Those who have grown up in or lived in evangelical circles for any considerable period of time may have experienced the feeling that the evangelical faith is somehow a minority facing much opposition and oppression. Many sermons and conversations within evangelical churches include an “us against the world” component. Among the supposed opponents, enemies or dangers:
the secular world
the political left
the theological left
public education
secular government
unbelievers
the news media
the entertainment industry
Kanye West (only up until he recorded worship songs)
I saw, as a pastor, that even the most loving and kind people within the church could pick up a sense that their faith was under attack from the world.
This lead to a combative posture that I think actually prevented people from seeing the richness of hopeful Christian theology. The combative posture was (depending on the circumstance) either defensive or offensive. Defensively the approach was to circle the wagons and speak of the evangelical faith as some kind of worthy remnant that held truth while the rest of the world had gone astray. Offensively the approach was to attack and accuse the perceived opponents as in some way being “godless”.
As a pastor I tried to not feed the tendency towards either of these approaches, and I tried my best to not congratulate them when I saw them. The problem was that some of the best, most well-meaning people at times saw it as a responsibility of faith to be combative as much of the evangelical culture and history had coalesced around such an approach.
Karl Barth, in a series of lectures given in the United States in the early 1960’s made a point that the evangelical church largely ignored. He said that true theology, in his words true “evangelical theology” would be “modest” theology and that true theology would “prove itself”.
Here is how Barth put it;
“The best theology (not to speak of the only right one) of the highest, or even the exclusively true and real, God would have the following distinction: it would prove itself by the demonstration of the Spirit and of its power. However, if it should hail and proclaim itself as such, it would by this very fact betray that it certainly is not the one true theology.”
For Barth, more boasting and fighting actually demonstrated that the theology was less than true. Speaking of other theologies, worldviews and arguments as “gods” he said the following;
“Other gods do not seem to prohibit their theologies from boasting that each one is the most correct or even the only correct theology. On the contrary, such gods even seem to urge their respective theologians to engage in such boasting.”
Suffice it to say for now that many of you reading this may be blessed to hear it directly; True and hopeful Christian Theology does not require you to boast or to fight.
You can consider this as a physical manifestation. Imagine what it feels like to be in a defensive or offensive posture geared up to oppose an enemy of some kind. What I am telling you is that you can release that posture.
You don’t have to be angry.
You don’t have to be afraid.
Anger and fear do not help reveal theological truth.
This is not to say that there is not opposition to what is good and true in the world. This is not a call to become passive. Rather this is a call to understand that hopeful Christian Theology is about discovering transcendent truth, not about fighting on God’s behalf. You don’t have to treat your friends as if they are “the lost”. You don’t have to attack what you consider to be “godless” in public education. You don’t have to listen to sermons that are cultural battle cries rather than hopeful reminders of the God who is over all.
It is possible that you have had people tell you that if you drop the defensive or offensive posture then you are less than Christian. That is the argument of anemic faith, not hopeful faith. Leaders and preachers who major in warnings and fear and cultural opposition are so often “hollow men”. Grievance is not faith.
There were a couple of news stories this week (both by Ruth Graham writing for the New York Times) that reminded me of some of the thoughts above. One was the posthumous fall of Ravi Zacharias. Zacharias was a popular apologist and intellectual within evangelical Christian circles. I never thought much of his work and writing as he seemed to me to be recycling other people’s ideas and leading his readers and listeners to believe that they were his own. My impression was that his intellect gave cover and perceived legitimacy to conservative evangelical cultural sentiment. It turns out that he was abusive, accusatory, threatening and dishonest. He also falsified and exaggerated his academic credentials. My interest in bringing up the article on this matter is to say that Zacharias fit well into the “evangelical fighter” posture. I think that this contributed in at least three ways to unfortunate circumstances;
his work was considered more highly than it should have been by the evangelical community because many people wanted a fighter
his persona of fighter likely bolstered the sense that he could take what he wanted and perhaps contributed to the façade that added to misdeeds and prevented honesty on his part and on the part of people around him
his work was not required to be actually good because he was seen as someone fighting battles for evangelicalism
The second article is about a terrible trend present in some evangelical circles, often charismatic evangelical circles.
As you read it, consider how far it is from Barth’s concept that true theology is modest theology. The kind of “prophetic” ridiculousness cited in the article is the fantasy world expression of defensive or offensive posture thinking. The method of truth claiming discussed no longer tethers to anything other than the feelings or wishes of those who make the prophetic declarations. I think that such magical thinking is a present incarnation of oppositional, “us against the world” thinking. Now, instead of marshalling the usual weapons, a person simply says that they had a vision. The visions or prophecies are almost all in the camp of a minority against a perceived oppositional majority.
And, on a more affirmative note, a song as a reminder that we can let go of the fighting and boasting posture. The intensity of the song also reminds me that dropping the combative posture does not mean we become unenergetic or lethargic. Enjoy.