Greg, I will risk violating one of our rules and say how much I appreciated your posts on this current topic of “missional”. I agree with your analysis and most of what you have said. I do agree, as you know, that we shouldn’t be unaware of the culture we are in, but I want to explore a little more this idea of an indigenous evangelism as responding to an indigenous culture.
You are right that Old Louisville isn’t Linden, Texas. Thank you, thank you for championing Old L’ville. A problem with urban spaces like Old L’ville (unlike more homogenous places like Linden or Louisville’s East end), and a problem I have with what I understand “missional” folks to be about is this urge to identify an “indigenous” culture. Old L’ville, for example is really a mosaic of three primary cultures and more secondary cultures. Old L’ville’s three dominant cultures are the urban poor, the young 20-30 something student/bohemian, and the middle/upper middle class “intelligensia”. They are all here and they all coexist, but they tend to be somewhat distinct. I think it’s great, but it makes it hard to say that as a church we will identify THE indigenous culture and minister to it.
This leads to one of my questions about the “missional” folks. The pursuit for the indigenous culture sounds like a quest to identify some native, unique, previously unknown culture (like the noble savage) that if we can study and imitate, then we can make ready for conversion. Well, this could be good at many levels, but it can be bad at many levels. What I see of many “missional” folks is that they have identified the “indigenous” culture of their 20-30 something contemporaries and adopted it. Is indigenous culture defined by a geographical boundary or really the same old homogeneous-unit principle? From my vantage point, the missional quest for an indigenous culture is really grandpa’s homogeneous-unit principle with more facial hair and more expensive coffee. (Disclaimer: I think the more facial hair and good coffee one can muster the better.)
I haven’t given this lots of thought, but my intuition has always been to be well aware of the culture and to do as little as possible to offend the culture, but within the church to develop a culture that is as transcultural as possible through simplicity, timelessness, and thoughtfulness thereby allowing the beauty, truth and power of the gospel to be displayed in all its slendor. In short, it is a Tiffanys approach that I am after I guess. I think in the end that a gift from Tiffanys would be welcome in any culture — how about Linden, Texas?
H. Richard Niebuhr wrote about several viewpoints one could take with regard to Christ and culture in his aptly named book . . . Christ and Culture. He said people usually have one of several views: Christ against culture, Christ of culture, Christ above culture, Christ and culture in paradox, and Christ the transformer of culture. I won’t take the time to explain all those, but it seems that Niebuhr liked the transformation view best.
I think that for much of the culture, that’s right. Christians ought to be working for the transformation of God’s creation, which has been marred by sin. But I also think there are times when Christianity must be wholly opposed to certain things the culture embraces and represents. For example, I agree with Keith that postmodern notions of truth are completely at odds with a Christian worldview. So I think that when the emergent folks try to appropriate the postmodern world’s notions of truth, they are in serious error. You have to make a choice between Christ and postmodern notions of truth. In that case, and in several others that come to mind, it’s Christ against culture for sure.
So . . . When it comes to being “missional,” I think 3ABC will do all it can to communicate and interact with the culture of Old Louisville—right up to the point where the culture of Old Louisville demands that we deny something crucial to the Gospel. Coffee houses, park clean-ups, B&Bs, community groups, college life? Yea, we can do all that, and I have no doubt that we will. Agreeing with the majority of people who live here that all truth is nothing but a social construct and that our faith in Christ is merely an individual expression of our own hopes and desires with no universal significance? No way.
Missional? Perhaps, but only to a point. Indigenous? Sure, but only so far.
Bruce, I think Stetzer’s quote is pretty good. I don’t think that’s all that’s usually meant by “missional,” but let’s run with it for a minute. If Stetzer’s given an accurate explanation of what it means to be “missional,” then I’d say we are pretty missional. We don’t use that language, but we are surely a church that is seeking to “understand its context and come to express that understanding by contextualizing the gospel in its community.” We’re also trying to become “an indigenous expression of the gospel within that culture, eventually removing all extrabiblical barriers.”
The context we need to understand and embrace is that of Old Louisville. Yes, there are all kinds of people in Old Louisville, but surely you’d agree that there is a culture to the place that is different from the culture in, say, East Texas (where I am now sitting). If you transplanted my home church in Linden, Texas to Old Louisville, my guess is that it would not work. And since you brought up CHBC, my guess is that if you dropped that church in Linden, Texas, it wouldn’t work either, faithful to the gospel though it is. There is a culture in every community, and a church that wants to minister to that community will have to know and embrace that culture (to a point—see my next post).
Normally, I think that probably happens naturally. You plant a church in Southern California, you’re going to get a church that reflects Southern Californian culture, dude. You plant it in East Texas, and y’all’re gonna be doin’ somethin’ entarly difrnt. Because a church is made up of people, it’s naturally going to reflect the culture in which those people live.
We’re a little different at 3ABC. Our church simply hasn’t grown up naturally in the midst of Old Louisville. Most of us drive a good, long way to get there. Wireman wrote in to make the point:
I look at our church and it is an interesting cross-section of mostly seminary folks. That’s who mostly attend our church. Thus, it has the cultural flavor of seminary. Over time, as God sees fit to bring others into our fold, it will smell differently. It must. If it does not, then the people who have joined in fellowship are not being heard and are being stifled.
He’s right. Right now, we are mostly—though not by any means entirely—a seminary-student church. But we’re thinking hard, even before the community really recognizes that we’re here, about how to become “an indigenous expression of the Gospel” in Old Louisville.
