The tension between being a citizen of this great county, the US of A, and being citizens of God’s kingdom is real. Or, it should be. In fact, I think there should be many sleepless nights and burden filled days for American Christians. I do love being an American. I enjoy the benefits that our form of government and the way our economic system works, and I appreciate the responsibilities that come with the role of citizen. I served in the Air Force, a volunteer, and I even served on the local Town Committee for the Republican Party (now, don’t go pigeon holing me—make sure you read a lot of this blog before making me a stereo-type conservative). And like Daniel and his three friends, I hope I contribute to my country’s welfare. But also like these four young men, I hope I know where to draw the line between what is acceptable in the emperor’s kingdom (i.e., the state) and what is pleasing as a member of God’s Kingdom. For any Christian, this is a tough task. Or, if should be—for too many, there is no tension at all.
Sometimes making this distinction and living it out can lead to a lion’s den and a fiery furnace (as in Daniel’s story). I hope when it is my turn, I live up to my convictions. In July, Americans get all patriotic—even Christians. Around the 4th many churches include such patriotism as a part of its worship, including the singing of the Battle Hymn of the Republic, the Star Spangled Banner, O Beautiful, and God Bless the USA, and in many churches, replacing the Apostle’s Creed with the Pledge of Allegiance. The Red, White, and Blue becomes the center of many American churches during this month. I have a problem with this—you should too! The worship service is to be characterized in such a way to reflect God’s throne and our allegiance to His Kingdom. Sermons—which ought to be a reflection of God’s Word, not American religiosity or civil religion—ought to be the place we learn about this tension and how to deal with it. In some countries and some places in history such kingdom-centered worship led to a lion’s den and a fiery furnace. The New Testament itself, especially books like Galatians and Revelation directly argue against aligning our church-life and Christian experience with the State, or a race, or an ethnic group. The worship of a Christian Church should not promote patriotism at any time, even if it’s only for the 4th of July; but, should celebrate that the church—no matter what country its adherents belong or living in—is a reflection of the eternal worship found in the consummation and in the nature of the Gospel itself. When we portray the Gospel as aligned in any way with a State or culture, we should listen seriously to what Paul said in Galatians 1:8-9:
But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we preached to you, let him be eternally condemned! As we have already said, so now I say again: If anybody is preaching to you a gospel other than what you accepted, let him be eternally condemned!
Better yet, we should make sure that our worship reflects God’s Kingdom rule as Daniel portrayed it in Daniel 7:13-14:
“In my vision at night I looked, and there before me was one like a son of man, coming with the clouds of heaven. He approached the Ancient of Days and was led into his presence. He was given authority, glory and sovereign power; all peoples, nations and men of every language worshiped him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion that will not pass away, and his kingdom is one that will never be destroyed.”
I only pray, despite whatever harm or result of my allegiance to God’s Kingdom comes my way, I can say as the three who faced the fire,
“O Nebuchadnezzar, we do not need to give you an answer concerning this matter. If it be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the furnace of blazing fire; and He will deliver us out of your hand, O king. But even if He does not, let it be known to you, O king, that we are not going to serve your gods or worship the golden image that you have set up” (Daniel 3:16-18).
We owe it to the martyrs of old and even those facing the same throughout the world today, who didn’t and doesn’t allow their faith to be a reflection of their civic duties and discovered as a result that their worship was welcomed by the face of lions and the flames of fire. We owe it to the truth of the Gospel. Sometimes, even when it seems unpatriotic, as Christians and citizens of the kingdom of God, we need to know where that line is. I need to know where that line is…daily.
PS In a few following posts I’d like to reflect on that line a little…
Finally, some concluding thoughts. Please remember these are first thoughts. I am hoping to work on a paper, maybe to present, but certainly as a chapter in my hopeful book on evangelism and Social Action: “Significance Before Application: Proclaiming, Casting, and Evangelistic Social Action Outcomes.” But for now, these concluding remarks are very rough draft. My concern in this thread was to attempt some thoughts and a preliminary answer to the question, “How is casting out demons = to social action.” I have suggested below in the posts to this thread that it is not that casting = social action, but that the significance of the fulfillment of the promise to become fishers (Mark 1:17), that is, the significance of the commission to announce the arrival of the kingdom and the activity of casting out of demons (Mark 3:14-15), ought to have social action applications—I’d rather say, they can have social action outcomes.
First as briefly discussed above, I believe part of the impasse, the barrier, to seeing how social action outcomes are a legitimate evangelistic outcome is that we start with application and move back to the text. We start with witnessing and other verbal forms of evangelism and we read back into the Gospel story that is what Jesus must have meant in saying you will become fishers of men. Second, we have a problem with moving from proclaiming the gospel to anything other than “the four spiritual laws,” or “Jesus died on the cross for your sins.” And third, we make no application regarding the significance of the fisher activity of “casting out demons” other than literal exorcism. So we stop and assume we know what the text says because we’ve already figured out how to apply it. So the text (i.e., “fishers of men” in Mark 1:17) must mean what we already think it means, namely, we are to verbally communicate that Jesus saves and fish, catch people for Christ, i.e., get them to convert, be saved, become a Christian. This however is our doing, not the text’s inference, and certainly not what is presented even throughout the whole of the New Testament.
I’d like to return for a moment to Mark 1:14-15, Jesus’ first summary of His ministry and Mark’s primary summary text of the content of what the Jesus-ministry-mission is.
Now after John had been taken into custody, Jesus came into Galilee, preaching the gospel of God, and saying, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel.”
