Culture

We’re All a Little Amish

January 14, 2019

Judah Smith recently announced “church in the palm of your hand” in the form of his new Churchome app. We have the technology to easily connect everyone, so why not do it?

I thought of a few reasons. When I first saw Smith’s announcement post, I laughed. Honestly, I thought for it might be satire. How could this be serious? Smith’s video claimed:

“We’re passionate about connecting people with God and each other and this is maybe the most effective platform we’ve ever used in doing so… People can actually build real, tactile relationships all over the world.”

I wondered, “Does he even know what the word ‘tacticle’ means? Or ‘real’?” Right away I saw so many tweets and comments and articles confirming my instincts to shoot this thing down. It was a misguided attempt to be relevant and it’s dangerous.

But then I thought about it a little bit. I talked to some of my friends. I talked to Ryan. And with a little reflection I came to a more profound realization: I’m a huge jackass.

The thing is, churches have historically been slow to adopt new technology. We’re embarrassingly late adopters. But why?

Where would you draw the line with churches utilizing technology? Is it bad for a church to utilize a website? A podcast? An Instagram account? Most of us would say no. But each of these things were slowly and reluctantly picked up by churches.

The same thing happened in the world of education (Christian and otherwise). A few early adopters starting offering classes online, and everyone else mocked them: “They don’t care about students or education, they’re just trying to make a buck.” But then a few more colleges started offering online classes. And then a few more. Now, almost every college offers online classes. But they have found a way to offer real value through a non-traditional platform. Is this the best possible way to do it? Maybe not (though you could make a legitimate argument for it). Is it valuable? Basically every college and tons of students think so.

When radio first became popular, a group of pastors were actually fairly cutting edge in utlizing radio ministries. They saw the potential to reach millions and had a lasting impact because they decided to use that technology to carry the gospel.

When Mr. Rogers first saw television, he was appalled at the way people were using it to degrade other human beings. But he saw its potential, so he dedicated his career to investing in human dignity through this new technology. Here’s the remarkable thing: Mr. Rogers went to seminary because he was going to be a Presbyterian minister. But while all of his classmates graduated and went on to preach thousands of sermons, Fred Rogers started a kids television show. There’s absolutely no way that all of his classmates’ sermons combined had anywhere near the impact of Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood. He didn’t talk about Jesus on the show, but he utilized technology in a way that embodied Jesus’ mission and message, and he impacted millions of lives. (I can’t watch “Won’t You Be My Neighbor” without balling all the way through—something I have done several times already).

All that to say, I was a jackass for mocking Judah Smith. For one thing, I made huge assumptions. I mocked his use of “real” and “tactile” for app-based interactions, but later I learned that his app can connect you with in-person gatherings. He knew what the words meant; I just made uncharitable assumptions. I think Judah Smith knows what church was designed to be, and I think he sees a way that technology can help to facilitate that.

“If we don’t think Judah Smith can use an app to facilitate interactions, then we’re being Amish. And we’re allowed to do that. But we’re not allowed to be jackasses about it.”

Here’s the thing. We’re all using technology in all of our churches, whether it’s instruments, sound systems, projectors, websites, or whatever. We have just drawn a line regarding how much is too much. That’s a total jackass move.

Think of the Amish: they’re known for totally rejecting technology. But it’s not true. Once upon a time, things like wagons and pulleys and even shovels were new technology. The Amish use all of those things; they just got to a point where they decided to avoid all technology developed after 1800 (or whenever, I have no idea). And good for them. As long as they’re not being jackasses about it.

So the thing is, if we don’t think Judah Smith can use an app to facilitate interactions, then we’re being Amish. We’re choosing an arbitrary cutoff for which technologies are compatible with the gospel. And we’re allowed to do that. But we’re not allowed to be jackasses about it. I was. And I’m sorry.

The Church’s PR Problem

Mark Beuving

January 28, 2022

The Church and Christianity in the broader sense both have a major Public Relations problem. I doubt you’ll disagree. My question is this:

Have we earned the negative reputation we’ve acquired?

