About ten years ago I discovered the writings of Henri Nouwen through his book ‘The Return Of The Prodigal Son.’ The book is an extended reflection on the parable from Luke 15 inspired by a meditation on a painting of the story by Rembrandt.
Suffice to say I enjoyed it so much that a very large framed print of the painting hangs our family room.
Henri Nouwen was a Roman Catholic scholar.
But I appreciate that some of his observations about the Bible illuminate my own understanding of its truths.
At Reformation21 Carl Trueman ponders a tendency in certain parts of evangelicalism
“to claim anybody who is helpful or admirable as an evangelical of some sort. It is our equivalent of Rahner’s `anonymous Christians’ — except we have `anonymous evangelicals.’ To put it in the idiom of the English class system, many theologians are `decent sorts of chaps who, if they had only known, would have been evangelicals, don’t you know.’ The great example of this reception/appropriation/transformation at American evangelical hands is C S Lewis (high church Anglican, believer in purgatory, advocate of the Devil ransom theory of atonement — these being only the three most obvious of his non-evangelical credentials). Now, I am not sure why this is, why we need to make somebody a member of the club. Maybe because there is a general cultural difficulty with finding people who are different to be helpful? Thus, by making them like us, the problem is overcome. That is one possibility.”
Read ‘Bonhoeffer and Anonymous Evangelicals’ at Reformation21.
mgpcpastor's blog 
An excellent article.
I remember in a very early sermon once calling G K Chesterton an Evangelical. I was helpfully corrected by a well meaning friend.
I think Tim Keller is probably the unnamed target here. Keller calls Lewis a hero and has written the foreward to Metaxas’ recent Bonhoeffer biography.
But it’s tricky. Because we do like our hero’s. I do. Lloyd Jones is probably my biggest hero. And the writings of Tim Chester and John Frame are becoming a little too close to inerrant sometimes for my own good.
And when someone does become my hero, I tend to be unreflective about them. Keller is a hero to many now. And in some sense that is a good thing. He says some things in a wonderfully helpful way. But you don’t have to scratch far below the surface of the internet to find lots of people who are questioning his Reformed credentials – and perhaps with good reason.
As I wrote, I found Nouwen’s imagery adorned my understanding of various biblical themes, but I had found myself substituting my appreciation for him as a form of orthodoxy.
Same with Brennan Manning and a few others.
I think there is a wider tendency within US culture to ‘baptise’ or ‘evangelicalise’ things to grant them greater legitimacy.
Consider the debate about whether each president is a ‘Christian’ or not.
And then there was that song about Sarah Palin that I cross posted from Nathan yesterday.
Like a separation between church and state, there is really no problem with a distinction between evangelicalism and other Christian theologies.
I think the distinction actually helps to preserve Gospel clarity.
‘Reformed Credentials’.
Now there’s a loaded expression.
I’m still trying to get my head around the two kingdom/no two kingdom, federal vision and new perspective on Paul things.
Apparently our Australian theological lecturers are too occupied to try and precis some stuff to help working pastors get on top of it all.
I know enough about the NPP and FV to put them outside the camp. ‘Works Righteousness’ springs to mind. And if I’m wrong, then I’m still waiting for someone to clearly show me my error.
The 2 kingdom thing seems less important. Is it?
I can’t perceive any Gospel issue to do with 2K.
It has impacts on Christian living and the church’s relationship with civil authorities, which in turn impact on the contexts in which we communicate the Gospel.
I don’t read the New Testament and get the idea that Christians are trying to ‘take over’ the civil government or seeking to have the civil government run to their standards.
There are however absolute moral standards in Scripture which I understand that governments should support and defend.
I think that makes me 2K and I’m still working out how that fits with the magisterial reformation legacy we inherit in the Westminster standards.