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.

The following Q&A is from Christianity Today. For the whole interview, go here.

Are young people becoming more sympathetic to Reformed theology?
The two hot theologies today are Reformed and emerging. Reformed theology offers certainty, with a masculine God who names our sin, crushes Jesus on the Cross for it, and sends us to hell if we fail to repent. Emerging theology offers obscurity, with a neutered God who would not say an unkind word to us, did not crush Jesus for our sins, and would not send anyone to hell. I came to Reformed theology by preaching through books of the Bible such as Exodus, Romans, John, and Revelation, along with continually repenting of my sin. I am, however, a boxers, not briefs, Reformed guy. I am pretty laid back about it and not uptight and tidy like many Reformed guys.

Keith, I appreciate your comments about the role of the church in helping to interpret scripture. I am not sure that the average Baptist would agree with you though. I am going to push you a little further too.
My question is: what about Luther? If you say that one has to seek the “church” in determining the interpretation of hard bits of scripture, what would poor Luther have done? He had the tradition and the church against him. If you say that he is the exception, then what are the principles you would follow for finally being able to contravene the counsel of the whole church?

I realize that hard cases make bad laws, but this is significant. When should you follow the church and when should you strike out on your own?

I am grateful for your remarks Keith about the resurrection, but I think that everything that reminds us of and causes us to talk about the resurrection is a good thing. I think that I succeeded.

But now about your comments on understanding the Bible in the context of the community of faith. You are starting to sound an awful lot like those who follow the Bishop of Rome. I mean, aren’t we all priests and can’t we all decide for ourselves what the Bible means? Surely you don’t mean I have to wait until some cleric tells me what it means when I go to church on Sunday. Can you develop a Biblical argument for your position apart from the historical fact that many of the NT books were letters to churches? Some of the NT books were written to specific people. Did they need to go to a priest to get an interpretation for the hard bits???

There are few issues more important to the affairs of a church than the relationship between tradition and doctrine. These two mingle and mix to decide not just what we do but how we do it. The collection of our offering is not simply tradition, it is biblical (1Cor. 16:1-3). However, the how of this collection is a matter of tradition, isn’t it?

As Keith has mentioned, however, tradition plays another important role, it can guide us in our interpretation of Scripture. Jonathan asked a tremendously helpful question during Wednesday night Bible study, something along the lines of, “How do we respond to those who argue that salvation does not require explicit faith in the divinity of Jesus Christ?” To answer this question, the tradition of the church is so helpful. It is a gift to the church to know that Athanasius wrestled with the biblical text and concluded salvation depends upon the death and resurrection of the God-man. Anselm of Canterbury wrestled with this question and concluded, as Jonathan mentioned, that our sins against an infinite God require an an infinitely worthy sacrifice–and this is a sacrifice that only the God-man can make. This tradition is helpful.

But when all is said and done, this tradition is only so helpful as it points us back to Scripture ourselves because I am convinced that the current generation will not be convinced by Athanasius or Anselm or even Luther and Calvin. They need to hear us speak from God’s holy Word, plainly and directly. We need to know the tradition but we need to test the tradition against the truths of Scripture. This is why the teaching and preaching of the Church is so important.

The reference I have made to chicks and ducks comes from the great revivalist George Whitfield.  He said all my chicks became ducks with reference to all his converts becoming baptists.  Maybe he was implying we are all quacks.  The matza ball reference was alluding to a Seinfield episode when George told a girl he loved her–that crazy George. 

Indeed, we have opened a can of worms with the covenant debates and how baptism is understood in each framework.  I will hang my gloves now on the issue, not because there is nothing more to say, but because I really do not care to rant and rave about the BUTs in the Westminster.  Praise God for the many paedo-Baptist from which I have gleaned valueable insight into God’s Word–Warfield, Bavinck, Calvin, etc.  Let us proclaim the gospel together and wait until the glorious day of the Lord when all of our theologies will be corrected (aka. everyone will become a Baptist). 

Woopee.  I got a response from a Presbyterian and we are developing.  I may have misunderstood the Westminster and the Presbyerians.  The response stated that “and infants of such as are members” is referring to the partents being members.  OKAY, I don’t think this is universal for the paedo-baptists,  and this does not help the dilemma.  It actually causes more of a conundrum. 

When a child was circumcised in the Old Covenant they had all the rights to being a citizen of the commonwealth of Israel.  If our hermeneutic is continuity and the whole practice of infant baptism is found in the nation, why are the infants not members of the church?  To be consistent with this hermeneutic one must make them members, right?  BECAUSE PB’s must recognise there is a true Israel that exercised faith, they remove infants from membership and place them in the Covenant Community?  The discontinuity I see in them at this point is the same I believe to be true.  There is no longer a race or a nation, but a kingdom of priests who come to faith.  The church fulfills the “spiritual” role Israel failed to accomplish.  There is no people apart from the people of faith.  So what are you accomplishing by baptizing the babies?  I am asking for help from my presbyterians. kwgoad@gmail.com

What great agreement we have for adult baptism because there is biblical support.  BUT, I have not received any support for infants, much less substantial support.  My matza ball out there concerns Abraham having faith and THEN receiving the sign.  Paul sees this as the pattern for true Israel and Abraham’s children (Rom 4).  That is good continuity.  The separation of infants from membership shows they acknowledge a difference in the covenants.