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With Millennials (those
with birth dates between 1980 and 2000) abandoning our
churches at an alarming rate, is it okay if we maintain a
discrete silence on the issues that trouble them the most?
Maybe we can’t achieve a rough consensus on the big issues;
but can we at least get a lively conversation started?
At issue is the character
of God. Does God love all of us, all the time, no matter
what? Or will God favor a select few with the splendors of
heaven while consigning unbelievers, and those born into the
wrong religious culture, to the fires of hell?
This may strike you as a
singularly crude way of stating the issue; but the
Millennials streaming out of our churches don’t have a lot
of theological tools to work with. All they know is what
they hear from the small circle of Christian superstars who
control the media microphone. Most of these young people
want nothing to do with a God who damns LGBT people for
being the way He made them. Nor are they interested in a
deity who bars the pearly gates to non-Christians.
Most Millennials read the
Bible randomly and with few contextual clues. They find
themselves with nothing much to do and they see the black
book sitting on the coffee table or the motel
nightstand. Succumbing to mild curiosity, they open the
black book and read a few sentences.
What do they find?
I just opened my Bible at
a venture and here’s what I found:
Do not rejoice, all you
Philistines, that the rod that struck you is broken, for
from the root of the snake will come forth the adder, and
its fruit will be a flying fiery serpent. The firstborn of
the poor will graze, and the needy lie down in safety; but I
will make your root die of famine, and your remnant I will
kill.- Isaiah 14:29-30
Informed Bible students
will recognize the familiar voice of the prophet Isaiah and
will understand the reference to the Philistines and a
rising Assyrian empire. We may also note God’s preferential
love for poor and vulnerable people – a common biblical
theme.
But the people turning
their backs on organized religion are not informed Bible
students. They read without context and catch the most
dramatic details - the fiery serpent, death by famine, and
the slaughter of the remnant. The takeaway: God is mad and
determined to do some damage.
Having completed my
experiment with random Bible reading, I just flipped on the
television and checked out the first religious program I ran
across. I learned that the Palestinians should stop asking
for their own homeland because they are the descendants of
Ishmael (the child of a slave woman), while the Jews are the
descendants of Isaac (the child of promise). I also learned
that God takes a dim view of Obamacare and that humans are
constantly besieged by evil spirits. All this in five
minutes.
Put all of this together
and we see why Millennials are fleeing the church. Ain’t
nobody got time for a vengeful God with a knee-jerk
preference for status quo politics. And that’s the only God
they know.
Viewed against this
cultural backdrop, our theological silence is a big problem.
For better or worse, most of the current crop of young
people didn’t grow up in Sunday school, they aren’t familiar
with the great hymns of the faith (whence we get most of our
theology), they haven’t been exposed to hundreds of
reassuring sermons about a loving God, and they have no idea
how to read the Bible. All they know is what they hear on
the radio, see on television, and discern from the half
dozen times they have randomly cracked a Bible. If we want
these people to believe that God loves them, all the time,
no matter what, we must be able to make our case in simple
and persuasive terms.
The essential features of
Christian theology aren’t all that complicated. First, we
must read the Bible “Christianly.” If Jesus is the full and
final revelation of God, his vision is decisive. Christ is
lord of scripture.
Drawing on Old Testament
teaching, Jesus portrays God as infinitely loving,
forgiving, merciful, long-suffering and kind. Since God is
like that, we should be like that. Because God loves the
enemy, so must we. Because God demolishes us - them
distinctions, so must we. Because God takes the side of
poor, vulnerable people, so must we. Because God condemns
cruelty and oppression, so must we.
Jesus used hell language
to dramatize the fate of those who exploit defenseless
children, poor people, immigrants, widows and
orphans. (Think of the parable of Lazarus and Dives in Luke
16, or the parable of the sheep and goats in Matthew 25.)
These simple principles
define the kingdom of God, the concept at the heart of
Jesus’ teaching. Jesus lived out the kingdom and it cost
him his life. Easter morning is God’s thunderous ‘amen’ to
Jesus and the kingdom he proclaimed.
To follow Jesus is to live
the kingdom of God he preached. That’s why we pray, “Thy
kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in
heaven.” Heaven and hell are this-worldly realities that
invade the world as a consequence of the choices we
make. When we live the kingdom, heaven takes root. If we
look out for number one, the scent of sulfur hangs in the
air and the wrath of God is upon us.
Serious theological
discussion is controversial. You may disagree with my
take on Jesus and the kingdom. Or we may agree about Jesus
but disagree about what kingdom living looks like in the
real world. Theology is a spirited conversation that never
ends. But if we play by kingdom rules, no one gets hurt and
the potential for blessing is great.
But if we maintain our
polite silence, we will have nothing to offer the folks who
are forsaking organized religion. They have very good
reasons for going. Can we tell them why they should stay?
Excerpted from Our silence is driving Millennials out of
the Church
By Alan Bean, Ph.D., Executive Director Friends of Justice
Used by permission
Contact Rev. Donald Perryman, D.Min, at
drdlperryman@centerofhopebaptist.org
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