Thinking-Christianly

If you are going to be accepted or popular in the American culture, you need to become skilled at using marshmallow words. These are words that never have an edge to them or any sharp angles. They are words that do not make contrasts or clear comparisons.

Marshmallow words are soft, pliable, and inoffensive. They don’t dare to call behavior into question. They find good in everything. They resist calling people to a single standard of living because some may find that standard personally unpleasant or objectionable.

Marshmallow words are the currency of political correctness. Universities are skilled in indoctrinating collegians in their use. Academia fosters a culture where the only people branded as outlaws are those who dare to speak otherwise. Social lepers in our day are those who speak of absolutes, of truth and error, and of religious clarity.

But marshmallow words go far beyond political correctness. They quietly become the norm in all our minds. They prompt us to speak in relative terms about things we value. They blur the difference between what is true and what is not. In the church they rob us of the courage to face obvious hypocrisy, falsehood, compromise, and sin. They turn the sword of the Word of God into a useless Styrofoam toy incapable of doing any serious work.

The infection of this kind of language cripples our ability to speak truth in the culture. It exchanges the voice of the prophet for the whimper of youngster intimidated by a pack of bullies. It has made great inroads into Christ’s church today. Truth becomes an opinion. Issues of life and death become commentary. The razor sharp contrasts that we must understand to live righteously and follow Christ faithfully disappear. Marshmallow words take their place. And they are everywhere. I shudder sometimes to see its influence in my own heart.

When the truth of God grips the hearts of his people, there is a change in the way we think and speak. Marshmallow words will no longer do. It’s not a change to bitterness, rage, condescension, or acrimony. It’s the willingness to speak truth in a culture where truth is unwelcome. It’s the courage to speak truth in my own heart when marshmallow words would feel better. It’s the love to speak accurately within the Church when marshmallow words would be much less dangerous. It’s not the language of pride, or self-righteousness, or superiority. It’s the return of the language of reality that permeates the pages of God’s revelation in the Bible.

Here’s an example. In Ezekiel 18:4 God claims, “For every living soul belongs to me.” In that radical statement God asserts that he is the exclusive Lord and Master over every person on the planet. They do not belong to Allah, Buddha, or themselves. The claim is that every human being on the planet is the property of the one God who revealed himself to mankind in the pages of the Old and New Testaments. This challenges any other competing claim—no matter how sincerely held—as false. While we are called to respect the people who claim allegiance to other beliefs, we are not called to respect systems of belief that God labels as false. There is no virtue in whitewashing error. Secular materialism, liberation theology, Mormonism, Islam, and Taoism are wrong. And we must gain the courage to make such statements again. Where faiths collide, we must call thoughtful people to compare and contrast the core documents and the founders. Jesus Christ and the Bible can easily withstand such scrutiny. Marshmallow words, on the other hand, reduce everything to a white mess held together by some sticky goo.

As difficult as it is to think and speak differently than the surrounding culture, Christ-followers must do so. It is the only way we can be faithful followers of the message we bear and the God we seek to serve.

Cultures cannot thrive when they ignore God. Neither can individuals. Survivors of the Jewish nation sat in the capital of a foreign country, enslaved by foreigners. Everywhere they turned they were reminded of the massive loss that marked their days since the conquest of their nation.

It was about 593 B.C. The Babylonians and Medes were the new superpower of the day, having conquered the Assyrian capital of Nineveh in 612 B.C. In the years to come they would penetrate the last defenses of the Jewish capital of Jerusalem and take the city on August 14, 586 B.C. As Ezekiel writes, about 10,000 Jews had been deported to Babylon as subjects of their new king. Among them was a man named Ezekiel.

God did not forget his people in exile. God gave Ezekiel a message for his fellow Jews. It was not words of false comfort and self-pity, but a call to turn back to him in the midst of their massive loss. In the first three chapters of this revelation, God repeatedly warns his prophet that the people are stubborn and reluctant to respond to his call. “Whoever will listen, let him listen,” God declares. “And whoever will refuse, let him refuse; for they are a rebellious house.” (See Ezekiel 3:27.)

