Launch the counter-revolution
Timothy Dalrymple writes on patheos.com:
There is a growing genre — call it Progressive Christian Scorn Literature — about the scorn progressive Christians have for conservative evangelicals. It seems to be celebrated on the Left as a kind of righteous comeuppance for the Christian Right, and it wins the applause of the Left for the Christian Left. But it’s wrong and it needs to be called out. It’s neither winsome, nor loving, nor constructive, nor right. It will not improve our witness because it’s soaked through with bitterness and rancor. I hope that people of good heart and mind, like Evans, leave it behind.
We cannot get beyond the culture wars by simply joining one side and lobbing bombs against the other. We cannot improve the reputation of the church by throwing half of it under the bus.
What Mr. Dalrymple says is true enough. Unilateral withdrawal wouldn’t be any more redemptive a solution for the culture war than it was victory in Vietnam or Iraq. If you won’t stand up for the implications of your faith’s worldview, your faith isn’t much.
At the same time, the fact is the culture war is lost for conservative evangelicals, not because the politics failed — indeed for a time they were successful — but because the culture of promiscuity and self-indulgence won the hearts of the people. Political involvement is crucial, but the culture war was fought in the arena of popular culture — TV, movies, music, etc. Conservative evangelicals failed to present as winsome a case for the biblical worldview as unbelievers did for theirs. People were persuaded. One wonders whether it was ever even possible to win, but the fact is we didn’t step up to the challenge when it mattered.
None of that is to say conservative evangelicals should stop advocating passionately for the biblical worldview. Scripture is clear that we are engaged in a battle declared against righteousness and justice, but it also reminds us that the weapons of that warfare are not flesh and blood tools like political power. The battle is spiritual, more about ideas and values than winning elections.
The battle will eventually be won. Jesus Christ is Lord. For our part, we can continue to make movies like Courageous that tell winsome stories full of God’s righteousness and justice demonstrated in loving lives. We can build deep relationships with those around us by caring about their day-to-day struggles. We can listen to the Lord’s heart for the poor and oppressed and stand with them in multiplying justice.
I’m not sure the day will ever come when Jesus’ values will be honored by the large majority of this country, but we can change our strategy for persuading the people. We can launch the counter-revolution.
Multiply Justice 