From 2006, this is my diagnosis of why evangelicals are increasingly drawn to the culture war. It’s not, contrary to what the rhetoric wants us to believe, because we have a Jesus shaped mission to the world, caring passionately about the issues Jesus cared about. No, it’s a bit less flattering.
I’m suggesting that spiritually empty, poorly led and poorly taught evangelicals are mistaking the Kingdom of God on earth for the victory of their political and cultural preferences. The Culture War is a poor replacement for the mission of the church as a Jesus shaped community, pointing to the eschatological Kingdom of God.
Read: The Tactics of Failure: Why the Culture War Makes Sense to Spiritually Empty Evangelicals.
Yup. I’ve been giggling all day at the fact that both the “naked public square” and “retake America for God” culture-warriors now have their worst nightmare for in the Oval Office (or soon to be). A politically left-leaning AND overtly Christian President.
To me, Obama’s election is a sign that most Americans don’t even accept the premise of the “culture war.”
Good stuff. I live in California and recently tried to argue that it isn’t necessarily the Scriptural thing to do to try to pass a law enforcing a Christian view of marriage when the rest of society doesn’t want it that way, even if the Bible does clearly teach us that marriage is between a man and a woman. The response? Accusations of putting my intellect above my devotion to Jesus and questions from “very disturbed” fellow Christians about how I could advocate something so “clearly unbiblical and against God’s plan” and this as evidence that I am “having a tug-of-war with God.” The culture war is inseparable from Christianity for many.
As a conservative Evangelical Christian, I do not see where this argument can apply at all on the issue of abortion. Abortion is the greatest of the civil rights issues for those of us who recognize that abortion kills an innocent living human being. The value that I place on the child is informed by my Christianity. Does that mean that I live in a Spiritual vacuum? Hardly. I have a deep and rich prayer life. I study both God’s Word and culture quite carefully. I conclude that God’s blessing is poured out on countries where He is glorified by the people — both individually and in the country’s laws.
This wonderful essay reminds me of the times of my youth attending a prominent large Southern Baptist Church here in Dallas. When our pastor would preach his sermon, the spiritual lessons would all be politely and quietly received. But if in a sentence or two he happened to rail against, say, “the liberals in Washington” the congregation would suddenly come alive and several amens would ring out.
As an American Christian, I feel that I am a steward of not just my time, talents and money, but of my rights and my vote. I do feel that I will answer to God for how I used what I was given. That’s not to say that God will say ‘you should have voted for that guy instead.’ Our hope is not in one man, one politician to save us, but is in Jesus. I don’t believe Christians should be pacifists in our culture. I guess you can argue with me on that…Well, I suppose you can’t, really, if you’re a pacifist. But we need to pick our battles carefully and allow the Holy Spirit to convict people of their sins and realize we offer a better way. It’s the same thing as missionaries attempting to show tribes a logical reason to give up human sacrifice because Christ offers a better way.
It should not surprise Christians however that the world is hostile to the gospel, to biblical ethics. It is interesting how so many Christians are concerned for ‘social justice’ i.e feeding homeless, planting trees and so forth for the call to ‘redemptive living.’ But many of these Christians are vehemently opposed to the old order of ‘social justice’ i.e. attempting to defend unborn human life. They do not recognize that they are part of the same cause – attempting to redeem and preserve our culture. What makes defending the life of an unborn child any less righteous than trying to save the life of a homeless man?
Matt-
being a pacifist doesn’t mean you cannot be active- it’s simply an alternative to violence, some I admit, are indifferent in their pacifism, but others simply see love as an alternative to anger or other ways of confronting that aren’t as effective. After all, Jesus resisted evil by showing it for what it was, by being full of love-such a huge contrast.
As for the statements on abortion-I agree, it is horrendous, it shouldn’t be done. But how many people who stand so opposed to it would be prepared to do whatever it took to save that baby, including loving the mother, providing for her, finding out why she was going to have the abortion, adopting the kid if need be, or supporting them?
