Perseverance

Radicalism and Reality (A Response to “Here Come the Radicals!”)

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Christianity Today has a smart piece on the rise of preaching a radical Christianity (“Here Come the Radicals!“). It’s a solid examination of “radical” voices in contemporary Christianity that are calling people to a faith that eschews the trappings of treacly Christian comfort and feel-good Evangelicalism.

As they say, read the whole thing. It’s an astute commentary.

Cerulean Sanctum readers will recognize a lot of the call for radicalism that some of these preacher/teacher/writers like Francis Chan, David Platt, and others demand. In fact, it’s heartening to read their books and hear some of the things that have bothered me for years finally published in the wider court of public opinion.

But there’s a disconnect between that radicalism and reality. This is also something I’ve talked about for years, but no preacher/teacher/writer with a national voice, publishing contract, or a megachurch pulpit ever takes on.

The buzzkill remark by Matthew Lee Anderson, author of “Here Come the Radicals!”:

“By contrast, there aren’t many narratives of men who rise at 4 A.M. six days a week to toil away in a factory to support their families. Or of single mothers who work 10 hours a day to care for their children. Judging by the tenor of their stories, being ‘radical’ is mainly for those who already have the upper-middle-class status to sacrifice.”

Bingo.

In 2003, the majority of Christian households I considered peers were single income. Today, none are. It’s crazy hard to sustain a single-income household anymore, and hardly anyone, no matter how radical, is up to the task. The economy is wrecking “simple living,” and the government plays fast and loose with real inflation numbers to make it look less horrifying than it is

Reality: I replaced the windshield wipers on my wife’s car yesterday and the cheapest I could get them was $25. That’s two to three hours salary for some people. For windshield wipers. How do people survive?

What does genuine Christian discipleship look like when everyone is working like crazy just to keep up with rapidly increasing costs of living? It’s one thing to be radical, but quite another when you get socked with a $15,000 hospital bill because your uninsured child needed an emergency appendectomy. Try paying that while working with street kids in the inner city while on donated support or working part time.

There’s another issue too.

So you feel called of God to be a doctor. You go to medical school. You end up with $350,000 or more in college and medical school debt, even if you go to a cheaper, no-name school. So, after graduation you, the newly minted doc, go to Africa to work as a doctor in an orphanage, just as the preachers of Christian radicalism would have you do.

How unlikely is that radical move to Africa? If your debt obligation makes it impossible to do something radical because you have to make serious cash to pay down your debt, does that put you in a position of earning hell for yourself because you fell into a comfortable suburban medical practice that charged enough for you to pay down that debt? Or do you simply bail on the debt in your pursuit of radicalism and hope someone else can absorb your failure to pay?

This is the reality for which radicalism offers no solutions.

Because there are no solutions within our present system. Too much of that system demands a certain adherence to the system or else. Yes, some people can flaunt that, but not everyone. If every Christian did the radical thing, then there would be no Christian doctors, lawyers, engineers, or any other professional in a career that demands much of its bearer in both time and money.

And after all, who is it who pays the support of those radicals who abandon the traditional lifestyle to work in an orphanage in Africa or save street kids in inner city America from a short, brutal life?

Notice this doesn’t even address the issue of the exhausted dad or the single mother mentioned in the quote above who is simply trying to get by. Or the caretaker dealing with sick and dying parents. On whom do we foist those in our care? Will the Church take care of them for us so we can be radical? Do we really just abandon them in their time of need? Where does this fall between “honor your father and mother” and “[he] who does not hate his own father and mother…cannot be my disciple”?

I’m not saying that God can’t come through with miraculous resolutions when we live “on the edge.” But at what point do we end up in a “you shall not put the Lord your God to the test” situation where we abandoned responsibility to pursue a radical Christianity?

I’m all for a radical faith. I’ve been saying for years we need it. But until Christians in the West address work-life issues with some modicum of sense, we’ll keep preaching a radicalness of faith the majority of Christians can attain only in their dreams.

Easy Accountability, Hard Accountability

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Iron sharpens ironIn my 35+ years as a Christian, I’ve heard a lot about accountability. In Evangelical ranks, the most common term of use is accountability partner.

An accountability partner is an individual who works with you to keep you on the straight and narrow. Iron sharpens iron and all that. In concept, it’s a nice idea.

It’s an easy one too. Maybe too easy.

The kind of accountability that an accountability partner provides, though, is that same kind of individualistic thinking about the Faith that seems ingrained in the American Church (see “The Church, Corporate Sin, and Christ as Community Savior“).

But there’s a harder accountability. Way hard. And perhaps because it’s hard, I hear about it as often as I hear about adding a Swahili-language service on Tuesday nights.

I’d like to see some accountability for all the prophecies and words of knowledge/wisdom some dole out that never come to pass. And I’d like to see the people who receive those words stop making excuses for their failures or for the people who pronounced them.

I’d like to see some accountability for all the times we go on and on about how radically “touched” our youth were at the retreat/conference/lock-in/whatever only to have those example youth walk away from the Church the second they graduate high school.

I’d like to see some accountability for the fact that so few of our church discipleship programs are effective enough to raise a church’s leadership from within so a church doesn’t have to scout the country for someone to lead it.

