The World According to "ME"
As disciples of Jesus we were faced with a monumental challenge. Our problems seemed to grow in direct proportion to how we chose to deal with the modern world. The question became quite clear as the modern world gave way to post modern thinking: Do we allow the gospel of Christ to speak to the real needs of people within a largely secular, materialistic, and pluralistic society by engaging people’s worldview and faith commitments in a genuine search for Truth? Or, do we allow culture to define gospel, as we baptize cultural expression into a watered down gospel which is often indistinguishable from the gospel of personal fulfillment loudly proclaimed within western culture in the name of church growth (defined primarily by numbers)? Most western minded christians have already chosen – fulfillment, happiness, freedom and personal significance are our ideals. Gone are the days where we expect science and technology and progress to create meaning and purpose in life. We have discovered this is up to “me”, and that the greatest love of all is my love for “me”, and that the only person who can create the world I want for “me” is “me”. I love you as long as you can love “me”. I hang with you as long as you can prove you enjoy hanging with “me”. I will work for you as long as you can show me that you will help “me” take care of “me” and “mine”. I will serve my community and give of my time and resources as long as the feeling I get from this in some way benefits “me”. In the Post Modern World, even Jesus’ value is determined by how He feeds “me” and how he makes “me” feel and whether or not He is able to touch “me”. “I” have convinced myself that if you want to be “my” church then you will meet “my” needs in a way that speaks to “my” heart as I find “my” place in a world that largely exists to give “me” a place to find “my” purpose as defined by “me”. We do this with sanctified speech, often sounding like people of faith even as we reject the primary principles of faith, like submission and humility and love and service and commitment and the Cross and death to Self. Jesus is relegated to the place of friend or brother or “the man upstairs”, and His Lordship over the universe or His claim of being Absolute Truth is largely relegated to the place of irrelevant discussions that take place in academic institutions by people who really have nothing to teach “me” in the world “I” define for myself.
This is the power of the post modern gospel, built within the framework of personal significance thriving within cultural expressions which are valuable simply because the people who live within these expressions are valuable. For most people in the post modern world, it is no longer the value of our goals and ideals which give us meaning and purpose in life, it is rather the value of individual expressions of diverse culture which give meaning and purpose to whatever we choose to believe in. We have come full circle. We use to find meaning and purpose as we found our place in a quest which was defined for us (As Elwood Blues proclaimed: “we are on a mission from God”). We now find meaning and purpose in direct proportion to how successfully we can live out the individual and personal agendas we have set up for ourselves. We never pause long enough to realize that this exuberant faith we place in ourselves is by definition conformity to something which originates in a time and a place we have absolutely nothing to do with. The very Core of the Post Modern Mindset is in and of itself an historical yet irrational myth, perpetuated over time by men and women who chose to abandon a belief in Truth which transcends culture and time, and redefined the traditional meaning of truth in order to elevate personal preference or private agenda as Ultimate Reality. Post Modernism is completely void of substance when it comes to any attachment to Classical/ Historical Universal expressions of Truth. The irony is that the Post Modern World must first be created in order for anyone to be able to embrace it. It is a bit like getting a divorce in order to declare yourself a bachelor, since no one would believe you are a bachelor as long as you had a wife. I’ll change my reality in order to declare my reality. And this mentality reigns supreme in our culture in almost all arenas, whether we are evaluating government, churches, marriage, serving our communities, neighborhoods, schools, or any other arena we see as serving the public good (public good redefined as how it serves “me”.) First, I define reality according to me; Then, I evaluate life through the lens I have created for myself. A perfect illustration of this was verbalized by a friend of mine just last week who said to me: “The best thing I can do to change culture is to help elect a politician who will fight for my political agenda.” If you do not understand the problem with this statement, then you are most likely drowning in citizenship in this Post Modern World while convincing yourself you are bathing in the warm waters of truth.
A primary difference between the modern world and the postmodern world is the environment in which truth is discovered. In the modern world, dominated by a mechanistic view of the universe which was faithfully committed to progress and science, only truth found in a laboratory could be called absolute. God became unnecessary and irrelevant, for the forces of nature could explain life, and the question of “why” was replaced by the question of “how”. Our educational institutions and our vocational choices became cultural expressions of this commitment to science and progress, and God was abandoned in favor of materialistic goals and the realization of the American Dream. Family values, personal achievement, social obligations, and church involvement all became subservient to the ideals espoused by science and progress set forth in the random and mechanical cosmos in which we find ourselves. Even church growth during this time became an expression of that which works and that which individuals value over and above traditional and orthodox understandings of faith and life. The Health and Wealth gospel (a baptized version of the American Dream), church growth seminars and books (the scientific method applied to church growth), and the power and prestige connected to the mega-church movement, all formulated differing cultural expressions or our religious commitment to the modern world.