I think the whole issue with the ‘culture war’ is that people get really upset about immoral things happening….but are they( i guess I should say ‘we’, we are all part of it)really willing to actually do something that matters about it? …instead of throwing huge temper tantrums maybe they should go befriend the people who are sinning and find out why, and learn how to love them, get involved in how complicated the entire thing is-do something that isn’t easy. It’s easy to sit and scream about all the immorality that’s going on. It’s much harder to go out and try and figure out how to love everyone in the midst of it and show them who Christ is so that they understand why we would want to live differently in the first place. and that seems to be what is lacking…..
I think the whole point of this good word is to get beyond the cultural wars and cultural Christianity. It’s so easy to continue to gravitate there whether with our arguments or our agreements. Lord Jesus, as your people lead us to “remember the height from which we have fallen, repent and do that things you (we) did at first” to rekindle a first love devotion to you and to your world. We need the Spirit to come and set his people free from our culture and our religion to be salt and light pilgrims.
In Lutheran theology, there is the concept of the “Two Kingdoms”. The “Kingdom of the Right” is the holy Christian church and the “Kingdom of the Left” is the world we live in. There is a distinction in the two kingdoms. The Kingdom of the Right has Law and Gospel while the Kingdom of the Left does not. Many times, we confuse the two kingdoms. We want to the society to do the work of the Church and the Church to do the work of society.
We live as citizens in two kingdoms, as Christians.
Great piece.
Just curious — wonder what your take is on the kind of cultural engagement a publication like First Things engages in?
Blessings!
I wonder if part of it could also be that as long as “we” are fighting the godless “them,” then we don’t have to look at our own sin. We transfer all, or at least most sin, to others, then build up a rage against “them” for whatever the current sin in fashion, so to speak, happens to be. We will fight like the proverbial dogs to defeat the sin we see out there, wherever that is. Meanwhile, our own spiritual condition continues to decline.
Pastor M;
“HERE AHURA-MAZDA, THERE AHRIMAN!”
– Ancient Persian battle cry; loosely translated, it means “Us Infinite Good! You Infinite Evil!”
I would contend:
1) Evangelicalism has gone too far in the culture war, your buddy Bob from a previous post being a great example.
2) A complete pull out from the culture war and becoming like Bob are only two possibilities in a broad range of alternatives.
3) It’s obvious that you don’t like the level to which evangelicals have become polticized. I don’t either. But from your essay, I can’t tell what level of political involvement you find acceptable or positive.
4) I hope that level is not “zero” because I really would hate to see evangelicalism follow the disastrous path of the Depression-era fundamentalists who effectively climbed into their ark and battened down the hatches.
5) Evangelicalism has always been poltical to some degree. The whole movement began with Carl Henry’s “The Uneasy Conscience of Fundamentalism” which was mainly a call to fundamentalists to return to social and political action.
6) We are called to be in the world, and not of it. I doubt that any body of believers has ever gotten the balance exactly right.
A few decades ago, it used to drive me crazy that evangelicalism seemd to be about nothing except scripture memory and shoving the Four Spiritual Laws in peoples’ faces. It used to drive me crazy that there was no evangelical thought or action on social issues. I think somewhere around 1990, we got the balance right for about a tenth of a second, and since then we’ve been erring horribly in the other direction.
And yet … I am obviously an unrepentant, but uncomfortable, culture warrior. In the last days of this election cycle, I noticed how hard it was for me to forgive some of my more enthusiastic, MoveOn.org Kool Aid drinking friends for their smugness. They definitely have attitude problems, no way around it. But my culture war was making it hard for me to show God’s love to them. So, I do have some changing to do.
Long comment! Sorry.
If I sat in a church and my pastor said that (insert candidate’s name here)’s election was God defeating Satan or God’s judgement on this country I would get up and walk out of the service, possibly for ever. Why don’t more Christians understand that if the church you are in isn’t following Christ closely enough for you….leave and find another. In this country we have a church on nearly every corner. There has to be ONE that you think is good enough. If not, it’s not the churches that are a problem. It’s you.
“They cheered when WWI broke out, then WWII, the six-day war, then Vietnam, then Desert Storm I, Desert Storm II, and now the Israel-Labonese conflict.”
