Tuesday, January 24, 2006
Culture, Counterculture, Or Just The Church?
Transforming Sermons points to a Christianity Today article that Milt describes as "strong stuff." The article is by Michael S. Horton, professor of apologetics and theology at Westminster Seminary California. Here's a sampling
Besides, isn't it really the world's job to make itself relevant to God? Isn't that, in fact, why Jesus came, why He died, and why He was resurrected? Not because the convenant with Isreal had become somehow outmoded or outdated, but because it had become apparent to God that for the covenant to work, we had to be transformed.
It has always struck me as he height of hubris to assume that Christianity has to be made relevant - it defines relevant.
Related Tags: church, Christianity, relevance, christian bookstores, Christianity Today
So Christians are not called to make holy apparel, speak an odd dialect of spiritual jargon, or transform their workplace, neighborhood, or nation into the kingdom of Christ. Rather, they are called to belong to a holy commonwealth that is distinct from the regimes of this age (Phil. 3:20?21) and to contribute as citizens and neighbors in temporal affairs. "For here we do not have an enduring city, but we are looking for the city that is to come" (Heb. 13:14). The church, therefore, as the communion of saints gathered by God for preaching, teaching, sacrament, prayer, and fellowship (Acts 2:46?47), is distinct from the broader cultural activities to which Christians are called in love and service to their neighbors. In our day, this pattern is often reversed, creating a pseudo-Christian subculture that fails to take either calling seriously. Instead of being in the world but not of it, we easily become of the world but not in it.I love those opening sentences - have you been to a Christian bookstore lately? The author, not satisfied to simply critize, ends his post with a vision
But the church is not really a culture. The kingdom of God is never something that we bring into being, but something that we are receiving. Cultural advances occur by concentrated and collective effort, while the kingdom of God comes to us through baptism, preaching, teaching, Eucharist, prayer, and fellowship. "Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us be thankful, and so worship God acceptably with reverence and awe, for our 'God is a consuming fire' " (Heb. 12:28?29). There is nothing more important for the church than to receive and proclaim the kingdom in joyful assembly, raising children in the covenant of grace. They are heirs with us of that future place for those "who have tasted the heavenly gift, who have shared in the Holy Spirit, who have tasted the goodness of the Word of God and the powers of the coming age"?a holy land "which drinks in the rain often falling on it" and is "farmed" so that it reaps its Sabbath blessing (Heb. 6:4?8).
Can churches be a counterculture amidst anonymous neighborhoods and tourist destinations, the apotheoses of individual choice, niche demographics, and marketing? Yes. The church can exist amidst suburban sprawl as easily as in cities or small towns, precisely because its existence is determined by the realities of the age to come?by God's work, rather than by the narrow possibilities of our work in this present age under sin and death. After all, this is our Father's world, even though, for the moment, we are just passing through.The thought when I read this stuff is that we don't need to make Jesus, God, or the gospel somehow relevant to society - it is by defintion.
Besides, isn't it really the world's job to make itself relevant to God? Isn't that, in fact, why Jesus came, why He died, and why He was resurrected? Not because the convenant with Isreal had become somehow outmoded or outdated, but because it had become apparent to God that for the covenant to work, we had to be transformed.
It has always struck me as he height of hubris to assume that Christianity has to be made relevant - it defines relevant.
Related Tags: church, Christianity, relevance, christian bookstores, Christianity Today
