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Well, I’m a bit biased here, but DIFW has been killin’ it lately. Here are keynote addresses from the past 6 months on the topics of technology, power, law, business and vocation. Enjoy.
https://vimeo.com/79194491
Ross Douthat’s Bad Religion: How We Became a Nation of Heretics won Christianity Today’s 2013 “Best Book of the Year” award in “Christianity and Culture” for a reason. Check out this stunning quote, pasted on the back of the Fall 2013 Issue of Comment Magazine:
“This turn boded ill for Evangelicalism’s long-term future, because although the ‘para’ groups were immensely successful at religious mobilization, they weren’t as effective at sustaining commitment across a life span or across generations.
“They were institutions for an anti-institutional faith, you might say, which meant that they were organized around personalities and causes and rarely created the sense of comprehensive, intergenerational community…You couldn’t spend your whole life in Campus Crusade for Christ, or raise your daughters as a Promise Keeper, or count on groups like the Moral Majority of the Christian Coalition to sustain your belief system beyond the next election cycle.
“For that kind of staying power, you needed a confessional tradition, a church, an institution capable of outlasting its charismatic founders.”
As one who’s now launching another one of those ‘para-church groups,’ this quote struck a chord. Some immediate takeaways for me – and maybe for you if you’re a part of Evangelicalism:
(1) Build inter-generational (and intercultural) partnership into your organization. The powerful para-church movements of the 20th century were great at reaching college students, political interest groups, or middle-aged men, but not at building deep partnerships between generations and cultures. Woe to us if we don’t intentionally create teams of leaders who are different from us! Double the woe if we serve our narrow market niche and consign ourselves to yet another “tribe” in social media land – while ignoring the rich diversity of Christ’s body.
(2) Quit building movements and organizations around charismatic leaders. I don’t think this is the intention of ministry leaders, but it’s what happens when we’re not more institutionally-minded. It happens when we build great conferences, praise great speakers, and publish great books, but neglect the time-consuming work of crafting policies, habits and practices that are intended to outlive their founder. Please, serve the vision, serve the organization, serve the ideal – but let our leaders become servants who become less while others become greater.
(3) Love the church. Go to church. Serve the church. Attend the church. Give to the church. Pray for the church. Quit criticizing the church. Join a church. And remember, when companies, non-profits, and even states pass away and are long forgotten, the Church will still be there. And oh yeah, if you’re in business or a non-profit, listen to the leaders of the church. The stewards of the mysteries of Christ may just surprise you.
It can be rather easy to lose one’s way. This afternoon I was working on the “shape” of our vocation groups for Denver Institute, and I almost got completely lost in the details. Tonight, I sat down at my desk, opened my notebook, and read some personal notes from 2012. I found notes on “six tragedies of modern public life” that led to the advent of this new organization.
Six Tragedies of Modern Public Life
- Work is isolating. Long hours, artificial online relationships, and high demands are not the only reasons for isolation. Many are caught spending their days in a deeply dualistic mindset, serving God on Sunday and other gods Monday-Saturday. Isolated from other co-sojourners and even isolated from some kind of overarching reason for work apart from mere survival, it’s no wonder Thoreau said, “Most men live lives of quiet desperation.”
- Cities are almost wholly organized on secular assumptions. The Enlightenment notion that what can be proven scientifically belongs in public, and morals and religion belong in private, still prevails. To bring your Christian faith to bear on just understanding your field alone is often seen as inappropriate. Just flip on the evening news or read the newspaper, and you’ll see how desperately true this is.O Of course, this doesn’t mean everyone’s an atheist. Far from it. The gods are everywhere; some are just less accepted than others.
- Faith has been systematically privatized. Francis Schaeffer saw it when he explained the “upper story” of facts (science, public) and the lower story of values (religion & humanities, private). Bonhoeffer saw it from a prison cell and lamented “God is being pushed further and further out of our life, losing ground.” Lesslie Newbigin saw it when he returned from India in the late 1970s, and saw a civilization in Britain that had lost all sense of public purpose. Today, social analysts like Charles Murray, author of Coming Apart, can even see the widespread loss of traditional values among the working class. “Religion” is an ever narrowing category.
