The Gospel Coalition

“The ‘gospel’ is the good news that through Christ the power of God’s kingdom has entered history to renew the whole world. When we believe and rely on Jesus’ work and record (rather than ours) for our relationship to God, that kingdom power comes upon us and begins to work through us.”

I’ve never been a huge conference goer. They certainly have their place, but conference-hopping has never really been my thing. However, I will be attending this one. See you there?

In my last post (an excerpt from the book I’m writing entitled Unfashionable) I mentioned that when it comes to how a Christian should engage the world around him, there are two extremes we must avoid: being culturally removed and being culturally relaxed. I handled the first extreme in that post (you can read it here). Here I handle the second extreme. 

Extreme #2: Culturally Relaxed

There is, however, another extreme we must avoid when it comes to relating to our culture — that of accommodation, or being “of the world.” It happens when Christians, in their attempt to make proper contact with the world, go out of their way to communicate sameness between Christians and non-Christians when it comes to style and taste, ideas and morality.

To be sure, we’re to follow the principle stated in Paul’s words: “I have become all things to all people, that by all means I might save some” (1 Corinthians 9:22). Christian thinkers call this “contextualization.” It’s the idea of translating the truth of the gospel into language understood by our culture. David Wells has noted rightly, “Theology is undoubtedly about timeless truth that we have in Scripture under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. But it is timeless truth that needs to be brought by God’s people into their own particular context.”

Missionaries and Bible translators have been doing this for centuries. Every Bible translation available is an effort to contextualize God’s written word (originally written in Hebrew and Greek) for a contemporary audience.

Whether in translating the Bible or simply talking to a neighbor, Christians are to be missionary minded in the way we communicate. This takes work — especially for those like me who are more comfortable with “inside” language. Although we don’t need to shy away from using biblical language, good missionaries go to great lengths to explain that language for those with no biblical knowledge. As Nancy Pearcey says, “We need to be actively translating the language of faith into the language of the culture around us.”

Contextualization also involves building relationships with people who don’t believe. We don’t expect them to come to us; we go to them. We meet them where they are. We enter into their world by seeking to identify with their struggles, their likes, their dislikes, their ideas.

Chuck Colson tells us what this contextualization, properly understood, involves: “We must enter into the stories of the surrounding culture, which takes real listening. We connect with the literature, music, theater, arts, and issues that express the existing culture’s hopes, dreams, and fears. This builds a bridge by which we can show how the Gospel can enter and transform those stories.”

But when Christians try to eliminate the counter-cultural, “unfashionable” features of the biblical message because those features are unpopular in the wider culture — for example, when we reduce sin to a lack of self-esteem, or deny the exclusivity of Christ, or downplay the reality of absolute truth — then we’ve detrimentally moved from contextualization to compromise. And compromise is to be avoided at all costs.

In an article titled “Calling Christian Rebels,” journalist Marcia Segelstein describes what being a Christian in our current culture means: “It will mean taking unpopular stands on highly charged issues such as abortion, homosexuality, and divorce. It means risking derision, humiliation, and scorn. It means looking at the way things are and — when they undermine the Word of God — challenging them.”

In this sense, Christians should always be troublesome. Devotion to God’s authority entails conflict with any authority that challenges his.

In seeking to “engage” and “connect,” Christians must remember that God has called his people not to be popular, but to be faithful. The truth is that many in this world will not take kindly to those who follow Jesus. Jesus himself tells us that if we follow him faithfully, others will insult us, persecute us, and tell lies about us (Matthew 5:11).

Contextualization without compromise is our goal. The great model for this is, of course, the incarnation of Christ. Here was God “contextualizing” himself by taking on human flesh. Jesus Christ became fully human — one of us. He entered into our world. He met us where we were. He made deep contact. Jesus completely “engaged” us. But because he was without sin, his contact resulted in collision. His refusal to “fit in” eventually led to his execution. He contextualized without compromise.

