Monday, September 08, 2008
Image
Bonnie at Intellectuele writes on our image obsessed culture and concludes:
As Bonnie says - attractiveness has its place, but when the church holds up as attractive the same false idea of attractive that our culture paints, we have a problem. But, always comes the refrain, nobody comes if we don't do that. Which brings me to G.K. Chesterton:
Changing our image is easy, being transformed is hard work.
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Humans have always been celebrity-worshipers, have always demanded "perfection" from their celebrities, and have always worshiped whatever it was that they thought brought them happiness and prosperity, i.e., gave them life. This is nothing new. And vanity is nothing new. Neither is power, beauty, image, nor captivation. These things of themselves are not bad; they are in many ways basic to life. It's just a matter of what is allowed to have power in our lives. What power do we choose to use and how, and why; what do we deem beautiful, and why? Do we keep the different kinds in their proper places, allowing them their powers appropriately?Bonnie has excellently diagnosed a cultural issue in this post, but I am far less concerned about the cultural decline she evidences than I am the fact that the church mirrors the same issues and rather than provides alternatives, capitalizes on the forces created. Mega-church pastors become celebrities and Joel Osteen writes books about "Better Life," church boards worry obsessively about the congregations image in the community, and we remodel the physical plant when we should be transforming lives.
May we be captivated (and captivating) by what truly will bring us good and not evil. Appeal must have its proper use, and its proper place.
As Bonnie says - attractiveness has its place, but when the church holds up as attractive the same false idea of attractive that our culture paints, we have a problem. But, always comes the refrain, nobody comes if we don't do that. Which brings me to G.K. Chesterton:
Christianity has not been tried and found wanting, it has been found difficult and not tried.If the church is not attractive it is not because we have an image problem, it is because we have not allowed ourselves to be sufficiently transformed as to allow the true glory of God to shine in and through us. Said again, slightly differently, God offers to make us into beings so attractive that people cannot stay away, but it is an attractiveness radically different from anything the world has seen save when Christ walked among us.
Changing our image is easy, being transformed is hard work.
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