- Public witness to the Christian faith has been almost completely dominated by politics in the past 50 years. James Davison Hunter saw this with adroit clarity in To Change the World; I personally keep my distance from both the Christian Right and Left, both whom I believe have been co-opted by worldly ideologies on some issues, and align with God’s purposes on others. Nonetheless, the notion that seeking political power can change culture has worn itself out, yet those in the public world who hear the word “evangelical” cannot think of us as anything other than a voting bloc.
- Many churches have willingly retreated into the private sphere. We indeed should care about personal morality – what we do in the home and in private. But so many can see no systemic powers at work that shape human life. If Jesus is Lord of the universe, and his gospel is public truth for all to see, then should it not be brought to bear on all areas of life? Perhaps, as David Van Drunen points out, this job belongs to the organic church (the church scattered throughout the week), and not the institutional church (the place you go on Sundays). But nonetheless, do systems, structures and institutions not matter for living faithfully for Christ today? If they do matter, then who is intentionally equipping those to make public witness to the gospel through where they actually live “in public” each day – at work?
- There’s no genuine pluralism. Most would disagree with me on this. After all, we live in a highly pluralistic society made up from people of every religion and ethnic background. But religious reasons for taking certain actions have been nearly eradicated from our shared vocabulary. Just imagine the blow back a politician would get today (in most districts) if she quoted a Bible verse as justification for voting for a bill? Just imagine what would happen if a Christian teacher in a public school taught that just as there are two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom in every water molecule, so, as verifiable history, Jesus has been resurrected from the dead? Those are grounds for a pink slip…and evidence that some views are accepted in public, and some systematically condemned.
As I was jotting notes in late 2012, I did not stop with just these tragedies. I also wrote five overarching goals for an organization that could address these problems. These five goals are the topic of my next blog post.
A few days ago I received an email from my good friend Dave Strunk. He referred me to an “excoriating” review of Why Cities Matter written by blogger Keith Miller. Since I recently reviewed the book for Christianity Today, and Mr. Miller and I rather different focal points for our reviews, let me respond to his critique.
Argument: Mr. Miller points out a central weaknesses of Why Cities Matter: the slippery definition of the word “city.” In Keller’s introduction to the book, Miller deduces that Keller uses the word “city” to mean at least three things:
1. “The Top 100 City”—a metro area at least as populous as Wichita, Kansas;
2. “The Not-Rural Farmland City”—everything with a greater density than homestead farming;
3. “The Urban Center City”—places like Manhattan.”
He draws this conclusion from Keller’s use of a Gallup pole and a UN statistic claiming “180,000 people move into cities each day.” Um and Buzzard switch between these slippery definitions throughout the book, at times referring to a major urban center like Los Angeles, and at other times referring implicitly to small towns that are not rural.
Response: Good critique. Miller is right to point out “sloppiness” here. There needs to be a standard way for evangelicals (and others) to talk about “cities.” It may be a pipe dream to think we could agree on such a thing, but the authors should at least lay out their own view and stay consistent.
Argument: Um and Buzzard are extremely liberal with the word “city” in the biblical review. Jesus was born in the “city”, say Um and Buzzard, but Miller points out Bethlehem had a population of 300-1000 at the time Jesus was born. He also critiques their claim that the Garden of Eden “may well have had buildings,” among other exegetically fanciful moves to find “cities” throughout the Bible.
Response: Again, this critique is also fairly well founded. In an earlier draft of my review, I pointed out that Um and Buzzard seem to substitute the word “city” for nearly any kind of human community, from Bethlehem to Babylon to the Church. Comparing the modern city to ancient settlements of nearly all sizes is problematic – to the point of needing correcting. Again, well said.