Let me borrow from Joel Markus’ thought on this passage from his commentary on Mark 1-8. We read this as two statements, but we do not read them as two parallel statements that explain or correspond to each other, which would not have been so far-fetched given the Hebrew thinking of the one who said it (Jesus) and the one who wrote it (Mark). Let’s just say it’s a structure that smacks of Hebrew parallelism.
The time is fulfilled and the kingdom of God is at hand
Repent and believe in the Gospel
The significance of the parallelism is that the time of the old age, or this present evil age with all its anti-YHWH aspects, has come to an end; that time (the καιρὸς) has come to its eschatological end, for the Kingdom of God has been inaugurated. The old age of Satan’s rule over mankind has come to its eschatological end, albeit in a “now and not yet” form. And, the time of God’s dominion, His right to rule over the realms of mankind, has come—His Kingdom has been inaugurated in the appearance of Jesus, the Messiah, the Son of God (Mark 1:1). (Also in the “appearance” are the other inaugurators as well—John the Baptist, the Holy Spirit, and the fishers of men.) The first imperative is to repent, which corresponds to the first indicative that the Kingdom has come. The second imperative is to believe, which corresponds to the second indicative that the hearers are to turn to belief/faith in (loyalty to) the good news that the new age of God’s dominion has dawned.
The fisher-promise, which comes right after this ministry-mission summary, pulls those who follow this King Jesus, the Messiah, to mirror this ministry-mission. As Jesus begins his ministry in the following verses through chapter 3, consisting of proclamation and casting (and healing), so now in Mark 3:14ff the followers are commissioned to mirror the same. The content of the Kingdom is drawn from Old Testament covenant texts, land-stipulations, and prophetic judgments—all of which contain issues related to the economically vulnerable (as I have already demonstrated and written and posted even on this site). Why shouldn’t we think that both the proclaiming and the casting interventions are related to bringing about the values, laws, and regulations that mirror the rule and reign of the arrived King? One certainly explains it; the other certainly demonstrates it. The proclaiming in the Gospel isn’t about “Jesus saves” (although one of the outcomes associated with the presence of the Kingdom for sure), but about the time when God’s Kingdom has arrived and all of creation is to realign itself with this Kingdom, and all people are to reorient themselves to the demands and values of this Kingdom.
Those who say “fishers of men = verbal communication of the Gospel as evangelism” forget there is a second part, “casting out of demons.” Of course there are those who believe casting is a miracle for today—this is not the debate here, although I have no problem with that assumption. What I am driving at here is, “Do we cast as well as preach, witness, and proclaim?” Few do. So how do those who disagree with me “cast out demons?” Or, do we take literally the fisher commission to proclaim (and narrow it down to only individual salvation) and “spiritualize” or do away with the commission to “cast”? Or perhaps we should see the significance of the Gospel of Mark’s commission and the two interventions of preaching and casting, that is interventions that are to reorient ourselves to God’s inaugurated Kingdom and that God’s Kingdom is “aggressively” taking over the realms of Satan, the present evil age, which has distanced itself through private actions of individuals, through structure sin (intended and unintended), and through both intended and unintended consequences of the choices and social structures we live within? Long sentence, but it makes my point.
Furthermore, as I have pointed out elsewhere, even the casting in Mark’s Gospel, particularly in the lengthy section of chapter 5, is actually about God’s stronger man invading the realms of mankind in order to bring about God’s rule and reign. More on this in a future thread. For now, I believe we should see the significance of the commission to proclaim and cast as interventions that are to move the realms of mankind away from the present evil age that has come to its end and move the realms of mankind—individually and corporately, things of the private sphere and things of the public sphere—toward the outcomes that are to be associated with the arrival of God’s Kingdom.
Yes, proclaiming the presence of the Kingdom and the casting out of demons are to be understood as including social action outcomes that address the needs and conditions of those who live in poverty. Social Action Outcomes can be biblical evangelism.
My fisher posting that precedes this one expands a Rough Cut on Mark 1:17 that I had written back in 2006. But now in order to give full disclosure on the matter, the expanded paper here now reflects my goal in producing a defense that Social Action can indeed be Evangelism. It is we who have narrowed evangelism down to proclamation. Oh, of course we say Social Action, that is helping the poor and doing other acts of kindness, can be “pre-evangelism,” but not truly an act of evangelism. But, this is to dismiss how the Gospel is actually presented in the New Testament, and in particular how it is built on Old Testament referents and contexts that speak clearly to God’s concern for the economically vulnerable. My previous three papers on the subject also provide a foundation for this view I hold. My first on Mark 12 and the “Poor Widow” is posted here on the site. The foundational essay on Mark 4 can be found in various draft postings here (and also in these posts, 1, 2), but the full article, “Wasted Evangelism” (Mark 4): The Task of Evangelism and Social Action Outcomes,” can be found in the Africanus Journal (Vol 1. No. 2, November 2009, pp. 39-58). My recent ETS paper on the biblical juxtaposition of idolatry and poverty is posted in draft form on this site as well. And there are other posts on Mark 3, the Beelzubul conflict, as well, that offers even more argumentation regarding the link between evangelism and social action.
