Balanced

In Yancey’s book "I was just wondering" he deals with the reality of suffering and the issue of “positive thinking” in the modern church.

He claims that the once “morbidly minded” (melancholy) evangelicals who were led by the likes of Wesley etc. competed with the “healthily minded” (overly optimistic) sects like Christian science - which (early last century) thrived in times of unprecedented prosperity.

(Interestingly, the influential Word-Of-Faith movement also has much of its roots in Christian Science as well as pentecostal revivalism).

These sects ‘met their waterloo’ when the reality of the depression and the World Wars hit - “a monstrous fact that exposed the flaws in their vision of the world and humanity”.

But what Yancey claims is that this “healthy mindedness” is now characteristic in the Christian church and he concludes his mini-thesis with the statement ”I hope and pray an even more ominous fact does not arise to smother the ‘healthy-mindedness’ that has swept evangelicalism in the last few decades”.

My personal view is that we do need to allow times for melancholy reflection and teaching “in the correct season” and with correct perspective - otherwise Yancey’s concern may be well placed.