Great Article on the Gospel and Culture

Here is an excellent article on the Gospel and culture by Paul Hartog.

It was first published in Faith Pulpit but was reprinted in the Sept/Oct ’09 issue of the Baptist Bulletin.

Here is an excerpt…

Post-Christian culture

Most cultural critics (both secular and Christian) predict that our Western culture will continue to move away from its Judeo-Christian foundations. Now, at last, the long shadow of Constantine fades in the twilight of Western civilization. The emerging “post-Christendom” culture is built upon its own religions: worship of self, worship of ease and comfort, worship of entertainment and pleasure, and worship of unencumbered individual freedom. As this continental drift continues, those who would attempt to parrot popular culture and remain unapologetically Biblically faithful will find that not even Atlas could straddle the great divide.

Nevertheless, in hopeful confidence, I believe that (should the Lord tarry) out of the ashes of “post-Christendom” culture will arise churches that function not as political or social power brokers, but as countercultural communities of sacrificial faith and genuine spirituality. As local churches cultivate flourishing examples of authentic, Biblical community, they will be able to disciple new converts in the Christian totality of communally transmitted values, virtues, moral habits, and behavior patterns. In a sense, the lines in the sand will be drawn for us by the cultural process of “post-Christianization.” Being fully Christian will require not fully enjoying our culture’s ephemeral pleasures and not being fully accepted by society. No attempt to cavort with Christian celebrities, athletes, politicians, and popular artists (or to mimic the latest trend by merely glazing on a religious veneer) will be able to mask the truth that being a committed follower of Christ will not be “fashionable.” Churches will earn a hearing not because they blindly imitate culture, but because they provide a distinctive alternative for those left thirsty by cultural cisterns that cannot hold soul-satisfying water.