I would argue, however, that the Bible does have significant things to say about urban centers – particularly large ones. From Babel to Babylon, and Eden to the New Jerusalem, it’s no coincidence that cities take on either heavenly or hellish characteristics in the biblical narrative. Precise definitions are needed, surely. But a gloss of his own over the importance of cities in the Bible does us no favors either. Dense groups of people are uniquely important in the Bible as today.
Argument: One of Miller’s final critiques is that Buzzard defines Silicon Valley as a “city.” He points out that it is actually a suburban sprawl, and that Buzzard’s own church moved from an urban center in downtown San Jose to an area that looks a lot like a suburb in Santa Clara.
Response: If the critique here is primarily of defining Silicon Valley as a “city” – that is mixed use space and “denseness” and “proximity”, an idea that Um and Buzzard borrow from Keller – then good. Buzzard is perhaps too in love with the idea of “cities” and wants to live in one even if he’s not in one.
But I’m inclined to push back against Mr. Miller. If city can also mean “center of regional influence,” then Silicon Valley certainly qualifies. It’s hard to imagine a more culturally influential suburb than the tech hub of the world (Um and Buzzard are right here). And perhaps this leads us to a closer definition of what we mean by city. After all, the plainest definition of “city” is: “a large or important town.” By that standard, which is more of a “city”: San Jose or Silicon Valley?
Final Thoughts: Mr. Miller’s critique of their sloppy use of the word “city” is right on, both as applied to the ancient world and the modern world. We need to draw the line better.
But, unfortunately, Mr. Miller skipped over nearly all the valuable pieces. First, cities are growing, both in size and clout. As Richard Florida points out, the lines between suburbs and cities may be dissolving, but “mega-regions” are growing, attract a disproportionate number of talented, creative people, and churn out far more economic output than in past generations.
Second, Um and Buzzard have valuable things to say on both how the characteristics of cities as well as how they work; concepts, for example, like “connective diversity” and “clustered diversity” are helpful for non-urbanologists trying to understand urban areas.
Third, their ministry applications are helpful. They counsel readers to try to understand a city’s storyline through five questions. We may squabble over the definition of a city, but “large or important towns” certainly take on unique characters over time. I’m from the Denver area, and its focus on outdoors and adventure is crucial to understand for pastors. Cities have “gods”, and they must be understood if they are to be confronted. It’s hard to say that where I live, Littleton, exerts anywhere near the influence of Denver.
If it makes Mr. Miller feel better, perhaps we can substitute the word “city” for “metro area” and be rid of the whole argument.
But don’t listen to me. I live in a suburb. But then again, Mr. Miller lives in Hillsdale, Michigan: population 8,278.
I wonder if each city has its own god.
The idea was rather common in the ancient world. Many first century Jews believed demons ruled entire cities. Pagans too believed in local deities. In Ephesus, the mother goddess Artemis ruled supreme. When she was challenged, it was seen as a challenge to the well-being of the city (Acts 19:26-28).
But local gods reigning over a city? Surely we’ve grown out of such myths, haven’t we?
Two weeks ago it snowed in Denver. The forecasters predicted 8-12 inches (which turned out to be a drastically generous estimation). High winds, close to no visibility. Stores were closing; churches canceled services. Stay home. It’s the obvious choice. But many Denverites did the opposite. SUVs were warmed up, skiis and snowboards were strapped to the top rack, and true Coloradoans braved the weather to shred some fresh powder, blizzard and all. The mountains called. And we answered – dutifully, faithfully, bravely.
It’s no secret that Denver is a city defined by the Rocky Mountains. Our culture has been defined by the outdoors. Everybody does triathlons here. Even me. Biking, camping, skiiing, running. I even have friends who do the “Tough Mudder” – a romp through the mud to show your Spartan spirit. Our 300 days of sun a year shape more than our interests. They shape our very being.
