A couple Sunday mornings ago, at the Community Bible study hour at our church, Tim told a story about a secular Jewish woman taking classes at the local Christian liberal arts college in order to get her teaching certification. Over coffee she tells Tim how she is struggling terribly – not with the classwork – but with the ever ubiquitous message at the Christian school – that all people are sinners, depraved, and deserving of God’s wrath. She said “I can’t believe everyone is born a dirty rotten sinner.” To me, this woman is the paradygmatic post Christendom person and presents a challenge to traditional ways evangelicals have taught evangelism. Tim’s question was “what do we say to this woman?”
Traditionally, the first move in evangelism is to convince the non-Christian that he or she is a sinner in need of God (or that he or she is deserving of God’s judgment and going to hell without Christ). “You must admit you are a sinner in need of God!” We evangelicals inherit this ‘starting point’ from our Reformed theology (which for many reasons starts with the depravity of humanity). This starting point was effective in Christendom where so many were determined by the ever-present Western guilt derived from the Roman Catholic ethos of the European medieval time period. This guilt however is waning in the new cultures of post Christendom. As a result, some of our evangelistic techniques must go to greater and greater lengths to prove to the non Christian that they are indeed sinners. Kirk Cameron’s 10 commandments technique is one of the latest examples of this where he goes through the ten commandments with people he meets on the street trying to prove to them intellectually that they are a sinner. These kind of approaches assume a whole host of things that have been true about our own conversions, yet make no sense to people in the new worlds of post Christendom. We therefore end up coming off as incessantly judgmental, and make no point of contact for witnessing the good news. The result is often now this person will try to run and hide whenever she sees an evangelical Christian within 50 feet.
I have no desire to avoid the issue of sin in engaging others with the gospel. Yet I suggest that in these new post Christendom contexts, we must teach believers three things about the doctrine of sin in order that those we encounter with the gospel might be able to hear the gospel as “good news” (not an agenda of some judgemental person).
1.) Sin is a complex doctine. Surely “the depravity of man (sic),” the sinfulness of humanity, is an essential truth of the gospel that should not be discarded because of its cultural irrelevancy. Yet sin in the Bible is not only about transgression – (i.e. breaking the law), but also about the missing the mark. Sin is not just about guilt but about the powers that enslave us. We therefore have to approach each person with the knowledge that sin will manifest itself in different ways. Our job is to listen and probe for the manifestations of lostness, emptiness, enslavement, and yes guilt, and be available to reflect with the person … always waiting patiently for the Spirit to reveal any sin, brokenness, hurt and/or enslavement that might be going on..
2.) Sin is a language we learn within a community. Sin is not a universal term that everyone automatically understands. It is not even a term every Christian automatically understands. The discovery of sin is a communal enterprise. I often say that I have many sins in my life I am not aware of. I need to be in conversation with people who know me who can enable the revealing of my sins by the Holy Spirit. Sin is understood and exposed in our lives through the witness of the community around us (and we must be humble, vulnerable and open to receive words that in turn can lead to confession and growth in Christ). This vulnerability should define us as Christians and should make it safe for those outside Christ to discover the source of their own brokenness.
We should therefore not expect people outside Christ to know what we are talking about when we say the word “sin.” As Hauerwas says, “We must be trained to see ourselves as sinners, for it is not self-evident. Indeed, our sin is so fundamental that we must be taught to recognize it … we only learn what our sin is as we discover our true identity through locating the self in God’s life as revealed to us through the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.” From Peaceable Kingdom 30-31.
3.) As witnesses we are therapists of sin, always listening to “the other” modeling the vulnerability that has made it possible for us to see our own sin. We listen, probe, ask questions. It is the Holy Spirit that convicts of sin. It is not our job to convince someone. Yet like a therapist we have a language for all that is going on in the social spiritual moral physical world as it is under God the creator and Lord of the universe. But the therapist rarely goes out and tries to convince all people they are sick. “They must be ready” we often hear. Likewise we who live in a post Christendom world, are not here to go out universally and try to convince people they are sick. We live life in and among the sick, the poor, the broken, the lost and make ourselves available and vulnerable to offer both the diagnosis out of our own lives and the gospel as good news.
All of the above challenges the use of sin as an anvil in the work of evangelism. Yet it argues that sin is an essential doctrine of the church. We make sense of it however in the practices of confession, repentance, and restitution in the community. In Hauerwas’ terms, as Christians “we must learn to become good sinners” in order to model it before the world and invite those outside Christ into this victory, healing and pardon. Is this too soft of a view of sin? I don’t think so? Is this too communal? contextual?
