So, I decided to listen to just the radio yesterday and stumbled upon one of the CHristian stations. THey played a Mercy Me song while I stuck hot poker's into my eyes. THen they proceded to talk about how their station promotes true worshipful community.
Is it me being fed up with people trying to sound like ultra spiritual, high thinkers, or would that phrase cause the biggest disconnect with anyone outside of western evangelical church subculture? I use words like... community, meaningful, fellowship, post-modern, etc. all the time but am often reminded that they are words that sound good. And "worshipful" ... come on, they can't be serious. It sounds like a word that would come out while praying aloud in a group of people who are better than you. Don't pretend like you haven't played the Pharisee, we all have done it at some point.
My point is, these sort of spiritual words, or made up words strike me as being dangerous. THey mask over the need for action with empty words. I have been seeing more and more recently how Christians get decieved with stuff that sounds important and sounds right but couldn't more distracting. THere are two bads happening. One, we use words like worshipful to help push us towards doing something new, something relevant, something that doesn't bore us because that will translate directly to a non- Christian, so we think.
Two , we use big words that turn away non-CHristians because the words couldn't be more irrelevant to someone who isn't engulfed in church culture.
My re-occurring thought is that the newest Christian song isn't going to pull the secular world into the church. ( not that it won't aide or that being relevant to the culture is mute) THe world need truth taken directly to them. When JEsus taught he taught straight truth through teachable moments steeped in secular culture. How does the church find the balance? Will my thoughts change things? no. Does everyone in my circle say this? yes.
There could be more to say, but I am gong to go and do.
The Secret We Can't Talk About
11 years ago
1 comment:
I have had this post marked as something to respond to forever, sorry for the delay.
Totally hear everything you are saying, but I wonder what to do with the idea that part if what it means to be a Christian means being able to understand and be formed by a particular kind of language. I think terms like grace, atonement, justice, peace, and worship (and their culturally and contextully interpreted equivalents) are important for Christians to understand and articulate in terms of their life in Christ and in Christian community. Obviously I would never be for letting these terms be used cheesily or arbitrarily, but I do worry about becoming so ingrained in a particular culture that we lose our ability to remain distinctive. Language seems to be a tool for that goal.
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