Really? You know Christians that were CHEERING FOR wars and death? Really? I’ve been knee deep in Christian circles for 18 years and know no one…no one, who was happy to see any war. For you to imply that there were any other than a tiny fringe somewhere who were “cheering” death and destruction is dishonest.
DD
I have among my friends, cultural warriors who are the “anti-bob”, as full of the fruit of spirit as anyone I have ever met.
I still think they are wrong in their approach, and that they are focusing on the wrong things, but I would not for a second accuse them of being “Spiritually Empty.”
I find this rather frustrating. If we as Christians oppose the collapse of our culture into idiocy and barbarism, we’re “spiritually empty.” And if we don’t, well, we watch our society collapse into idiocy and barbarism.
I understand the concern that this sort of political engagement tends to make people act all ugly, but I can’t accept that it’s wrong to be involved and concerned.
DK:
I don’t think it is wrong to get involved, but politics by its very nature is the business of compromises. And when you bring your faith to bear on the issues of abortion and support the GOP, but then say nothing about issues of war and poverty and become a cheerleader for one party, that’s a problem. It frustrates me when many of my evangelical friends say the bible “clearly” speaks out about abortion, but when I ask them about the Iraq War they start doing textual gymnastics.
DaveD, is church-shopping really the answer to somebody else’s bad teaching? I’ve come to believe, in theory at least, it would be best to stay put and do what you can to challenge the leadership to reform itself. We used to tease some of the Bible professors at school for attending the most vapid wanna-be megachurches in town, but their position was, basically, “we were there first, and it’s not all about us”. They stayed, listening to inane sermons and hearing terrible music week in and week out. Just a thought.
“These are matters of high concern
Where State-kept schoolmen are;
But Holy State (we have lived to learn)
Endeth in Holy War.”
– Rudyard Kipling, “Macdonough’s Song”
“They cheered when WWI broke out, then WWII, the six-day war, then Vietnam, then Desert Storm I, Desert Storm II, and now the Israel-Labonese conflict.â€
Really? You know Christians that were CHEERING FOR wars and death? Really? — DaveD
End Time Prophecy fanboys. (Christian Zionist fanboys for any war involving Israel or the Mideast.) I remember them very well from the 1973 Yom Kippur War and both Gulf Wars. “THESE ARE THE BEGINNING OF THE BRITH PANGS! REJOICE, FOR THY REDEMPTION DRAWETH NIGH!”
When Late Great Planet Earth was the Left Behind of its day, Lindsay’s explaining of all the plagues of Revelation as nuclear weapons effects begat an attitude I called “Christians for Nuclear War”. It was Inevitable, It was Prophesied, (grab Bible from under desk and wave over head) “IT’S ALL IN REVELATION!” Not helped by the connected idea (preached in so many words during the 1975 Rosh Hashanah Rapture Scare) that The Rapture would happen as the first ICBM warheads were cutting atmosphere over their targets.
Is it just me, or does that sound Bat-turd Crazy Dangerous?
“DaveD, is church-shopping really the answer to somebody else’s bad teaching? ”
Yes. I’m not referring to one or two bits of disagreement. I VEHEMENTLY disagree with my Pastor’s take on the Rapture. He’s Pre-Trib, Take Me Home now sort. I believe that when Paul said “last trump” he meant it. This is not enough to leave my church over.
If my Pastor started preaching Properity (as popularized by TBN) I would give real thoughts to it.
The simple fact is that if the teachings of any given church is so fundamentally flawed as some that come here think their’s or someone else’s is, how can you continue to sit and listen to it? If you have brought the matter up with the pastor and nothings changed, shake the dust off your feet and leave nicely. Don’t be the guy that no one wants to be around because all he can do is complain about what’s wrong.
Maybe if more people were willing to leave a church that was wrong but comfortable instead of having 100 weak churches and 2 good ones we could have 100 weak churches and 4 good ones. Not a dramatic difference but the impact would be hard to ignore. Imagine doubling the on-fire, following Jesus churches in your city. What sort of an impact would that have?