One of the difficulties in positing a different interpretation of a popular text is making application changes. In fact, sometimes Christians are apt to forget good exegesis, forgo sound contextual and biblical theological considerations, and jump directly to application. In this case for many, application is interpretation. It goes like this with the “fisher of men” texts in Mark 1 and Matthew 4: Since evangelism is like fishing in that I am catching people for Christ, that’s what Jesus meant when he says “You will become fishers of men.” But this is backwards; we start with application to explain what a text means—and this makes it all the more difficult in presenting and convincing others of a sound, new to them, interpretation of a popular and fond text to many Evangelicals. One problem with application is that is can narrow one’s view of a text from which the application is linked--How else are we going to apply it, if the text doesn’t say what I thought it used to say? and But, if that text doesn’t mean what I thought it meant, then we’ll stop doing the application (in this case “witnessing” and “evangelising”) and that isn’t right. Linking fishing for men simply to verbal communication and individualised acts of salvation creates barriers to hearing the text and then seeing its significance for a whole other range of potential application.
Over the next few posts, I’d like to muse on the significance of my understanding of “fishers of men” as God’s agents of judgment, and then reluctantly make some application.
My paper on Evangelism and Social Action, which I presented at the 2008 Evangelical Theological Society annual meeting in Providence, RI, has been published in the Africanus Journal’s recent edition. I am honored and humbled by their kindness in asking for and publishing this paper as an article. You can obtain both the article and the Journal online through the Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary website, the Boston Campus.
“Wasted Evangelism” (Mark 4):
The Task of Evangelism and Social Action Outcomes
Chip M Anderson
A number of years ago my pastor had a great idea to get people to come to church. One Sunday morning he asked us to list on the 3 x 5 card in our bulletin topics that our friends would like to hear. He was planning a “relevant and practical” sermon series during the evening services. The pastor hoped the topics would interest our non-churched friends if there were some “practical” value to them. This was a no-brainer for me, so, without hesitation, I wrote down “workforce development” and “poverty,” topics that would interest my friends. Some weeks later, I asked the pastor if he had seen my 3 x 5 card. He acknowledged he saw my topics and then made this comment, “That’s your area.” For sure, these areas are mine in the sense that I work within the social service world, and, in particular, a Community Action Agency, whose mission is to alleviate the causes of poverty and move families toward self-sufficiency. At that moment, I realized I needed to develop my own “theory of evangelism” as it relates to the Christian faith and issues like “workforce development” and “poverty.”
The pastor’s comment was in line with a history of dissonance over the Church’s social responsibilities and how the Bible speaks to issues of poverty…click here for the full article...and scroll down…
Writing projects sometime have a mind of their own—taking you places you didn’t expect to go. At the previous 5 posts to this drawn-out thread indicates, I have draw some conclusions about my political leanings, about taxing and taxes, and about political rhetoric. In particular, I have concluded that I can no longer be a registered republican—certainly not because I am not conservative in my political views, for the most part I am, in particular in my view of the constitution, limited government, and policy related to taxes and business. Nonetheless, it is the affiliation that is at heart—I cannot find myself affiliated by commitment to a political party: neither major parties represent my views on my relationship to the world around me, particularly to the poor. Neither party offers solutions that are biblical enough for me to sign my name to, actually. Although simplistic, but certainly not naïve, the political action arena and too much of the business associated with the issues of social action and poverty seem more about power—who has it, who controls it, and making money off it—for me to align myself in a political affiliation.
Now perhaps more naïvely so, it seems to me that Christians should not be too quick on affiliating with a party. I know some Christians turn to the Conservative Party, or the Libertarian Party (which I now seem closer to in basic philosophy, except this party, too, undervalues the role of government in addressing the issues of generational poverty), and even some Christians seem to now pump the so-called Tea Party as a political home. I think as an independent, non-affiliated citizen-voter, I have power to give away (which seems a more biblical view of political power), so that politicians and parties need to win my vote and support.
Many Christians won’t be a democrat because as a party they are pro-abortion—that seems clear enough for me, and personally, understandable. But simply because a party (in this case, republican) is via platform and rhetoric pro-life should not be enough to sign on. Because both parties seem to have enough to make my Christian-skin feel uncomfortable at this time, an independent position seems best for me. Candidates will have to win me over—and I will be specific on my questions to them regarding their positions and actions on behalf of the least vulnerable among us. Rhetoric will not be enough. Power is to be given away—not grabbed. I see too much of that now. How do I perceive their hold on power? These will be some of the criteria for my support and vote. I am committed to be a more thinking Christian when it comes to politics, political support, and voting.
The previous Expressing my independence thread posts...
1 of 6,
2 of 6,
3 of 6,
4 of 6, and
5 of 6.
“There was a time when the church was very powerful—in the time when the early Christians rejoiced at being deemed worthy to suffer for what they believed. In those days the church was not merely a thermometer that recorded the ideas and principles of popular opinion; it was a thermostat that transformed the morés of society. Whenever the early Christians entered a town, the people in power became disturbed and immediately sought to convict the Christians for being “disturbers of the peace” and “outside agitators.”‘ But the Christians pressed on, in the conviction that they were “a colony of heaven,” called to obey God rather than man. Small in number, they were big in commitment. They were too God-intoxicated to be “astronomically intimidated.” By their effort and example they brought an end to such ancient evils as infanticide and gladiatorial contests.
“Things are different now. So often the contemporary church is a weak, ineffectual voice with an uncertain sound. So often it is an archdefender of the status quo. Far from being disturbed by the presence of the church, the power structure of the average community is consoled by the church’s silent—and often even vocal—sanction of things as they are.
