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My sister belongs to an interdenominational women's Bible study group. She has been teaching over the last year or so. She was speaking to one of the women there about me, and mentioned that I attend a Calvary Chapel. The woman told her that Calvary Chapels were charismatic churches. While that is not the case, I wondered what her definition of charismania actually is. For that matter, it made me think about what the differences are between a charismatic and an evangelical, as those two terms are not always used for what they must mean. I always think of "Inigo Montoya" from "The Princess Bride" at times like this, because he said, "You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means." (laughing here)

"Charismatic" usually refers to a believer who practices certain spiritual gifts, like speaking in tongues, interpreting tongues, healing, prophecy or the receiving of a "word of knowledge". I don't know who dubbed those gifts "charismatic", but that's the way it is. A lot of non-charismatics believe that those gifts did exist in New Testament times as a sign to the unbelieving, but that those gifts no longer exist. They believe they have "ceased". Charismatic believers and non-charismatic believers would probably agree that the 'other' gifts, like teaching, giving, administration or the gift of prayer for example, are all gifts that remain to this day.

I think more than that, there is a 'style' of worship among charismatic churches that might be characterized as more, well...'energetic' than other churches, wherein the services are a lot more emotional? I could be wrong, but the thing is, a lot of the things that thirty years or so ago may have bull's-eyed a church as 'charismatic' have now come to be accepted and practiced by much larger numbers of mainstream Christian denominational and non-denominational churches.

These days, the word evangelical can refer to either a charismatic Christian or a non-charismatic Christian. In my thinking, evangelicals are those who hold to those doctrines that show that Christianity is not a religion, but rather a personally interactive relationship with Almighty God through His Son, Jesus Christ. I'm talking about believing in Jesus' virgin birth, that He was fully human, His substitutionary, atoning death on the cross for sinful man, His resurrection, His grace. When I think evangelical, I think of people who believe that the Bible means what it says, and says what it means. I think of people who believe that all have sinned and are deserving of God's wrath, and that the only way to salvation is through Jesus Christ and what He did for them on the cross--in their place. I think of people who trust solely in Him to have provided the way for their sins to be forgiven, and who believe that He has resurrected, ascended to heaven and that He is now with the Father, interceding for them.

I am not a cessationist, even though I grew up in a more liturgical, conservative church. Raising one's hands during the church service was never seen. Forget it. My wife grew up in a church much like the one I grew up in. She would not have thought of raising her hands in worship. But-- my wife and I belong to a church now where that sort of thing is accepted, and if people want to dance in the Lord, they are not discouraged from doing so in an orderly way. Not too many folks usually do, but it is not discouraged.

As far as the terms, "charismatic" and "evangelical" go when applied generally to churches, if one wants to get down to where the rubber and the road meet, I would say that it has more to do these days with the origin of those movements, (and what they might dwell upon), so the two are not interchangeable, but on a surface level they can share certain things. Certain, 'superficial' things we might do at our church might be totally unacceptable in another evangelical church down the road, even if my church does not accept an over-emphatic, preoccupation with spiritual gifts and experiential signs and wonders.