The Airplane, or the Authentic?
Last night presented a perfect April evening. The humidity hasn't yet settled over South Carolina, so the party honoring my wife's birthday opted for an outdoor table. The subtle splendor was marred by a man-made buzz from overhead.
It's a bird. It's a plane. It's, well, yes, it was a small and noisy plane pulling an advertisement across the sky. Naturally, the eye followed the ear's unwilling fixation on the unusual. Only, the eye couldn't find its reward for turning its attention skyward. As we watched the plane hired at great expense, the message it thrust before us was unclear. The merchant traded altitude which put his message before more people for clarity. The print was too small. Even as we pieced together the point deemed important enough to take it to the skies, we were underwhelmed with the snippet about offerings from another local restaurant.
There is a Scriptural point here, and it can also be found in 2 Samuel 18:21-22. King David's general Joab commissions a Cushite to sprint with a crucial message of victory for the King. So far, so good. In verse 22, however, someone else wants in on the intensity. A follow-up runner wants to set out. Reasons Joab, "Why will you run, my son, since you have no news ready?" (New King James Version)
Too often, we run because others are running, because the culture is running. Our words flow with the current of verbiage, but we had nothing to say. We have, instructs Joab, no news to report. We focus on hiring an airplane to cut through the clutter of claimant upon people's attention, and we give little thought to the message behind the plane. Institutionally, as the Church universal, we tap into demographics to help us decide when it is time for one pastor to leave because his stories from the pulpit as he ages will be more about doctor's appointments and flow less with anecdotes relevant to young families. We hire media stylists to work around the edges of our message to engage attention. I'm afraid we put comparatively less energy into how to make the most of the attention the culture has kindly granted us, for a moment.
I'll bring this home because it is comparatively easy to blend into the carping criticism of institutions. I will willingly, lovingly, consider the airplane I hire with every bejeweled phrase or five dollar word I stuff into OneNote for future writing use. I'll praise myself for the relevance and erudition with which our present the Gospel. Too often, I confess to and with my fellow Christians, the airplane gets all the attention. The medium, the tactics, the strategy becomes an end in itself. I lose the kind of guileless, almost resigned candor that Mat Chandler recalls of his teenaged self in a book fittingly titled The Explicit Gospel. He blurts out to the guy who had a locker beside his, I need to talk to you about Jesus. The response he got cuts through the clutter better than an airplane. "When you want to do that?" The honestly engaged recipient said.
I have no doubt that the national ministry of Matt Chandler has gotten a lot more sophisticated since his locker encounter. I don't doubt that he is willing to hire media consultants because the Gospel of Jesus Christ is worthy of excellence in every aspect. He would probably hire an airplane. Authentically, though, these changes or progressions as to the "how" spring from an abiding joy of ongoing personal experience of the "what" of the Gospel and especially the ever discovery of the ultimate Who, Jesus. It is when my walk with Him has become old news to me that it risks becoming old news to everyone else. Then, I self-consciously start to think about word choices, and timing, and technology, and airplanes. When my relationship with him is most alive and my gratitude bubbles over for what He has done for me TODAY, I can't help but engage the culture around me in season and out of season (2 Timothy 4:2), in ways that are cutting-edge cool, and in ways that are hopelessly, charmingly square.
I need to talk to you about Jesus.
It's a bird. It's a plane. It's, well, yes, it was a small and noisy plane pulling an advertisement across the sky. Naturally, the eye followed the ear's unwilling fixation on the unusual. Only, the eye couldn't find its reward for turning its attention skyward. As we watched the plane hired at great expense, the message it thrust before us was unclear. The merchant traded altitude which put his message before more people for clarity. The print was too small. Even as we pieced together the point deemed important enough to take it to the skies, we were underwhelmed with the snippet about offerings from another local restaurant.
There is a Scriptural point here, and it can also be found in 2 Samuel 18:21-22. King David's general Joab commissions a Cushite to sprint with a crucial message of victory for the King. So far, so good. In verse 22, however, someone else wants in on the intensity. A follow-up runner wants to set out. Reasons Joab, "Why will you run, my son, since you have no news ready?" (New King James Version)
Too often, we run because others are running, because the culture is running. Our words flow with the current of verbiage, but we had nothing to say. We have, instructs Joab, no news to report. We focus on hiring an airplane to cut through the clutter of claimant upon people's attention, and we give little thought to the message behind the plane. Institutionally, as the Church universal, we tap into demographics to help us decide when it is time for one pastor to leave because his stories from the pulpit as he ages will be more about doctor's appointments and flow less with anecdotes relevant to young families. We hire media stylists to work around the edges of our message to engage attention. I'm afraid we put comparatively less energy into how to make the most of the attention the culture has kindly granted us, for a moment.
I'll bring this home because it is comparatively easy to blend into the carping criticism of institutions. I will willingly, lovingly, consider the airplane I hire with every bejeweled phrase or five dollar word I stuff into OneNote for future writing use. I'll praise myself for the relevance and erudition with which our present the Gospel. Too often, I confess to and with my fellow Christians, the airplane gets all the attention. The medium, the tactics, the strategy becomes an end in itself. I lose the kind of guileless, almost resigned candor that Mat Chandler recalls of his teenaged self in a book fittingly titled The Explicit Gospel. He blurts out to the guy who had a locker beside his, I need to talk to you about Jesus. The response he got cuts through the clutter better than an airplane. "When you want to do that?" The honestly engaged recipient said.
I have no doubt that the national ministry of Matt Chandler has gotten a lot more sophisticated since his locker encounter. I don't doubt that he is willing to hire media consultants because the Gospel of Jesus Christ is worthy of excellence in every aspect. He would probably hire an airplane. Authentically, though, these changes or progressions as to the "how" spring from an abiding joy of ongoing personal experience of the "what" of the Gospel and especially the ever discovery of the ultimate Who, Jesus. It is when my walk with Him has become old news to me that it risks becoming old news to everyone else. Then, I self-consciously start to think about word choices, and timing, and technology, and airplanes. When my relationship with him is most alive and my gratitude bubbles over for what He has done for me TODAY, I can't help but engage the culture around me in season and out of season (2 Timothy 4:2), in ways that are cutting-edge cool, and in ways that are hopelessly, charmingly square.
I need to talk to you about Jesus.
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