But the judgment of God is upon the church as never before. If today’s church does not recapture the sacrificial spirit of the early church, it will lose its authenticity, forfeit the loyalty of millions, and be dismissed as an irrelevant social club with no meaning for the twentieth century.” ~Martin Luther King, Jr., “Letter From a Birmingham Jail” (1963)
My daughter never ceases to amaze me. In a recent homework assignment she analysis two pieces of literature from two government antagonists and advocates for civil disobedience—Henry David Thoreau and Martin Luther King Jr. Both these men, according to my daughter, Amanda, challenged “the ‘rightness’ of government laws and its justice system through civil disobedience.” These two essays reflected these sentiments: Thoreau in his essay “On the Duty of Civil Disobedience” (1849) and King in his “Letter from Birmingham Jail” (1963). She utilizes these essays and how each of these recognizable civil antagonists provoked others to be persuaded by their point of view. She summarizes the essence of these men’s conflict with Governing laws and the laws of personal morality:
“Humanity is ruled by a large range of moral law, which dictates the difference between right and wrong. However, society is ruled by a government that dictates what is considered right and wrong according to laws. These laws set the standards by which a society functions and the penalties for breaking the laws. When the law of society clashes with the moral individuality of humanity, it is only fair that one should be able to ask if the government’s laws are sound and morally correct.”
My Amanda contends that Luther, rather than Thoreau, has a better persuasive essay, for in the end both use appeals to justice, both from two very different angles. Thoreau because of how what he considered unjust laws affected him—he pushed his argument from an individualistic point of reference; whereas Luther, on the other hand concentrated on what is just for all people, especially those marginalized in places of concentrated poverty. I, too, read Thoreau, not in high school, but in college and I told Amanda I always felt he was a whiner. He complained about what he didn’t like personally. He would no more want you or his neighbor to exercise their personal morality if it somehow placed him in conflict with his own.
I never read King until I was a Christian, out of college and grad-school and working in a Community Action Agency. King on the other hand, despite any personal failings, didn’t complain for himself, but identified what ought to be just for all. My daughter’s brief essay contrasting these two firebrands draws out King’s poignant comment to the Church:
“King’s essay is exceedingly more personal than Thoreau’s. Within this letter there is also a hint of logical appeal, for example when his is talking to the church and how disappointed he is with their role in segregation, King ‘logically’ states that if the church does not ‘recapture the sacrificial spirit of the early church, it will lose its authenticity, forfeit the loyalty of millions, and be dismissed and an irrelevant social club…’ (King). This logical appeal attempts to get the church to think about the consequences of their actions and inaction, drawing the point that it may be their downfall to not aid in the termination of segregation.”
I was amazed at both the reference in the Letter and that my daughter would draw out her own attention to the Church’s culpability in following unjust laws (and allow and not confront structural sin that leave many poor and marginalized around us). She ends her own argument that King was more persuasive than the selfish, bellyaching, whining Thoreau:
“In comparing King’s letter to Thoreau’s essay—both on civil disobedience— it appears that King’s letter is more effective in its use of emotional appeals and ability to draw in the audience with a convincing tone and persuasive argument. King is fighting for something he believes to be right and the reader can feel his passion simmer throughout the letter. King also is more effective in the way he establishes his authority. In the letter he gives a brief introduction of who he is and his purpose for being in Alabama. Thoreau, while demonstrating a well thought through and logical argument, still fails to truly captivate the reader. At the closing of his essay it appears as though he is just bitter for being placed in jail. Thoreau was not prepared for the consequences of his actions. King, on the other hand, was convinced that suffering the consequences of his actions was part of his argument.”
Perhaps one reason the Church fails to captivate the public is that we argue like Thoreau—we’re only complaining about what affects us, selfish, moralizing whiners who just don’t want what is unjust toward us. We ought to reflect more King’s argument and stop being “an irrelevant social club,” and realize that whatever suffering as Christians we are to endure on behalf of others is part of our apologetic, part of our argument for Christianity and that Christ is alive and the true King over all things in heaven and on earth.
In my profession within the social services and social action world, I have been identified as the “good republican.” This is mostly so because I work and argue on behalf of social action, social programs and safety net provisions for the economically vulnerable and poor among us in our communities—and do it rather well. And yet, I am conservative and tend to vote republican at the State and Federal level and tend to be rather hawkish regarding the military, and advocate an originalist approach to understanding the US Constitution and Bill of Rights. (The nuanced and progressive approach is eisegesis, a reading into the text, and more like making ammendments without going through the constitutionally established process of having the States vote on the ammendment—tricky I say.) Mostly I consider myself a politically conservative person because of these tendencies, but my social leanings are mostly libertarian. And as for my views on social action and the poor, most would say my leanings are liberal, however, I’d beg to say why such a designation—probably because it is held mostly by those who are politically liberal. So I am accused of being liberal, too. The number of people who hold or act on a principle or view (or worldview) determines such a principle or view is defined by the larger group? Who made that rule? I think I am a Christian who thinks christianly about the poor and poverty.
But I know…since conservatives believe in limited government that implies that the government should not be involved or utilize public funds to pay for or support social service programs; thus, those who advocate social service programs supported by the government are liberal, not conservative. But yet, it is degree—almost everyone believes the government has “some” role in providing a social services safety-net. But, should that line of too little or too much, too socialist/liberal or too capitalist/conservative be drawn in the Christian community. Now I agree that “line” could and should be debated, but as my recent paper on “Idolatry and Poverty” pointed out that many of the non-poor conservatives seem to think they “did it on their own” without the government—which is simply not true (read the paper!). So in the end its not limited government, but who gets the benefits of limited government and when and how. This is duplicitous.
