Evangelical?

I was reading Ben Witherington's blog today. He posted an article about a survey done by "Gary A. Tobin, president of the Institute for Jewish and Community Research, who set out to gauge levels of academic anti-Semitism compared to hostility toward other religious groups. He found that only 3 percent of college faculty holds unfavorable views toward Jews."

Another finding of this survey was that 53% of those surveyed admitted to an anti-evangelical bias.

What does evangelical mean? According to Merriam-webster, evangelical means the following:

1. of, relating to, or being in agreement with the Christian gospel especially as it is presented in the four Gospels
2. PROTESTANT
3. emphasizing salvation by faith in the atoning death of Jesus Christ through personal conversion, the authority of Scripture, and the importance of preaching as contrasted with ritual

I found an article on the web which says that evangelical is derived from the Greek word "euangellismos" which means: gospel or good news. Evangalism, I think, is to share the Word of God with those around us. If, by logic, an evangelical is a person who does that, then we should all be evangelicals. I hesitate, though, to assume this label.

This same article said that the characteristics of evangelicals are:

• Conversionism: the belief that lives of all humans need to be changed by way of a "born again" decision to repent of their sins and accept Jesus as Lord and Savior.
• Activism: the expression of the gospel in various ways, including missionary outreach and social reform.
• Biblicism: a particular regard for the Bible as the Word of God and the ultimate authority for religious belief and morality.
• Crucicentrism: a stress on the substitutionary atonement by Christ on the cross.

Am I an evangelical? I suppose I am, if it is defined as one who believes that we are to share the Word of God with those around us. I don't believe that I am if it is defined using the list above. I think these statements limit our faith, and limit God's gospel. While I do believe, and am grateful for the times that God transforms a person through a moment in time decision, I think he does it in more ways than this. I do believe in the necessity of activism. I also believe that the Bible give us the word of God, but I believe he communicates in more ways that just the Bible. I also believe that our salvation through the crucifixion is bigger than substitution.

Why is there an anti-evangelical bias? I think I leave that for another post. I do believe it is one of those words which causes some people to have an instant negative reaction, and we need to figure out why that is the case.