The Catchphrase That Can't...

Much has been made in other places about the cheesy PoMo quasi-evangelical catchphrases such as 'dialogue', 'story', 'journey', 'romance', etc. I would like to comment here on the term 'conversation.'

A 'conversation' is apparently when more than one PoMo gathers, and they begin to speak. They pile up one non-descript cliché (see above for some popular choices) on top of another, each describing their own 'authentic experience' (their story) which becomes, to each of them, uniquely authoritative for their own journey.

Perhaps the reason why these ones are so quick to devalue language and its inherent meaning is because they simply have chosen to create a dialect of their own, in which each one of the seven (7) words they know becomes entirely defined by its own context (the word's story??). Interpretation, then (and thus, meaning, as well), is entirely in the ear of the hearer.

No wonder they can connect and have such wonderfully meaningful 'conversations'... Everyone tells me my own interpretation of their story... which I interpret the way I do because of my own story... how wonderful!

All that, however, is simply by way of introduction. The reason I wanted to write about the term 'conversation' is because I feel it has been violated, perhaps worse than the others.

It is often stated that the truly 'missional' Christian will not seek to win 'converts', but rather to make 'relationships' which will lead to truly 'meaningful' and 'mutually beneficial' conversations. Only mean old moderns want converts. Hip missional Christians know that conversations are much better.

But that is a lie. This catchphrase simply doesn't work the way they want it to work (which is quite sad, really, because it does sound very pious of them).

The trouble is that conversation is not the goal of a Christian. Conversion of sinners is. While I understand that many emergent types are reacting against the old 'crusade' style of evangelism, they are throwing not just the baby, but also the mother, out with the bathwater.

To be a Christian means that I love God. It is to God's glory to see sinners saved. That's why he sent his Son... that's why we're called to go to every nation and make disciples. We're not told to go to the ends of the world to stake our share in the marketplace of ideas.

To be a Christian means that I love others. I love because God first loved me. Being saved, I know that it is to the benefit of any man, woman, boy, or girl to be saved. To know Jesus is the most eminently wonderful joy the soul could ever know. Why would I want to deny to someone that I really want them to know the greatest, truest, only absolutely sovereign joy the world will ever know? So that we could 'have conversation'?

What a joke.

Either you desire sinners to be saved, or you're not a Christian because you obviously haven't understood that it's to the glory of God and for the good of the person for them to be saved!

So one of two things is happening here. Either these wonderfully conversational emergent types are really seeking conversions through conversations (which seems awfully deceptive... why not just say what you mean? Tell them what you really want!) or else they really think that the world has as much to offer them as they have to offer the world.

If the latter is their mindset than I would argue it is true. The world does have as much to offer as they do... which is absolutely zero. Only a heart that has never experienced the true grace and love of God in the forgiveness of Christ and the comfort of the Holy Spirit could ever think that the world has anything to offer them.