Perplexing Politics

I’m heading off to Washington later this week, the capital, not just of America, but in some ways of world politics. I therefore thought it would be sharing a couple of thoughts from Carl Trueman’s book, ‘Republocrat’. Just a couple of caveats before I begin, Carl Trueman’s book is not a work of huge depth or subtlety (it is not trying to be, although for its size – about 100 pages – it does offer surprising depth and breadth), and, as others have said, he is occasionally guilty of the things he is trying to correct.  Having said that, here are a few of the headlines:

Complexity – politics is extraordinarily complicated and issues are usually too complicated to be simplified for one party’s position.  Furthermore, it is possible for people to have similar goals and yet have great differences on how to achieve it.  Given this complexity, it is a very damaging thing to make political allegiance to a particular party a test of orthodoxy.

Civic duty – Trueman is keen to argue that it is the duty of Christians to be involved in politics, not just as advocates for particular parties but in weighing the arguments about different issues carefully, contributing to the debate, and shaping public opinion for the good of our neighbours.  In Roman times, Christians has a reputation for being the best citizens but it seems it is a reputation that has been lost to a certain extent in recent times.

Warnings – finally three warnings:

• Be wary of ascetics where the appearance often matters more than the content (this is particularly true of TV debates)
• Be wary of narratives (the way an event is reported is often shaped, simplified, and even distorted to fit an over-arching story, rather than explore the realities of things)
• Beware, there is no neutrality.  Every media outlet, whether print or broadcast, has a bias, some more open than others. Which means that we can never just switch off our critical faculties when we are reading, listening and watching.

Trueman’s position can be partly summarised in the following quote:

“All christians should vote, as part of their civic duty, but they should also feel the trade-offs they are having to make as they do so, and how their action belies the complexity of reality.”

Social Action Vs. Evangelism?

I’ve been studying for an essay on the relationship between mission and evangelism.  It’s been particularly interesting getting stuck into some of this as Lausanne III has been going on down in Cape Town.  A lot of ink has been spilt this century on the debate between mission and evangelism and I certainly don’t expect to solve it with my essay!  A few observations:

1 – Almost all of the books and positions I have read so far have agreed that Christians should be involved in what Jonathan Edwards would call charity, or what Keller would call meaningful service to the poor.

2 – A lot of the opinions I have come across have stressed the primacy of evangelism in relation to social action, primarily because of the eternal perspective.

3 – A lot of people criticise other people’s opinions, despite them both agreeing on the 2 points above!

This leads me to think that there may be a problem with the way in which we discuss the issue in the first place.  In trying to answer how the two relate to each other, writers and theologians seem to talk past each other, tying themselves in knots as they try to define whether one is subordinate to the other, or a means to the other, or the fruit of the other, or independent of each other.  Each express this slightly differently and are therefore led into criticism of each other.

I think it may be more productive to see the relation between social action and evangelism as originating in the Christian themselves.  So rather than dealing with the two as independent aspects of Christianity (and therefore first getting into [unnecessary?] questions of primacy and centrality), the starting place should instead be the Christian as new creation, their identity in Christ, the obligations on them as a disciple of Jesus and the fruit of the Spirit that should flow from their faith union with Jesus.

The question could then be, what should followers of Jesus do, rather than how do these two aspects relate to each other?  Or if the latter is the question, then we could start by relating them both to the Christian, rather than each other.

Anyway, that’s my starting place for my essay I think.  Let me know if you have any thoughts.

Centres of Influence

We’ve been looking at Acts a bit this semester, both in New Testament and in our Mission module.  One of the things which is notable about Paul’s approach to mission seems to be his attitude towards cities.  Paul liked cities.  Antioch, Corinth, Ephesus, Athens, Rome… Paul spent time in them all.  That’s not to say that he didn’t have time for lesser settlements, but cities held a special attraction for him.

This strategy made good sense in Paul’s day.  Cities were regional hubs.  They were located on trade routes, markets were held there and they were the homes to cults, pagan temples and Jewish synagogues.  Lots of people lived in cities, lots of people passed through cities or used cities for trade and decisions made in cities and the ideas generated in them would eventually trickle out to the surrounding regions.  What better place to reach a large number of people for the Gospel, and to plant a Gospel seed which could multiply out like the seed of dandelion to land all over the place?