As God assesses their behavior, he notes that their moral behavior had been inferior to the pagan countries around them. “You have not even conformed to the standards of the nations around you,” the prophet declares. (See Ezekiel 5:7.) Followers of Islam routinely look at ‘Christian’ America and note the same thing. Sex saturates our media—from advertising to film to salacious news stories designed to hike ratings. Marriage is under attack as an outmoded relic of the past. Civility in language is less common, even among evangelical Christians who increasingly use expressions that echo the culture. Devotion to God is considered the property of the priestly class (ordained or licensed religious leaders)—not the call to the normal follower of Christ. Ministry is often built around a desire to impress men more than a desire to please God.

The good news in all of this is that God does not go silent even in times when he withdraws a measure of his protective grace from his people. The same God who spoke to the stubborn Jews in exile is the one who speaks to us as we feel the growing hangover of a culture (and to some degree a church) that has become intoxicated with the wine of disobedience and self-centeredness. His awareness of our reluctance to hear does not stop him from speaking.

When times get tough, our natural temptation is to question God’s goodness and love. We tend to see adversity as evidence that God is indifferent or powerless. And the more we fuel those thoughts, the less likely we are to respond to him. In such situations God speaks to remind us that the flaw is not with him, but ourselves. It’s hard to hear that message because it challenges our pride and our inflated sense of our own righteousness. But when we take it to heart, it changes the way we view ourselves and opens the door to greater intimacy with God.

In the August 13^th edition of the Wall Street Journal Brett McCracken analyzes the trend of many in the modern evangelical movement to stem the exodus of young adults from the church by being cool. His article, The Perils of ‘Wannabe Cool’ Christianity, notes that some churches seek to reach the emerging generation through screening of R-rated films, sermon series that focus on sex and sexuality, and Twitter and iPhone interaction during services.

As a twenty-something himself, Mr. McCracken sees the desperate attempts at relevance in such efforts and finds them ultimately unappealing. He writes, “I can say with confidence that when it comes to church, we don’t want cool as much as we want real.”

In the last decade writers like Os Guinness and David Wells have echoed the same message. The desire among modern innovators in the church to reach the emerging generations is laudable. Some argue that in order to do this we must be cool and must build a bridge from the latest trends in society. This approach is desperately flawed because it assumes that what is fashionable or in vogue has the appeal to draw the heart more than what is eternal.

The trend is far from new. In the book of Exodus we find Moses was AWOL on the mountain in the desert as he meets with God. No one is sure if he is dead or will return. The leaders persuade Aaron to build a golden calf to represent the God who delivered them from bondage in Egypt. This kind of animal was a symbol for power and fertility in all the surrounding cultures. Certainly such an act would honor the God who had just delivered his people from slavery. It was simply a tool for worship that all would understand. But God realized it would become an obstacle, not an asset. Under his direction Moses had the idol burned in the fire, ground to powder, and scattered over the water. He even made the sons of Israel drink it. (See Exodus 32:20.)

When the focus shifts from the person and work of the triune God, the church ultimately suffers. The centerpiece of our message to mankind must be Christ and his work. To bank on the shifting trends of modernity is to replace the radical life-transforming reality of God’s investment in our dilemma with something with a limited shelf life. Whenever the American church has traded relevance for truth, it has become less meaningful to the culture, not more.

You and I live in a time when people in power pretend that they can create a state of perfection if they are given enough authority and control over the dimensions of human life.

For the past week much has been written about the discovery of Salmonella bacteria in eggs. Once again, government regulators are using “this-must-never-happen-again” language to attempt to create a biologically impregnable food distribution network. The promise is that if bureaucrats are given enough rules, regulations, and stiff fines, not one American consumer should ever again get sick from anything they consume.

Should food producers do their best to comply with reasonable safety measures? Of course. Should those who knowingly defy best practice procedures face consequences? Certainly. But the posturing of the regulators reflects a hubris that assumes that we can have complete control of our environment in a fallen world. (In this particular case, it also conveys the idea that the American consumer is too stupid to cook eggs and remove the risk the bacteria poses.)

No matter how diligent our efforts, we cannot eradicate the brokenness that is part of our environment—whether it be the presence of a bacteria, the carelessness of someone in a production facility, or the greed of a business owner. Though we may strive for quality, the pledge of perfection rings hollow. It’s like the infatuated remarks of a couple in love who assert that they will never behave in a way to disappoint one another. The nature of the world and the condition of the human heart prevent such absolute promises from coming true.