Ah, but this leads me to my new found independence and some conclusions I have drawn from my recent research and my political involvement and observations over the last twenty years. Not everything makes it into a paper—so I’d like to post a thread of the gemera, the leftovers, some thoughts and thinking on a few areas.
First I’d like to unveil my decision to change political parties, well, really to move from being a Republican in party name and affiliation to being an Independent with no party affiliation (My renewed independence). Then a series of observations that review how the policies and rhetoric of political parties and talking-heads can have the opposite effects on desired outcomes: Second, Low taxes almost always means more revenue into the government.
Then a post where I talk about a grave concern I have, namely Liberal Extreme and Undisciplined Spending on Social Programs Pave the Way for Zero-lining Important Social Service Programs by Conservatives and a post on Populist Rhetoric Favoring the Poor over the Rich and the Government over the Private Sector Hurts the Poor in the End. And finally in this thread, Political Power-grabbing that Claims Attachment to the Poor Never Works for the Poor, but Secures the Establishment Wealthy. I might not curry favor with some of my colleagues, nor make friends among my more conservative associations. But, my aim is not to be liked or loved, or even to gain power in any sense of the word. My goal is to maintain a Christian persepective on the issues of poverty, advocate on behalf of the poor, and attempt to be faithful in my obedience to God’s Word as much as I possibly can, particularly in how I express my political and social views as they relate to those living with the affects of poverty.
In the next post in this thread (My renewed independence), I will explain some conclusions I drew on a personal level.
Again my three ETS papers have taken a toll on my view of the world and in particular the political world. I remain conservative politically—low taxes, limited government involvement in almost everything, and in particular how one reads the US Bill of Rights and Constitution: I am an originalist if I need to put a word to it. But that’s for other posts. I am profoundly Christian and hopefully someone who seriously thinks christianly. Now that the papers are done, I am beginning to unpack their implications for me as a person, as a non-poor, evangelical Christian. The direction I take is focused on, obviously, the local church’s responsibility toward the poor, I have rethought, more clearly, the role of the church in society, that is our task, mission, and activities. At one of the sessions (i.e., papers) I attended in 2006 in Washington DC (where I presented my first Mark paper, “Widows in Our Courts”) my former colleague and hopefully still good friend, Kenneth Shoemaker presented a paper on the Psalms and God’s mission among the nations. I was struck by something he concluded: The Psalms as it talks of God’s and Israel’s mission to the nations (i.e., the gentiles), there is a strong sense that “out there” the nations practice unrighteousness and injustice, and that the nations were to see in Israel as a people who did righteousness and justice. This is certainly in line with my recent paper on “Idolatry and Poverty” (New Orleans, LA 2009), where the biblical view of poverty is set within a God vs. the gods apologetic, God’s righteousness/Israel’s righteousness vs. the god’s/pagans/non-Israelite’s un/righteousness relationship. Sort of, “Hey look here, our God does righteousness and justice; look at us!” This directs my thinking that perhaps the church’s mission isn’t to change the culture or even fight the culture wars, but to offer through its activities, attitudes, and worldview a righteous alternative and a community of people does justice and advocate on behalf of the poor.
George Coon, in his 2006 ETS paper on Paul B. Henry (Carl Henry’s son and former US Congressman), referred to Henry’s book, Politics for Evangelicals (1974)
, offered a quote:
“So long as evangelicals engage, then, in prescribing only moral clichés to difficult social and political problems, they are in fact avoiding any direct interrelating of their faith with the sociopolitical world around them” (p 51).
Coon felt that Henry was not denying the important role of evangelism, but that the use of “platitudes” by Christians to deal with social and political ills of society was more of an excuse to not get our hands dirty and do the work of justice and righteousness. We fight the cultural wars by lobbing catch phrases and platitudes into the public square, whereas the Scriptures actually say (or seems to anyway) that God’s people are to “preserve justice and do righteousness” (Isa 56:1) in the public square. Maybe we should think less about fighting the cultural wars and should do more to be that alternative community of justice and righteousness. As Dietrich Bonhoeffer said, we need to “smudge” ourselves with “the hard complexities of the world.” The problem is, most Evangelicals comfortably living in the burbs just don’t like to get smudged with anything.
After re-reading my last paragraph, I needed to reverse something...here is the ending re-written with a better twist reflecting on the Emil Brunner quote in light of my paper’s assertions regarding the idolatry-poverty juxtaposition:
Emil Brunner famously remarked, “For every civilization, for every period of history, it is true to say, ‘show me what kind of gods you have, and I will tell you what kind of humanity you possess.’” For the Christian and Christian community it is, Show me what kind of association you have with those living with the affects of poverty, and I will tell you what kind of god you worship. The reality of everyday life, the acceptance that Suburban life and its enablers, the free market and human acts of power, are often at odds with the Gospel, especially a Gospel that has been formed by the idolatry-poverty juxtaposition. For the non-poor Christian this is an idolatrous mode of living and does not offer a biblically defensible apologetic for the God revealed in the Gospel of Jesus Christ
.
In less than a month (Nov 19) I will be presenting my paper on ”Idolatry and Poverty” in New Orleans at the 2009 annual meeting of the Evangelical Theological Society. Am I nervous? Of course, besides some really smart people sitting in the room, listening, some of my former professors will be there, too. But the topic is close to my heart—in the very fabric of my heart, really. The paper is a forum that reveals my own journey as a Christian in what it means to be biblical and a disciple of Jesus. I don’t know how I missed it all those years, but how can we escape the fact that Jesus and the Gospel writers embed and define the Gospel we say we believe with the Old Testament’s emphasis on caring, protecting, and advocating for the poor and economically vulnerable. Just because we are Americans with a Constitution and a Bill of Rights does not mean we are exempt or released from how the Bible defines who we are and what is Christian discipleship. Anyway…here is the drafted introduction to the paper. The rest of the draft has been posted as threads on this site over the last few months…happy, convicting reading..