I like the word “indigenous.” Maybe that’s a good word for the kind of evangelism we’ve been trying to describe and encourage. We’ve talked about organic evangelism, natural evangelism, corporate evangelism, and even a couple more kinds of evangelism. But what about indigenous evangelism? The kind where we’re out in the community doing community things, going to community places, becoming a recognizable and appreciated part of the community—all to the end of bringing and showing the Gospel to the community. If that’s what it means to be missional (and not the embrace of postmodern epistemology) then I’m all for it, and I think we are it—or at least we’re working toward it.
During the course of the past year, an increasing number of college students have attended and even joined the body of Christ at Third Avenue. A few months ago, I spoke to a handful and mentioned five ways I thought Third Avenue Baptist Church could serve them. By God’s grace, should we continue to grow, it is my prayer that our investment in college students would continue to be along these lines:
We want to teach you the Word of God – to know it, love it, and live it.
We want to disciple you because we think you need more than knowledge; you need a life to follow.
We want to instill in you a love for God’s church. She is the one institution that the gates of Hell will never prevail against and yet she is ignored by so many in your generation.
We want to encourage you in your desire to fulfill the Great Commission and partner with you as you engage in evangelistic ministries through on-campus evangelical organizations.
We want to equip you stand for the truth in a world that is unsure truth exists.
We know that we will fulfill these goals only imperfectly, but as a church near more than one university, it is our prayer that we are constantly moving in this direction.
As we continue to turn over this question of what kind of church we should be given our ministry location, I want to talk briefly about engaging the heart and mind of our members and hopefully some of our neighbors. When you compare 3ABC to other urban churches, our location is not really the typical inner city/urban setting. Old Louisville is really the 19th century suburb of downtown Louisville. Over the last 20-30 years, Old Louisville has had a new and growing neighbor — the U of L.
Our situation today is one in which a majority of our members are students — either in advanced theological education or at university. Regardless of program, those who are engaged in full or part-time study will in general approach their church life in a thoughtful way. Whether or not it is realistic, Mayor Jerry Abramson aspires to make Louisville more of a “college” town. (Now I admit for those who may have lived in a city that has had years to develop that culture it may be hard to think of Louisville that way, but we have to give the politicians credit for having a vision.) Even in the short time that I have lived in Louisville, the U of L has had significant development in facilities and research potential. I don’t know that we want to be a “college” church, but I think that we should assume that there are and will be those in our neighborhood who will expect a thoughtful approach to the gospel and to a life of faith in Christ. We should boldly orient our church life not in a heady intellectualism, but in a thoughtfulness and reflectiveness that mirrors our membership and community life.
So what is our church life to be like in view of our location? The Biblical and thoughtful organization of weekly services (see more about them here on the web site), and the ordering of those corporate times together are meant to engage the heart and mind. Why should that be unique to a city church you ask? I don’t think that it has to be, it’s just that suburban life in general tends to be oriented to comfort and ease — neither of which are fertile soil for developing rigor of any sort.
As I said in my last post about caring for the city, cities have become aware of the importance of the vitality and image of their cores. Without a healthy “identity” or brand, they have little to market when competing with another city for that major RV exposition. When that RV exposition goes to a city in another state, all kinds of revenue is lost. You get the picture.
So now that there is leadership in a city that understands the importance of a healthy center, where do those people live who devote themselves to leading the government, arts, media, education, etc.? Do they move to Quiet Acres Dr. and commute 20 miles into the city? Many may, but many will chose to live — even if it is less comfortable — in the thick of it all. Many others who are not leaders themselves will want to live in places that are “authentic” and chose the ideal communal life, even it is less convenient than the suburbs.
I am oversimplifying many things here, but my point is that many thoughtful people who hold responsible roles in the life of a city, will chose to live in its center. They need a church that respects their minds at the same time that it has concerns for their hearts and souls. They need a church that has the piety to respect the local culture and not try to reproduce a denominational prototype or an Anywhere is Nowhere Community Church. They need a church that has the piety to take the long view of things — not planting a new church in a neighborhood when it is just too hard and would take too long to revitalize or reform an existing congregation. They need a church that models pilgrimage — acknowledging that life can be inconvenient and hard, but that God is good despite difficulty, and that there is hope for something beyond urban renewal or suburban bliss. Can 3ABC be this kind of church?
A couple weeks ago I wrote a post about the church’s ministry in an urban setting. I haven’t pursued the topic because I have some hesitancy about over generalizing. Nevertheless, I am going to push ahead with the understanding that these are not necessarily “universals.”
After abandoning the center city in the 1960’s and 1970’s, urban planners have come to realize the vital importance of a healthy and vibrant urban center. Cities like Louisville have made many changes in the past 10-15 years to revitalize their centers. They are doing this to try to recapture the “soul” of the city that was lost in the urban to suburban shifts and then homogenized to nothing once it went to the ‘burbs. So, in our city we have a newly restored “front lawn”. We have a skate park, bar/entertainment district, arena (maybe), new museums, etc. (I wish that we could get a new public library like the new one in Seattle.) But of course there is no one taking measures to reintroduce the churches and congregations that once gave cities a large part of their soul. I would suggest that a primary reason to be involved in a city church, and for us to exist as we do at 3ABC, is to make space for Christianity in the cultural landscape of the city. I am not talking about taking over the city government, but I am suggesting that Christians live, work, and worship in the city so that the new “soul” of a city like Louisville is not just sports and entertainment. Those who come to these newly revitalized cities will want/need to see people living out their faith around them and be to them the aroma of life. In general I think that city churches can be the aroma of life better than suburban churches, but I will save that for another post.
