Thinking caps at the ready! [2]

Well, what a difference being BlogSpotted (r)(C)(tm) makes... I started to publish a follow-up to my initial post re: presenting the Gospel in a post[whatever] context, then I noticed all the links inbound from TeamPyro. So, I decided to press pause for a second. I figured that I could wait and then pull some of the comment content up here to the main page.

I figured it was time to just pull the trigger since the comments haven't exactly rolled in. Nonetheless, a big welcome to those of you who've tuned in for the ride...

To me, two of the first big gotchas that Keller's challenge raised are the issues of Time and Substance. The church in which I grew up got all uppity about the 4 Spiritual Laws as an evangelistic tool one year. I remember boxes of 4SL-based tracts arriving and being stacked neatly in the narthex (yes, we had a narthex) for people to take. Looking back, the appeal to us seemed to rest mainly in two arenas:

1) The 4SL methodology was understandable. This appeal was manifest in two ways:

• The clear 'method' was critical because I think it's safe to say we were far from well catechized Christians. Our understanding of the Gospel was, in hindsight, pretty weak. So, something like the 4SLs really provided the somewhat-solid foundation for our own understanding of our message.
• In addition, the 'script' aspect of the presentation gave us confidence... We didn't need to think of 'what to say' or how to respond to questions - it was all right there for us.

2) The presentations were relatively short. The facts of the Good News are plainly laid out and could be presented to someone over lunch, a coffee break, or even just casually talking on the street. There was no need to set aside time or be concerned about 'squeezing everything in'.

Nowadays, both of those past strengths meet new challenges... For one thing, the scaffolding/methodology assumes a certain mono-cultural, semi-white bread, historically Judeo-Christian worldview in the hearer. As Keller points out, that simply won't get you any traction in some contexts today. Say something like, "God loves you", and you might well expect to hear back "Huh? Who is this God guy?" Suddenly the scaffolding and script comes crashing down around you. In the same way, responding to such 'paradigm-busting' questions requires that you invest time into your response (and in the study to arm you to respond).

Tim Keller notes the rising use of the Alpha Program as perhaps the new 'silver bullet' in evangelism. In light of these challenges I think it's easy to see why it's successful. Based on my limited understanding, ample time is set aside for the lessons/Q&A and the material is relatively meaty. So, Alpha presents substantial answers to questions and gives people time to interact with the material in a group.

So if part of the challenge is to formulate an exceptionally pithy presentation of the Gospel to post[whatevers], I think we have a problem. The challenges of a multicultural, pluralistic, post-Christian era mean that we have to be prepared to start from ground-zero and build things carefully.

Setting aside the issue of time, to focus on content... A couple of the comments were especially on-target and helpful, IMHO. Eddie Beal (aka Taliesin) kicked things off by saying that 1 Corinthians 15:1-5 provides a good framework for dealing with both the 'Christ-haunted' and the completely profane people we meet. I think that is a great place to start. As I have been chewing on Dr. Keller's challenge, I had in my head a framework like this:

• Present Jesus and the Resurrection as historic fact. Postmodernism has created a truth problem, and I think at least one way to tackle that would be to present the historicity of the New Testament Gospels. Jesus was born, lived, taught, died, and rose from the dead. These events are way more than just historically 'plausible'. This discussion could range all over the place, from philosophical, epistemological challenges to real questions about evidence for Jesus having walked on the Earth...
  
• Present what Christ taught about Himself. Not only was Christ a real person, but He certainly cast Himself as "the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world"... Why did He come to earth? What is sin? What is my condition thanks to sin, and how do I get outta this mess? I suppose the goal would be to weave together both the propositional, concrete, systematic theological statements and the overarching story line of redemptive history. I think that this is really at the core of what Keller's driving at. I suppose I don't understand enough about the value of 'story' to the postmodern worldview to flesh this out much more.
• The Existential Rub. What are the real, personal questions in this person's life to which Christ is the answer? It might be feelings of guilt or shame, facing death, a craving for justice, or any number of things. But how can allow the Gospel to impact their worldview and answer their struggle now? As Frank Turk (aka centuri0n) noted in his comment: "[T]he Christians were presenting this [God] who intersects with reality in the man Christ Jesus, and is working out History for His glory and the salvation of us lousy sinners." Christ is not just ! He is here and now!
  
• How then do we live? Assuming that we get this far, how do all the points above impact our day-to-day life, both at the level of worldview and of practical living.

In thinking that through, the one thing that became crystal clear to me was that any of these discussion demand of us that we know what we believe... I noted above that at least part of the appeal of the 4SL and similar programs was that they gave us a theological crutch.

Now, perhaps more than ever, we need to have internalized much more that a script. Though there's really only one message/lesson (the Gospel), we need to be able to articulately bring that truth to bear on a number of possible challenges or objections.

Everyone's a philosopher nowadays - so we need to be able to present Christ as Truth rather than just an option on the buffet table (Luke's illustration). Everyone is also 'spiritual' - so we need to be able to show the Gospel as superior to all the false faiths and ideas that our sin imposes on us. Everyone wants justice and peace - so we need to show that justice and peace cannot be had without the Gospel and Reign of Christ. For us to be able to do this, the message needs to be especially real and alive to us.

This has turned into more of a rant than a systematic post, and I'm sorry about that. But I'm tired, and I don't feel like re-writing this anymore. I'll try to do better next time. In the meantime, I hope more of you chime in.