Jesus calls us as Christians to engage culture as a result of being in relationship with him. All too often, however, Christians withdraw from culture and leave it to people who do not follow Christ to shape the world. We create Christian bubbles for ourselves and our families. That is escapist theology, and it is unbiblical.
We do not need to run away from messy environments and brokenness. Instead, the Holy Spirit empowers us to bring light into darkness. Amazingly, God chooses to work through us. This is why Christians should always be leading the way in such areas as cross-cultural relationships, racial reconciliation, local outreach, global outreach, and much more.
Neutrality and indifference to culture are not an option. Fear keeps Christians marginalized in society, but the Holy Spirit empowers us to engage.
1 comment:
Bryan
I agree. I think there's several reasons for this:
It IS messy. We don't like messy. We forget Jesus engaged messy people every day (prostitutes, the sickly, etc.)
We see engaging the world as futile. It's the 'we'll never change things, so why try' mentality.
Our faith is too weak.
We don't believe God could us for change.
We believe that the end is near (Jesus return, that is) and instead of working on fixing a messy world we instead applaud messiness in the belief it will hasten Jesus' return.
I believe all of the above is flawed thinking, of course...
John V
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