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We’ll be discussing issues like this (post-Christendom evangelism) and more at the Missional Learning Commons. A non/conference gathering of “missional co-conspirators.” So you’re welcome to join us!! Check out info on the missional commons website. If you’re going to show up let us know via the Facebook Page, or e-mail me at fitchest@gmail.com.
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David, you may know that this question caused considerable controversy within Young Life in the past couple of years.
Gospel Talk
Entire area Young Life staff out after evangelism mandate.
Collin Hansen | posted 1/07/2008 08:49AM
http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2008/february/1.13.html
Young Life requires:
“evangelists should explain the reality and consequences of sin before presenting the crucifixion of Jesus Christ and his resurrection.”
As you can see in the article, Douglas Campbell was one of the defenders of those who protested against Young Life’s rigid salvation road steps.
Campbell’s new book The Deliverance of God (http://www.andyrowell.net/andy_rowell/2009/11/reviews-of-douglas-campbells-the-deliverance-of-god-an-apocalyptic-rereading-of-justification-in-pau.html) argues that this doctrine of sin first and then salvation second is presented in Paul primarily in Romans 1:18-3:20 and that Paul is being ironic and that this therefore should not be the exclusive way we think about the salvation process.
I thought it was also interesting how Tim Keller says almost the exact same thing as you do about how postmoderns don’t usually understand they are sinful.
Here is a quote from his article:
The Gospel in All its Forms
Like God, the gospel is both one and more than that.
by Tim Keller | posted 5/23/2008
http://www.christianitytoday.com/le/2008/spring/9.74.html
“There are people from other religions (Judaism, Islam), people with strong Catholic backgrounds, as well as those raised in conservative Protestant churches. People with a religious upbringing can grasp the idea of sin as the violation of God’s moral law. That law can be explained in such a way that they realize they fall short of it. In that context, Christ and his salvation can be presented as the only hope of pardon for guilt. This, the traditional evangelical gospel of the last generation, is a “gospel for the circumcised. However, Manhattan is also filled with postmodern listeners who consider all moral statements to be culturally relative and socially constructed. If you try to convict them of guilt for sexual lust, they will simply say, “You have your standards, and I have mine.” If you respond with a diatribe on the dangers of relativism, your listeners will simply feel scolded and distanced. Of course, postmodern people must at some point be challenged about their mushy views of truth, but there is a way to make a credible and convicting gospel presentation to them even before you get into such apologetic issues. I take a page from Kierkegaard’s The Sickness Unto Death and define sin as building your identity—your self-worth and happiness—on anything other than God. That is, I use the biblical definition of sin as idolatry. That puts the emphasis not as much on ‘doing bad things’ but on ‘making good things into ultimate things.’”
dave,
good one.
i really feel that two approaches that could still be used are: 1) sin is relational, it is manifested in broken relationships (who can’t identify with that in some way?), and 2) sin as power, holding people in situations they know are not good for them (addictions), or the misuse of power (oppression). These two avenues, while perhaps starting less personally, and not starting with guilt, allow for sin to be placed on the table for conversation.
I think a reverse method should be take. Find out where people’s sense of justice lies, and its corresponding injustice (poverty, global warming, government abuse, whatever…), and then plumb why it is they are bothered by injustice. This reveals both that they are bothered by sin in the world, and opens the door both for a conversation regarding their involvement with sin and the solution for sin. But the trick is not reducing the gospel to social effects, it must also be personal.
[...] friend David Fitch just wrote a lucid examination of why the traditional “You must admit you are a sinner in need of God!” evangelism [...]
Very well said, Dr. Fitch.
Andy Rowell you are a media encyclopedia extraordinairre. Thanks for all those links!!
Holsclaw? social? personal? isn’t it all entertwined?
This is an excellent post.
I think that the missing the mark piece is a crucial one. It may be difficult to persuade some post-Christians of their ontological and existential lostness, but I am finding it easier work along this path: Are you living as the person whom you were created to be? This opens the door to exploring the Gospel’s power to liberate and transform.
Thanks for sharing this.
Not so sure about the language of witnesses as “sin therapists.” Could imply that we are the ones who help people deal with/minimize their sin (which I know is not what you mean, Dave). Also, I think the therapist-client relationship is too mono-directional to serve as a model for providing language for understanding sin.
I found the video clips from that 10 Commandment approach hilarious, disturbing, and strangely inspiring all at the same time.
I ran across this talk a few months ago. http://www.ted.com/talks/philip_zimbardo_on_the_psychology_of_evil.html From a Christian point of view, I understand the Lucifer Effect as without the power of God in our lives we are subject to doing evil if we are in an environment that promotes evil.