We, too, while we come in contact with the world, must always resist the ways of the world. The ideas, values, and passions of the kingdom of God will always collide with the ideas, values, and passions of the kingdom of this world — and we need to stand our ground when and where this collision happens.

You could summarize it this way: Unfashionable living means that we avoid being culturally removed on the one hand and culturally relaxed on the other; instead we’re culturally resistant. We’re in the world, but not of it; against the world, for the world. We’re to be making contact with the world while colliding with its ways. We’re to be culturally engaged without being culturally absorbed.

We must not fear being different. If we do, we’ll never make a difference. It’s only as we faithfully refuse to “fit in” that we unleash God’s renewing power in this world. So we must always beware that in our attempt to make contact, we do not lean over so far that we fall in.

In this excellent post, Jeremy Taylor looks at the three leading Republican presidential candidates (Romney, McCain, and Huckabee) and points out what needs to happen if a Republican is going to win the Presidency.

The great nineteenth-century evangelist D. L. Moody was once asked to describe what he thought the relationship between the church and the world ought to be. Should the church reject the world altogether — separating from it so as to avoid contamination? Or should the church embrace the world wholeheartedly — becoming just like it so as to reach the lost? The evangelist answered, “The place for the ship is in the sea; but God help the ship if the sea gets into it.”

Moody rightly outlined the proper relationship between the church and the world: Christians must be in the world but not of the world — a very difficult balance to maintain, as we will see. To be in the world but not of it assumes two extremes that need to be avoided. We need to avoid being culturally removed (failing to be “in the world”). We also need to avoid being culturally relaxed (becoming “of the world”).

Extreme #1: Culturally Removed
The most explicit antithesis between Christians and “the world” (in the sense of “worldliness”) appears in 1 John 2:15-17.

There’s clearly a sense in which we ought to be separate from the world around us. But this separation is to be spiritual, not spatial. Spatial separation is wrong; spiritual separation is right. If we aren’t clear on this we’ll never be clear on how to execute God’s mission in transforming this present world into the world to come.

As surprising as it may be to some, the Bible never tells Christians to “leave” the world. On the contrary, we’re specifically sent to the world. As Jesus prays to the Father concerning his disciples, he says, “I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but that you keep them from the evil one” (John 17:15). And also this: “As you sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world” (17:18). Every Christian, Jesus is saying, is a missionary. We’ve been sent by Jesus, the captain of our salvation, into enemy territory to continue the work he began and will one day complete. Cultural withdrawal, then, is not an option for followers of Jesus. In this sense, we are to be for the world.

In Matthew 5:13-16, Jesus called on his followers to be “the salt of the earth” and “the light of the world.” The people of God are to serve the world by acting as both a preservative and a lighthouse. But salt and light cannot make a difference without first making contact. Salt prevents decay in meat only when it comes in contact with it. A dark room cannot be lighted until a lamp is brought in and placed where it will shine. Jesus points out the worthlessness of a lamp hidden under a table; for light to be useful, it must be visible to all, like a city on a hill. So we, who are the salt of the earth and the light of the world, must make contact with the world around us — letting our light shine before others so they see our good deeds and praise our Father in heaven. Withdrawal from this world is therefore not only selfish, but sinful.

One example of such withdrawal is what happened to Protestant fundamentalism. Although it began in the early twentieth century as a movement to defend orthodox Christian belief and practice against rising liberalism in the church, Protestant fundamentalism soon became strictly separatist. They saw the main problem not as “in here,” but “out there,” and a militant separation from the world became the true test of faith.

Such radical withdrawal by Christians isn’t nearly as prevalent today as it was in past decades. And that’s a good thing, in my opinion. But a less obvious form of cultural withdrawal and retreat is much more prevalent among today’s Christians.

Ironically, many of the churches that seem most interested in cultural engagement actually encourage and practice cultural withdrawal, unintentionally. Many of them now have their own restaurants, gymnasiums, weight-rooms, and baseball fields. They provide their own sports leagues, exercise programs, and yellow pages. I understand the benefit of some of these things, but when churches provide an alternative activity site for everything under the sun, we run the risk of living life without coming into contact with the very world God has commanded us and equipped us to transform.

