Rick Warren preaches at the main campus of Saddleback Church in Lake Forest, Calif., in August 2021. Warren founded Saddleback Church in 1980 and followed management principles to foster the Southern California congregation’s remarkable growth. Warren’s “The Purpose Driven Life” is one the top-selling nonfiction books in modern history. (Source credit: Photo by author)

From the prologue of Soul Winners: The Ascent of America’s Evangelical Entrepreneurs, published in September 2022 by Prometheus Books, an imprint of Globe Pequot:

What makes someone an evangelical? The term is derived from the classical Greek word euangelion, translated as “gospel” or “good news” in reference to the Gospels of the New Testament and the evangelists Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Scholars generally agree that evangelicals are Protestants who believe in “the literal or near-literal truth of the Bible,” feel the missionary spirit to spread the word of God, and believe that a conversion or “born-again” experience is necessary for salvation. Evangelicals often speak of having a personal relationship with Jesus that influences every aspect of their daily lives.

Evangelicals encompass a wide range of Protestants—fundamentalists, dozens of Baptist groups, Pentecostal churches, and charismatics. Some are independent or nondenominational or are loosely tied to an association of churches. Predominately Black Protestant churches, such as the African Methodist Episcopal Church, evolved separately from the broader, largely white evangelical tradition that is the subject of this book. Many evangelical congregations in cities are a blend of races, ages, and income levels.

Evangelicals are more conservative theologically than mainline Protestants, who interpret the Bible through the lenses of modern science and scholarship. Their political liberalism can be traced to the Social Gospel movement of more than a century ago that believed it was the duty of Christians to correct social injustices. In recent years, many denominations have splintered over whether to sanction same-sex marriage or to ordain openly gay clergy. Mainline denominations include the Episcopal Church, the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), the United Methodist Church, and many Lutheran groups. The churches adhere to traditional standards of liturgical worship and their ministers report to ecclesiastical authorities. In contrast, evangelical entrepreneurs design their own services and create their own structures, whether it is a church, Bible institute, media-based empire, or a full-fledged university.

Surveys on religious affiliation rely on the self-identification of respondents, so gauging the true sizes of groups is challenging. The Public Religion Research Institute’s 2020 Census of American Religion interviewed more than four hundred fifty thousand adults from 2013 to 2019. It found that white evangelical Protestants represented 14.5 percent of the U.S. population in 2020, down from a high of 23 percent in 2006. White mainline Protestants dipped from 17.8 percent in 2006 to 16.4 percent in 2020. A Religious Landscape Study taken years earlier by the Pew Research Center looked at the groups in their totality. Pew reported that mainline Protestants dropped from forty-one million in 2007 to thirty-six million in 2014, its most recent survey. Meanwhile, evangelical Protestants increased from sixty million to sixty-two million. (The PRRI and Pew surveys did not measure depth of belief or intensity of activity among the respondents. Both polls agreed that the country’s largest religious group was the religiously unaffiliated, often called the “nones.”)

Evangelicals have flourished in America’s religious marketplace by blending business principles and media savvy. As the first country in modern history constituted without an established religion, America provided the perfect climate for innovators. Persuasion, not coercion, would be the key ingredient to succeed in their mission to win souls for Christ. Early evangelists such as George Whitefield transcended sectarianism and took his message where the people were. Successors such as Charles G. Finney and ballplayer-turned-fundamentalist-preacher Billy Sunday understood how to create a sensation, and Dwight L. Moody united big business and revivalism.

Evangelical entrepreneurs learned that they had to excel at mass communication to thrive. Radio and television could spread the Gospel faster than even the most tireless traveling preacher. The flamboyant preacher Aimee Semple McPherson knew that radio’s intimacy was ideal for listeners seeking a personal relationship with Jesus. Billy Graham and Oral Roberts built multimedia empires that packaged evangelicalism for a mainstream audience. Though not typically categorized as evangelicals, Norman Vincent Peale and Robert Schuller perfected an upbeat style of preaching, a mastery of media, and a consumer-focused approach to ministry that influenced evangelical megachurches.

For more than a century, corporate titans have funded evangelical enterprises that echoed their pro-business, anti-union beliefs. Such a worldview values individualism over collective action, private charity over government activity. When these ideals are preached from the pulpit and interwoven with politics, they land with a compounded force. Liberal programs are portrayed as socialist threats to personal freedoms. They are even considered to be anti-Christian and un-American. Jerry Falwell Sr. pushed evangelicals into political activism while engaging in the business of winning souls through his megachurch and media ministry. White evangelicals have remade the modern Republican Party in their own image.

Two of the nation’s largest evangelical churches were created through market research and management principles, inspiring countless imitators. Bill Hybels left a career in business to found Willow Creek Community Church in the Chicago suburbs. He canvassed neighborhoods to find out what people liked and didn’t like about church and organized Willow Creek around meeting those needs. A few years later, Rick Warren did much the same in Southern California when he started Saddleback Community Church. Warren, the bestselling author of The Purpose Driven Life, who has cited management guru Peter Drucker as a key influence, created a consultancy for pastors as Hybels did. “Seeker-sensitive” churches like these target the unchurched and present a full menu of activities to keep them engaged all week

“Prosperity gospel” megachurches such as Joel Osteen’s Lakewood Church in Houston are more explicit about linking belief to material wealth. Other like-minded preachers, such as World Changers Church International’s Creflo Dollar (who asked his congregation for $65 million to buy a Gulfstream G650 jet) and Relentless Church’s John Gray (who purchased a $200,000 Lamborghini as an anniversary gift for his wife), exude material signs of success that amplify their message that faith will be rewarded in this world as well as in the kingdom to come. If people are struggling spiritually, emotionally, or financially, perhaps they can achieve a better life through faith—a powerful idea that has profoundly shaped American life.

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