Non-poor, Evangelical Christians need a framework to think Christianly about being a believer in a capitalistic, free market economic society where there are almost 40 million people who live with the affects of poverty; where almost 18% of children live in poverty; and, where 42% of children born in the bottom income quintile will remain in that quintile as adults. At the risk of setting up too many straw men, typically, discussions on the issue of poverty revolve around
individual accountability vs. corporate responsibility and/or
the individual vs. the state. Issues of poverty are almost automatically, by default, arranged in
private vs. public dichotomies, arguments, and responsibilities, which sets up a defective social construction of reality for the Christian. Alternatives offered are often defined by reactions to opposing sides, rather than truly addressing the issues of poverty and the effects of poverty on neighborhoods, families, and children. Most Christians, conservative and liberal, agree that the poor are to be cared for, but the range, methodologies, and degree, as well as government involvement are areas of disagreement. Some Christians can give the impression, however, that they do not have other than a political affiliation or economic preference as a framework to engage the issues of poverty. And on the other hand, the banal, neutral posture on the part of many non-poor Christians regarding the poor can lead to the “bystander effect” or a “diffusion of responsibility,” leaving many Christians out of any active role in addressing the causes of poverty or assisting those affected by poverty.
Regarding the issues of poverty in America there is a lot at-stake for many people, Christians included: Constitutional rights, entitlements, property rights, taxes, freedom, wealth, the “American dream,” upward mobility. Sides often define the opposing socio-economic approaches to solving issues of poverty as a threat to society or the cause for continued poverty. For most on the political right the free market system with minimal interference from the government and private charity is what will ameliorate poverty; those on the political left stress public responsibility and that government is to deconstruct “unjust” structures and utilize its power to distribute resources more equitably. While most non-poor Christians understand there is a general Biblical call to help the poor, they, too, are divided left and right, public vs. private. The Christian is then faced with the choice of leaning toward one as biblical, while making accusation toward the other as unbiblical.
Much of the discussion about poverty, the poor, and right and left ideologies associated with the means of eradicating poverty involves how the Old Testament presents the topic of the poor. The Christian’s framework for thinking about poverty is not individualism, nor any socio-economic/political system, but should be formed by the Gospel itself. Interestingly, Jesus and the Gospel writers, and in particular Mark, not only utilize the Old Testament to develop the nature and content of the Gospel, they utilize texts and contexts where the poor and idolatry are juxtaposed. In this we have a programmatic approach for discussing poverty and, as such, actually narrows the application down to, not what the government or general public or charitable individuals think or do, but how the Christian and the Christian community define themselves. In the following I will explore this idolatry-poverty juxtaposition, particularly in Mark’s Gospel, and will seek to apply its significance to forming a Christian framework for thinking about the issues of poverty.
See below for all the other parts…
A while ago, my alma mater, Crown College, asked me to put a few words together on my “Marketplace Ministry” in a non-church vocational career…or something like that. Crown has begun a major called Social Entrepreneurship, which caught my eye in a recent email discussion with the current President, Rick Mann (no relation to my own CEO and boss, Joseph Mann, but it is ironic nonetheless). I keep telling my own kids, my time at college was the greatest time of my life. And now, as I commented to President Mann, it is nice to see that my own Christian College had ventured into the same journey I eventually ended up in as a grew older in my Christian life—non-church vocational ministry in the marketplace. Below is the quote that appears in Crown’s most recent alumni magazine, Bridge.
“The Gospel Jesus came to preach to the poor was the Gospel of the presence of God’s Kingdom, the invasion of His rule and reign into the life of this world, into our communities,” Chip shares. For over 40 years, Norwalk Economic Opportunity Now, Inc. (NEON) has welcomed low-income and economically vulnerable families through its doors to find help—help with anything from food/rent assistance to childcare/preschool to job search to energy assistance. Chip designs, implements, and monitors programs that help low-income people become less dependent on assistance and move toward self-sufficiency. Chip realizes, “My job, although not directly a vocational ‘church’ ministry, is a fulfilment of the Kingdom of God.”
I bring this rather long thread to a close, making a brief closing remark on thihs wildly fasinating use of OT texts by Mark throughout his Gospel narrative—the use of OT texts that juxtapose idolatry and the poor.
Summary
Although a more detailed, exegetical investigation of the Old Testament referenced texts is needed, the obvious use of Old Testament material regarding idolatry and the poor are certainly embedded into the very nature of the Gospel, making these texts paradigmatic for discipleship and evangelism. Mark’s strong and pervasive use of the original covenant documents, with a high concentration on texts related to idolatry and the economically vulnerable, indicates that the Old Testament ethical texts are paradigmatic for discipleship. The consistent use of Old Testament texts related to expectations regarding the poor and the juxtaposition of references to the issues of idolatry, as well, point to the apologetic and evangelistic potential of social action.
The following: A concluding remark from the overall paper as it stands now in draft form. I do have another section to write to better conclude the paper, but the following is a added conclusion to the “application” section (
A Defective Social Construction for Christians). So, I include this as part of the thread now.