Similarly, many Christians conclude that being culturally relevant means we should develop a “Christian” version of everything in the world. Walk into many Christian bookstores and you’ll find “Christian” t-shirts, “Christian” candy, and “Christian” board games and toys. (My son was once given a Jesus action figure from his friend for his birthday; I immediately took it away for fear that Jesus would be engaged in a fight with Darth Vader and lose). Even Christian music groups intentionally imitate non-Christian bands. One Christian bookstore I visited even offered a comparison list of Christian bands and their secular counterparts: “If you like the Dave Matthews Band, you’ll love…” or, “If you love Beyonce, you’ll love…”

I understand the good intentions behind some of these efforts. But by developing a “Christian” alternative to everything, we unintentionally reinforce the tendency to withdraw from the very world that God has commissioned and empowered us to renew and transform.

Martin Luther was once approached by a shoemaker who enthusiastically announced that he had recently become a Christian. Wanting desperately to serve the Lord, he asked Luther, “What should I do now?” As if to say, “Should I become a minister, or perhaps a traveling evangelist? Or maybe I should make shoes only for missionaries and preachers?” Luther asked him, “What do you do now?” I’m a shoe maker.” Much to the cobbler’s surprise, Luther replied, “Then make a good shoe and sell it at a fair price.”

In becoming a Christian, we don’t need to retreat from the vocational calling we already have — nor do we need to justify that calling, whatever it is, in terms of its “spiritual” value or evangelistic usefulness. We simply exercise whatever our calling is with new God-glorifying motives, goals, and standards — with a renewed commitment to performing one’s calling with greater excellence and higher objectives.

One way we reflect our Creator is by being creative with the talents and gifts he has given us right where we are. As Paul says, “Each one should remain in the condition in which he was called. So, brothers, in whatever condition each was called, there let him remain with God” (1 Corinthians 7:20,24). As we do this, we fulfill our God-given mandate to reform our various “stations” for God’s glory.

Christians need to remember that Christ is Lord not only of the church; He is supreme over the family, the arts and sciences, and human society at large. In the famous words of Abraham Kuyper, “There is not one square inch in the entire domain of our human life of which Christ, who is sovereign over all, does not proclaim, ‘Mine!’”

That’s why we must not withdraw from the world, but rather bring the standards of God’s Word to bear on every dimension of human culture.

So while Christians are to separate from the self-glorifying motives, God-ignoring goals, and sub-par work standards of the world (our spiritual separation), we are not to separate from the peoples, places, and things in the world (a spatial separation). We are to be morally and spiritually distinct without being culturally segregated. We’re to be fully engaged in every arena of culture — education, art, politics, business, media, science — making a profound difference because we are different.

In this very helpful (and short) post, Kim Riddlebarger answers the question: What are the different millenial positions and what are their strengths and weaknesses?

(Here is another excerpt from my forthcoming book Unfashionable: How To Live Against The World For The World)

Back in the 1950’s, when my grandfather was becoming a well-known preacher of the gospel, a famous actor pulled him aside and said, “Billy, don’t ever try to compete with Hollywood, because Hollywood will always win. You give the world the one thing Hollywood can’t — the timeless truth of the gospel.” The rest is history.

In many ways, we in the church today need to heed this actor’s advice to my grandfather. If, in this context, “Hollywood” represents what’s “fashionable” in our society, then it seems that in some circles we’ve lost trust in the timeless truth of the gospel. We’ve spent too much of our churches’ time and money trying to “do Hollywood” in a thousand different ways.

We need to be reminded of the antithesis between the wisdom of the world and the wisdom of God (1 Corinthians 1–3). Much of what the world esteems as wise, God considers foolish; much of what the world dismisses as foolish, God considers wise. Being “in style” with God often means being “out of style” with the world. Therefore we need to be much more critical regarding “the things of this world,” things which we so quickly embrace under the guise of evangelism and outreach.