Yes, HUG, that does seem NUTS. I have never seen it that I can remember. This is one of my big problems with the Pre-Trib Rapture theory. I hear people “longing to meet him in the air” but forgetting that, if true, it would mean judgement on a whole lot of people.
On the other hand, aren’t we supposed to rejoice when we see the signs of the times? Of course, in my mind, that rejoicing doesn’t take the form of “Us four and no more!!” or “Now you’re going to get your’s!” but a desperation to tell people to flee from the judgment that is coming.
DD
“The Culture War is a poor replacement for the mission of the church as a Jesus shaped community, pointing to the eschatological Kingdom of God.” –iMonk
Whoa, Michael! Didn’t you just say on the Hell House thread, and I quote, “I don’t do eschatology”? Yet here you are saying, and rightly so, that it is the mission of the church to be “a Jesus-shaped community, pointing to the eschatological [italics mine] Kingdom of God.”
Are these “just words” (to quote the president-elect). Do words have real meanings or are they just convenient sounds are mouths make when we do not want to convey anything at all?
As Desi used to say to Lucy, “You got a lotta ‘splainin’ to do.” What do you mean excactly when you use the word eschatology if you “don’t do” eschatology?
Bob Brague,
I believe Michael has a similar view on eschatology to me, that is, we may have a view on it, but we don’t want to waste time in debate on it as there are much more important and clearer things in scripture.
I grew up in a church and family that debated eschatology until the cows came home. When I got older I started to wonder, why did we waste so much time on that when there is so much more important stuff to be talking about.
And if I read you wrong on this Michael, my apologies.
Mike Bell
“Bob,”
I don’t do debates on eschatological theories and schemes. As I said, no major confession requires a detailed eschatology. My Southern Baptist Faith and Message Statement doesn’t. If you want mine, read N.T. Wright, Surprised by Hope.
Using the word “eschatological” means I believe in final things. Duh.
Sorry Ricky, Lucy ain’t playing eschatology arguments.
peace
MS
“The Michaels” (since we are using quotation marks): I agree with you both; we don’t need to be debating eschatological theories and schemes, and that wasn’t my purpose. There are many different opinions, and I was just wondering what yours was. Now I know, after a fashion. Certainly nobody’s breaking fellowship over a mere difference of opinion (what a novel concept!).
If you called me “Bob” because you think I am like the not-exactly-fictional “Bob” on that other thread, I prefer to be just plain Bob without the special punctuation.
Just Plain Bob
Little bit o’ “Bob” humor there Bob.
e.hope,
I’m changing my name because of the nature of this post (iMonk, don’t rat me out!)
What a beautiful post. As a Christian woman who had an abortion as a teenager and is now fully in the throws of Post-Abortion Syndrome (PAS), I wanted to weep at your lovingly truthful statements.
I am repenting for the sin of killing my unborn baby 17 years ago, and as I go through PAS and the healing from the trauma of the abortion, I have come to several conclusions:
* I am responsible for the death of my baby. And I’m suffering terribly for it now. The blame rests on my shoulders. That said…
* One of the influencing factors of my choice to abort/kill my baby is the judgment I KNEW I would experience in my own church. (And yes, I was a 3 service a week attending, born again believer as a teenager). I saw it happen when another unwed mother was forced to confess her sin in front of the church and I never witnessed a rallying around her or expressions of love for her after her repentance or a caring support for her and her baby.
* No one around me encouraged me to keep my baby — even my pro-life Christian family. Keeping the family name respected was more important than bringing a grandchild into the world.
That said, I have been deeply hurt by the church. And to this day, when people SPEAK up against abortion without showing a willingness to help or show love and concern for a woman in crisis, it’s as if I’m being judged over and over and over again for what I have done. Where is the love that Christ commands his people to demonstrate? Isn’t SPEAKING UP and not doing anything to help like saying, “I see you are in need, but leave me alone and may God help you!”? Being both a Christian and a woman in need of grace for this sinful choice, I see both sides of the equation in this debate. I have seen and have experienced the hypocrisy of the church (myself included) and I have been the desperate girl/woman in a crisis pregnancy situation.
I am coming to the conclusion that the evangelical church’s methods of trying to rid the country of this scourge as several things:
* As coming across as more angry/judgmental than as a message of truthful love and hope and peace through Christ.
