Good Monday everyone. Hoping you had a good weekend. Mine was busy. Not bad; just busy. Continuing to ramp up into the normal school year stuff, both with my grad work, and of course, all going on with the kids’ school.
As we launch into the week ahead, I want to share a remarkable line from Dietrich Bonhoeffer. In his Ethics, he writes, “The space of the church is not there in order to fight with the world for a piece of its territory, but precisely to testify to the world that it is still the world, namely the world that is loved and reconciled by God” (Bonhoeffer, Ethics, p. 14).
That first bit caught my eye initially: “The space of the church is not there in order to fight with the world for a piece of its territory…” This should be non-controversial. Jesus made it clear that his kingdom is not of this world. Paul made it clear that we don’t fight flesh and blood. And yet over and over again, I see American Christians fighting for territory.
I admittedly get somewhat defensive when sociologists and historians describe American evangelicalism in monolithic political or cultural terms. Because I belong to evangelical spaces where that is manifestly not the case. Let’s be fair, you know?
The problem is, all too often, the loudest and most visible American evangelicals end up fitting the stereotype. It is immensely frustrating. I’m not willing to give up the evangelical label because I still think there’s value to it. But my goodness I wish some of my brothers and sisters would stop making it so difficult!
All that to say, that’s why this line from Bonhoeffer caught my eye at first. I’m tired of Christians fighting with the world for claims on its territory.
But that’s not the really radical part of this sentence. It’s what he says next that really stopped me in my tracks: “The space of the church is…precisely to testify to the world that it is still the world, namely the world that is loved and reconciled by God.”
Hang on, what?
It’s easy, as Christians, to view ourselves in strictly oppositional categories: us vs. the world. And again, there’s truth to this. We are not of this world, even if we are in it. We are exiles.
Yet our differentiation from the world is not for conflict. The goal of being weird and strange in this world is not to stand above it and stare down our noses at it in righteous indignation, or to try to eradicate our enemies.
It is instead to stand in its midst, bearing witness to the reality that it is loved by the God who made it.
It is to bear witness to the reality that Christ has reconciled the world to himself through his cross, and to call the world to experience his goodness.
It is to bear witness to the love of God for those who hate him, by ourselves loving our enemies, out of the love that we ourselves—who were once enemies—have received.
So here we are, on a Monday morning. Let’s step into this week boldly, ready to remind the world what it is, and of the God who loves it.
Yes! And… God created all the good, and wonder, and beauty, and love that exists in His Spaces.
Thanks Bob. This is a good word!