ddubb industries

The Shaping of Things to Come: Chapter Three

May 25th, 2006 literary, spiritual

Flanderization of the gospel is a great social study. There probably isn’t a mirror that more effectively illustrates how the non-Christian world views Christians. I think it would be a good group exercise to watch a Simpsons episode which features the relationship of the Flanders to the Simpsons, I’m sure there’s at least one. Then rewrite the script to imagine how the Flanders could have been more incarnational to their secular neighbors.

From newbie Christians to incarnational missionaries. To be incarnational is a great admonition to the seasoned Christian leader entrenched in the Christian ghetto and rendered all but useless to the non/pre-Christian world (i.e Dave Williams), yet how can we ask this of young Christians who have not yet solidified a Christian worldview? Is there not an appropriate phase of nurture, teaching, indoctrination, cloister in a new Christian’s life where they grow roots into the Christian metanarrative. (Please excuse my liberal application of pomo theology buzz words, I’m trying to become “incarnated in this context”! ) How are we, the children of Abraham called out of Ur to be father of a holy set-apart nation, to maintain this set-apart ethos? I fear the authors are being a little too reactionary in their critique of the status quo. I have yet to see them mention any benefits of the institutional church. Without any component of set-apartness, we are inextricably both in the world and of it.