re thinking that are driving this growth?
We’ve really began asking again. There was some time where the EA perhaps took its foot off the gas a little bit bit with this. Another factor is we will’t ignore the present landscape where you possibly can argue that some parts of the church are baptizing the culture a little bit, and which means the distinctiveness that evangelicalism offers brings hope. I believe we’re clear on stuff.
Certainly, within the UK, our access to the corridors of power is amazing. I used to be at [the prime minister’s residence] 10 Downing Street last week. We’re out and in of Westminster and the 4 governments of the UK on a regular basis. We get to take people’s voices to somewhere they wouldn’t get otherwise.
The EA here has only really existed for 2 things since 1846 when it was formed: unite the church in reaching the lost in every corner of the UK, and secondly, give the church a transparent and effective voice into the corridors of power. I believe a number of individuals are wanting their voice to be heard, and by joining the EA, we add their voice as we go into those places.
Does this strong rate of growth change your vision for the EA in the approaching yr? Or in the subsequent ten years?
It doesn’t change it, however it speeds it up. … Last yr I said to my board, “If you let me set a ten-year direction for where we would like to go, I’ll stay for a decade to see it through.” The plan might be summed up in a single sentence, and that doesn’t change. Basically, we want to face firm theologically, whilst going for it wholeheartedly in sharing the gospel.
I do know folks that are good at one among those: I do know great theologians who don’t know a non-Christian. And I do know individuals who say they need to share the gospel but don’t know Scripture. Those two must go together. We must hold our nerve theologically. Do not compromise on the things that matter within the Word of God, irrespective of what the value tag inside your culture, after which go for it wholeheartedly in sharing the gospel. For me, that’s the subsequent ten years on the EA.
Let me be honest, if we had gotten to three,000 latest members in a yr, that might have been essentially the most in a protracted time. With 5,000, the Lord’s blown out of the water what we thought was possible.
A yr ago, you told the Religion Media Centre that more Anglican churches would probably join the Evangelical Alliance due to that communion’s debate over blessings for same-sex couples. The Church of England subsequently approved those blessings and started offering them for the primary time in December. Have these developments in truth spurred more evangelical Anglican individuals and congregations to affix the EA?
We’ve seen more Anglican churches joining us than normal, and once I’ve preached in Anglican settings, we’ve seen more individuals join us than normal. So, there is no such thing as a doubt that for many who are wanting to remain throughout the Church of England, they’re also on the lookout for a house with us as well, and that’s exciting. … There’s no happiness on our part that [these developments have] led to that, but we’re here to serve and support.
Loads of our work is advocacy. You have [Church of England] bishops within the House of Lords here, so why would an Anglican church need the advocacy of the EA historically? Now they’re undecided that their bishop is at all times going to say what they imagine. So yes, what we predicted a yr ago has come to fruition.
The EA describes itself as an “evangelical unity movement.” Evangelicalism within the US has often seemed very divided lately. Do you’re thinking that that UK evangelicals have been able to take care of a stronger sense of solidarity? If so, why?
Look, you may pick up the UK and drop it in Lake Michigan and it doesn’t touch the edges. So let’s be realistic in regards to the scale of where we’re. Because the nation is sufficiently small, you may have the relationships, and there’s a unity. Also, within the UK, we’ve lost our churchgoing culture. We unite or we die, so we’re united. Is that pragmatic? Is it a message from the Lord? It’s probably a little bit of each. But we will’t afford competition throughout the kingdom.
And we don’t have quite the identical marrying between evangelicalism and politics. That is kind of liberating. We have a member of Parliament for the Labor Party and a member of Parliament for the Conservative Party serving on the Evangelical Alliance council. Both are members of the EA, members of our council, and represent us more widely. I don’t think that might quite occur in the identical way in another parts of the world.
Previously, you led Youth for Christ within the UK and before that served as a youth employee with that organization. How did serving in youth ministry mold you as a pacesetter?
I learned to evangelise at school assemblies (you may’t do those within the US, but we will go to colleges and do assemblies) and youth prisons. When people ask now if I’m nervous about preaching to a big crowd, the reply isn’t any. I used to be nervous about preaching to 1,000 teenagers at a college who didn’t need to listen, or to 50 teenage lads who were imprisoned.
So firstly, there was an actual grounding to it. Secondly, in youth ministry, you have got to innovate. The average church leader within the UK lasts seven to 10 years. The average youth employee might last a few years. And the rationale for that’s youth culture changes 4 times as rapidly as adult culture. The most tiring thing in ministry is reimagining. It’s not about substance, it’s about contextualization. Reimagining to succeed in a [different] generation. I learned skills by doing that in youth ministry which can be helpful to no end in what I do now.
When you’re employed in youth ministry … you get empowered early. And that’s essential, because when Jesus wanted to vary the world he began a youth group, not an elder board. According to the late John Stott, the disciples were 15 to 22 years old. I believe that’s really difficult to us, because sometimes within the church in the event you’re not sufficiently old, you’re not adequate.
You have set a goal of getting 50,000 total individual EA members inside the subsequent decade. What gives you confidence that that is achievable, and what potential obstacles do you see to reaching that focus on?
The last yr gives us some confidence. I believe the UK is crying out for a brave and sort Evangelical Alliance that may steer them through the storms, that may keep the predominant thing the predominant thing, which is about people meeting Jesus.
But we’ll also take stands on the essential problems with our time from marriage to abortion to finish of life care to racial injustice and every little thing in between. As long as we stay on mission, and we don’t drift, and we keep our focus, and we spend more time on our knees than on our feet, I’m confident that the Lord is with us and we’ll get there.
There are quite a couple of obstacles. We’re living in a secular tsunami. It’s a really contested culture. There are fewer Christians within the UK than before. I’m believing for a significant movement of God, but we will’t currently claim to be in a single.
Another obstacle is that the UK has an aging population. Let’s be honest, of the 23,000 members we currently have, how lots of those will still be alive in ten years? I don’t want to begin doing that math, but some are going out the back door in addition to through the front door … I have faith that the Lord’s got this, but only a idiot would take a look at our culture and think there aren’t any obstacles.
