In Belgium, some evangelicals are opposing an evangelistic event

Note from Bruce Barron, blog editor: On September 27, Franklin Graham, son of famous evangelist Billy Graham, will hold a “Festival of Hope” evangelistic event in Brussels, Belgium. But Léo Lehmann, who pastored a church in Brussels for eight years and now serves as a freelance writer, editor, and translator with various ministries including a French-speaking European missiological network (REMEEF) and Christianity Today magazine, won’t be participating. In this guest post, Lehmann explains why he and his Baptist denomination didn’t want to be associated with the Festival of Hope.

When Billy Graham held an evangelistic meeting in Brussels in 1975, Protestants represented 2 percent of the Belgian population. Today, it is 3 percent—a modest change in 50 years.

Still, we’re again told that “Europe is ripe for harvest,” and Belgian evangelical leaders are leading us into a new Graham crusade. But with a new Graham: Franklin Graham, Billy’s son. Here is why I'm not happy with that, even though this episode has given me some hope for evangelicalism in Belgium.

Billy Graham wasn’t a perfect figure. He was a man of his time, with his own temptations. Still, he generally kept an open mind and maintained balanced positions, which allowed him to open many doors for the gospel.

But when Christianity Today asked him in 2011 about what he would do differently if he could go back in time, he replied, “I also would have steered clear of politics. … I know I sometimes crossed the line, and I wouldn’t do that now.”

Despite all attempts to make him the legitimate heir of his father, Franklin Graham has ignored this warning. From his support for the US invasion of Iraq in 2003 to his enthusiastic support of President Donald Trump, Franklin Graham has a long record of strong political partisanship and divisive comments. And he keeps on. In an August 6 Facebook post, celebrating a new decree from Donald Trump, he took aim at those he called “the never-Trumper, so-called evangelicals.”

Still, most leaders of the Belgian evangelical movement thought Franklin Graham and his organization would be a good pick to unify evangelicals around a shared event.

Belgium has three national languages (Flemish, French, and German) and many divisions. This is also true for the Belgian evangelical world, where we very often live apart in our silos. This is why the current leader of the main representative evangelical body, the Federal Synod, promotes "Unity and Prayer" and had the dream of gathering all evangelicals in a stadium. Contact was made with the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association (BGEA), which also desired to hold an event in Belgium. Everything fell into place, and after various meetings and evangelistic trainings in local churches, we’re a month away from the culminating event: the “Festival of Hope with Franklin Graham” in Brussels on September 27.

But the small Belgian section of the Baptist denomination I serve, the Association évangélique d’églises baptistes de langue francaise (AEEBLF), declined to be associated with the event. Of course, we sympathize with our brothers and sisters who want others to encounter Jesus. We recognize their efforts and we trust that God will use this event in gracious ways. But how are we supposed to unite around someone who publicly claims that those who don’t share his political stance can’t be fellow evangelicals?

I’ve been told by Belgian supporters of the event that Franklin Graham will “focus on the gospel.” But how will non-Christians view a gospel whose messenger goes hand in hand with one of the most controversial political leaders of our time? Isn’t there a deep misunderstanding about the nature and the fruit of the gospel of Jesus?

I’ve also been told that the American context is far from us and that we shouldn’t be concerned about it. But I see how the appetite for power and influence that undergirds wholehearted endorsement of political figures in the US represents a temptation for Christian movements in Europe as well. I see how the love of some American evangelicals for strong men and simple answers may align with some trends among churches here. It’s not only in the US that the fusion of an "unchanging gospel" with selective sets of “Christian values,” like the set used by the BGEA in its campaign for Donald Trump, nurtures feelings of superiority and self-righteousness while overlooking the needs of the most vulnerable among and around us. Others see these things too. We don’t want our Christian faith to go in these directions.

Even though many other Christians, in the US and Canada and even recently in Ethiopia, have challenged Franklin Graham’s stance, our decision not to participate in the Festival of Hope brought us a sense of isolation in our national evangelical landscape. What kind of Christian opposes an evangelistic event? But in a paradoxical way, this event may also have achieved part of its intended goal for me.

Opposing this initiative has offered me many opportunities for more in-depth conversations with my fellow evangelicals here. Those of us opposing the event have clarified our shared identity and what is important to us. Some of the supporters may have seen me as just a small annoyance in their path, but a few openly and honestly discussed what was at stake. We may have reached different conclusions, but I feel closer to them now.

Thus I am hopeful, because I see such opportunities for open dialogue as a far more promising way to deepen our unity than having a controversial foreign preacher bring us into one room. We could continue in this way. There is something greater in the quality of our sensitive presence to each other than in any event we could organize. Jesus said this is how the world will know we are his disciples (John 13:35).

Léo Lehmann, theologian and writer in Belgium. This article was first published at brucebarron.substack.com. Republished with permission.