Our hunger for perfection is understandable. It is a faint echo of the condition our ancestors experienced when the world was young. But it’s not a reality we can achieve on our own. We can taste perfection in this life, but it’s only in relationship with our creator. Deuteronomy 32:4 says of God, “He is the Rock, his works are perfect, and all his ways are just. A faithful God who does no wrong, upright and just is he.” Our desire for something totally unblemished, absolutely flawless, is found only in relationship with God. We cannot create perfection through technology or bureaucracy, despite our promises to do so. It comes as we get to know the one whose every thought and action is unspoiled and true. Christ-followers have the privilege of satisfying—to some degree—this hunger for perfection. It does not come through threats and investigations. It comes by pursuing a living relationship with Christ, who graciously relates to members of our imperfect race and restores us to our Father at the cost of his own suffering.

Culture shapes our thinking more than we may admit. It works in invisible ways to reshape the categories of our thought in ways that we cannot see. What we consider to be normal and obvious is sometimes a premise that is arbitrary.

For example, before Copernicus, most people subscribed to early Greek throught that considered the world to be the stationery center of our universe. His heliocentric model was not part of the thinking of either the educated community or the common man. As the tools became available to understand the physical universe, this new information changed the way thinkers looked at the ancient Greek theories.

One of the assumptions of modern skeptics is that the advances in science has made belief in God obsolete. Because we understand more about how processes work under normal circumstances, it is assumed that the physical universe—including man—is part of an impersonal cosmic machine.

Such thinking conceals a huge hidden premise. It presumes that understanding the how answers the why? Why something exists instead of nothing at all is not a question of science, but of philosophy. But when a scientist steps out from behind her test tube in her lab coat, she presumes that her skill at explaining mechanisms in the physical universe carries over into her philosophical declarations about the whys of life. Expertise in one area does not guarantee credibility in a completely different realm.

The materialistic philosophy that is entrenched in many universities rests on an arbitrary philosophical base. It is not a product of deduction or experimentation. Unfortunately, it masquerades as a proven conclusion when it is nothing of the sort. Ordered processes in the universe are ordered processes. They do not falsify the theocentric approach presented in the special revelation of the Bible. One may argue that the sky is blue and go on to state that his mother in law is ugly. Accuracy about the first statement does not insure that the second conclusion is true.

Psalm 53:1 begins with the assertion, “The fool says in his heart, ‘There is no God.’” Modern man may recoil at the statement because it challenges the premise held by many. But the statement of the psalmist should not be rejected simply because we don’t like it.

From the perspective of the God revealed in the Christian scriptures, the denial of his existence is an act of folly. It cuts us off from the reality of a personal God who has spoken to us and who interacts with us in space and time. He has addressed the core “why” questions of life and spoken about our incredible value. He has disclosed the underlying reasons for our brokenness, folly, and self-destructive choices. He describes how his grace makes it possible for us to enjoy a meaningful and eternal relationship with him.

But in order to consider such things, we must at least understand that the premises we bring to the discussion are not the assured conclusions of modern science, but arbitrary philosophical assumptions whose popularity does not guarantee their truthfulness.

One of the values that public universities continually celebrate is their willingness to embrace diversity. They loudly declare that in order to stimulate the minds of their students, they seek to provide a rich and free-flowing atmosphere of ideas.

Faculties across the country initiate new programs and classes designed to challenge the limits of yesterday’s thoughts and explore ideas that traditional society may be afraid to examine closely. This attitude of experimentation has produced classes dealing with the culture of soap operas, the reality of pornography, and the social and cultural values of civilizations around the world, both living and dead. Many would contend that this atmosphere where no thinking is censored and no topic is prohibited produces the best learning atmosphere and the greatest opportunity for innovation, cultural progress, and creativity. It is the university’s gift to its students and the next generation of leaders.

Unfortunately, this celebrated diversity shows signs of evaporating. It is not being squashed by narrow-minded traditionalists who want to circumscribe the course of inquiry into a tiny sliver of life. The advocates of diversity are constricting it themselves.

Increasingly, diversity is not allowable when it comes to those who embrace traditional Christian morality. For example, Eastern Michigan University contended that Julea Ward should be expelled from its counseling program. The university argued that her refusal to counsel homosexual students violates the ACA code of ethics and thereby disqualifies her from the program. The judge upheld the university’s insistence that she counsel clients without imposing her personal values.

