The Church and Contemporary Challenges

In the book The Bravehearted Gospel, Eric Ludy notes that, “Many [people] today have inherited a faith that has no real life or power.  Instead of zeal there is apathy.  Instead of courage there is timidity.  An instead of confidence there is paralyzing doubt”.  This quotation sums up what the Church in Jamaica and worldwide is facing at the moment in the midst of economic, social, moral and spiritual crises that appear to be unparalleled in human history.  The reality is, though, that, as Qoheleth (The Preacher) clearly states in Ecclesiastes, “There is nothing new under the sun” no matter the sphere of life in which we are experiencing upheavals and crises.  This does not sound too encouraging, but it is the truth.

I outlined the preceding realities in light of the issue of the threat of crime and violence and the challenge of homosexuality.  Many Christians seem to think that the world is coming to an end now because the forces of darkness are dominating this planet.  The recent mass gatherings and demonstrations orchestrated by church leaders and their declarations of possible martyrdom in the event that the Supreme Court open the floodgates to the normalizing of the homosexual lifestyle by declaring the buggery law unconstitutional could be seen by some as a last gasp attempt at life and relevance by a half-dead entity called the Church.  

Those of us who are Christians need to realize that the Church no longer holds the positions of privilege that it enjoyed since the time of Constantine.  The forces of secularization and those with a sinister futurist agenda have orchestrated this current scenario that bewilders those of us who lack insight and foresight.  Jamaica is no longer a Christian nation, if we could have classified it as such.  This means that, as Himes and Himes note in their book Fullness of Faith: the Public Significance of Theology, “the church must be engaged with but not seek to control society”.  Nevertheless, its responses are understandable given the fundamental nature of the implications of crime and homosexuality with respect to the perpetuation of the human species.

I suggest to my Christian brothers and sisters that we should not be apathetic, timid, nor paralyzed by the vexing occurrences around us.  The Church should return to its roots and recapture the transformative “power” that it demonstrated at its inception in the first century of this era.  We need to demonstrate life-inspiring zeal and passion for the Lord and the lost again.  We need to be courageous in our attempts at realizing our core mission of transforming the world.  We also need to reject paralysis of whatever kind and move forward confidently knowing that no matter what is happening in our society and in the world, God is at work slowly but surely fulfilling His purposes for mankind.  We need to be more Christologically redemptive, penetrative, illuminating, and contextualized in our communities and leave the rest to the Creator, Sustainer and the Judge of the universe.