Tuesday, April 29, 2008
Real Change
Ther is a new meme growing out there. I first encountered it as Justin Taylor linked to a post by Tullian Tchividjian:
Well, we are in an election cycle, and it is an election cycle in which we evangelical Christians of all stripes find our political clout diminished. Could it be we are "running home to mama" after we have taken a bit of a beating out there in the "real world?" Of course, nothing like this is EVER that simple, but I am betting it is a contributory factor.
Why do we do this to ourselves? It seems to happen with ever generation. We have to learn the same lessons over and over again.
If there is a change we need to make in the church, perhaps it is to restore the wisdom of age. Real progress could be made if the hard learned lessons of one generation were made available to the next in a way that permitted progress instead of relearning. When I was in school I did not have to discover acid-base chemistry for myself, it was taught to me so that I could use it to advance science to the next level.
In the church sometimes it seems like all we ever do is teach people how to make the same mistakes we made.
Where would I start? How about a little more self-revelation on the part of church leadership. Hmmmmm....there's a concept, confession as pedagogic tool. And here we always thought confession was about self-negation somehow. Funny how God is ALWAYS smarter than we are.
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“The world”, says Richard John Neuhaus, “desperately needs the Church to be the Church”, not to do church differently. The difference that people are longing for, in other words, is a difference in being, not doing. So while many church “strategists” are locating reformation and revival in structural renovation, we must remember that the deepest needs of the Church today are spiritual, not structural. And yet, we are told that the Church’s cultural relevance depends ultimately on its ability to keep up with the changing structures, on its ability to do church differently.Then, a week or two later, Al Mohler:
I have good news for all of us who are becoming weary of this type of pressure: We don’t have to keep up the way we think we do; the world doesn’t want us to! So how do we compete? We don’t! We must come to see that God has established His Church as an “alternative society”, not to compete with this world, but rather to offer a home to those who realize the homelessness of life in this world without Him. It is the calling and the privilege of the Church to be “against the world for the world”. We should be encouraged and challenged by the historical reminder that the Church has always served the world best when it has been most counter cultural, most distinctively different from the world.
The truths of God's Word reveal the Gospel of spiritual transformation, and the proclamation of the truths of God's Word is the only means available to us of cultural transformation. From beginning to end, it is all in God's hands. We are called to faithful witness and compassionate ministry. In the context of post-Christian America, our task is to preach the Gospel and to proclaim the truths of God's Word. As the Apostle Paul wrote to the Corinthian church, the Gospel is foolishness to those seeking wisdom and a scandal to those looking for power. To the redeemed, however, the Gospel is the power of God unto salvation. Here is found the only genuine transformation. Therein is found our charge.This is actually a very old meme resurfacing - I have talked about it constantly on this blog for years now. My question is, "Why is it resurfacing now?"
Well, we are in an election cycle, and it is an election cycle in which we evangelical Christians of all stripes find our political clout diminished. Could it be we are "running home to mama" after we have taken a bit of a beating out there in the "real world?" Of course, nothing like this is EVER that simple, but I am betting it is a contributory factor.
Why do we do this to ourselves? It seems to happen with ever generation. We have to learn the same lessons over and over again.
If there is a change we need to make in the church, perhaps it is to restore the wisdom of age. Real progress could be made if the hard learned lessons of one generation were made available to the next in a way that permitted progress instead of relearning. When I was in school I did not have to discover acid-base chemistry for myself, it was taught to me so that I could use it to advance science to the next level.
In the church sometimes it seems like all we ever do is teach people how to make the same mistakes we made.
Where would I start? How about a little more self-revelation on the part of church leadership. Hmmmmm....there's a concept, confession as pedagogic tool. And here we always thought confession was about self-negation somehow. Funny how God is ALWAYS smarter than we are.
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