Amen, Dr Watson. In my opinion, this approach to neglect the teaching of basic orthodox Christian doctrines is the underlying reason that our country has been re-paginized. The lack of preaching on what constitutes true discipleship has been going on for more than one generation, so what we see now are young adults who were never exposed to it. The overall lack of small group discipleship/accountability involvement only compounds the problem. It’s definitely time for the Church here in America to wake-up.
I teach high school students, and I don’t at all think that they want a “journey of self-discovery.” They seem to me to desperately long for a sense of belonging to something greater than themselves, and having grown up in a world full of digital fakery, they want something genuine. Look at the massive following the Canadian psychologist Jordan Peterson has gained among the youth by insisting that sacrifice is necessary and for defending traditional norms. I appreciate his work, but the church has all of the above plus the life-giving power of the Spirit. Unfortunately, few in the church seem to be as bold as Peterson in bluntly demanding sacrifice and a subjection of emotion to the truth. A young man recently asked me after class, “How do you be a man?” I spoke to him for half an hour about self-sacrifice and giving up our selfishness, and he listened. He is a very new believer who was not raised in the church, but he wants to know how to live right. These kids want someone to give them something worth dying for, and if the church doesn’t provide it , someone else will. But if they feel like they belong to our tribe, they will believe what our tribe believes (almost without questioning, in some cases). Of course, that means sacrificing our comforts too: from what I remember about babies, they take your time, your sleep and your money. The youth can’t just be taught truth: they must be adopted into our families first- then they can be fed “the sincere milk of the word,” and I believe that they will gobble it down.
I have often come to the conclusion (although I could be disabused of the notion) that it is actually Boomers who are the problem here. The youngest generation often seems quite open to a more traditional faith, but when they come into fellowship with boomers, they somewhat lose that reverence and fear of the Lord. Boomers started the Jesus Movement and its following iterations of relative worldliness and laxity. They are the ones that chafe at liturgy, order, and formality. In that sense, they are actually quite anomalous among the generations of believers before, and maybe after, them. Yet, while they are the ones in control of the gears of power, one can either get watered down and commodified like them, or one can just leave them behind. I think we largely find that boomer theology and its people are so intolerable as to be worthy of leaving behind. Harsh word, I know. Like I said, I'm open to correction.
I think the Boomers really went in for "contemporary" worship and church growth (seeker-friendly) practices. It was the two generations before them that were most instrumental in liberalizing the mainline.
Absolutely. The thing I felt was unique to the boomers in the context of your article was the naked commercialization of all things and the reducing of congregations to consumers and affinity groups. Perhaps this was an outgrowth of liberalism, but I guess I see it as a concomitant force or conflagration of materialism which, I guess, is fundamentally rooted in pervasive Marxist ideology. While progressivism, postmodernity, and marxism all often overlap, I think each has done its own damage to the modern church, alongside other forces, of course.
Amen, Dr Watson. In my opinion, this approach to neglect the teaching of basic orthodox Christian doctrines is the underlying reason that our country has been re-paginized. The lack of preaching on what constitutes true discipleship has been going on for more than one generation, so what we see now are young adults who were never exposed to it. The overall lack of small group discipleship/accountability involvement only compounds the problem. It’s definitely time for the Church here in America to wake-up.
I teach high school students, and I don’t at all think that they want a “journey of self-discovery.” They seem to me to desperately long for a sense of belonging to something greater than themselves, and having grown up in a world full of digital fakery, they want something genuine. Look at the massive following the Canadian psychologist Jordan Peterson has gained among the youth by insisting that sacrifice is necessary and for defending traditional norms. I appreciate his work, but the church has all of the above plus the life-giving power of the Spirit. Unfortunately, few in the church seem to be as bold as Peterson in bluntly demanding sacrifice and a subjection of emotion to the truth. A young man recently asked me after class, “How do you be a man?” I spoke to him for half an hour about self-sacrifice and giving up our selfishness, and he listened. He is a very new believer who was not raised in the church, but he wants to know how to live right. These kids want someone to give them something worth dying for, and if the church doesn’t provide it , someone else will. But if they feel like they belong to our tribe, they will believe what our tribe believes (almost without questioning, in some cases). Of course, that means sacrificing our comforts too: from what I remember about babies, they take your time, your sleep and your money. The youth can’t just be taught truth: they must be adopted into our families first- then they can be fed “the sincere milk of the word,” and I believe that they will gobble it down.
I have often come to the conclusion (although I could be disabused of the notion) that it is actually Boomers who are the problem here. The youngest generation often seems quite open to a more traditional faith, but when they come into fellowship with boomers, they somewhat lose that reverence and fear of the Lord. Boomers started the Jesus Movement and its following iterations of relative worldliness and laxity. They are the ones that chafe at liturgy, order, and formality. In that sense, they are actually quite anomalous among the generations of believers before, and maybe after, them. Yet, while they are the ones in control of the gears of power, one can either get watered down and commodified like them, or one can just leave them behind. I think we largely find that boomer theology and its people are so intolerable as to be worthy of leaving behind. Harsh word, I know. Like I said, I'm open to correction.
I think the Boomers really went in for "contemporary" worship and church growth (seeker-friendly) practices. It was the two generations before them that were most instrumental in liberalizing the mainline.
Absolutely. The thing I felt was unique to the boomers in the context of your article was the naked commercialization of all things and the reducing of congregations to consumers and affinity groups. Perhaps this was an outgrowth of liberalism, but I guess I see it as a concomitant force or conflagration of materialism which, I guess, is fundamentally rooted in pervasive Marxist ideology. While progressivism, postmodernity, and marxism all often overlap, I think each has done its own damage to the modern church, alongside other forces, of course.