• Home
  • About This Blog
  • Contact Me
  • Subscribe
  • Comment Policy

Attempts at Honesty

Reflections on the interplay of the Bible and Culture

  • Westminster Shorter Catechism Series
  • Sermon on the Mount Series
Home Christianity and Culture The fight against inanity

The fight against inanity

Posted on July 21, 2014 Written by Mark McIntyre 6 Comments


Merry-Go-RoundWarning: if you are put off by a few profanities and a misunderstanding of Calvinism, then please do not click the link below. If, on the other hand, you would like to engage with the culture around you, then please read the article. 

I ran across a post entitled The Bullshit Machine which I found challenging and thought I would share it with you. I am not sharing this for shock value, nor do I do it gratuitously. I realize that I risk alienating readers who frown upon the use of profanity, but the risk is worth it if the ideas are heard.

The author of the article points out the futility of living in an unthinking, uncritical society which lives for pleasure (or the avoidance of pain). For example, he writes:

Remember when cafes used to be full of people…thinking? Now I defy you to find one not full of people Tinder—Twitter—Facebook—App-of-the-nanosecond-ing; furiously. Like true believers hunched over the glow of a spiritualized Eden they can never truly enter; which is precisely why they’re mesmerized by it. The chance at a perfect life; full of pleasure; the perfect partner, relationship, audience, job, secret, home, career; it’s a tap away. It’s something like a slot-machine of the human soul, this culture we’re building. The jackpot’s just another coin away…forever. Who wouldn’t be seduced by that?

The struggle I have is that people in the church can be just as unthinking and un-engaged as the people the author describes in the article. In the church, we have real answers to real questions, but too often the church is the last place where people feel comfortable asking those questions. We erect ramparts of rules, lists and tradition as a defense against engaging the culture around us. The ramparts are effective in keeping the world out, but make impossible the mission that Jesus gave us to make disciples.

We, as the church, need to provide a refuge against the inanity that is all around us. We cannot remain content to offer cleaned up, “Christianized” inanity. We must offer real truth and articulate how that real truth speaks against the inanity. We must present the gospel in all its fullness by teaching and demonstrating how it speaks to every issue of life. We must make the church where it is safe to ask difficult questions. We need to provide more than simplistic answers to those questions.

We are flawed people living in a flawed world and we desperately need an intervention from God to make us something we cannot hope to become on our own. Life is a messy affair and the church needs to be willing to walk through that mess to bring people to Jesus.

Forget programs, forget gimmicks. Bring the gospel in a way that can be understood and help people out of the cycle that the author of The Bullshit Machine describes.

If we have the answer (we do in Jesus) we should be living in such a way as to attract people to find that answer. As Jesus said, Keep your light shining . . .


Filed Under: Christianity and Culture Tagged With: Gospel, inanity, Light, shining

About Mark McIntyre

A follower of Jesus Christ who shares observations about how Scripture should impact the church and the world. Mark is the original author and editor of Attempts at Honesty.

Follow Attempts at Honesty

Honesty in your Inbox

Ashley Madison and Matthew 5

Some have expressed surprise and dismay that Christian leaders have been found to have their names on the list. But I don’t think that we should be surprised. The church is not filled with people who have it all together. We know this because they let us in and we do not have it all together. Whether our failures are obvious to others or not, we all fail.

Question 20

Did God leave all mankind to die in sin and misery?

We like to think of ourselves as free moral agents with the ability to control our own destinies. We don’t want to have anyone tell us what we can or can’t do. We are taught that such freedom is our birthright and no-one should be able to take this away from us.

Getting caught in the blame game – Part 2

If evolution is true on what basis do we blame others? Where does the need to blame come from? This post is part 2 of a 2 part series.

Golden Calf Idol

Confessions of a man-pleaser (idol worhipper)

I could blame it on the church of my youth . . . or, I could just face the fact that I am an idolater at heart and have made an idol out of the approval of others.

Non-conformist

Wholesomely non-conformist

Maybe it has been a problem in every age, but it is certainly a temptation in ours to look back to previous decades or centuries wishing that those conditions could be repeated now. We see religion in general and the Christian church in particular under attack in our culture. We see values that would not […]

Post Series

  • Westminster Shorter Catechism Series
  • Sermon on the Mount Series
September 2023
SMTWTFS
 12
3456789
10111213141516
17181920212223
24252627282930
« Jun    

Categories

Archives

Blogger Grid
Follow me on Blogarama

Copyright © 2023 · Focus Pro Theme on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in