Nov
28
2009
Two Kinds of Popularity
Tim Keller has a helpful post here on two kinds of popularity, as expressed by John Calvin:
the one, when we seek favor from motives of ambition and the desire of pleasing;
the other, when, by fairness and moderation, we gain their esteem so as to make them teachable by us.
As Keller puts it:
The first motive will so control us that we will never offend people.
The second motive will help us choose our battles and not offend people unnecessarily.
Keller rightly warns against the thinking that does not see any distinction in these two modes of adaptation and accommodation.
Read the whole thing.
HT: @DarrinPatrick
5 Comments
“The Farels of the world cannot see any such distinction — they believe any effort to be judicious and prudent is a cowardly ’sell-out’. But Calvin wisely recognized that his friend’s constant, intemperate denunciations often stemmed not from a selfless courage, but rather from the opposite — pride.”
The reformed blogosphere would look so much different if we could hold this helpful idea in mind more often. It would be so encouraging to see our leaders build bridges and leave well enough alone, moving towards whatever amount of unity is possible instead of calling out every perceived difference/inconsistency in our brothers’ and sisters’ theology.
Amen, Chris!
In our hyper-opinionated culture, it seems the Farels of the the world are running things. They are busy purging the Republican Party of anybody who doesn’t neatly check off a list of bona fides, or they smiting infidel users of the opposing type of computer in the fierce Windows versus Mac Wars, or running the hundreds of other “wars” intransigent people now like to wage.
Marion–
Yes. But notice how Calvin didn’t just write off Farel and call him an ‘intransigent’’smiter of infidels’ (even if he was!) He was trying to be non-Farelish with Farel himself. Not easy, and Calvin certainly didn’t always succeed. But Calvin understood that it was wrong to be self-righteous toward the self-righteous.
Tim-
I agree. I did not mean to imply that I was writing them off, just bemoaning the state of affairs. We can’t just write off the Farels of the world. Being non-Farelish to the Farels requires patience, wisdom, love, a tough skin to absorb slights (perceived and real), and. In short to treat them the way you would want to be treated in a heated discussion. Also, it helps to be aware of one’s own inner Farel and the things which we can each be intransigent about, whether it be one’s favorite types of music, favorite computer operating system, political party, favorite TV news channel, preferred mode of baptism, etc. Being self-righteous to the self-rightoeos is, I guess, a little like being proudly humble, and indeed is something to watch out for in our own hearts.