Inconvenient Christianity
Inconvenient Christianity
Convenient Christianity won't survive another generation.
If it hasn’t happened already, it will. Soon, someone you love will make a choice or utter a statement that makes you wonder whether your kind of Christianity will survive in the world that is emerging. Here is what it could look like:
A married Christian couple, your long-term friends, has decided to divorce. No adultery. No abuse. They have simply “been growing in different directions and need the freedom to become who God made us to be.” They’ll keep coming to church, just attending at different service times.
The twenty-something son of a church elder has moved in with his girlfriend. They’re both serving in the children’s ministry. No one seems to have a problem with this.
You’ve just put down a Christian magazine in which a noted evangelical leader says that it’s time for Christians to move on past abortion as a defining political issue.
Your 19-year-old daughter comes home from her Christian college. One of her professors had her class visit a local mosque as part of her comparative religion course. “You know what, mom,” she says, “I know we have much more in common with them than you think. We’re really praying to the same God, aren’t we?”
What do you do in situations like these? How do you reply? Does your pulse race in panic? Does your heart pound in anger? Do you feel disarmed by disappointment and grief? Do you question your assumptions?
How we choose to proceed in these moments will reveal what we really believe about Christianity. These encounters will uncover, at least in part, how we approach our faith. There are two, very different ways of talking about religion. One starts with humanity. The other starts with God.
In the last century, it has become popular to think of religion as “what people have to say about God.” In other words, religion starts with us and reaches up towards God. This first way of thinking about religion is prevalent in our day. We have become so used to hearing religion spoken of this way that we might unconsciously assume it to be true.
But Christianity won’t allow itself to be understood in that first way. If we let it speak on its own terms, we will clearly hear one thing: Christianity is a message from God, for people. God himself is the source, sending us the message. He has been sending that message throughout history in very specific ways. He has done this by enacting great events in the course of time and wants us to understand our situation in light of this revelation.
The Christian message about Scripture—it claims to be “God-breathed”—should be enough to make the point. If we needed more evidence, consider the Christian message about Jesus—he is God, called “the Word,” come in human flesh. If this is the case, then Christianity is not the product of human ingenuity and isn’t open to invention on our part. We’re really left with one of three responses to these claims.
We can chose to reject this revelation and abandon name of Christian. If we do, then at least we’ve taken the path of integrity, even if we’ve left the path of life.
We can compromise it, picking the parts we like best, leaving the rest and defining our own brand of “Christianity.” Of course, if we take that route, we’re acting with the chronological arrogance of someone who presumes the right to redefine the very meaning of a religion embraced by millions over the last two thousand years. And, if we’re honest, not really practicing Christianity at all.
Lastly, we can receive the revelation. Christianity, as a message from God, provides a vision of reality. It tells us where we came from, why we’re here and where we’re headed.
We must choose: all or nothing.
This choice will be increasingly difficult in the coming days. We’re going to face intense pressure to pick one of the other options (abandon or compromise). That pressure will come from our society—media, education, government, and the workplace. It will also come from friends and family. In the days to come, Christianity will not be convenient.
One thing is clear: What has long been accepted and assumed is no longer a given. There is a great fracturing taking place in the church and culture today. The most obvious divisions lie along generational fault lines. Consider:
…the number of Americans describing themselves as Christian has declined by about 10% between 2007-2014.
Meanwhile, those professing no religion grew by 50% in that same time frame.
Fewer than 6 in 10 millennials affiliate with any branch of Christianity.[i]
In just two years, the percentage of Americans who qualify as “post-Christian” rose by 7 percentage points, from 37% in 2013 to 44% in 2015. Across the United States, cities in every state are becoming more post-Christian—some at a faster rate than others
Young adult “outsiders” (not in the church) were asked to respond whether the following terms were accurate descriptions of Christians in America. They affirmed in the following percentages:
Antihomosexual: 91%
Judgmental: 87%
Old-fashioned: 85%
Too political: 75%
Out of touch with reality: 72%
Boring: 68%
Confusing: 61%[iii]
It would be a serious miscalculation simply to write these figures off as academic concerns for the experts to contemplate. The kinds of questions people are asking, the choices they’re making and the conclusions they’re reaching challenge our approach to every day living. These things will land on the dining room table at Thanksgiving, so to speak. In other words, the relationships we have with people we love and respect are going to be impacted by this fracturing of our religious world. Those who choose to embrace Christianity will find it inconvenient.
When we resist the pressure to abandon or compromise our beliefs, that’s inconvenient Christianity. When we’re in conversation with someone we like, and we have to say something that we know they will hate, that’s inconvenient Christianity. When a child we long to affirm makes choices we have to correct, that’s inconvenient Christianity. When we have to exercise love, as defined by Scripture, over tolerance, as promoted by society, that’s inconvenient Christianity.
Increasingly, people believe that reality can be infinitely molded to our desires. Individuals are told that a meaningful life will only be unlocked if they live out their “deepest self.” The results are everywhere evident. But this quest to assert the self—free from the external standards of a bygone era—has ironically led us into a world where identity seems as transparent and insubstantial as tissue paper.[iv]
Into that thin, fragile world, Christianity speaks a different word. It presents a vision of reality every bit as relevant as oxygen, gravity, sunlight and rain. We can close our eyes to this vision—to our own detriment. Those who choose to embrace this vision are invited to a life of discipleship, where the driving motive is not elusive self-expression, but the quest for a self-worth-having.
[i] [http://www.forbes.com/sites/daviddavenport/2015/07/29/elites-and-courts-push-america-into-a-post-christian-era/
[ii] https://www.barna.org/barna-update/culture/728-america-more-post-christian-than-two-years-ago#.VfXBC7T4tSU
[iii] As noted in Rise of the Nones, by James Emery White, pg 40
[iv] In their book Good Faith, David Kinnaman and Gabe Lyons note that 91% of US Adults believe “The best way to find yourself is by looking within yourself.” 89% affirm “People should not criticize someone else’s life choices.” 86% believe “To be fulfilled in life you should pursue the things you desire most.” And 84% affirm that “The highest goal of life is to enjoy it as much as possible.” Practicing Christians affirmed those same statements at 76%, 76%, 72% and 66% respectively. Pg. 58