We live in a world that is dominated by postmordernity and if we say that we want to reach out to this emerging generation, we are essentially reaching out to Postmoderns.
The more I know the mission field of the postmoderns, the more I feel drawn to it. I see a vision of a Team of Postmodern Missionaries, crossing the border of the Christiandom and entering a culture that is seeking for authentic Faith, who are seeking for great meaning in Life and hope for their future. Both, which our God provides.
Know the Past, Experience the Future
In order to be Missionaries to Postmodernity, we must redefine and re-adapt ourselves. We need to move from what is now being practiced in our church - a series of theological propositions to providing environments where people can have a genuine encounter with God. We have exchanged that and substituted it with a rational understanding only.
Oh how easy to say "Yes, we have a relationship with God" and to pay lips service. Yet many mistake, having "gone though through everything", and that everything about the Christianity seem logical to them that we mistake that for having a relationship with God.
There must be a move from the didactic (educational, knowledge-based) to the experiential. Many people know the truth but don't care a thing about it. You can believe in something without caring about it but you cannot care about something without believing in it. Our Churches are loaded with people who know the 'right stuff' but don't care a thing about them. For mere knowledge don't move people, experience with a Living God does. We have placed such a large premium on Knowledge of the Faith and downplay Experience of God that the emerging generation are going away unfulfilled and Spiritually starved.
The Emerging Generation is a Spiritual People. We are slowly departing from the Enlightenment Age, where knowledge, propositional truths and logic used to move people. Now this rising generation is beginning to sense a spiritual void inside of them and they are seeking for something bigger then they. They are not going to stop searching for an authentic spiritual experience just because the church cannot provide it. And this should be a sobering thought for us all.
The Future Ain't The Way It Used To Be
Postmodernism is closing in whether we like it or not. It is a mistake for us as church to ignore and to turn a blind eye to a reality that could well be sitting in our very pews - and maybe not for very long. We have to realize, the world as seen from this Emerging Generation is very different from that of our forefathers. Now change happens in a pace faster than before.
A phenomenon known as globalization is taking place around us and for the first time, cultures, ideas, religions and mental modes converge together. A 'Global Tsunami' as one writer puts it, is about to overtake us and cause us for the first time in History to be confronted with a million world views available right in the comfort of our own homes. Traveling through the entire world on the veins of Internet and Television, young people more savvy in accessing information technology, are confronted with a myriad of convictions, cultures and contradictions. This pluralism is causing a massive shift in the way people used to see the world and their reactions to it.
A kind of relativism is emerging and previous models, symbols and authorities are losing their meaning and effectiveness faster than the church is reacting. Religious educators and shapers of our ecclesiology must realize this or we would find an Exodus of the next generation out of the church.
As this wave (read: flood) hits us, can we like Noah, build new structures, new shelters, new designs to stay afloat and be a Lifeboat to a generation that is virtually drowning in a relativistic, media-mad, God- starved world?
We must change. We must ENGAGE. Get out from the illusionary safety of being in the middle of the road, cross the street, embrace the edge, engage the world or risk being knocked off by the incoming traffic of world culture... "
The Race of Time is more of a cross-country than it is a Round track event. From the very hands of Jesus, the Church through the centuries has been passing the Baton of the Gospel from one generation to the next. Each generation is responsible to run with it through it's own terrain before passing it on. That's why our Church is always one generation away from extinction.
Today, that same Baton is in our hands. It's a race to the finishing line. The Heavens and the Earth are watching.
Are we ready?
Leo
No comments:
Post a Comment