Marks Of The Modern "Evanjellyfish"

The following is taken from an article by Mike Scruggs which you can find here. These are the "five points of Evanjellyfish Christianity". Remember that you don't have to embrace all five points to be an Evanjellyfish. By affirming any one of these points you may be well on your way down the road to modern Evanjellyfishism.

He modifies the TULIP acronym that commonly denotes the popular "five points of Calvinism".

T = TOLERANCE. The underlying principle here is that all moral or theological truths are relative and equal no matter what their source.

U = UNTHINKING CONFORMITY to majority or popular opinion, especially if supported by the mainstream media, publishing, and educational institutions. Again, for the evanjellyfish Christian, acceptance and respectability are more important than truth.

L = LIBERTY of conscience in ALL things. Contrary to traditional and especially Reformed Christianity in which there is a place for liberty of conscience on questions not addressed or given any ethical preference in Scripture, the evanjellyfish Christian has a remarkable tendency to apply this liberty to everything that they choose.

I = the notion that INEQUALITY IS EVIL. There are, of course, many areas where some sorts of equality are preferable, such as equal justice under the law, etc. However, the evanjellyfish Christian expands the concept to areas that make no common sense and cannot be justified by Scripture or a study of nature. It is particularly repugnant to them that any differences in intellect, personality, and aptitudes exist among mankind.

P = The principle is PERSONAL PEACE and PROSPERITY at any PRICE. There is hardly any truth they will not ignore to achieve this. They will go along with the silliest and most inane proposals by demagogues, charlatans, and crackpots, so long as their acceptance, respectability, personal peace, and prosperity can remain intact.

So, where do you stand? Are you an "Evanjellyfish"?

Rituals

Some Evangelicals fail to see The Church's rituals as vital to the life of the Church because they have convinced themselves (or have been convinced by their pastors) that rituals, while vital to the 'Old Testament System', have been done away with by Christ under the 'New Testament System'. Thus they see any type of 'ritual' by the Church to be a reversion back to the "old" ways.

To 'modern' people (like us) rituals that involve a sacrifice and blood seem like some sort of throw-back to less civilized times. After all, didn't Jesus do away with the need for bloody sacrifice and performing of rituals? ..... An honest look at the scriptures must conclude that the answer to this is NO! We still offer to God a bloody sacrifice for the remission of our sins and through the ritual of the Lord's Supper remind YHWH and ourselves of the "blood of the New Covenant which is poured out for many" (Mark 14:24).

What we too often fail to realize is that Jesus didn't do away with sacrifice or ritual. What He did was take sacrifice and ritual up into Himself and transform them ............. make them "new". I guess you could say that under the New Covenant, sacrifice and ritual have been 'born again'.

Our rituals have been transformed from rituals of exclusion to rituals of inclusion. They have been instituted to teach us that "the Gospel" is not about you or me individually, but about the "New community" that has been created in Christ. This is what the common bath "One Baptism" and the common meal "One Cup and One Loaf" are all about. They teach us that we must die to self. They teach us that we must become like Jesus.

Jesus' ushering in the New Covenant did not mark a movement from a time of ritual to a time of non-ritual. It marked a time of change in the rituals we have been commanded to perform as God's people.

The "Modern" Church and the Sacraments

Most modern Churches in Protestantism have relegated the Sacraments (Ordinances for most) to what can best be described as appendixes to "real ministry". In today's Church it isn't unusual to see pastors delay Baptism for new converts for months and sometimes years. In today's Church it isn't considered abnormal to take the bread and wine(or Welch's) of The Supper once per year. Or, if you're lucky, once per quarter. ............. but Why?

I'm convinced that the answer is to be found in the 'culture of individualism' which has infiltrated the Church. I think this is most clear with regard to The Lord's Supper, but is also true for Baptism. In both, it is a case of a rejection of 'ritual'. And this rejection of ritual is rooted in favoring individualism over community. There are certainly other factors involved, like rationalism and the Protestant tendency to idolize the intellect, but individualism is at the root. 