Several friends and I speculate about the culture of Colorado. What is ultimate to these people? The earth? That would be Boulder. The individual? We certainly are a state of cowboys. But what, or who, really reigns here? The purple mountains majesty, of course. We live for recreation – for the weekend.
How does this influence our view of work? Everybody moves to New York to work. But nobody moves to Denver to work; they move here to play. Yes, put in your hours, but ultimately its about finding a villa, a latte, and a black diamond run with some fresh snow.
But how can we determine if something good (ie God’s creation) has become something ultimate? The best definition of a god I’ve found comes from philosopher Neil Postman. In his book The End of Education, he points out how easily teachers are swayed by the “god of Technology.”
“At some point it becomes far from asinine to speak of the god of Technology – in the sense that people believe technology works, that they rely on it, that it makes promises, that they are bereft when denied access to it , that they are delighted when they are in its presence, that for most people it works in mysterious ways, that they condemn people who speak against it, that they stand in awe of it, and that, in the born-again mode, they will alter their lifestyles, their schedules, their habits and their relationships to accommodate it. If this is not a form of religious belief, what is?”
Postman is not only writing for Silicon Valley here. In Denver, to what extent do we rely on nature, stand in awe of it, condemn those who speak against it, marvel in its presence, and alter our “lifestyles, schedules, habits and relationships to accommodate it?” When church planters come to Denver, they learn quickly that they start services on Sunday night, not Sunday morning, because that’s when Denverites return from the mountains.
Questioning loyalty to the local gods is awfully unpopular. Easier to work around them. Far easier yet to believe that we’ve grown out of silly, ancient myths of gods ruling over entire cities.
Discussion question: What are the gods of your city?
That was the question my 4-year-old daughter recently asked on the way home from church. Such random questions weren’t rare for her. As we cruised down South Santa Fe, perhaps the streetlights hit the German Auto Parts Dealer at the right angle, or perhaps she was concerned about the Old Saint Nicholas Christmas store that was closed for the season. Either way, it was an interesting question.
“Well, Sierra, just imagine. If there were no stores we wouldn’t have this car we are driving in. We wouldn’t be driving on roads, these streetlights wouldn’t be on, and we wouldn’t even have these clothes on our backs – maybe we’d be naked! We wouldn’t have any food in the grocery stores, our house would eventually fall apart, and we wouldn’t have any warm baths.”
“And daddy, there wouldn’t be any doctors!” she replied. This was of great concern to her, because playing doctor with her 2-year-old sister was her favorite game. “Nope, no doctors,” I said. “Wouldn’t that be terrible.”
My daughter’s question reminded me of a question asked by Lester DeKoster, the author of Work: The Meaning of Your Life.
“Imagine that everyone quits working, right now! What happens? Civilized life quickly melts away. Food vanishes from the store shelves, gas pumps dry up, streets are no longer patrolled, and fires burn themselves out. Communication and transportation services end and utilities go dead. Those who survive at all are soon huddled around campfires, sleeping in tents, and clothed in rags.”
So what’s the difference between civilized life and barbarism?
“The difference between barbarism and culture is, simply, work. One of the mystifying facts of history is why certain people create progressive cultures while others lag behind. Whatever the explanation, the power lays in work.”
Simply put, work is about creating human civilization. Few go into the office on Monday and think that way, but the skyscrapers of Dubai and the sewage systems of Paris wouldn’t exist without work. Nor would this Mac I’m typing on right now. Work is the source of all the things that most intimately affect human life: organizations, products, and services. And apparently that fact is not lost on 4-year-olds. Work might be a burden sometimes. But can you imagine a world without work?
Why should Christians care about integrating their faith and their work? Perhaps a better question: does God care about civilization?
And the LORD said, “Should I not care about the great city of Nineveh, which has more than 120,000 people who cannot distinguish between their right and their left, as well as many animals?” (Jonah 4:11).
Discussion question: What would happen if, overnight, your business or organization closed? What would be lost? Who would it matter to?
