Christ, Kimball, and Culture
I’ve been reading Dan Kimball’s book, They Like Jesus But Not the Church, lately and it’s been thought-provoking. Kimball shares the story of how he was a typical Christian caught in “the bubble” of Christian subculture. At one point he woke up and realized he was speaking “Christianese”, hanging out with only Christian friends, and spending so much time doing Church things that he had no relationship with those outside the church.
Kimball’s whole argument unfolds from that point: If we’re in the bubble, we’re not fulfilling the Great Commission and thus we’re not really Christ’s church. The solution is for the church to focus on secular culture and, instead of rejecting it, embrace it. This idea is a radical shift from the church’s practice that has gone back to the Enlightenment, but it has gained traction as we become a global village. Many Christians have lived uncomfortably with double lives for a long time now, and the idea that secular culture can be embraced is a huge relief.
So how are Christians supposed to relate to culture? Perhaps Richard Niebuhr is the most famous 20th century theologian to tackle this question. He proposed 5 ways in which Christians can/do relate to culture in his famous work Christ and Culture (1951):
1. Christ against Culture: Christians view Culture as the enemy, leading to a monastic desire to be separate and avoid sinful entanglements that come by participating in Culture.
2. Christ of Culture: On one hand, Christians “interpret culture through Christ” and favor those elements which seem in accord with Christ. One the other hand, “they understand Christ through culture” – emphasizing the aspects of God that are most in line with the culture.
3. Christ above Culture: Christians do not see the culture as all bad and believe that culture is part of God’s plan (Cf. Romans 13; 1 Peter 2). We obey God first but participate in the culture we are so long as it doesn’t interfere with our relationship with God.
4. Christ and Culture in Paradox: Christians view culture and Christianity in constant tension, so that to move towards one is to walk away from the other. The Church and Culture are two separate, God-given entities that are both necessary (like law and grace) but can never be reconciled. The idea is to find a good balance between the two.
5. Christ the Transformer of Culture: Christians should seek to transform Culture in order to create a Christian state. In this way Culture is Christian and thus no difficulty should exist. Christian principles provide the framework for social innovations driven by men continually transformed by the Spirit.
No doubt you have a hard time choosing which approach is best. Philip Yancey once wrote: “I remember that Niebuhr’s book left me feeling enlightened, but as confused as ever. All the approaches seemed to have something to contribute, and in fact, I could point to biblical examples of each one”[1] Yancey’s right, we can make a Biblical case for each one of those models and yet it would be awkward to combine them all. Angus J. L. Menuge, in Christ and Culture in Dialogue, summarized Niebuhr’s claims in three points:[2]
(M1) All five models are sometimes appropriate at different times of history
(M2) No one of the models is exclusively correct
(M3) It is impossible to find one correct answer to the Christ and culture problem.
We can certainly sympathize with such an agnostic conclusion. So how will we know if Kimball’s proposed shift in Church-Culture relations is right?
well done, brother