Such thinking defies logic. It subtly assumes that an approach to counseling that is free from religious ethics is neutral, and one that embraces religious values is not neutral. In reality, every counselor brings values into the counseling situation. If the counselee is late for an appointment or insists in encroaching on the next appointment, is the counselor to be value free and do nothing? What is the counselor to do if the counselee refuses to pay for services rendered? The counselor’s decision to adhere to some or all of the ACA code of ethics is an expression of personal values. Even the framing of Freudian questions reflects personal values.

The core of the issue is not the presence or absence of values, but an arbitrary enforcement of certain values and the exclusion of others. The university’s position expects Julea to accept a certain set of values in order to remain in the program. Underneath the soft garb of diversity one can see the chain mail of intolerance. Because it impacts a segment of society that is increasingly viewed as marginal and Neanderthal (Christians) it is not seen as significant. But this trend exposes the duplicity of some in the university community who will not live out the diversity they proclaim when mixing with anyone who will now bow down to their arbitrary sociological edicts.

There is increasing pressure in government circles to silence those who would utter the name “Jesus” in a governmental setting. This excludes the occasional epithet that uses his name.

One odd dimension to this trend is that the pressure to silence any reference to Jesus is sometimes applied to those who supposedly have devoted their careers to declare to others what Jesus did and said. A FOX news story from July 9^th offers a recent example.

The North Carolina state house of representatives invited Pastor Ron Baity to serve as honorary chaplain of that body for a week. The House clerk asked to see the prayer, which included prayers for the military, state lawmakers, and a petition that God would bless North Carolina. The clerk objected to the fact that the name Jesus appeared in the prayer, arguing that someone might be offended. Pastor Baity did not want to remove the reference to Christ. The clerk contacted the Speaker of the House, who did not want Jesus name included. Pastor Baity was relieved of his honorary role.

The article reported the clerk’s rational that the name “Jesus” be deleted as, “We have some people here that can be offended.” Such an argument defies all logic. If the potential that someone might take offense at the mentioning of a name, then there can be no rational debate in legislative bodies. Avoiding the possibility of offense would stifle the entire process. Yet such forums are routinely filled with intense disagreements about taxes, spending, the role of government and the rights of the governed. Controversy and conflict over ideas, values, priorities, and agendas fill the records of legislative sessions. How is it that the politicians who constantly engage in the rough and tumble of debate that often looks more like war than deliberation must somehow be protected from hearing the word “Jesus” from the lips of a minister? Would it inflict some kind if irreparable trauma to their fragile egos?

The real conflict is not in the name, but in the claims that Jesus made about his authority. Jesus used the third person to speak of the authority the Father gave him in John 5:27 “And he has given him authority to judge because he is the Son of Man.” Jesus claims that all are accountable to him. Some may hear that claim and reject it. Others don’t want to hear it at all. If it is true, then we can’t shape the world after our own image. And that is simply a challenge some don’t want to face.

The Associated Press reported today that the Supreme Court will look into a dispute between a Christian group and the Hastings College of Law in San Francisco. A student group called the Christian Legal Society was denied official recognition by the college. Anyone can attend its meetings. But those who wish to join must sign a statement affirming their adherence to the moral standards of the Bible. Those standards include the conviction that Christians should not engage in sexual conduct outside of a marriage between a man and a woman. The college calls such a belief discriminatory and will not recognize the group for that reason.

The only action the Christian Legal Society needs to take to receive recognition is to abandon the historic understanding of Christian behavior as taught by the Bible. They are not free to embrace their religious beliefs and participate on an equal level with other campus groups.

The stance of the college is another example of how unwelcome a Christian world view can be in a place where open-mindedness and a generous liberal spirit of inquiry and learning are supposed to prevail. It unmasks the intolerance that masquerades as academic fairness and mandates that the values chosen and blessed by the current leadership of the institution trump all others. Oddly enough, the beliefs of the Christian Legal Society are in accord with the theological consensus in 1878 when Hastings College was founded. In the hubris of modern academic thought, however, the enlightened view of 2010 can have no competition. Such archaic ideas as those held by the CLS must be marginalized or driven from the campus. The prevailing view must be enforced.