(Photo: I Am Legend, Annie Wu)
Our view of the destiny of the world should deeply influence how we understand work.
In the renewed Jerusalem, there is a river flowing from “the throne of God and of the Lamb down the middle of the great street of the city,” (Rev. 22:2). And on both sides of river is “the tree of life, bearing crops of fruit.” The tree of life, from which humanity was exiled after the Fall in Genesis, is now at the heart of the city. The culmination of history includes both the divine (throne, river, and tree of life) and the human (the city). The great hope of the Christian faith is for a renewed human city, a day in which God will reign over human life, including our cultural production that comes from work.
This biblical vision of the future is radical, especially when we compared to other worldviews:
- The traditional fundamentalist vision is that this world will be burned up in judgment and believers will live with God in a disembodied state in heaven. The idea here is of a wholly other-worldly eternal state with little to no connection with this world. Yet the Bible states that “the kings of the earth will bring their splendor” into the heavenly city (Rev. 21:24), including their finest work (like the camels of Midian, the ships of Tarshish, and fir trees of Lebanon – see Isaiah 60). In God’s grace, he brings actual human culture, though purified by fire, into a renewed earthly city. There will be real overlap between our work here and its redeemed state in the new Jerusalem.
- The liberal vision is of establishing God’s kingdom here and now through social and political action. Outlined masterfully in Ross Douthat’s Bad Religion, in the 1960s and 1970s accomodationists, both liberal Protestants and Catholics, emptied traditional theology of its other worldly elements and equated social justice and politics with God’s kingdom. However, the historic Christian faith teaches the heavenly city comes down out of heaven as a gift from God (Rev. 21:2). It cannot be built, nor can we transform this world into God’s kingdom. Each generation equates some social program with God’s kingdom – and in so doing is eventually disappointed as the reality of sin disappoints all our utopian ventures.
- The secular vision is perhaps the most depressing. The generally accepted public philosophy of secular materialists sees a distant future in which humans will be long forgotten, the sun will continue its expansion and eventually burn up the earth. The great tension in the secular mind is how to balance the view of the scientific materialists with the myth of progress, still espoused by lovers of technology, despite the horrific events of the 20th century (and the stark suffering of places like Syria). Businesses and even government entities rally behind “mission statements” even though their universe has no mission other than extinction.
- The Eastern vision of the future is cyclical. Humanity is caught in a never ending cycle of life, death and reincarnation. The world, as well as human culture, has no real ultimate purpose. This view leads to such desperation that Buddhism was born, and it’s great hope was placed in attaining nirvana – freedom from the wheel of samara and the ultimate extinguishing of each person’s light (the definition of nirvana). The statue of the Buddha, with his eyes turned inward, is the paradigm of this worldview. Free yourself from suffering through meditation – let your light burn out in the darkness.
Each of these visions of the destiny of the world ultimately influences our view of work:
- Fundamentalist eschatology devalues work. Why build a house or start a business when all that matters is saving souls? This view leads to a stark division between spiritual work and secular work – a view all too common in conservative American churches.
- The liberal view overvalues work. It equates human triumphs with God’s own kingdom, and both denies the reality of sin that has infected work, and tends to make human achievement an idol. This slippery slope of accommodation also tends to lead to empty churches, as people start question why they should attend a this-worldly congregation that is essentially no different from the rest of culture.
- The secular view is so dark, people tend to look other places to find meaning in work, such as prestige, innovation, power, or wealth. Work here becomes a slave-driver as people put unrealistic expectations on creation rather than the Creator, and can slip into hopelessness.
- Eastern religions have a similarly dim view of work. Not only is there no human city in the future, but each person must try to earn good karma on his or her own. Work may provide an income, but it is not connected with any objective goal for human history. History, just like work, has no culmination. It’s an inescapable cycle.
