Worldliness, By America

Yesterday, in reflecting on kingdom — nearly ten years after I wrote a book about it — I mentioned the need for a fresh and an organic approach to worldliness. I grew up in fundamentalism and we heard lots about the world. It mostly meant not joining in on the trends of the day, like drinking and dancing and Elvis and The Beatles. It was an early form of cancel culture.

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In the 1970s and 1980s the fundamentalist movement, which had morphed in important ways into neo-evangelicalism, gave up on the term “world.” Their new fav was “culture” and culture was neutral.

Giving up on world had good redemptive reasons. Giving up on it altogether was not a good idea nor was it redemptive. We need to bring the word “world” back. Lest I be accused of being some old fuddy-duddy, let me outline seven themes of Worldliness, By America.

I’m thinking aloud here. Please use the comment box for how you see America’s version of worldliness.

First, it is the American economy without equity. One of the most potent set of verses (for me anyway) in the Gospels are from the lips of John the Dipper:

Luke 3:10      And the crowds asked him, “What, then, should we do?”  11 In reply he said to them, “Whoever has two coats must share with anyone who has none, and whoever has food must do likewise.”  12 Even tax collectors came to be baptized, and they asked him, “Teacher, what should we do?”  13 He said to them, “Collect no more than the amount prescribed for you.”  14 Soldiers also asked him, “And we, what should we do?” He said to them, “Do not extort money from anyone by threats or false accusation, and be satisfied with your wages.”

These ideas of economic equity and justice did not go away. Paul said this:

For I do not mean that there should be relief for others and hardship for you, but it is a question of equality between  14 your present abundance and their need, so that their abundance may also supply your need, in order that there may be equality (2 Corinthians 8:13-14).

Second, education without character. The scientism of a previous generation is giving way in important ways in public education to a generalized, largely inoffensive, but somewhat progressive vision of moral character. But university education has slipped behind our public schooling when it comes to universities forming character fit for public life. Christians ought to be in the lead here, not in an aggressive sense but in voicing the need for basic virtues at the heart of education. Notice these words of Jesus:

In the same way, every good tree bears good fruit, but the bad tree bears bad fruit.  A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire (Matthew 7:17-19).

Third, workplace without culture. Too many businesses are bottom-line realities; number-based evaluations; productivity-rooted judgments. What we Christians can offer against this money- and greed-shaped reality is a culture in which workers/humans flourish as humans. Not as cogs in a wheel; not as agents of production. As humans. The bottom of bottom-line thinking is a bad perception of humans as made in God’s image, as humans having value for who they are and what they can bring to the community of workers, and as humans having dignity with a story that is unlike the stories of others.

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Fourth, family life without the table. Let’s return, and here I evoke my age, to the day when families ate together at the table together and talked together til the evening became night. How often do we turn the table into the chair in front of the TV or the computer screen? How often do we turn the table into private dining with one person eating there and another eating here? This is worldliness. Kingdom life is lived in community, and community begins with families. The ultimate act of redemptive love, the surrender of one’s life for the good another, has been embodied in the church in the Lord’s Table. It is worldly because it is not good when the Table gets raptured from the home life.

Fifth, art without story. So much of the world of arts and entertainment is sensational, spectacular, sensualizing imagery. What is the story at work in the art and what is the story one perceives in the art? Is the story evocative of the great themes of the history of humans? Is the story one that roots itself in commonalities and aims toward love, peace, justice, and reconciliation? I’m not talking about using art to communicate a message, but the essential world presented in the art and by the art and its modes and materials and perspectives. Worldliness evacuates art from a meaning-making story. The Bible’s ultimate story line is God in covenant with humans, history having shape toward the goodnesses of God (like peace, justice, equity, etc).

Sixth, media without truth. Our social media and our news media and all other media today are in a crisis of the absence of truth. Worldliness obliterates truth and turns the media into the games of power and manipulation and destruction. Christians, I believe, can participate in redeeming media by becoming agents of truth-telling and truth-making.

Seventh, settling scores with violence. America has formed a culture of violence in its quest to become the world’s greatest nation. Like Rome. Victory through violence is not justice or peace. It is subjugation. We have a culture, because of our gun laws and the proliferation of guns, of settling scores by physical (and verbal) violence. We settle scores by the manipulation of power to sabotage others who don’t agree with us. If they don’t agree with us, or if they made a decision that didn’t go our way, we want to get rid of them. That’s worldliness. The ultimate Christian vision, according to the hymn in Colossians 1, is reconciliation. Blessed are the peacemakers, Jesus said.

OK, seven themes of organic worldliness. I’m thinking aloud here. Over to you. What would you add?