I thought it was very interesting how psychology could demonstrate something we understood from the Bible. I think if we talk about the ‘depravity of mankind’ in modern/post-modern psychological terms such as the Lucifer Effect then we might have a more open/understanding audience.
I have also found it interesting that the Quakers start not from a depravity point of view, but that we all carry the light of God within us. As different and apparently conflicting as these two points of view may be, I believe they are both true.
Just this thanksgiving weekend at the parallel Bible study hour at our community (not to be confused with http://www.communitybiblestudy.org), our discussion revolved around a Keller chapter that reflected on people like the one you mentioned, agitated over the focus on sin, hell, and the like. So your post was quite timely.
I’d like to go back the the question you presented, “What do you say to this woman?” Even though my ‘favorite’ form of a gospel presentation is the one-verse method based on jn 3:16 because I prefer to know one method well than knowing several partially. I really like James Choung’s Big Story too. I have no problem with a 3 minute presentation because I see a gospel presentation as a “crossroads” that introduces several important themes rather than a complete picture of anything. …and pragmatically, if you can coherently talk about something for 3 minutes you can probably do fine in a 2-hr conversation–the reverse is often not true.
A secular/postmodern/post-whatever person isn’t going to start with a high view of scripture or God, so the Big Story starts with presenting a messed up world and then goes into broken relationships and so on. I think agreeing on a messed up world is common ground for almost everyone. It is a non-badgering way of presenting “Christians believe X, what do you believe and why”. Part of our ultimate process is recognizing that our starting point doesn’t hold up and changing our mind/attitude/action to True Truth.
Also see Scot McKnight http://tinyurl.com/qcj5b6
At the CPC congress Stuart Murray took on the issue with similar conclusions.. of course the UK being even further along than Canada in this. But what is striking is how far the church in general lags behind in this engagement. As someone has quipped, “Generals lose new wars because they are still fighting old battles.”
Also remember Dallas Willard’s thoughts on “the gospel of sin management”…
I can’t help thinking that we majored on sin when we reduced the gospel to personal salvation. That played into individual (Cartesian) anxiety about eternal destiny. But if we step back and take a more communal view and a broader view of redemption involving all creation, that is.. if we remove SELF from the center of all this — we start with different questions, more in the direction of “justice” and God putting things to rights (implied connect to NT Wright .. yes).
Matt … “sin therapists” … therapists who help people see their sin through reflecting back, and helping then learn the skill of using the language of sin enough to locate their own sin … Obviously not the method most used by modern therapy… so thanks for the clarification
[...] few days ago David Fitch wrote a post on evangelism for post-Christendom cultures. In it he said this: Traditionally, the first move in evangelism is [...]
It seems that any engagment of non-Christians from a foundationalist epistemology (the appraoch be taken to intellectually prove a person guilty of sin) may prove to be a frustrating endeavor. In my experience a relational-dialouge has been more helpful…so it is not just me deductively and showing with syllogistic reasoning why all people are generically sinners and therefore person X is a sinner. Instead, we both are iductively learning about our specific lives where we find them as we find them which takes into account the complexity of sin, some of which is true in our lives but some of which is not entirely true (i.e., I am a sinner but I am not the same as someone like Charles Manson or Ted Bundy who are not the same as someone like Mic Jagger or John Lennon who are not the same as….).
Does that make sense?
Grace and peace,
Rex
I live in Cornwall, a very beautiful county in the UK where people are generally very aware of environmental and climate issues. I find that using the way we have done damage to the earth as an example of wrongdoing enables people to connect with the idea of sin more immediately and naturally. It seems the most sensible starting point as there is already common agreement on the need to act responsibly and what that means in practice. Recycling and acting to reduce CO2 emissions is a good example of practical repentance, and then it all starts to fall into place.
Great post, Dave.
The method of witness encouraged in InterVarsity while I was a student and staff was to have students invite non-believing friends to take a look at the life of Jesus with them in the Gospels. This assumed that students would have non-believing friends that they could invite.
The idea behind these groups was that if people could have an actual encounter with Jesus Christ they would be drawn to Him and to a community that is sincerely trying to embody His teachings.
This doesn’t really bypass the sin issue, but it does help nonbelievers encounter the real Jesus in community. Sin comes to light soon enough for many people in this situation, as they engage with this community of believers. At this point, surrounded by a group of believers who love them, sin becomes something they can accept as part of their nature.
[...] David Fitch at the blog, Reclaiming the Mission suggests that a staple of evangelism, getting people to admit that they are sinners, doesn’t work with postmoderns. [...]