The ritual of Baptism is about inclusion into the community (body) of Christ and the ritual of the Lord's Supper is all about the sustaining of that community. The Sacraments communicate to us and to the world (at least in part) that in Christ we have forsaken our individualism and self-centeredness for community. This community is the "new man" or the "new creation" that Christ has brought about by His life, death and resurrection. 

To reject the Sacraments or treat them as unimportant appendixes to the life of the Church is to embrace modern culture's disdain for ritual. Modern culture rejects ritual because it is seen as an infringement on 'individual rights'. 

Is it any wonder that the "modern" Church has all but rejected our 'rituals'?

Wade B.

The "Modern" Church

Some have described "modernity" as possessing the attributes of value pluralism, privatization, individualization, and over-intellectualization, which have characterized Western civilization since around 1500. From a political perspective "modernity" is know as (or shaped by) liberalism. 

Liberalism, according to Peter Leithart, is "the political system dedicated to the one proposition that political systems must not be dedicated to one proposition". It is an ideology which is founded upon a self-refuting principle .............. It's insanity! Please don't think I'm only talking about a particular political party, I assure you I'm not. This is the ideology which characterizes, for the most part, our entire political system. It characterizes America and 'the West' in the modern era.

Peter Leithart paraphrases Alasdair MacIntyre's description of this ideology when he says, "liberal democracy claims to liberate individuals from all tradition, leaving every member of society free to live according to whatever concept of the good he finds pleasing, to live out whatever narratives he can conceive.". To drive home the self-refuting nature of this ideology, Leithart, paraphrasing MacIntyre, continues, "liberal democracy does have its own overriding story and its own overarching purpose. Despite its claim to liberate from tradition, liberalism is itself a tradition and has a particular vision of the good society." (emphasis mine). In other words, you are free to choose any 'story' to define yourself ..... except a story which conflicts with the ideals of liberalism. How's that for freedom?

So what does all of this have to do with the Church? Look around you. We have allowed secular, pluralistic, individualistic, privatized ideologies into the Church. This is another way of saying, "we are worldly". The problem is ............. we don't recognize these attributes as a problem. We are drowning in the sea of 'secular, liberal modernity' and we don't even know it. 

How often have you heard Christians characterize , and even emphasize, their 'relationship with God' as being "a private and personal thing"? How often have we heard preachers/evangelists call people to Christ by stressing the need for a "personal relationship with Jesus"? This type of thinking has led Christians to conceive of salvation in strictly individualistic terms. The "It's just me and Jesus" attitude is a result of the influences of 'modernity' and  has crippled the Church. 

How many times have you heard (thought), "Well, that might be o.k. for that Christian / Church / Denomination, but it's not for me."?  Or, "I'm not going to join a local congregation because I can't find one that believes exactly like I do or offers a worship style that I like or plays the type of music I prefer."? Or,"I know my pastor preached on this or that, but that's just his interpretation. He is entitled to his opinion on the matter and so am I". Or, .............. I could go on and on. These are nothing less that the symptoms of our common illness. The Church is infected with the disease of modernity and all the individualistic symptoms that come with it.

The cure is to reject the modern ideologies which have infiltrated the Church. It is to reject worldliness. And we will do this only as we accept as our own, the full story which our God has given to us in the pages of the Bible. Only as we retrain ourselves to see the world through a Biblical 'lens' will we be able to understand who we are and what our true place in this world is. 

Wade B.

A Question

Question: Is the gospel about saving individual souls or is it about building a Christ honoring culture (Kingdom) on the earth?

Answer: Both.

This type of question creates false dilemmas that I believe are responsible for disagreements in many areas of evangelicalism today. Most (not all) disagreements come about because the parties involved take opposing sides of an either/or dilemma ("It's either the Word preached or the Sacraments", "It's either the family or the Church", etc.). If only we could recognize that to some degree the truth usually involves both, and we have probably placed too much emphasis  on one side or the other. 

I think this is what has happened with the question posed above. In our modern hyper-spiritual, individualistic, introspective, even hyper-evangelistic Church culture we have gone too far in focussing on the individual and if we can "get them saved".  For these new converts and even for our own children, our focus in discipleship normally consists only of making sure they go to Church, read their Bibles, and have their personal "quiet time". The modern Church's focus is almost totally on what we consider to be personal piety.