* As missing an opportunity to share the gospel and be missional because of a lack of willingness to get one’s hands “dirty” to love the woman in crisis.
If the church wants to make a dent in this slaughter of innocents, I think speaking love and showing love to a woman in crisis will do so much more to sway her decision to the side of life rather than death. The pro-life movement, thankfully, is moving in that direction, at least with it’s message which is: Abortion HURTS women and we are FOR women. (No one told me I’d hurt this bad missing my baby). I’m truly mourning the death of my baby and the tragic reality that I am the one responsible for it.
Just wanted to through my 2 cents in and I’m feeling vulnerable for it. The reality is that 50% of women in this country have made the same tragic choice I have made, yet few of us can say we know someone who has had an abortion. Why? It’s too risky for us aborted women to admit, so I ask for grace in your words when you approach this sensitive topic–especially when you try to express your thoughts politically.
>The reality is that 50% of women in this country have made the same tragic choice I have made, yet few of us can say we know someone who has had an abortion.
I don’t believe that number is accurate.
I appreciate your story.
I am not going to have an abortion debate on this thread, so please don’t be upset if I close this thread. I don’t know any way to avoid a debate following this post.
peace
MS
>I don’t believe that number is accurate.
Hi Michael,
I did a quick statistical analysis based on the numbers out of Centre for Disease Control. Over the last thirty years the U.S. has averaged about 300 abortions per 1000 live births. Or .3 of an abortion for every 1 live birth. If the average women has had two kids, it means that the average women has had .6 of an abortion. Or one abortion for every two women. So Redeemed numbers are not far off.
I crunched the numbers a couple of other different ways too, and largely got the same results.
So to refocus the topic (and to end the debate on abortion for now) I would ask this question. What is the role of the Christian and the church as far as having a prophetic voice on these issues?
Is it that we need to have a prophetic voice proclaiming the good news of Jesus Christ in the knowledge that a life transformed by Christ will not be as influenced by the culture of the day?
I’m not upset at all at wanting to close the thread so as to avoid a debate on abortion. And my intent in sharing wasn’t to provoke a debate on the issue. I thought after I posted that I didn’t relate what I wrote well enough to the topic of your blog post. My intent on sharing that was just to give a real example to reinforce what e.hope had said. And to bring some perspective on the “culture war” as it relates to this issue. I didn’t do a great job of that and I apologize. I appreciate Ecclectic Christian’s help in refocusing. His questions are the ones that I’m thinking through in my own life.
I don’t know how anyone could explain this better than you have and yet so many, even in this comment stream really do not get it. For most (most?) it seems that the choice is either fight the culture war with political action or go home and lock the door. Does anyone have confidence in the gospel anymore? Someone above mentioned the idea of a missionary going to a foreign land and convincing people to stop cannibalism. I assure you we do not do that! We present Jesus and the Holy Spirit Himself changes people.
It is the same for the abortion issue. Roe v Wade has killed not one single baby. OUR daughters- as eloquently expressed by e.hope- are killing the babies. The answer? Not repealing Roe but leading our daughters to Jesus and teaching them to live a life of faith. A woman who is living for Jesus is not living a life of selfishness which leads to abortions being needed at all.
Let us proclaim Christ and disciple our friends and families to live on mission for Him and we will not need to talk about a culture war anymore.
Jesse,
Why would you assume that ones’ opinion on every issue must have iron-clad biblical support? Certainly some subjects are open to debate, and certainly there are some things that should be beyond debate.
Michael Bell, your statistics may be accurate, but there is no such thing as “the average woman.” Some women have had six or seven abortions. Some women have had none.
One of the saddest true stories I have ever heard occurred at the hospital where a member of my family was an RN in the neo-natal unit. A woman with a horrific drug problem had given birth to several babies there and each one was routinely taken away by the Department of Family and Children Services (DFACS) and placed in foster care. After about the sixth time, one nurse was brave enough to ask the woman, “Why do you keep having babies?” and she replied, “To replace the ones they keep taking away.”