Barna has been watching this for decades. In their book UnChristian, David Kinnaman and Gabe Lyons track the perception of Christianity from 1996, when 85% of people who did not identify as Christian held a favorable view of Christianity, to 2007 when that percentage dropped to 16%. The number of “non-Christians” who viewed the role of evangelicals in society as favorable in 2007 was 3%!

In that same 2007 study, they found that 85% of young “outsiders” (their technical term to describe people who don’t see themselves as “inside the church”) saw Christianity as hypocritical. Perhaps not surprisingly, 47% of young churchgoers agreed! 57% of “outsiders” said that Christians are quick to find fault in others. Only 16% of young “outsiders” believed that Christians consistently show love to the people around them. Along the same lines, Kinnaman and Lyons found that many young adults perceive Christians and the churches they belong to as being more devoted to self-preservation than world restoration.

These numbers are bad. I’ll address some of their more recent studies in future posts, but trust me, our PR problem hasn’t improved.

“Barna tracked the perception of Christianity from 1996, when 85% of ‘non-Christians’ held a favorable view of Christianity, to 2007 when that dropped to 16%. Have we earned the poor reputation?”

(Some get dismissive of studies like this, but let me assure you that Barna does its homework. And they love the Church. AND, Kinnaman does not believe our task is to make Christianity more popular or Jesus more palatable. He says outright: “Softening or reshaping the gospel is an utterly wrong response to the objections people raise” (UnChristian, 33). He simply wants us to understand the reputation we have garnered and ask ourselves if that’s what we want.)

So back to my question: Have we earned the negative reputation we’ve acquired?

Here’s my take: yes and no. I’ll start with no. I could list for you hundreds of names of Christians who are loving, compassionate, and who contribute positively to the world around them. These people are not any more (or less) hypocritical than the average person who fails to be all that they aspire to be. Think about it: The average unchurched person believes that people should be treated with dignity but still gets snappy when service is poor at a restaurant. He or she also believes that we have a responsibility to care for the environment but has a hard time making the sacrifices necessary to reduce their carbon footprint. We don’t typically call this person hypocritical, but it’s not that different than someone who aspires to live like Jesus yet continues to fall short. So there’s a sense in which this broad brush dismissal of Christianity and Christians has not been earned, at least by the majority of Christians I know.

But also yes, we have absolutely earned this reputation. I look around and I truly do believe that we have been collectively more invested in self-preservation than the good of the people around us. I think that we Christians have been very judgmental on certain issues. It’s not that we hate the people around us (I suppose there are always exceptions), it’s that we have failed to consider the tone we use when we speak about certain people. Or how our actions and words affect real people. How did Christianity get a reputation for being horrible to the gay community? I’d say that in many cases, we earned this reputation by being horrible to the gay community. (No, I don’t believe it’s wrong for us to disagree with someone’s lifestyle. Nor do I believe it’s wrong to tell someone that we believe that they are engaging in a sin. But I do believe we have earned a reputation for being judgmental by the way we’ve done this and by an almost complete lack of love towards the people in this community.)

My contention is that while I can point to hundreds of really amazing and loving Christians, even these people can sometimes be jackasses in the name of Jesus. I feel confident saying this because that statement is autobiographical. We have come to collectively hold an un-Jesus-like posture on many things, and we’ve all individually misrepresented Jesus in a myriad ways. All of this contributes to the poor reputation of Christians and churches.

So yes and no. But also, whether or not we’ve earned our reputation for being judgmental and hypocritical and unloving, I do know this: we currently have this reputation and we have to live with it. We’re not going to help anyone by arguing that people shouldn’t be viewing us as judgmental. Here’s reality: they see us that way. So what will we do about it?

That’s our goal in addressing Jackass Theology. We want to help the Church move back into the ways of Jesus.

I don’t think we can instantly shake the poor PR we’ve been building for a long time now. But that’s not the point of Jackass Theology. The point is to ask what Jesus wants for his church. Let’s not negate the words of Jesus by dismissing biblical teaching. No, let’s hold the words of Jesus tightly, but also pursue with greater intensity the works and ways of Jesus. I believe we’ve lost sight of this.

Some would argue that we need to stop caring about truth. You won’t find us doing that here. We need to change, but not like that. I believe our PR problem has come from mishandling the words of Jesus by divorcing them from the works and ways of Jesus. If you want to see what that looks like, I invite you to join us in this journey of addressing Jackass Theology.