The biblical view is that the heavenly Jerusalem is a gift, and it cannot be earned or built by men. Yet, in God’s grace, he includes elements of our work and cultural production in God’s new world.
If we truly embrace this view, we’ll be work with both tremendous hope as well as deep humility. Because God is making all things new, we won’t join the fundamentalists who undervalue the nature of God’s good creation, nor will we join the secularists who look into the future and only see a dark universe. Nor will we will join liberals who believe God’s kingdom can be built through only political action. (Nor will we join those who attempt to “transform culture” through their work and cultural engagement. Jesus clearly gives us a picture of the world growing in both good and evil as The Day approaches [Matt. 13:24-30]. For those who espouse of view that Christians should “transform culture”: can you point to a single culture in all of history that has been transformed by the gospel?)
The key way to view our work today – whether it be selling ads or teaching second graders – is as a sign, or a foretaste of the kingdom of heaven. Christians are called to be representatives of a new world, who are yet living in this age, and to tell the good news through both words and actions. The key creative task is this: how can I take my work and make it a banner that points people to the hope of a renewed heaven and earth?
Perhaps the key image here is not the developer who paves over the earthly city, nor hermit who retreats from the city’s confines, but instead the farmer, who plants the seeds of new life through the work of his hands. And perhaps some of those seeds will grow into strong trees, whose leaves will be for the healing of nations (Rev. 22:2).
Discussion question: What is your view of the destiny of the world? How do you think it influences your work?
(Photo: The Farmer)
What is the role of pastors and theologians in bringing about cultural and social change?
Theologian Miroslav Volf, in his classic book Exclusion and Embrace, believes there is an important distinction between the role of pastors and the role of Christian laity, especially when trying to apply the gospel to our social world.
“Attending to social arrangements is essential. But it is Christian economists, political scientists, social philosophers, etc. in cooperation with theologians, rather than theologians themselves, that out to address this issue because they are best equipped to do so….
“When not acting as helpmates of economists, political scientists, social philosophers, etc.—and it is part of their responsibility to act this way—theologians should concentrate less on social arrangements and more on fostering the kind of social agents capable of envisioning and creating just, truthful, and peaceful societies.”
His point is well made: the gospel does influence how we see culture and society, but the ones best suited for making statements about politics or economics (or, by way of extension, technology, education, and business) are Christian laity. Theologians are accurately described as “helpmates” of economists and politicians, and should not cross the line in trying to trade vocations. Instead, theologians should focus on shaping “social agents capable of envisioning and creating just, truthful, and peaceful societies.”
At bare minimum, this means two things for pastors:
(1) Pastors have a responsibility to disciple those in their congregations who serve in the public sphere. Our public activity, namely, our work, is a matter of Christian discipleship. Work is not neutral – it is loaded with temptations, idols and opportunity for kingdom service. To never speak to the issues that affect the majority of our waking hours is irresponsible.
(2) Pastors should not confuse their distinct calling as a minister of the gospel and so try to become politicians, economists, or even philosophy professors. This is not a call to be aloof from the matters of the world. Far from it. It is a call be faithful to telling the story of the life, death, resurrection and Second Coming of the Son of God, and to walk alongside laity and shape their imaginations so thoroughly that the gospel will transform parishioners who can therefore shape society through their work.
Takeaway: if you’re a pastor, go and visit somebody at work and so hear about their high priestly ministry (1 Peter 2:9). If you’re not a pastor, go and invite your pastor to lunch and start “envisioning and creating just, truthful and peaceful societies.”
(Photo: Conversation at the Coffee Shop, Steve Hammond)
William Faulkner once wrote,
“You can’t eat for eight hours a day nor drink for eight hours a day no make love for eight hours a day—all you can do for eight hours is work. Which is the reason why man makes himself and everybody else so miserable and unhappy.”