There was a huge empty place in that woman’s life that needed to be filled with something meaningful, and not drugs. Strider is right. Leading our daughters to Jesus is the answer.
I agree with Bob Brague’s latest comment. Statistics, while accurate, often mask what is really going on.
I want to reemphasize what Strider wrote as it is where I am at personally:
“For most (most?) it seems that the choice is either fight the culture war with political action or go home and lock the door. Does anyone have confidence in the gospel anymore?… Let us proclaim Christ and disciple our friends and families to live on mission for Him and we will not need to talk about a culture war anymore.”
“Does anyone have confidence in the gospel anymore?”
The answer is no.
If the numbers are true, less than 2% of “professing believers” shared their faith with somebody in the last year. If accurate, that means that the majority of even those railing against the culture war and lament the lack of the gospel being preached AREN’T preaching the gospel to anyone. Even those who pay lipservice to the life-transforming power of the gospel are NOT sharing the gospel.
Yes, I understand there is still the 2%..so there are SOME who have confidence in the gospel. For the most part, we’d rather pass laws to make the heathen ACT like Christians so we’re not offended by their actions (which I believe is jealousy that they get to do what we want to do) and call it “God’s Work”.
DD
The Culture War is a poor replacement for the mission of the church as a Jesus shaped community, pointing to the eschatological Kingdom of God.
iMonk
I agree with this statement. And I agree with the posters who are calling for a sharing of the gospel as the means of transformation of our culture. However, what iMonk has said in his previous blog post (linked in his blog post above), is being ignored or perhaps forgotten:
Where is the Gospel? Where is the missional calling of the Christian? Where is the church’s ministry of spiritual formation? Where are ministries of Word and Sacrament? All of these are increasingly buried under doublespeak and culture war rhetoric. Evangelicalism is being betrayed by many of its leaders who are building their “ministries†by the appeal to anything but the Gospel and compassion of Jesus.
iMonk
The gospel needs to be communicated in word and deed (“missional calling” as described by demonstrating the “compassion of Jesus”). We need both. Jesus didn’t just come and say he was the Son of God and tell people to believe him. He also demonstrated the love of God. And it was the love he showed that was the powerful transforming agent to a love and grace-starved world. That love made people listen to the gospel and His love and His gospel words changed their lives.
My one lament about the church is that we are so good at talking about Christ and the gospel (even if we don’t outright “share the plan of salvation”) and not so good about loving. And so we are “a loud gong and a clanging symbol”. Our words are empty because they are not backed up by loving deeds. We have paid lip service indeed, and as a result, our contribution to transforming culture is virtually nothing. If sharing the gospel is the measure of our cost of discipleship, they have cost us nothing because we haven’t practiced what we say.
Michael Bell,
I did a quick statistical analysis based on the numbers out of Centre for Disease Control. Over the last thirty years the U.S. has averaged about 300 abortions per 1000 live births. Or .3 of an abortion for every 1 live birth.
OK, that’s a horribly high number and I am very surprised to see it. But …
If the average women has had two kids, it means that the average women has had .6 of an abortion. Or one abortion for every two women. So Redeemed numbers are not far off.
This is not a valid inference. OK, total number of abortions divided by total number of women is .6, but we are certainly (From other statistics I have seen.) dealing with two different “sub-populations” here — one sub-population of women who never have had an abortion, and the other made of up women who have had abortions multiple times. This means the number of women who have actually had an abortion (i.e. one or more abortions) is significantly less than 50%.
This is the same kind of bad statistical reasoning that gets us to believe that we have only a 50% chance of a successful marriage. Yes, half of all marriages fail, but that statistic is skewed in a number of ways, particularly by “serial marriers” who get four or five divorces over the course of their lives. So yes, number of divorces divided by number of marriages is around .5, but the percentage of people who divorce is much smaller.
I’m sorry I even brought the issue up. Why are we arguing statistics? iMonk has asked us not to debate this issue on this thread. I apologize to everyone.
Anybody have any creative alternatives to the culture war? Anybody know how to reframe the conversation about Jesus and Culture without wandering away the context of the Church entirely in pursuit of trying to be Christian, as so many young people do?
