Emerge or Submerge
Making a Case For Relevance: The Evangelical Church in the United States
Never before in the history of the church have we had more “relevant” Christian products and programs than what exists in the U.S. today. We have Christian music, movies, mints, t-shirts (Argue & Livermore, 2004), belt-buckles, art, journals, phone books, novels, websites, videos, pens, candy bars, magazines, camps, resorts, coffee shops, schools, political groups, radio and TV stations… Need I go on? If yes—open up the “Christian yellow pages” where you can find your Christian physician who can refer you to a Christian weight-loss program or a Christian aerobics group or a Christian retreat Center. Okay, I’ll stop. Oh wait! Just let me share a few more. Have you seen the key chains that say “Got Jesus?” or the stuffed ducks wearing rain gear labeled “Showers of Blessings?” (Wittmer 2004, p. 67). I live in Grand Rapids, Michigan—I could share 20 more pages of examples but I promise I’ll move on.
Clearly we have resources for “cultural relevance” unlike any generation of the church before us. We appear to be quite at home in the culture around us. In fact, of all the religious followers in the U.S., Christians tend to be the quickest to jump on whatever cultural fad has most recently hit mainstream culture (Hauerwas and Willimon 1989).
Our embodiment of the American culture in which we live is not limited to products and Christian resources. Ideologically, American culture has shaped the lives of most evangelical Christians and our churches every bit as much and more as non-evangelicals and their institutions of faith. This is seen in three dominant threads that run throughout American culture—Individualism, Isolationism, and Consumerism. All three threads are ubiquitous throughout our evangelical churches. Consider each of these for a moment in light of their presence in mainstream culture and the evangelical church alike.
Individualism
“Have it your way!” That’s the mantra of the “me culture” in which we live. The importance of the individual is a foundational value of our American, capitalistic heritage. We were founded as a republic that was formed in reaction against socialism gone awry. As a result, Americans are driven by the attitude that says, “I’ll think what I want, do what I want, go where I want, and be responsible to no one but myself.” In fact, the American dream of the 21st Century is less characterized by the 4-bedroom home with a white picket fence, a mini-van, and 2.5 kids. The American dream has become getting to a place where you get to do whatever you want without the bother of anything you don’t want to do.
Individualism has crept into the church where the average believer is most interested in their personal needs and personal formation at the expense of what’s best for the community. Personal devotions, personal retreats, personal purpose and life plans, and personal gift assessments are at the core of what happens under the name of “discipleship” in most American evangelical churches. Personal commitment is an obvious need in our following of Jesus however our American world of individualism has secularized our following away from a sense of following in community with others (Argue & Livermore, 2002). “Americans practice their faith in ways so personal and individualistic that their practices blend seamlessly into the culture around them” (Wolf 2003).
Communion is taken individualistically, programs are set up with the individual in mind, and evangelism, formation, and service are all tailored around individuals rather than around the shared needs and gifts of the local church community as a whole. Sermon applications most often refer to individual assimilation of the moral from the text rather than also including communal assimilation. Clearly the American cultural ideal of individualism is pervasive in American Christianity.
Isolationism
Closely related to American individualism is our isolationism. We have not always been isolated, though. For the first two-thirds of the 20th Century, American life was characterized by ever-deepened engagement by people in the life of their communities. Club meetings, bowling leagues, poker game nights, Kiwanis groups, religious gatherings, and sports leagues had continual growth through the 1960’s. However, “Silently, without warning—that tide reversed and we were overtaken by a treacherous rip current. Without at first noticing, we have been pulled apart from one another and from our communities over the last third of the century” (Putnam 2000, p. 27).
Our modern buildings and sprawling suburbs have come at the expense of relationships. We work so hard at manicuring our yards, which sit on ever-widening boulevards. Our 2-3 vehicles allow us to shop where we want and work where we want and “best” of all, we can drive them into our remote controlled garages without having to ever stop to talk to the passing neighbor (Blakely and Snyder, 1999). It wasn’t too long ago that most Americans had one primary circle of relationships. Within that circle, several networks of relationships overlapped—extended families remained in the same communities, people worked with fellow church-members, who shopped at the same stores and attended the same sporting events. Today, the Average American family has several circles of relationships—the kids’ school friends, mom’s work friends, dad’s work friends, extended family scattered around the nation and world, church friends, neighborhood friends, etc. As a result, life in the suburbs becomes rather lonely and fragmented (Putnam 2000).
Again, there is little notable difference in the fragmented, isolated lives of American evangelicals and their neighbors. Church members have moved to the suburbs along with their fellow citizens. Evangelical churches gravitate away from starting or staying in urban areas and locate themselves in or beyond the suburbs, where land is cheap. The former farmland can be transformed into sprawling mall-like structures offering “advantages” like safe streets, low taxes, and “affordable” homes and church buildings for parishioners. But for exactly the same reasons that make it affordable, the “exurban frontier” does not offer many accessible public spaces where churches can live in community much less evangelize others into their communities of faith. (Wolf 2003, 202).
Category: Ministry, Winter 2007