A call to follow Jesus and act like Jesus
Dr Bruce Manners
Senior minister
Avondale College Seventh-day Adventist Church
We now live in a post-Christian world.
In 1949, historian Herbert Butterfield wrote that “we can just about begin to say” in the West, no one was forced to be Christian to gain favour at court, to gain public office or by government compulsion. That was the “Christian” world.
Sixty years on, this seems odd.
Michael Frost* and Alan Hirsch (in The Shaping of Things to Come) criticise the church, though, for acting as if we’re still in a Christian world. Christianity, they say, has three “flaws in its DNA—it is attractional, dualistic and hierarchical.”
“Attractional” is the mistake of believing if we get our programs, our seating, our music, our preaching, our children’s or youth ministry, our parking right then people will come. This come-to-us approach not only doesn’t work, it’s unbiblical. The New Testament has a go-to-them mentality.
“Dualistic” refers to Christianity separating the sacred from the profane, the holy from the unholy, the us-in-here and the world-out-there to the point that there’s a gap between belief and everyday life. A whole-of-life spirituality is needed.
“Hierarchical” is as it sounds—a top-down model of leadership. No matter how they’re structured, every denomination has it. The problem is we now live in a world where egalitarianism and community are valued.
If Michael and Alan are right, what do we do? Are you ready for a revolution?
But what would this revolution look like? What should it look like? Here’s a clue from Dallas Willard: “Religion has many critics, but Jesus very few.”
Followers of Jesus acting like Jesus is the best response. Always. That’s never changed.
* Michael Frost will be a presenter at Avondale College Seventh-day Adventist Church’s Salt Conference, July 15-17, 2011.
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