January 4, 2003

There is a quote in the article:

Do you see the hubris in the quote? The speaker assumes the substance ("message" as he/she calls it) is correct; therefore, the form must be the problem. They assume there is no problem with the substance! Note the utter lack of self-examination. This, I believe is the scourge of our times.

One of my "theories" of life is that people do not change fundamentally. We can smooth the rough edges; we can make some adjustments to the packaging, but people do not change who they are fundamentally. This statement by this unnamed Democratic Party Official makes that point for me without any explanation required. And it also tells us why people do not change – because they assume they are "right" in their substance. There is no need for self-examination, because they assume everything is OK at the core.

From this base, there are two points that I want to make.

If the Dems really believe they do not need to examine their message, only their delivery, I think we may be looking at the end of the Democratic Party of FDR. The success of the Dems since FDR’s first election to the White House has been based primarily on capitalizing upon the fears of the nation (the Depression) or creating fears to capitalize upon (current environmentalism). We live in a time; however, when even those of us completely willing to let someone else manage their lives can see the charade of those created fears. Furthermore, everyone can see that the Dems were so busy creating problems they failed to respond to a very real one – terrorism.

The mainstream denominations are in danger of making the same mistake. The efforts they are making to rescue themselves are all in the delivery. We discuss worship music. We discuss the ordination of homosexuals. The Catholics discuss allowing priests to marry. All of this is repackaging, not genuine self-examination.

This statement is probably going to get me in a lot of trouble, but most people are not all that articulate. When they attend a mainline church, and then attend a "successful" church, they know something is different. If asked, they point to what they see like music and liturgy, but the sense of different is much deeper. If you asked the average joe that voted Dem last time and Republican this time, "Why?" I doubt he could articulate that it was because of the failed policy of appeasement adopted by the Clinton administration, compounding the empowerment that the Carter administration gave the radical Islamists by allowing them to take control in Iran. The average joe would just point at what he can see -- a gaping hole in the New York skyline.

Twelve-step organizations always talk about "hitting bottom." What they mean is coming to the point where you have failed so miserably, where things are so utterly bad, that you have no choice other than to engage in the soul-searching deep level self-examination that the Dems and the mainline denominations seem to be working so hard to avoid. It is becoming increasingly difficult to "hit bottom" in the western world, and this, I believe is why the gospel is struggling here.

We are too successful in the western world. Virtually no one in America hurts for food, unless it is their desire. The problems we experience in everyday life are trivial. Lack of parking, bad cell phone service, and not enough money for a vacation just do not qualify as major problems in the grand scheme of things. The fact of the matter is that we have done so well in the western world that bottom is so far down that we can usually find something to grab a hold of before we get there.

Deep felt, hard-held Christian faith requires hitting bottom. Lots of people practice Christianity, but as I have said so many time before, Christianity is a matter of transformation, not practice. I said earlier that people cannot fundamentally change, but they can BE changed. But to be changed, we have to realize we need to change, then it is pretty simple to "let go and let God."

In other parts of the world, the bottom is not so far away, thus the gospel is being much more successful. It is not hard to engage in self-examination when where you live involves genuine hunger and oppression. Self-examination comes easily when you have nothing of value to hold onto to begin with.

So how then can the church help people in the west? Well, I do not think the bottom is nearly so hard to find as some would think. In my opinion the greatest manifestation of something being wrong in western culture today is in the increasing isolation of individuals. Loneliness is the key. We do not need to become turn-or-burn evangelists. We need to become a community of genuine love. Such a community will make the isolation of those outside of it apparent, and in that isolation they will find bottom, and come to join us!