Christianity will always be a threat to societies and social engineers. It dares to believe that we are significant moral creatures who were designed by a creator to whom we are accountable. He has revealed truth about our nature and purpose. He defines the parameters for life that produce justice, respect, goodness, loyalty, and honor among men and holiness toward God. All who seek to define the human race according to a blueprint of their own subjective design will rail against the Christian perspective because it challenges our attempts to play God.

The Associated Press reported that the city of Gilbert, Arizona accused a group of a violation because they held religious meetings in several houses for Bible study during the week. The official stated that Bible studies, fellowship activities, and church leadership meetings are not permitted in private homes.

While it is easy to sympathize with the city’s desire to protect residential communities from commercial development, the legislation is troubling. If enforced strictly, consider some of the activities that would be prohibited. If someone lost a mate, would mourners from the church be allowed to collectively visit without constituting a fellowship meeting? If people assembled to pray in a home concerning the health of a family member, would such an assembly violate the code? Would an assembly consist of two people, two carloads, or some other magic number?

If the zoning law was enforced in a way to avoid any religious discrimination, it would need to be applied to all human activities. If the purpose of the meeting is not religious in nature, what would be allowed, and what would be prohibited? If a company vice-president invited a co-worker over for a meal and some strategic planning afterwards, would that constitute fellowship and a leadership meeting? What do we do about a meeting of five girl scouts around a kitchen table or in a family room? What would be the verdict on a Mary Kay party? When does a graduation party cross the line?

If the critical issue is frequency, the problem does not go away. How about a Superbowl party or a group of men meeting weekly to watch the NFL during the entire season? If a group of women meet to deal with weight loss, how infrequent can their meetings be before they fall into the category that jeopardizes their ability to meet?

Zoning restrictions may sound innocent, but they can be tools for manipulation. Quiet discrimination often takes a similar appearance in countries where religious freedom is officially endorsed, but subtly restricted. Groups can meet, but for some strange reason every location where they attempt to assemble violates some kind of bureaucratic regulation. And such house churches do not have the resources to obtain other facilities. The freedom slowly disappears by a thousand regulations. This may not be the intent of such regulations, but it can be the effect. The bigger question deals with how much should the state regulate behavior on private property in the name of the common good if that behavior is not immoral.

Imagine you are attending a performance of “Oklahoma.” The musical starts out as expected, but it isn’t long before you notice that one of the characters is saying strange things that do not fit into the setting. One of the actors was given lines from “Death of a Salesman” and uses this language instead of following the script of “Oklahoma.” If that unlikely scenario were to happen, you can imagine the conflict it would cause. There would be outrage and criticism on the part of some. Others might be mildly amused or confused. But the harmony of those on the set would be threatened by this renegade actor.

In some ways that is the picture of the Christian in the drama of human life. In Matthew 11:16-17, Jesus compares the people of his time to children playing make-believe. They complain that others don’t comply with their fantasy expectations. “We played the flute for you, and you did not dance; we sang a dirge, and you did not mourn.” They are critical of the script that Jesus and his followers are following because it does not fit into the screenplay they have written.

The storyline the culture follows has a radically different spin on life than God’s revelation in the Bible. Value is measured in the accumulation of stuff. People are the result of a freak accident in the ancient past, compounded by endless mutations. The individual is the measure of all things, and works best when he is autonomous from those around him. The supernatural is the byproduct of fertile imaginations, wishful thinking, and human ignorance. The only meaning you find in life is that which you construct for yourself. Truth is the byproduct of your own internal thinking and not universal. God does not (or may not) exist. Christianity is a religion populated with hypocrites who have no fun, condemn everyone, and are infected with a nasty bigotry against all others.

Such are the parameters of the play that men tend to write. They draft their own understanding of life and reality and expect everyone around them to follow the script and go along with the presuppositions that shape their version of life’s story.

In such a situation Christ-followers will always look strange. They will respond to situations differently. They will humbly but courageously challenge the values that the majority of people around them embrace (whether these friends and neighbors have thought through them or not). They will not fit in with the role culture assigns, and will be regarded as stupid, odd, mistaken, or dangerous by those who deeply value the storyline that is the cultural norm.

Neither Jesus nor John the Baptist fit the story their contemporaries scripted. (See Matthew 11:18 -19.) Anyone who dares to follow Christ today will encounter similar responses by those around them. It’s the natural consequence of following a screenplay drafted in heaven rather than the one written on earth.