Part 3: Role of the Church, Community and “Calling”: Where do we go from here?

I was chopping up veggies for a monster soup tonight when I realized I never got back to summarizing the final part of my paper!

Image Bearing, Culture-Making Part 1 explored the framework and concepts of culture, defined as "what we make of the world in both senses" (what we physically make and how we understand our world). I identified ways we normally think of engaging with culture and offered an alternative. Part 2 examined the way Christians in power positions in recent years live out and apply their faith, specifically in politics, entertainment, academia and business. I concluded that there are two main groups: one focuses on the Christian community, largely removes itself from its community in carrying out their vision of change and acts through mass mobilization while the other focuses on the community around them, largely removes itself from church and the Christian subculture and acts through small, intentional gatherings meant to equip more than mobilize. The reality of this divide among Christians forced me to ask questions that led to Part 3: do they need the Church? Do I? Can we really change the world? Are we blending the self-reliant, skeptical American hero with our idea of Christ as exemplar? How do we determine or discover our sense of vocation or "calling"?

While preparing the lecture for Part 3 I realized that there was a ton of ground to cover: ecclesiology, ethics, Christology, community and discernment. Any one of those areas could distract us from the questions at hand, though extremely important to understand. I realized the typical reaction from Christians when they feel pressured to be part of a Church is: “All men are called to the Kingdom; not all men are called to the church.” When we think of engaging the world around us, I believe the church has become an option, and a small, fragile one in our minds. The Bible defines the church as the people of God, the body of Christ and fellowship of the Holy Spirit. The gravitas has been lost for most.

The Church

There is much that can be said to refute this statement but the worth of the church to Christ and the clear purpose of the church come immediately to mind. God sent His only Son to die for the Church, the community of believers, those God has called to Himself. The Church was worth Jesus' life, and it is therefore worth more than our "consideration". The Church has been integral to God's plan of redemption since the beginning: we are blessed to be a blessing, and in doing so God’s name is glorified. Israel is God’s cultural project-to create a people defined by faith. God’s blessings impact not simply our souls, but our entire existence. Our love for him is to affect everything (Dt. 6). This mission is not meant to be a blueprint, for then we would never need God. Our mission, our goal individually and communally is to worship God, to know Him and all else flows from that.

Ethics and theology

But how do we bless others? How do we connect our theology (study of God) to our ethics (way of life)? Unlike human relationships, we often limit knowing God to knowing who He is, not what He does. Before we ask “How do we..? we must ask “how does He...?”As we go to God’s Word we see that He engages with the cultures of the world by penetrating and preserving, wrecking and redeeming. He curses Adam and Eve yet gives them leather instead of fig leaves to cover their shame. He destroys Sodom yet saves Lot. He sends a flood, but saves a family. His bride, the church, is called to penetrate and preserve the cultures of this world. Jesus made disciples and called us likewise to invest relationally and all else would flow from that. Paul exemplified this through church planting and the epistles emphasize that it is among the community of believers (the church) that we discern what needs to be torn down and built up around us.

Reality Check: Calling

I know it sounds very un-American, but there are things we cannot do. God changes people, which is the core of culture. In most of the discussion of culture making I grant too much human agency as sociologists would call it. It is helpful again to look at how God works through people in scripture and how they are identified: patient, grateful and generous, daring, humble responsible. They are reliant on God to guide them-incredibly humbling yet empowering.

They learn in community by asking questions. Where have you successfully proposed a new cultural good? What is something specific that you have fixed or redeemed in some way? In what ways do you currently have cultural power or influence? With whom are you sharing your power? The act of making an idea or something material starts small, with just a few people. Out of that circle is often a circle of 10-15 people and after that might be a circle of 100. This is a normal pattern for how artifacts or ideas of culture are made and multiplied, be it a scientific theory or organic produce. Who are your 3? These are the few people who you trust enough to risk attempting something together. In considering the characteristics above, are you more excited about discovering more of the world or more of God? Where do you experience grace-divine growth that far exceeds your efforts? To put it another way, what is your story? What has God done most powerfully in your life?

I have found it helpful to include others in discerning “the next step” by asking them:
What are three specific weaknesses and strengths you see in me?
What do you think is my motive and goal in this decision?
Do you think I have trusted God in this whole process?
Does this fit at all with what God has been doing in my life?
Do I feel the freedom to fail? Do I have the joyful assurance that all could be taken away, all that people know of me yet if I have Christ, I have a worth, peace, hope and future?

What are questions you have asked?

Final reflection:
Though it would be nice to focus on what we do as transformed, re-cultured people with God’s guidance in the redemptive art of culture making, it is challenging to consider Paul’s words in I Cor. 1:18 reminding us that the most consequential moment in history is “not an action but a passion-not a doing but a suffering”.[1] He was the most capable person ever to shape the world with his own power and talents yet when he faced sin and death and Satan head on, it was on a cross, representing the dead end of culture. The resurrection thus represents the pattern for culture making in the image of God-not power but trust. Not independence, but dependence. Boasting in the cross is radical and admittedly weird. Jesus died not merely as our friend but as our Lord. God is not merely Creator but Ruler of all. Jesus as King puts teeth to his title of Redeemer. We need to follow who we serve, which means loving those he has loved even when they hurt us.
[1] Andy Crouch. Culture Making. 142