I first read historian Paul E. Johnson’s 1978 book A Shopkeeper’s Millennium: Society and Revivals in Rochester, New York, 1815-1837 in 1989 while I was studying church history at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. Johnson argued that evangelical religion in Rochester,...
First Great Awakening
The First Great Awakening and a New England cold spell
Two years before Jonathan Edwards preached “Sinners in the Hand of an Angry God” he suffered through what historian Philip Jenkins calls a “horrific period of extreme weather and glacial cold.” Here is Jenkins at History News Network: Scholars of...
Liberty University’s Falkirk Center is promoting an embarrassingly bad Eric Metaxas speech on the American Revolution
I was going to include this in my MAGA evangelicals post this morning, but I decided to save it for a separate post. The Falkirk Center at Liberty University just tweeted a video of an Eric Metaxas speech: Almost everything...
Liberty University’s Falkirk Center meets all expectations at its “Get Louder” event
Yesterday, Liberty University’s Falkirk Center, the culture war wing of the largest Christian university in the world, held a 1-day conference titled “Get Louder: Faith Summit 2020.” Evangelical Trump supporters were encouraged to yell and scream more, fight more, and...
A George Whitefield statue is coming down at the University of Pennsylvania
George Whitefield was arguably the most popular man in colonial America. His preaching was the catalyst for the colonial-wide evangelical revival that historians call the “First Great Awakening.” Recently, the University of Pennsylvania decided to remove a Whitefield statue on...
The Author’s Corner with Wendy Raphael Roberts
Wendy Roberts is Assistant Professor of English at the University of Albany, SUNY. This interview is based on her new book, Awakening Verse: The Poetics of Early American Evangelicalism (Oxford University Press, 2020). JF: What led you to write Awakening Verse? WR: When...
Should Evangelicals Be Defined By Their Spiritual Commitments or Something Else?
(This is the second post in a series on the word “evangelical” in the eighteenth-century and today). In my first post in this three-post series, I made the case that there was a religious movement in the eighteenth-century that can...
Yes, There Was an “Evangelical” Movement in the Eighteenth Century and it Should Be Defined Theologically
(This is the first post in a series on the word “evangelical” in the eighteenth-century and today). If the Jonathan Merritt dust-up had a positive result, it was that it got historians thinking again about the meaning of the word...
Pastor Greg Laurie Wrongly Tells Fellow Court Evangelicals that the United States Was “founded in a time of spiritual revival”
Here is what Laurie recently told his congregation (as reported by the Christian Post) about his speech (and prayer) at the August 27 court evangelical celebration at the White House: Laurie reminded those in attendance for the dinner that the...
The Author’s Corner with Peter Choi
Peter Choi is Director of Academic Programs at Newbigin House of Studies. This interview is based on his recent book George Whitefield: Evangelist for God and Empire (Eerdmans, 2018). JF: What led you to write George Whitefield? PC: It was a seemingly...
Is Evangelicalism Primarily a Political Movement?
No, it is not. I think John Turner is correct in his recent piece at The Anxious Bench blog. Here is a taste: John Fea, in what has become a must-read age-of-Trump blog about American religion, quotes from C.S. Lewis’s Screwtape...
On Misspelling George Whitefield’s Name
Twenty-five years ago I was writing an M.A. thesis on separatist fundamentalism in twentieth-century America. One of the key figures in my research was a mid-century fundamentalist named Carl McIntire. (I actually published an article about him in 1994). As...
2017 Princeton Seminar: Day 6
The 2017 Princeton Seminar on the “Colonial Era” wrapped-up yesterday. The day began with lectures on the “Enlightenment in America” and the “First Great Awakening.” The Enlightenment lecture focused largely on the lives of Philip Vickers Fithian and Benjamin Franklin. The...
The Author’s Corner With Doug Winiarski
Douglas Winiarski is Associate Professor of Religious Studies and American Studies at the University of Richmond. This interview is based on his new book Darkness Falls of the Land of Light: Experiencing Religious Awakenings in Eighteenth-Century New England (University of North...
Jonathan Edwards on the Marks of the Christian Convert
Last week James Dobson claimed that Donald Trump had recently had an evangelical or “born-again” conversion experience.” Since Dobson is a well-known leader within evangelicalism there are many Christians who believe his claim. Others are skeptical. I have no idea if...
One and Done
In case you haven’t seen the First Round results in the 2016 Junto March Madness tournament, my article “The Way of Improvement Leads Home: Philip Vickers Fithian’s Rural Enlightenment (JAH 2003) lost to Jon Butler’s “Enthusiasm Described and Decried: The Great Awakening...
“Born Again”: Backstory Devotes an Episode to Religious Renewal in America
In case you missed you missed it, Backstory with the American History Guys (Peter Onuf, Ed Ayers and Brian Balough), a syndicated public radio program, did an Easter espisode on religious renewal in American history. Guests on this episode were...
Thomas Kidd on George Whitefield
I have yet to read Thomas Kidd’s new biography of George Whitefield, but it is getting a lot of attention and some very good reviews. In this interview with Justin Taylor of the Gospel Coalition, Kidd gives us a nice...
The Author’s Corner with John Howard Smith
John Howard Smith is Associate Professor at Texas A&M University– Commerce. This interview is based on his new book, The First Great Awakening: Redefining Religion in British America, 1725-1775 (Fairleigh Dickinson, December 2014). JF: What led you to write The First Great Awakening?...
The Author’s Corner with Thomas S. Kidd
Thomas Kidd is Professor of History at Baylor University. This interview is based on his new book, George Whitefield : America’s Spiritual Founding Father (Yale University Press, 2014). JF: What led you to write George Whitefield : America’s Spiritual Founding Father? TK: George...