I don’t have any idea how to think about Christianity in public apart from its dour social stances, these days. Intellectually, emotionally, we don’t seem to have any other defining characteristics more ultimate than the culture war, do we? Our confessions of faith easily become whips in the hands of zealots, our ministries manage to maintain our collective naivete instead of defeating it. Ennui characterizes the entire struggle. Anybody know where to start?
Personal piety? House-church-ism? Focusing on social projects? Christian mysticism and moral reflection?
Is it just me, here?
Redeemed, I am sorry this discussion has degenerated into statistics when we should have been talking about showing compassion and having a loving acceptance for the other victims of abortion. But it seemed like such an unfair indictment to say that 50% of women in this country had aborted their pregnancies. Or a rationalization to lessen the pain.
Either way, you’re right. The thread’s focus got off-track. I apologize for being part of the distraction.
I do think the chief focus should be on the children who never had a chance, though, whatever the statistics happen to be.
Whoa, Michael! Didn’t you just say on the Hell House thread, and I quote, “I don’t do eschatologyâ€? Yet here you are saying, and rightly so, that it is the mission of the church to be “a Jesus-shaped community, pointing to the eschatological [italics mine] Kingdom of God.†— Bob Brague
“Eschatology” in its original meaning (from Catholic theological terminology): The Four Last Things — Death, Judgment, Heaven, and Hell.
NOT today’s common meaning of running around playing Pin-the-Tail-on-The-Antichrist.
The gospel needs to be communicated in word and deed (â€missional calling†as described by demonstrating the “compassion of Jesusâ€). We need both. — Jen E
Because Talk is Cheap.
“You have a saying: ‘Knowledge is a three-edged sword.’ We have a saying, too: ‘Put Your Money Where Your Mouth Is’.”
– Babylon-5
This election is an opportunity to wean the millions who have mixed Regan Conservatism with the Beatitudes. As the country grinds on under the presumptuous stereotype that conservatives are archaic, uninformed and hypocritical, I have hope that Christians, true Christians, will return to their Gospel roots and let a Sovereign God sort out the political details.
Michael, Bob, Bob, and Redeemed,
I find it a little frustrating that people can say in essence, “you are wrong with your statistics but I don’t want to talk about it any more.” At the same time I agree with all of you, that it is a major distraction to the post. So what do I do? Both Bob, Bob, and Michael are right that the 50% number is high. (By a factor of about two.) If they or anyone else want some clarification of how I can state this new number with some certainty, they can email me at mike_kim_bell [at] hotmail [dot] com.
Otherwise, let all of us respect the original intention of the thread.
I have hope that Christians, true Christians, will return to their Gospel roots and let a Sovereign God sort out the political details. atruefaith
I agree…but what does this look like in practical terms? I have a hard time figuring out just what that looks like. Sounds to me like I’m not the only one. Patrick Lynch had some good questions that I’m curious to see some discussion on.
Motivated, self-starting missionary Christians would tell me I have a motivation problem. Faith-filled insiders would say I’m not a belonger and need to seriously consider my commitment to Jesus. Activist-types would tell me I’m a pessimist. Cultural Catholics would tell me I worry too much. Culture-war cheerleaders would tell me I don’t really see the big picture – that the culture war is “winnable”.
I don’t believe it’s a real fight. My atheist friends think the culture war is a socio-economic privilege and a hypocrisy, and I have no idea from what well of education and experience to draw from that’s not tainted brackish with Hegel and sociology or doped with Christian “Holy Spirit!!!!” enthusiasm. As a result, I have no real reply to the culture-war except that I don’t like it and I don’t care about it, but I’m the more vulgar for my stance on it. Which I’m not, at heart, that comfortable with either.
There’s full disclosure. If anybody has any brilliant insight on this phenomenon, now’s the time to drop it.
I’ve said all I have to say about the abortion thing. But anyway, sorry if my comments were out of order. Inaccuracy just gets to me. I have suspected for some time that I have Asperger’s syndrome.
I didn’t pipe up until a couple of other comments about it had already been made, so I assumed the topic was in bounds. Like I said, though, I’m done on the topic.