The question is, should cities still occupy this place in our missional affections?  In some senses, there’s a great deal of continuity – cities are still great places to reach lots of people with the good news about Jesus. More people than ever pass through cities for conferences, on work placements and as temporary or permanent migrants.  So in that sense, cities still represent great centres of gospel need.

I wonder if cities still form opinion in the same way as they used to however.  As society becomes more fragmented and people’s existence becomes more atomised, do ideas formulated in Manchester say, still influence Glossop or Bolton or Chorley, in the same way that the ideas of the city of Rome affected its surrounding towns and villages?  Possibly.  But there are new centres of influence now – national television, the press, blogs, social networking websites, pressure groups all influence households now, and the provinces are famous for being out of step with the cities.  In the case of internet-based structures, these are not bound by geographical locations.  At the same time, globalisation means that the influences on culture(s) in this country are altogether more diverse and distant than ever before, relativising the influence of local cities.

And yet, cities play host to the press and institutions like the BBC, and to governments and think-tanks.  So maybe they are worth particular attention?

I guess what this might look like is that whilst provincial places are not neglected, cities would receive the main attention of church planters and evangelists in the hope of a) reaching as many people as possible with the good news about Jesus and b) reaching people and institutions that might be won for Jesus and transmit that message out to other places.

Whilst it’s hard to ignore the need of great numbers of people (making aim ‘a’ reasonable), I’m not fully convinced that society, information and influence work in such a way to allow ‘b’ to make complete sense.  However, many are persuaded, so I could easily be wrong.  Are cities centres of influence that can be used to God’s glory in spreading the gospel?  Let me know what you think.

The offence of exclusivity

We’ve been considering in our lecture series with Dan Strange on race and religion this semester, why people often find the message that Jesus is the only way to God so offensive.  Part of the problem concerns the culture of pluralism (all beliefs are equally valid and are should therefore not be subject to criticism) that prevails at the moment.

We live in a culture where it’s very unpopular to make value judgements between beliefs.  Religious Studies is just that – the descriptive study of religions, not an evaluation of religions.  At root, this seems to stem from the natural desire to be and to act autonomously.  Pluralism allows me to hold my beliefs, which may be inconsistent and incoherent and incompatible with other people’s beliefs, and remain impervious to other people’s criticisms or opinions about them, because in a pluralist system, everyone is right.

On the surface, there does seem to be something very attractive about this.  It should promote peace, because what is there to argue about if everyone’s beliefs are equally valid.  And it should promote people’s security, as we can hold whatever beliefs we want without ever being unsettled by anyone else’s beliefs.

The trouble is that at its heart, pluralism is desperately flawed.  By asserting that everyone is right, the pluralist has no way of dealing with the Christian who claims that only their way is right and true.  Any denial of the Christian belief is to abandon pluralism itself.  Furthermore, it is an arrogant position to take.  The claim of the pluralist is the viewpoint of one who considers themselves impartial and considers all those who make exclusive truth claims as blind and biased.  This discounts the reality that all of us are biased in some way (we all view the world from a certain world view) and discounts the possibility of a God who can, from outside creation, reveal himself to those in creation.

What’s the bottom line for Christians?  We should not be afraid by the apparent wisdom of the prevailing pluralism!  We can have confidence to proclaim Jesus as the Son of God, Lord and saviour of all, not just because it is true, but because it is coherent and consistent in itself and the pluralism of Christianity’s detractors is far more troublesome.  Christians can be confident that we have a message and a truth which can satisfy the underlying dissatisfaction of the pluralist.

A cultural mandate?

This week, one of our lecturers, Dan Strange, was talking about the ‘cultural mandate’ for Christians. He was talking about the design, set out in Genesis, for God’s people: “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground.”

It seems tragic how far mankind has fallen from this ideal, especially given that we are created in God’s image to reflect his character and rule as his stewards.  Dan was arguing that everything people output (their ‘culture’) should be in line with his original design.  So our work, leisure, relationships, creativity and conversation should be consistent with this design.

That means as I approach these areas I should ask myself, how does my work steward God’s creation?  How do my relationships express my relationship with God?  How are all my choices and attitudes in life an outworking of the fact that I have been created by God, for God, to do his work?