I am a what? A Consumer????

Yes, I know I tend to post things rather randomly--comes with being who I am. But the following thoughts actually do relate to church, simple church, whatever church, and they are fresh to me so I pass them along. (And I edited this puppy today, Friday, February 20--it needed a lot of work!)

Recently, in one of those wonderful early morning times of lying still and pondering things, Papa brought to my mind one of our culture’s most common descriptions of the average person: "consumer." And yes, I do subscribe to Consumer Reports magazine! If I am going to be labeled a "consumer" (what a terribly impersonal and yet descriptive term!), I at least want to be an informed one!

The thought that we are designated as consumers led me again to the realization that American culture has successfully enshrined and enculturated greed and covetousness. As Paul Ford writes in Knocking Over the Leadership Ladder, our culture is built in a way that encourages us to be narcissistic, feeling dissatisfied and entitled to self-fulfillment. My generation, the baby boomers, has managed to turn this mindset into a fine art. We have become the first US generation to be almost completely individualistic and self-oriented. But what does this have to do with the church?

No big thought here, but the western church has ever increasingly yet unwittingly absorbed and then reflected our twisted culture. Instead of being radically counter-culture, in our sincere attempts to reach those in this culture we have become just like the culture. But it seems to me that the Gospel of the Kingdom will always be counter-cultural to any human culture and that it is certainly counter to the vast portion of our American culture! Yes, the Apostle Paul said that he “became all things to all men in order to reach people” but in doing so he did not compromise the sharply counter-cultural nature of the Gospel (hence the heavy persecution of early believers). (Did you ever wonder about why there is such a huge similarity between traditional church approaches to growth and approaches used by retailers? Get them inside the building, give them something they want, etc. Kind of scary to me anyway!).

As I continued to ponder all of this I realized that the deep influence of American culture on US believers requires a willingness on our part to ask God to constantly examine all that we are doing in light of true Kingdom culture. And this examination by God needs to take place at the deepest level, not just the surface level. Lots of Christians today are talking about "Kingdom culture," but much of what they are describing sounds more like American capitalism or some kind of spiritual imperialism than like the humble, quiet life Jesus lived and invites us to.

This willingness to examine things must be true regardless of the form the church adopts. Unless we address the deeply flawed cultural and theological assumptions that lie several layers down in our thinking, changing the form, model, meeting place or anything else of the church won’t change much of anything! Self-oriented, covetous, broken, demonized Christians in any type of community or structure are not what Jesus had in mind, no matter how they are "packaged"!

So… I think people like Dallas Willard, J.P. Moreland, Paul Young, Wayne Jacobsen, and many others are all very much indeed prophetic voices to God’s people. I raise up these particular men and others like them because they are all addressing the deeper issues, issues of the heart, in light a an brand new way of looking at culture and Scripture, issues of how we view God and ourselves, others, etc.

The bottom line, I guess, is that those who say "Question everything!" may be closer to the truth than we realize, but with one very important difference and that is the difference in who is asking the questions! What would it look like for God to ask the questions? I wonder if when He was finished we would still find ourselves described as "consumers"!

Just wondering.

Tom, still just Abba's little boy