Faulkner gives two reasons here that illuminate the desperate need for more faith and work initiatives throughout North America. The first is a simple matter of time. Work is how we spend our lives. Eating, drinking, making love – one could add exercising, going to church, or watching football – all make up only a small fraction of our lives in comparison to work. If Christian discipleship doesn’t extend to our working lives, then it simply doesn’t touch the largest part of human life.
The second reason is more grave: work is the reason why we are so “miserable and unhappy.” I’m reminded of a quote by Dorothy Sayers on work:
“Far too many people in this country seem to go about only half alive. All their existence is an effort to escape from what they are doing. And the inevitable result of this is a boredom, a lack of purpose, a passivity which eats life away at the heart and a disillusionment which prompts men to ask what life is all about.”
Although I can’t substantiate this claim with research, I think I’m on safe ground saying that most people see work as something to escape from as soon as possible. For most, their careers or jobs are not their vocations, but simply a means to end, whether that end be money, leisure time, or another job. This desire to escape leads to “boredom, a lack of purpose, and a passivity which eats life away at the heart” – the core ingredients in Faulkner’s recipe for misery and unhappiness.
So the question is this: can we really claim to be shaping believers for Christian maturity if we never mention their work? Can we really claim to be equipping the saints for mission with an array of elaborate ministries if we ignore both where people spend the majority of their days as well as one of the great causes of frustration and unhappiness in human life?
Of course, I think Faulkner was missing a key element of work in his diagnosis, namely, hope. We are hope-shaped creatures, and the Christian faith gives us a supreme hope because of Jesus’ resurrection from the dead.
Discussion question: Do you think Faulkner is right, that most people’s jobs are a source of unhappiness? Also, do you know of intentional efforts in your neighborhood that seek to integrate faith and work in practical ways? If so, what are they? What has been helpful?
I often find myself divided when driving in the car. Should I turn my radio to NPR or to K-LOVE? Most days I find myself compelled to listen to both.
NPR (National Public Radio) is my daily connection to the world. News, author interviews, Science Friday – to me, the life of the world is beautiful, and immensely important to God. Whether it be education (my own field) or the latest research in brain research (certainly not my field), this is where real human life is found.
But if I listen to NPR exclusively, I become worn out, feeling kind of thin, like old Bilbo Baggins, “like butter scraped over too much bread.” The sad secular monks who fill the airwaves of NPR have knowledge, but most don’t have hope, a reason to dance. Frankly, most days I need a reason to dance.
So, I turn to K-LOVE. The praise and worship songs (most of them, anyway), give me hope. Christ is resurrected from the dead, and the song of the redeemed spurs on the people of God. Yet if I listen only to K-LOVE, I begin to wonder what’s happening in God’s world, the world that he so loves (John 3:16).
And so I flip between NPR and K-LOVE, knowing my home is in another country, yet I’m called to this world at this time and in this place. It’s this tension that leads me to yearn for a way to bring K-LOVE into NPR, that is, to bring the gospel into fields like education, science, politics, and art.
But how might we actually do that?
My favorite author, Lesslie Newbigin, believes this intentional equipping of the saints to serve well in their secular work is a part of the mission of the church.
“The congregation has to be a place where its members are trained, supported, and nourished in the exercise of their parts of the priestly ministry in the world. The preaching and teaching of the local church has to be such that it enables members to think out the problems that face them in their secular work in light of the Christian faith. This is very difficult…There is need for ‘frontier groups,’ groups of Christians working in the same sectors of public life, meeting to thrash out the controversial issues of their business or profession in light of their faith.”
One way we can intentionally live on the “frontier” between the private world of religion (K-LOVE) and the public world of politics, education, art and business (NPR) is by joining with small groups of Christians who can work out the problems of their field in light of the gospel. In these small groups conversations are hosted that can help to heal the public/private divide, and can help to unify our commitment to the gospel with our commitment to the life of the world.
Discussion questions: Do you prefer NPR or K-LOVE (or something else)? Have you ever met in a “frontier group” that discusses the problems/opportunities of your field in light of the gospel? If so, how did it go?