{"id":12779,"date":"2019-09-12T19:41:34","date_gmt":"2019-09-12T23:41:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/?p=12779"},"modified":"2019-09-12T19:41:34","modified_gmt":"2019-09-12T23:41:34","slug":"adjusting-to-the-world","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/?p=12779","title":{"rendered":"Adjusting to the world"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"\/<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Thinking about history,<\/strong> philosophy, and theology.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I have enough thoughts for a lecture (if anybody wanted a lecture), but I\u2019ll lay some of them out very briefly here.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Church adjusts to the world. It isn\u2019t determined by the world \u2013 or shouldn’t be \u2013 but we have to relate to people as they live, and we have to live in the world as it is. So we adjust our message to the tenor of the times. We have to. It\u2019s not necessarily bad.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But it can be bad when it goes off the rails.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The modern world, I think, began with Isaac Newton. Newton occupied the role of prophet in European civilization, sparking what we call the Enlightenment. \u201cGod said let Newton be, and all was light,\u201d as Alexander Pope wrote. The Enlightenment achieved the level of religion \u2013 and that religion was Deism, where God was sublimated into a cosmic Watchmaker. Intellectuals believed they now understood the laws of Nature, and soon all questions would be answered.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Church followed the Enlightenment to an extent. Great emphasis was now placed on correct doctrine. Cold reason was elevated, in some quarters, to a theological virtue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But the Enlightenment didn’t last long.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In practice, it was inadequate to actual human life. Enlightenment thought was like trying to feed people with vitamin pills only. Technically all the necessary nutrients might be there, but people need more than that. They need flavor and texture and scent. They need the whole human experience. The Enlightenment didn\u2019t feed the soul.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So the Enlightenment was replaced. It was replaced by two\nmovements (you could call it one of them a sub-movement, but I like the sub-movement\ntoo much to subordinate it).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The secular reaction was Romanticism. Romanticism reacted\nagainst cold formalism and logical reductionism. Romanticism centered on passion.\nLife was to be lived with intensity. Love and freedom were what made life\nworthwhile.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But there was a theological corollary to Romanticism (some,\nas I mentioned, would probably call it a sub-movement). This was Pietism (the\nforerunner of contemporary Evangelicalism). To the rationality of Enlightenment\nChristianity, the Pietists replied, \u201cThat\u2019s not enough! Jesus\u2019 greatest\ncommandment was not to understand God, but to love Him!\u201d They emphasized a\npersonal experience with Christ and a life of growing sanctification, learning\nto love Him more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now an argument can be made that Pietism led directly to the Liberalism of today\u2019s mainline churches. It\u2019s argued among Lutherans, in some quarters, that Pietism\u2019s emphasis on personal experience led people to set their subjective feelings at the center of their faith \u2013 which is what Christian postmodernism is all about.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And there\u2019s probably a measure truth in that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But I would relate it, once again, to the Church\u2019s habit of imitating the world. Christian postmodernism (I maintain) is mostly the fault of secular postmodernism. The nihilism and despair that followed the World Wars led secular thinkers to existentialism and moral relativism. The mainline churches followed suit, rejecting all authority, including that of the Bible and orthodox doctrine. (Leaving both the Pietists and the orthodox out in the cold.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It wasn\u2019t the Pietists\u2019 fault, in my view. But they did get\nsucked in.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The one unifying principle of all these theological fashions, it seems to me, is following the world. We have to adjust to the world, but we must not let it set our agenda.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.” (Romans 12;2, ESV)
<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

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Thinking about history, philosophy, and theology. I have enough thoughts for a lecture (if anybody wanted a lecture), but I\u2019ll lay some of them out very briefly here. The Church adjusts to the world. It isn\u2019t determined by the world \u2013 or shouldn’t be \u2013 but we have to relate to people as they live, … Continue reading Adjusting to the world<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[14],"tags":[1911,2212,2421,2812,2846],"class_list":["post-12779","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-religion","tag-modernism","tag-pietism","tag-romanticism","tag-the-church","tag-the-enlightenment"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12779","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12779"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12779\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12779"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12779"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12779"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}