EVANGELICAL ALLIANCE, an association of different Christian denominations formed in London in August 1846, at a conference of more than 800 clergymen and laymen from all parts of the world, and embracing upwards of fifty sections of the Protestant church. Though the proposal for an alliance was first mooted in England, it ultimately obtained wide support in other countries, more especially in America, and organizations in connexion with it now exist in the different capitals throughout the world. The object of the Alliance, according to a resolution of the first conference, is “to enable Christians to realize in themselves and to exhibit to others that a living and everlasting union binds all true believers together in the fellowship of the church.” At the same conference the following was adopted as the basis of the Alliance :—“Evangelical views in regard to the divine inspiration, authority, and sufficiency of the Holy Scriptures; the right and duty of private judgment in the interpretation of the Holy Scriptures; the unity of the Godhead and the Trinity of persons therein; the utter depravity of human nature in consequence of the fall; the incarnation of the Son of God, His work of atonement for sinners of mankind, and His mediatorial intercession and reign; the justification of the sinner by faith alone; the work of the Holy Spirit in the conversion and sanctification of the sinner; the immortality of the soul, the resurrection of the body, the judgment of the world by our Lord Jesus Christ, with the eternal blessedness of the righteous and the eternal punishment of the wicked; the divine institution of the Christian ministry, and the obligation and perpetuity of the ordinances of Baptism and the Lord’s Supper;”—it being understood, however, 1st, that ...

EVANGELICAL ASSOCIATION, an American religious denomination originated about the beginning of the present century by Jacob Albrecht, a German Lutheran of Pennsylvania. About 1790 he began an itinerant mission among his fellow-countrymen, chiefly in Pennsylvania; and his labours meeting with considerable success, he was, at an assembly composed of representatives of the different stations, elected in 1800 presiding elder or chief pastor, and shortly afterwards rules of government were adopted somewhat similar to those of the Methodist Episcopal Church. In 1816 the first annual conference was held, and in 1843 there was instituted a general conference, composed of delegates chosen by the annual conferences and constituting the highest legislative and judicial authority in the church. The members of the general conference hold office for four years. In 1873 the association comprised 15 r annual conferences, consisting of over 600 itinerant and 400 local preachers, possessed 4 training colleges, and numbered 83,195 members.

EVANGELICAL UNION, a religious denomination which originated in the deposition of the Rev. James Morison, minister of a United Secession congregation in Kilmarnock, Scotland, for certain views regarding faith, the work of the Spirit in salvation, and the extent of the atonement, which were regarded by the supreme court of his church as anti-Calvinistic and heretical. His deposition took place in 1841; and his father, who was minister at Bathgate, and other two ministers being deposed not long afterwards for similar opinions, the four met at Kilmarnock in May 1843, and, on the basis of certain doctrinal principles, formed themselves into an association under the name of the Evangelical Union, “for the purpose of countenancing, counselling, and otherwise aiding one another, and also for the purpose of training up spiritual and devoted young men to carry forward the work and ‘pleasure of the Lord.’” The doctrinal views of the new denomination gradually assumed a more decidedly anti-Calvinistic form, and they began also to find many sympathizers amongζthe Congregationalists of Scotland. Nine students were expelled from the Congregational Academy for holding “Morisonian” doctrines, and in 1845 eight churches were disjoined from the Congregational Uniou of Scotland and formed a connexion with the Evangelical Union. In 1858 the Evangelical Union issued a new doctrinal statement superseding that of 1843. The Union exercises no jurisdiction over the individual churches connected with it, and in this respect it adheres to the Independent or Congregational form of church government; bat while the affairs of those of its congregations which originally belonged to the Independent denomination are managed by meetings of all the communicants, those congregations which ...

the inspired authors of the Gospels. The word is derived from the Greek, εὐαγτελιον, formed of εὖ, _bene_, “well,” and ἄγτελος, _angel, messenger_. The name of evangelists is said by some to have been given in the ancient church to such as preached the Gospel without being attached to any particular church, being either commissioned by the Apostles to instruct the nations, or, of their own accord, abandoning every worldly attachment, consecrated themselves to the sacred office of preaching the Gospel. In which sense these interpreters think it is that St. Philip, who was one of the seven deacons, is called “the evangelist” in Acts xxi, 8; and that St. Paul, writing to Timothy, bids him do the work of an evangelist, 2 Tim. iv, 5. It is, however, to be remarked, that the office in which the evangelists chiefly present themselves to our notice in the New Testament, is that of assistants to the Apostles; or, as they might be termed vice apostles, who acted under their authority and direction. As they were directed to ordain pastors or bishops in the churches, but had no authority given them to ordain successors to themselves in their particular office as evangelists, whatever it might be, they must be considered as but temporary officers in the church, like the Apostles and prophets. The term evangelist is, at present, confined to the writers of the four Gospels.