Living Where Worlds Collide (part 1)

A couple months ago now, four bright young emerging adults; two guys and two gals, sat in my office with more questions than answers.  A defining point of emerging adulthood is just that:  the prevalence of questions and scarcity of answer.  And the questions are often really good ones.  Frankly, they’re questions we all ought to be asking.  They make us stop and think.  And if these posts generate questions (or comments) in you, feel free to offer them below.

As really good questions often go, one of their specific questions was stated in less than specific terms.  The verbiage tumbled out into the room like Yahtzee dice on a table; phrased and rephrased by each of the four present, hoping that one of them would get the combination just right.  Eventually the idea of the question settled into a perceived feeling of being caught between the Church and the world around them.

With all four of them living in or having experienced at some point a cultural context other than that of rural north Whatcom County, Washington, they have all seen and heard the positions of the world around them on issues such as social reform or gender-based morality or prenatal euthanasia.  As well, with each of them being Christians from solid Christian families, they have all seen and heard the positions of the Church on the same issues.  Issues, mind you, which appear reserved for spheres of political discourse and debate between Democrats and Republicans, but really, at root, transcend all manner of legislation as they are issues born on a much higher plane.  These are issues with emotion and strident concern connected to them.  These types of issues reach way down deep into us personally and touch the part of us where beliefs are held and convictions are formed.  And at the end of it, the positions held by Christians on these issues and those held by the world around us are often polar opposites.

These four young people are feeling the tension of the divide that is present:  Being a Christian presumably associated with particular positions, and living in a world that is presumably associated with other and often opposing positions.  It has to do with that middle ground where two worlds collide.  And the tension is not what we mean when we say, “be in the world, but not of the world.”  Rather, for these four, the tension is in their honest desiring to bring these opposing positions together or harmonize the individuals associated with them in evangelism; to actually leverage the middle ground instead of skirt it.  Do you see the difference?  It’s really subtle. 

Imagine standing in front of a puddle of barf in the hallway at the elementary school.  Let’s be honest, if that barf came out of your kid, you handle it differently than if it came out of a stranger.  Your willingness to get down and dirty, risking a chain reaction while cleaning it up, diminishes based on your relationship to the barfer. 

To lighten the image, we’ve all been walking down the sidewalk with our family or a group of friends and one of them drops paper on the wet pavement.  Generally, we stop and grab the dampened page and toss it into the trash.  Often we laugh about it or seize the opportunity to teach a lesson.  But what do we do if we come upon a piece of paper that has been dropped by a stranger?  Same wet pavement and dampened page.  If we notice it, we step over it or move aside, don’t we?

See the difference now?  The image of being in the world, but not of the world for many Christians has become something other than what Jesus prayed for in John 17 (where we derive that phrase).  Somehow it has begun to look more like stepping over the dampened page on the wet pavement as the public looks on or backing away from the puddle of barf as the stranger writhes in pain nearby.  In short, it has become walking through the world without actually touching it or its people.  We're just being in the world.  It doesn’t seem to me like that’s what Jesus had hoped for, and that doesn’t quite get to the measure of engagement these four are hoping for either, because of what it has come to communicate. 

Whether by action or attitude or audible voice, the message of many Christians has bred contempt for those with opposing positions or beliefs, as well as in those with opposing positions or beliefs.  Both sides, contempt.  The effect has been an increasingly thick barrier or wall between these four young Christians and the world around them.  Even the category of “the world” as a means of reference to that which is “other than” Christian works to reinforce the piles and footings for the wall.  

Theirs is a pursuit that moves beyond the stepping aside or backing away.  When they come upon that middle ground where two opposing beliefs mingle and the stench of sinfulness wafts thick, they don’t want to be seen as those who plug their nose, lift their chin, squint their face, and skip quickly past without having to inhale, and in so doing add bricks and mortar to the divide.  You get the picture?  They want to know more than just how to be in the world.  They want to know how to live in the middle ground and engage those loitering about with the Good News and not be castigated for the actions and attitudes of those who set a precedent for stepping aside or backing away.  They want a voice.  They want to live where worlds collide without being crushed.