The present model for socio-economic progress and prosperity, objectifies the non-poor Christian’s reality (i.e., “home world”) through habits and experiences of everyday life, and thus assumed a part of his or her belief system—validating the experience of everyday as biblical. The problem for the non-poor believer living in such a history and current social location, then, experiences only a partial reality. For the Christian, this is a defective social construction. The prophets warned of God’s judgment upon those who create or maintain economic structures that benefit some and exclude others (e.g., Amos 4:1ff; Mic 2:1-2; Isa 5:7ff; Jer 22), that pave the way to prosperity for some and prolonged, generational poverty for others. The non-poor accept a world that is duplicitous, limiting the historic and current benefits of a socio-economic system to those the “market blessed.” Furthermore, the reality of everyday life, the acceptance that Suburban life and its enablers, the free market and human acts of power, sustaining an everyday life, are often at odds with the Gospel, especially a Gospel that has been formed by the relationship between idolatry and the issues of poverty. For the non-poor Christian this is an idolatrous mode of living and does not offer a biblically defensive apologetic for the God revealed in Jesus Christ.
A slight pause before I conclude with my thread on the Gospel of Mark, idolatry, and poverty. Friday night I had the privilege of giving a small talk at our agency annual dinner. The following are more or less the notes…some you have read here before…
- Two years ago, at NEON’s annual dinner, many of you heard me say that 1 out of 10 children will be live in poverty. It is as if you can picture when you see, say, a group of ten children that one of them lives in poverty. But that’s not actually the case with everyone in this room. Some of you will see a group of children, say a group of ten, and none will be in poverty—because you really don’t live and work and play in an area where you know any or only a few people who’d likely live in poverty. But if you are a NEON Head Start teacher, everyday, you see 8 out of 10, or in some cases 10 of 10 children who live in poverty; or, a NEON after school program, where 7 to 9 are most likely children and young people who live in poverty. Some of us are alienated from poverty, except knowing about NEON and about the urban center of our town.
- I have the privilege of developing a paper for an up coming conference in New Orleans. It is a theological conference, but some former professors of mine asked if I’d put together a paper on poverty. The topic I have chosen is the concept of idolatry and its juxtaposition with texts related to poverty.
- One of the quotes I found in my research stands out and has affected me greatly: Emil Brunner, in his book, Man in Revolt, said, “For every civilization, for every period of history, it is true to say, ‘show me what kind of gods you have, and I will tell you what kind of humanity you possess.’”
- So I have been immersed in reading and researching for the last year, and after 100s of articles and books on the subject. I have made some discoveries. When I started I knew what I wanted to write, but I didn’t know what I’d discover.
- One of the things I discovered what that much of the Old Testament material related to the poor or poverty is mostly codes and land-laws that created barriers or amerliorated the causes of generational or prolonged poverty of families and individuals. Yes, there is charity and kindness, but direct public laws that governed relationships, neighborliness, and business relations regarding the issue of generational and prolonged poverty. That seems to be where the emphasis lay: I made sense to me—privately and publicly, for my faith and for my profession. Poverty and poor people will always exist—that’s a fact of life—but laws and public policy need to reflect a commitment to end prolonged and generational poverty. In other words we all need to be Thinking Generations Ahead.
- Not long ago I had the privilege of speaking to our Childcare staff. I concluded by saying, We have one purpose, one goal, one outcome to achieve: As childcare workers, Family and Parent Partners, Educational Managers, especially teachers, you have one purpose, one goal, do such a good job at teaching your children and assisting their parents so that when the child become a parent, their children DO NOT QUALIFY for Head Start. Isn’t that all of our objective: To do whatever we can to address prolonged and generational poverty and do such a good job that when the children of poor families today grow up, they and their children will not qualify for all the assistance and programs because they will be ineligible because they will not need it.
- Many of you are familiar with The American Community Survey because it was just in the local paper, indicating that from 2007 to 2008, the population in Norwalk who live in poverty rose 200%. In fact, this rolling estimate puts Connecticut as the state with the largest increase in the country. Even the regular census indicates a growing pecentage of those in poverty right here in Norwalk: in 2000, we were at 5.2% and in Norwalk now based on the 2000 census, we are at 7.2%. did you know that 14% of the population in Norwalk receives food stamps? And, in Norwalk, of those who live in poverty, 36% are under the age of 18.
- The rolling, annual survey of the Census Bureau, The American Community Survey, puts us in 2008 at 9.6% poverty in Norwalk up from 5.3% in 2007. The jump, is not because we aren’t doing something about poverty or that we’re not helping poor people. I believe the jump is related to not preparing the poor to get out and stay out of poverty. Between 1994 and 2007 we provided mostly for short term solutions just to move low-income people quickly from poverty to low-income; we prepared them for low wage, service-centered jobs, NOT policies and programs to set up long term educational and vocational tracks to prepare them for living outside of poverty—to stop prolonged poverty.
- Did you know that Fairfield County is 37th in Median Household Income 37th. But in terms of measuring wealthy, Fairfield County, Connecticut is the 6th wealthiest County in all of the United States—we’re 6th when it comes to Per Capita Income (2009). What does it mean to be so privileged to live in the 6th wealthiest County in American, to live in a capitalistic, free market economic society where there are almost 40 million people who live with the affects of poverty, where almost 18% of children live in poverty, and here’s the one that cuts right through me, where 42% of children born in the bottom income quintile will remain in that quintile as adults. This means we’re allowing prolonged and generational poverty to exist to claim as victims of this cycle the most vulnerable among us. Something is wrong with this picture. That’s why we need to be thinking generations ahead.
