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Being the right kind of Christian ‘nutter’
How do we overcome the perception that Christian faith is for people who
have let go of their critical faculties? This month Bishop Lee reflects on
the credible good news of the gospel.
Earlier today I received an e-mail from someone who heard me on national
radio speaking about some of the issues related to the Government’s
Embryology Bill. It was an encouraging one thanking me “for making it clear
to at least a small part of the population that Christians are not all
nutters!”
I was reminded of Tony Blair’s admission after he stepped down as Prime
Minister that he kept his religious views largely to himself because he felt
he would be accused of being “a nutter.”
Since a nutter is defined as someone who is, at best, eccentric or
exceptionally silly and, at worst, foolishly insane or mad this perception
is unlikely to give us a foot up in advancing the cause of Christ and God’s
Kingdom. As Joel Edwards’ has made clear, we need to connect the gospel and
Christian life with credible good news.
But that does not entail abandoning our values or principles in order to get
a good press. It does not mean ruling out of court the ideas of a virgin
birth, Jesus’ resurrection or miracles in order to be acceptable to the
likes of Richard Dawkins or Polly Toynbee, or for that matter, your
workmates or friends. It is not about accepting contemporary mores or a
secularist agenda as the way things have to be, or gagging our moral
consciences – blowing whichever way the societal wind takes us. No!
Being credible means making a well founded case for our position but being
honest about the weaknesses as well as the strengths. Credibility and
humility are not opponents but cousins. It means remembering that Christian
faith is not an argument to be won but a loyalty to be graciously attested
to and demonstrated. And if it truly is good news we are about, we ought to
be clear who will be blessed and why. What reliable difference does this
good news make to the poor, the marginalised, the oppressed or the broken?
What about the other parents at the school gate, the managers at the office,
the men and women in the canteen, the folk in the day care centre? What
might it mean for those of another religious faith or none?
Yet even when we have been as credible and as full of good news as it is
possible to be, we may still find ourselves labelled as nutters. We can
present Christ’s claims and God’s way for human flourishing as well as we
can, but there is a foolishness associated with the cross which always risks
dismissal and ridicule as the apostle Paul made particularly plain to the
Corinthian Christians.
In my time in the Holy Land earlier this year I met a hugely impressive
Palestinian Arab Christian who is a Lutheran Pastor. Around 20 years ago he
founded an outreach project which has grown over the years to be the third
largest employer in the Bethlehem region. In a time of political
uncertainty, economic adversity, and Christians leaving the region, this
Pastor is pulling together a major new project involving an international
Conference Centre and a Centre for the Arts and Education. “People say we
are crazy,” he said. “But in this crazy world, God needs crazy people like
us.” Sometimes in God’s economy being credible good news involves being
regarded as foolishly insane by most people.
+Lee |
Church of England