I’d like to see some accountability for the fact that we have thousands of Christian conferences around the country each year, and yet for all that wisdom being trotted out before thousands and millions, the trajectory of the general spiritual status of the populace of the United States continues sharply downward.

I’d like to see some accountability for the reality that most people who are on that downward slope only think about Jesus in negative terms because the people who represent Him are doing such a lackluster job of being excited about what they believe and sharing it in a positive way.

Getting an accountability partner for oneself is cake. Finding an accountability partner for the big “C” Church in America? Seemingly impossible.

I say seemingly because I don’t believe for a second that it really is as impossible as we make it.

As a whole, we Christians CAN do a better job. We CAN stop making excuses for the lacks. We CAN get serious about what we believe.

But we have to WANT to. And wanting to means dealing with the mess of the cleanup. We can’t kid ourselves about the job.

Do we want to improve? Or is taking the easy way all we want to be held accountable for?

Slowly to Oblivion: How Christians Fall Away from the Lord, Part 2

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Falling AwayPreviously, I wrote how Christians fall away (“Slowly to Oblivion: How Christians Fall Away from the Lord, Part 1“). In doing so, I realized I erred by focusing on one type of falling away solely: Phariseeism.

In truth, more than one way exists.

If you missed the intro explaining the idea of falling away, rather than rehash it here, please see the previous post.

Here is another pathway to falling away. Some will contend it afflicts you folks in the younger generation more so than older folks who are so susceptible to the other type of falling away.

Another way in which some Christians fall away from the Lord…

Crown Doubt.

Faith is one thing, but when you repeatedly parade your doubt before your Christian friends, you show how cool you really are. After all, the sword swallower  and fire-eater in the circus side show are the real attractions, aren’t they? Talk about doubt all the time. Love doubt. Write poems and hymns about the wonder of doubt. Make sure you sanctify that doubt, too, by dredging up historical references to Desert Fathers and Ancient Patricians who doubted all the time, like some type of Old Timey Doubt Machines.

Embrace appealing causes.

Get on board! You know which causes people are talking about most. Make sure you like that cause’s Facebook page. And don’t forget to buy the T-shirt. Wear it proudly so others can see how committed you are—until a hotter cause comes along.

Take the temperature of the times and adjust your beliefs accordingly.

What does the culture say? What’s society’s scuttlebutt? If you don’t already know, find out. Then open your Bible—if you still have one—and find a way to make the words in it conform to whatever the trend gurus say. Truth is flexible, right? A living document should change with the times. So be the one who changes it! Or find a pioneer or two who have already done the flexing for you and parrot everything they say. Besides, that pioneer is surely popular. You have his/her/its T-shirt and iPad app by now, don’t you?

Pick fights with the unenlightened.

Find a deeply held belief in someone else? Challenge it. Especially if it conflicts with your cause or the temperature of the times. Jesus challenged people all the time, so you’re just imitating Him. Convince yourself this makes you look more like Him. Remember, there’s a solid biblical precedent to ask questions that start with “Did God really say…?”

Talk in riddles and circles.

What is the sound of one hand clapping? That is the sort of thing Jesus would ask because He liked to unsettle people. Make statements that don’t say anything concrete. Ask questions you never plan to answer (which is a great way to allow for plausible deniability should the temperature of the times change). People will see you are spiritually deep if they can’t make sense of what you’re saying or pin you down. Clarity is so 2002.

Endorse other religions while making sure everyone knows the evils of your own.

Make sure other people know that Christianity is messed up, terribly. Apologize for being a Christian to anyone who will listen. Talk about how truth can be found in so many other religions. Read just enough about those other religions to be able to talk about them with likeminded people over a biscotti and fair trade mocha grand latté with organic soy milk.

Proudly avoid church.

Church? “Old and busted indoctrination factory” is more like it. And while you’re not attending church, make sure other people know your reasons. The reasons are always good, especially if you own a T-shirt that explains them.

Sin boldy.

Nothing says you are sanctified better than showing that you can sin as much as the next guy and not be affected by it. Nike said it best. And the founder of Lutheranism, Martin Luther King.

Read the right pseudepigrapha.

You have read the gospels of Judas, Marcion, the Four Heavenly Realms, and all the rest. Of course you have. Wisdom right there, ladies and gentlemen. John Shelby Spong says so.

Hate whatever is the new hate.

Point out that some Christians are really haters in disguise. Ensure other people know you hate that. While you’re at it, hating yourself in a meta sort of way can give you street cred (see Endorse other religions while making sure everyone knows the evils of your own).

Love yourself.

Look at those fundamentalists. Morons. Pretty much everything bad in the world can be traced to them. But not you. You are soooooooo much smarter than they are.

Sarcasm isn’t pretty, but then neither is the kind of delusional thinking depicted above. Yet it is very common among people who once started in the Faith and then kept pushing past the limits God set.

While the above may seem like caricature, I wish it were. I’ve met folks like this, though. They seem to be the reverse of the Pharisaical type mentioned in the previous post. They have pushed so hard not to be seen as a Pharisee, they have become one, albeit of doubt rather than faith. Sadly, their nonstop questioning only leads them to faithlessness and ruin.