Many Christians these days insist that in order to reach the world, they must become just like the world. With good intentions, they strive to look like the world, talk like the world, sound like the world, and act like the world. With evangelistic fervor, many ministries orchestrate their efforts according to the tastes of this world: They ask the world what they like, then give the world what they want. Their efforts and attitudes become guided and shaped more by cultural trends than by God’s truth. Whatever’s “in fashion” becomes more important than what’s theologically sound.

But in following such a course, we inadvertently communicate to our culture that we have nothing unique to offer, nothing deeply spiritual and profoundly transforming.

So our culture is forced to look elsewhere for the difference they crave.

By continuing to pursue worldly relevance so emphatically, Christians will ironically render themselves completely irrelevant. For, as Os Guinness points out, “There is an irrelevance to the pursuit of relevance just as there is a relevance to the practice of irrelevance.”  Or, as John Seel has put it, “The timeless is finally that which is most relevant, and we dare not forget this fact in our pursuit of relevance.”  If we fail to be different from the world, we’ll never make a difference for the world or in the world.

As we’ll see throughout this book, being entirely different from the world around us is exactly what the Bible calls us to, as followers of Jesus. We’ve been given a new heart and a new mind, a new way and a new destiny. That’s why we march to the beat of a different drummer. We operate according to a different standard, with different goals, different motivations, and an altogether different perspective on money, lifestyle, and relationships. Our thoughts are to be different, our affections different, our behavior different. Our priorities, pursuits, and passions are to be different.

Our calling in our culture is to live in contrast to it. In this world, we’re God’s otherworldly representatives. Our privilege and responsibility is to be his people in a world that has abandoned him. We’re his city on a hill, his light in this darkness, his hope in this brokenness. We’re to be “against the world, for the world.”

Ultimately we’re citizens not of this world but of the kingdom of God. We are those who say, “Here we have no lasting city, but we seek the city that is to come” (Hebrews 13:14). We’re exiles from the world, strangers in a strange land, pilgrims making our way across the wilderness of “this present darkness” on our way to the Promised Land, the New City.

The faithful, in other words, are not the fashionable. They are not supposed to “fit in”; they’re supposed to be “odd.” In fact, as Will Willimon writes, “Our oddness is essential to our faithfulness.”  Or, to put it another way, faithfulness to Christ requires foreignness to the world.

Let me say once more the simple yet profound truth: Christians make a difference by being different; they don’t make a difference by being the same. In fact, as one author observed, it is “those who are cognitively and morally dislocated from worldly culture”  who alone carry the power to change it.

Justin Taylor just posted this interview with Tim Keller regarding his forthcoming book The Reason for God.

“I went to a bookstore and asked the saleswoman where the Self Help section was. She said if she told me it would defeat the purpose.”

Dennis Miller

I recieved a letter the other day from my friend John Seel. I found this part of it to be especially thought provoking and challenging: 

The most powerful aspect of culture is the way it shapes our moral imagination. As Einstein observed, “Imagination is more important than knowledge.” Books and films such as “The Golden Compass” are opportunities for important discussions with our children about truth and the nature of reality. We need not be defensive or judgmental. God’s truth will prevail. All that is at risk is casual Christianity and unreflective belief. A distinguished atheist philosopher at Princeton University Walter Kaufmann once observed, “Millions do not even know that they deny essential Christian doctrines: they have never bothered to find out what the essential doctrines are. In extenuation they may plead that the evasiveness and the multiplicity of churches create a difficulty; but to be deterred by this when one’s eternal destiny is said to be at stake bespeaks a glaring lack of seriousness.” In other words, assertive atheism can be a good thing if it encourages us to become serious seekers of truth. Many will simply use such films to justify their rebellious attitudes toward authority. We live in Nietzsche’s world, after all. However, more important than blaming atheists for what they think and write is to acknowledge the failure of Christian believers to provide a thoughtful, winsome, and life-affirming alternative in our culture. This is the challenge of our time.