Michael, I’ve noticed you aren’t filtering. What’s up?
I’m filtering less and less as we get more civil. And I’m just overwhelmed with school.
I’m only 23, so I figure I (hopefully) have plenty of time to learn more wisdom regarding all of this, So anyone feel free to correct me….or help me along in learning more wisdom : )
Here’s my take (what I have so far) on all of this ‘culture war’ thing. firstly, one of the things that frustrates me about it, is that it seems like the majority of people are either now all for social justice, etc… or all for evangelizing. And the funny part about it is that both groups seem to polarize themselves because they want to avoid being identified with the other.
The thing is, you can be ‘socially -justice’ minded all you want, but if Jesus isn’t part of it, it’s empty. It’s dust and ashes. And you can shout and throw the name of Jesus around as much as you want, but if you aren’t loving people, it doesn’t make much of a difference. The entire thing was meant to be relational. Words and actions were meant to go together, they see the way you act, the way you love, and therefore actually lend some value and weight to what exits your mouth. So maybe this sometimes requires a lot more time that we would like to actually give.
But I think really, people get so caught up with agenda’s, institutions, what it should look like, what we should be doing….that we forget to ever do anything. Or maybe that’s just what I do sometimes.
Maybe we just really need to get to know Jesus better……..And then become that picture of Him for others. I don’t know that there are any set rules, we are all different, we all have different strengths, weaknesses, ideas, talents….and love has different ways of manifesting itself. I think when it comes down to it, sometimes it isn’t the idea that was wrong, or without effect….it’s that it was done without love.
…and sometimes it simply won’t look nice or ‘effective’ through our own eyes….? If Jesus was persecuted and scorned, what do we expect?
I think the entire ‘culture-war’ really, is a result of a lot of people trying to follow some of the teachings of Jesus, without actually trying to follow Him.
forgive me. being concise is not one of my talents.
e.hope, I was thinking the same thing about getting to know Jesus better this afternoon while I was raking leaves. You are wiser than your years. I think that’s what it boils down to. But then I have a lot of questions about that too.
Bob Brague, I say this humbly, but I found it a little insulting that you assumed I pulled that statistic out of nowhere and used it as a rationalization to lessen my pain. I assure you, that isn’t what I’m doing. That statistic has been spoken to me and I have also ready it several other places, so that’s why I used it. I didn’t make it up to make myself feel better. Whether it’s accurate or not is, like scripture, a matter of interpretation. If you’d like a link to a source (one among others where I have gotten this stat), I’ll be happy to email it to you. Otherwise, I accept your apology and I sensed your humility and thank you.
Ideology is death. It doesn’t matter where it comes from; Republican, Democrat, Marxist, Capitalist, even and maybe especially Christian. It’s all death.
Only words that lead us to fall wordless before the feet of Christ have any value. Those that strip us of our flesh till nothing remains but bits of bone, muscle, and sinew are words of life if they lead us to finally deny the nasty bit of “life†we have clung to in order not to follow Christ.
The Black Knight from Monty Python’s “Holy Grail†is a perfect picture of what you and I are like. Our limbs hacked off one after the other, and we still spit and fume and feel proud for not giving up the fight.
Christ, out of respect and love, suffers through our ignorance just as those of us who are parents do when our children follow destructive paths. But the grace of God leaves open to us the possibility we will finally become disgusted with being the God of our own life.
This is what I see in the story of Redeemed. This is what I hear in the words of e.hope. When we are finally grown ill with ourselves and desire nothing more than to learn how to be a simple follower of Christ, the miracles really start to fly. By the stripes of Christ we are healed. By our own stripes, we are healed. The deep sin of our lives becomes the means of grace by which we are able to understand the suffering of Christ. He doesn’t remove our scars, whether they were given to us by others or self inflicted. But they begin to become our strength. In our weakness we are made strong. Through all our crap, we begin to learn to love as Christ does.
God does everything wrong. But somehow it all comes out right. And redemption is one of God’s best inventions. Christ is the answer to the riddle.
Don’t be the Black Knight people. Turn and be healed. Follow and become a healer.
MDS