We have forgotten that the gospel, while it certainly includes the salvation of individuals, is more about the restoration of man as a community. The gospel is more about restoring how we, as the people of God, relate to God and to one another. The gospel is about how God, in Christ, through Christ, and for Christ has kept His promises to reconcile fallen humanity to Himself. We, the Church, are that new humanity! 

Wade B.

Citizens of The City

I guess you can't talk about "the Church" without addressing the Greek term ekklesia. This is the term most often used in the N.T. for the Church, .... but why? What were the N.T. writers trying to teach us about ourselves by picking this term? 

This term was used in the Septuagint (LXX) to describe the assembly of Israel in many different contexts. It is used for Israel as a religious, social and political body. In the Greek world it was used to describe the citizens of a particular city when they gathered for "official" business. To put it bluntly, ekklesia was and is an inherently social and political term.

When Paul went to Gentile cities and proclaimed the message of the gospel, he was announcing to the leaders and citizens of that city that a new city was being formed and in this new city we bow the knee to King Jesus. In this new city, we have our own story and are governed by our own King. The Church was not being offered as a club or sect that existed along side or under that particular city, but as a clear alternative to that "city of man".  

Wade B.

What Battle?

If the Church is to be a new culture (which she is), doesn't it seem likely that we would be at odds with any culture that 'competes' with us? If we are proclaiming the gospel rightly, then isn't a battle inevitable? Didn't Jesus tell us that the world would hate us?

As we have it, the Church is at peace with the world around us. What does this say about the manner in which we are proclaiming the gospel?

Wade B.

Tell Me the Old Old Story

Every culture is defined by its stories. For any culture to survive it is imperative that these stories be passed on to the next generation. Take our national culture as an example. Our calendar is organized around special days which commemorate, memorialize, and help tell the story of who we are as a nation. It's these 'stories' that define us as a nation. Telling and retelling the stories of who we are and where we have come from helps create a sense of common history and common purpose which bind us all together as 'Americans'. This sense of common history and purpose creates in a cultures' citizens the single greatest attribute necessary for its perpetuation -- loyalty. 

One question in my mind is; 'How have we come to the place in the modern Church where there seems to be so much confusion over who we are '? The answer to this question, I am convinced,  has much to do with the story of the Church, which ultimately defines us. One thing we must be aware of is who is telling our story and thus, who is defining the Church?  We have allowed modern society (the world) to define the Church for us , and so we think that the Church is supposed to be a private, religious club that we tack on to all our other weekly activities. And as long as the Church doesn't interfere with the lives of those who don't belong to 'our club' we are allowed to live peaceably with the world around us.  We have allowed the government to define the Church for us, and so we believe its normal for the Church to exist at the margins of American culture. We have been convinced that the government exists to take care of "public/corporate" concerns and the Church exists to take care of "private/individual" concerns.  As long as we behave and stay where they want us, the government will let us keep our 501(c)(3) tax exempt status. If we're not a 501(c)(3) then we're not really a church, right? We have too often confused the story of the Church with the story of the USA. So much so that some of us actually think that the spread of "democracy" and the spread of the gospel are the same thing. 

Make no mistake about it, the Church of Jesus Christ is meant to be a culture. And like other cultures we have a story. The problem is, as Christians, we don't know our own story anymore. We have forgotten that our story starts in Genesis and not in Matthew, therefore most of our local congregations are only taught one third of their identity.  We have forgotten that it is our triune God Himself who defines us. We are what and who He says we are. He has given us His written word which tells us exactly who we are and what we have been created to do. His written Word is not a systematic theology textbook. It is a book which tells a story. Properly understood it is The Book which tells The Story. If you are one of His, if you are a part of the people of God, a member of the Body and Bride of Christ, then this is YOUR STORY.

Most importantly, we have forgotten how crucial it is that we know the whole story of who we are so that we can pass on our story faithfully to the next generation. The story of the Church must be told and retold to our children and our children's children. We must know our common history, embrace our common purpose and pledge our loyalty to our common King, King Jesus!

Wade B.