As disciples of Jesus we were faced with a monumental challenge. Our problems seemed to grow in direct proportion to how we chose to deal with the modern world. The question became quite clear as the modern world gave way to post modern thinking: Do we allow the gospel of Christ to speak to the real needs of people within a largely secular, materialistic, and pluralistic society by engaging people’s worldview and faith commitments in a genuine search for Truth? Or, do we allow culture to define gospel, as we baptize cultural expression into a watered down gospel which is often indistinguishable from the gospel of personal fulfillment loudly proclaimed within western culture in the name of church growth (defined primarily by numbers)? Most western minded christians have already chosen – fulfillment, happiness, freedom and personal significance are our ideals. Gone are the days where we expect science and technology and progress to create meaning and purpose in life. We have discovered this is up to “me”, and that the greatest love of all is my love for “me”, and that the only person who can create the world I want for “me” is “me”. I love you as long as you can love “me”. I hang with you as long as you can prove you enjoy hanging with “me”. I will work for you as long as you can show me that you will help “me” take care of “me” and “mine”. I will serve my community and give of my time and resources as long as the feeling I get from this in some way benefits “me”. In the Post Modern World, even Jesus’ value is determined by how He feeds “me” and how he makes “me” feel and whether or not He is able to touch “me”. “I” have convinced myself that if you want to be “my” church then you will meet “my” needs in a way that speaks to “my” heart as I find “my” place in a world that largely exists to give “me” a place to find “my” purpose as defined by “me”. We do this with sanctified speech, often sounding like people of faith even as we reject the primary principles of faith, like submission and humility and love and service and commitment and the Cross and death to Self. Jesus is relegated to the place of friend or brother or “the man upstairs”, and His Lordship over the universe or His claim of being Absolute Truth is largely relegated to the place of irrelevant discussions that take place in academic institutions by people who really have nothing to teach “me” in the world “I” define for myself.
This is the power of the post modern gospel, built within the framework of personal significance thriving within cultural expressions which are valuable simply because the people who live within these expressions are valuable. For most people in the post modern world, it is no longer the value of our goals and ideals which give us meaning and purpose in life, it is rather the value of individual expressions of diverse culture which give meaning and purpose to whatever we choose to believe in. We have come full circle. We use to find meaning and purpose as we found our place in a quest which was defined for us (As Elwood Blues proclaimed: “we are on a mission from God”). We now find meaning and purpose in direct proportion to how successfully we can live out the individual and personal agendas we have set up for ourselves. We never pause long enough to realize that this exuberant faith we place in ourselves is by definition conformity to something which originates in a time and a place we have absolutely nothing to do with. The very Core of the Post Modern Mindset is in and of itself an historical yet irrational myth, perpetuated over time by men and women who chose to abandon a belief in Truth which transcends culture and time, and redefined the traditional meaning of truth in order to elevate personal preference or private agenda as Ultimate Reality. Post Modernism is completely void of substance when it comes to any attachment to Classical/ Historical Universal expressions of Truth. The irony is that the Post Modern World must first be created in order for anyone to be able to embrace it. It is a bit like getting a divorce in order to declare yourself a bachelor, since no one would believe you are a bachelor as long as you had a wife. I’ll change my reality in order to declare my reality. And this mentality reigns supreme in our culture in almost all arenas, whether we are evaluating government, churches, marriage, serving our communities, neighborhoods, schools, or any other arena we see as serving the public good (public good redefined as how it serves “me”.) First, I define reality according to me; Then, I evaluate life through the lens I have created for myself. A perfect illustration of this was verbalized by a friend of mine just last week who said to me: “The best thing I can do to change culture is to help elect a politician who will fight for my political agenda.” If you do not understand the problem with this statement, then you are most likely drowning in citizenship in this Post Modern World while convincing yourself you are bathing in the warm waters of truth.
Written on Friday, 27 May 2011 12:00 by Rick Farmer
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