- I closed with an illustration I had given before on this blog: There is a rather strong scene in the movie Hotel Rwanda, a 2004 film about a Hutu tribesman who is the manager of a hotel in Kigali, Rwanda during the 1994 genocide. While striving to protect his family and hundreds of Tutsi refugees from the Hutu mass-murderers, he was confronted with international indifference to the country’s plight. The scene is between this hotel manager and a reporter—we listen in:
Hotel manager: “I am glad that you have shot this footage and that the world will see it. It is the only way we have a chance that people might intervene.”
Reporter: “Yeah and if no one intervenes, is it still a good thing to show?”
Hotel manager: “How can they not intervene when they witness such atrocities?”
Reporter: “I think if people see this footage they’ll say, ‘Oh my God that’s horrible,’ and then go on eating their dinners.”
[later] Hotel manager: “There will be no rescue, no intervention force. We can only save ourselves. Many of you know influential people abroad, you must call these people. You must tell them what will happen to us… say goodbye. But when you say goodbye, say it as though you are reaching through the phone and holding their hand. Let them know that if they let go of that hand, you will die.”
- We have people living in poverty, right here in our prosperous community, and as I conclude and say good-bye, the poor are reaching out their hands to you and letting you know that if you let go of their hands, they and their children will die. Thinking Generations Ahead . . . how does that change what we do? How does that motivate us to end prolonged and generational poverty together as partners, as members of the community?
I again apologize for not being very “postee” these days. I am feverishly working on my paper for New Orleans in mid-Nov. But after working on a section on “Idolatry, a Defective Construction of Social Reality,” I couldn’t help pass on a paragraph from another paper (I am referencing in this paper) on the subject of Evangelical Interest in the public square. For what it’s worth:
Raymond Knighton, in his report on the “Social Responsibility of Evangelization” to the 1974 Lausanne Committee for World Evangelism, alluded to what Colin Morris wrote in Include Me Out, “If the church turns a blind eye to the injustices around it, the world will turn a deaf ear to everything else the church tries to say.” Knighton concluded his report, “Social action is simply obedience to the command of God” and is part of the evangelizing task of the church. Os Guinness, in his report to the same committee on “Social Responsibility,” rebuffed the church’s tendency to concentrate on minor and private issues to the “virtual ignoring of major principles and issues” related to justice, mercy, violence, race, and poverty. Elsewhere Guinness writes that the “highest American good is more than the struggle over who gets what, when, and how.” Not a bad comment for the church to absorb. Often involvement in politics for the church is limited to issues that threaten its existence or its status quo. Being convinced that Christ is Lord over every part of life, including the public square, should draw the church outward. However, on the other hand, there is a tendency to think of faith and the Christian experience exclusively in individualistic terms (e.g., as a ‘personal’ relationship with Jesus Christ). From this perspective, church-life, including discipleship, becomes vague and privatized, and society at large becomes invisible. The rise in political interests and public square activities among conservative churches does not necessarily reflect “a shift from a protective goal to a redemptive goal but an increase in the perceived level of threat.” Renewed attention by the evangelical church to the public square can represent, actually, an increased desire to protect the status-quo of the church in American life. The injustices in the public square that are of interest to conservative churches are those that are perceived as threats to the adherents’ lifestyles, economic comfort, and theological plausibility. In other words injustices that are “not personally threatening” receive “much less of their attention.” In fact, there might be a threat to the church’s and the Christian’s socio-economic comfort if the poor are “in their midst” or if the church-goer’s taxes, let alone “tithes,” are utilized to advocate and care for the poor.
The previous posts on Vain Spirituality and Justice might leave the impression that I am against capitalism. Well, don’t misunderstand me. I am not against capitalism; what I am for is making sure everyone in a capitalistic, upperly mobile society has access to the benefits of its resources and that everyone is given or has the means to make oneself and family self-sufficient. As a Christian who takes the Bible seriously, I don’t care what type of socio-economic system we live under—whether it be socialism, communism, aristocracy, oligarchy, tribal, or monarchy. Every socio-economic system has its weaknesses, inclinations, outcomes and unintended consequences. Economic systems that utilize a central planning model, whether it be forms of communism, fascism, or socialism, have been and continue to be disastrous, most notably in the darkest corners of our planet. Capitalism, on the other hand, although definitely a prosperous economic system, breeds a strange acceptance of greed and consumerism that is proving unhealthy, and equally dangerous to culture.
And we should note, every system still has winners and losers—and I believe it is the Christian community who should act as a prophetic voice in whatever system to ensure that the losers, that is those who do not have access to power are spoken for and given a voice in order to have access to what is necessary to enjoy the benefits of the land and ameliorate both personal poverty and the causes of poverty. It seems foolish and shortsighted to me that much of the Christian (and mostly evangelical) community is so aligned with the present system of capitalism that we confuse it with the Kingdom of God. We preach against individualism and then defend a system built on the premise of individualism; we scorn commercialism and its damage to our culture and churches and then defend the very system that promotes it. We want it both ways. But we cannot have it both ways.
I am not against capitalism, but I am for the Christian community to live in such a way that all of Scripture is taken seriously, not that which protects our place and status in this upward mobile socio-economic system and not that which puts at risk the economically poor (right here in America) that do not have access to power and the means to provide what is necessary for self-sufficiency. Don’t get me wrong—I find that the capitalistic system is best to ensure expanded economic growth; but it does have its weaknesses and such prosperity blinds the Christian community to its responsibility toward the poor, which is both private as well as public.