Customer Reviews

Believers: A Journey into Evangelical America

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US News and World Report editor Jeffery Sheler travels from place to place, meeting with evangelical Christian leaders and laypeople and discovers that they are normal people trying to live out their faith in ever changing times.

The book may have had its birth in the late 1980s in the wake of the televangelist sex scandals involving Jim Bakker and Jimmy Swaggart. While other US News reporters were making fun of gullible evangelicals, Sheler kne deep down that this was not the evangelicalism/fundamentalism he remembered as a youth.

Sheler himself was saved as a young man in a fundamental Baptist church back in the early 1960s, but later had joined a mainline church with his wife. He noticed that the evangelicalism of the 21st century seemed a lot different from the evangelicalism of 40 years earlier, and so he takes a trip through the wonderful world of evangelicalism. He meets with Pentecostal Bishop John Gimenez, James Dobson, Rick Warren, Cowboys for Christ, Albert Mohler Jr, Richard Mouw, and National Association of Evangelicals advisory board member Richard Cizik. The visit with James Dobson was revealing, as Dobson took the time to bristle at his critics who always want to ask him about his politics.

Sheler even takes a short term mission trip to Guatemala with a work group from an Atlanta Wesleyan church, which included an adventurous ride into the mountains on curvy roads without guard rails.

I would strongly recommned this book as a gift for anyone who is not an evangelical who wants an inside look into our culture. Sheler never tries to take cheap shots or portray the movement in an unfair light. You will enjoy his forays into evangelical America.

Rev. Marc Axelrod

I'm glad that evenhanded religion journalist Jeffery L. Sheler is the one that takes us through the world of American evangelicalism in his recent book-length report Believers: A Journey into Evangelical America. Having grown up in the deep South, I'm always interested in this topic, and Sheler has a great background for reporting on it: he's been on the inside and the outside, having gone through an intense evangelical stage as a teenager and since joined Mainline Presbyterianism. He represents a wide swath of American Christians and a wider swath of any kind of American that's curious about the rise of the evangelicals' political prowess and the roots of a movement that seems stronger than ever. Great background on major figures like George Whitestone, John Wesley, and more modern mouthpieces Pat Robertson and Billy Graham. You'll meet evangelicals from lots of different points of view, and the big surprise is that the movement is not as cohesive as you might think. A fascinating read, though slow at points.

Thanks to the growing influence of evangelicals on the politics and culture of America, journalists like Jeffery Sheler are beginning to take a closer look at just who these people are who identify with evangelicalism. And what they're discovering is that evangelical America is far more diverse and far more normal than the media --- print, television and film alike --- portray. In making this discovery, Sheler, contributing for religion for U.S. News & World Report, crisscrossed the country observing and interviewing evangelical Christians, both well-known leaders and the so-called "people in the pew."

Unlike some journalists (including one clueless reporter Sheler heard about who expected to witness a person being born-again, as if it was a visible ritual), Sheler did not enter the world of evangelicalism as a complete stranger. Spiritually reared in a fundamentalist Baptist church, Sheler eventually became disenchanted with fundamentalism, began attending a Nazarene church and, later, a Nazarene college, before transferring to a state university. Clearly, Sheler understands the nuances that distinguish fundamentalism from evangelicalism, something many in the media miss.

To launch his quest, Sheler began at the Rock Church in Virginia Beach, VA, pastored by John and Anne Gimenez, where the line between faith and politics appeared to be particularly blurred to him (not all that surprising, considering Gimenez's geographic, political and spiritual proximity to Pat Robertson). Sheler's journey included visits to other mega churches, such as Rick Warren's Saddleback Church in Lake Forest, CA. Warren, author of the unprecedented bestseller THE PURPOSE-DRIVEN LIFE, represented the opposite end of the faith-politics spectrum --- unlike Gimenez or Robertson, Warren stays out of the public policy debate, and with him the diversity in evangelicalism becomes even more apparent.

From the academic rigor of Wheaton College near Chicago to the fun- and praise-filled environment of the annual rock festival in Pennsylvania known as Creation, from the ministry-saturated city of Colorado Springs to the evangelical think tanks in Washington, D.C., and from Billy Graham's 2006 New York crusade --- his last --- to the mission field in Guatemala, Sheler covers most of the bases that are representative of a religious movement that has risen to significant prominence in a relatively short time.

One distinctive feature of Sheler's work is the extensive history he provides, not only of the evangelical movement but also of the churches and other institutions --- such as Wheaton College --- that he examines along the way. Another is the many conversations he has with the previously mentioned people in the pew, though there's seldom a pew to be found in today's evangelical churches. He strikes up conversations with visitors to the Focus on the Family headquarters, young people at Creation 2005 and a Canadian volunteer with Habitat for Humanity, among others. Each conversation serves to shed more light on the many faces of evangelicalism, even when --- or perhaps, most often when --- one professing evangelical contradicts another.

Those outside the evangelical world will likely learn a great deal from BELIEVERS, while evangelicals themselves --- who, like me, may find a misinterpretation or two if they choose to quibble --- should be relieved that a journalist of Sheler's caliber has offered a fair and generally positive look into a world that outsiders just don't seem to get.

--- Reviewed by Marcia Ford

Sheler is fair and historically accurate as far as I can tell. I have enjoyed reading this book as an evangelical insider. Sheler seems fit to write such a book as a man with one foot in both worlds.

I found Believers on sell at a Books-a-million for $1, and it seems you can get it that cheap anywhere. To me, its ashamed the book doesn't sell better. I wonder if fair is just simply not very popular.(?)

Sheler presents a good sociological analysis of the "Evangelical" movement in the US, outlining its history and characteristics. Written in a popular but reflective and analytical style, this is a cultural perspective on an important though diverse segment of the American populaiton.

The insights and social portrait that arise from Sheler's investigations shed light on some recent trends in American politics and culture that often puzzle European observers and Americans themselves. The author starts with his personal experience and moves into a journalistic engagement, reporting on field interviews and personal observations over a period of years.

Sheler narrates, for instance, his experience of accompanying a volunteer mission group to Guatemala, and reports on his experiences, insights and conversations with visiting and local leaders and the Mayan people they built homes for. He tells of attending a Christian "Woodstock" event, held annually since 1979, and details conversations and encounters with various participants.

This is a sophisticated and yet personal presentation presenting a credible picture that attempts to overcome the common stereotypes. The author's analysis enables the reader to see "evangelicals" from the inside. He also is clear and coherent about the unique characteristics and the diversity within the movement and shows us why some notable irritating examples of the "evangelicals" have led to the popular stereotypes.

He enables us to see deeper into the diverse movement to find caring, sensitive and cooperative human beings concerned about the environment, their neighbours and the hurting poor and social injustice around the world.

Besides just being an interesting and readable story, entertaining and engaging, this book will enable the reader to better understand to 40-60 million Americans who claim to be "evangelical" Christians.