The Church’s Tone & Emphasis Problem

Mark Beuving

January 31, 2022

The Church has a tone and emphasis problem, which ties in to our PR problem. We are often speaking the truth, but we seem to have forgotten what it means to do this in love. Though I hear many evangelicals explain that they are “speaking the truth in love” they seem to be taking it to mean “I will say whatever I need to say to you in whatever tone I need to say it and that in itself is a loving act.” In other words, it’s loving to make sure people know what’s right; I don’t have to worry about being loving as I dispense that truth.

This is our tone problem. And actually, many times we are spouting our opinions—in many cases our unearned opinions–and calling those God’s truth. When we do this, we’re neither speaking the truth, nor doing so in love.

I’m old enough to have seen Christians get really worked up and focused on whether or not Christians are allowed to drink and whether or not Christians are allowed to listen to “secular” music. I’ve seen Christians advocate at full volume and with all of the self-righteous piety of a Puritan preacher that courtship and homeschooling are the only non-sinful options (I’m exaggerating, but only slightly). I’ve lived through periods when the Church’s biggest battles were over partisan politics—with many instances of churches bringing literal political candidates to “preach” in their pulpits. Lately we’re caught up in wokism and anti-wokism. We’re losing our minds over the prospect of women preaching. This list will never stop growing.

Let’s step back and take a breath for a minute. What does God call us to do in this world? Is it possible we’ve raised up as primary some issues that were never meant to be?

“We seem to be taking ‘speaking the truth in love’ to mean ‘I will say whatever I need to say to you in whatever tone I need to say it and that in itself is a loving act.'”

In Miguel de Cervantes’ novel Don Quixote, the eponymous hero fights boldly and bravely. No one can hold him back from what he knows is right. He disregards the protests of enemies and friends alike when they tried to dissuade him from his mission because he knows what’s right and he will boldly stand and defend truth and justice. The problem, of course, is the very thing that makes Don Quixote a comedy. Don Quixote is utterly misguided throughout the entire novel. In the book’s most famous episode, when Don Quixote attacks the ferocious giants terrorizing the country peasants, he’s actually attacking a row of windmills. With deep conviction. With full self-righteousness. But he’s utterly deluded.

I fear that this is a decent parable for the modern evangelical church. We’ve been brave. We’ve been bold. We’ve applauded for each other when we’ve fought the culture wars and said the things that are really difficult but important to say, such as correcting a minimum wage retailer who dares to utter “Happy Holidays” instead of “Merry Christmas.” Few could accuse the evangelical church of lacking passion or not standing up for what we believe in.

The problem is that we’ve often been fighting like Don Quixote. Under the banner of being biblical we’ve often been jackasses. Under the pretext of being Christlike, we’ve often failed in the very things that Jesus said were the most important: loving God and loving our neighbors.

“Here’s a helpful rule of thumb: If you find your theological convictions making you less like Jesus, then something is off.”

I’m not suggesting that we grow soft on biblical truth. I want to stand firm on everything Jesus stood firm on. But I want to be careful to say the things that Jesus said in the way that Jesus said them. I want to hold those truths in such a way that I actually look and act and feel to other people like Jesus!

Here’s a helpful rule of thumb: If you find your theological convictions making you less like Jesus, then something is off. If you can’t live consistently with your beliefs in such a way that your life looks like Jesus’ life, then you’re missing something.

I am a conservative American Christian. There are very few areas where I have come to disagree with the Christianity I was taught growing up or even with my very conservative seminary training. But I have come to see numerous areas in which some aspects of that theology were wrongly emphasized, or held with a sinful level of certainty, or wielded like a weapon rather than borne in love and grace. And I have also seen many of my brothers and sisters (and also myself) turn to other battles that we have never been called to.

So I am continuing to try to live in that journey of pursuing the words, works, and ways of Jesus. It’s not enough to quote chapter and verse. We have to quote chapter and verse while also living in love and embodying the grace that God so readily extends to everyone around us. That is the journey of Jackass Theology. And I’m deeply thankful for a growing group of people that are on that same journey with me.

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