Speller, following the research of Nelson and Nelson in the 1970s, notes how each of the above three models placed Black churches within a reactive rather than a proactive mode. Finding that problematic, and unsatisfied that previous interpretive models accurately depicted Black churches that emerged in the 1960s, Nelson and Nelson developed a fourth model, The Ethnic Community-prophetic Model. Black churches that have been categorized as such are those that have been marked by Blacks who spoke out and undertook activism against economic and political injustices from a heightened awareness of Black pride and power.
