More Ready than You Realize

Evangelism as Dance in the Postmodern Matrix
Brian D. McLaren

I liked this book a whole lot more than I expected to. It offers a very engaging challenge to those who would want to package evangelism into diagnostic questions, canned illustrations or five point outlines. He likens it to a dance. It "begins with something beyond yourself," and "over time, your whol life begins to harmonize to the song. It's rhythm awakens you; its tempo moves you, so you resonate with its tone and flow with its melody. The lyric gradually convinces you that the entire world is meant to share in this song with its message, its joy, its dance" (pp. 15-6). McLaren understands that it is the gospel itself, and the transformation that occurs in us by God's Spirit that motivates our engagement with unbelievers. And he undestands that the hope of the gospel is more than just the conversion of the sinner--the entire cosmos (not the sum total of all people in the world) is supposed to share in this song. If I may insert my thoughts on McLaren's words, it seems to me he's arguing that God is about the transformation of the comsos, and as we engage in His song, we become about His work.

He argues that evangelism requires that we engage in real relationship with people who are not yet believers. Evangelism is more about conversation than about lecture--getting someone to listen to our expertise. Evangelism is more like a dance with a parter than a sales pitch. I had the opportunity once, as a young seminary student, to be evangelized by someone who came to my door. He asked me two diagnostic questions, and I told him he didn't have to worry about me. I'm a Christian and a seminary student seeking to become involved in full-time ministry. He responded, "That's the wrong answer." So I gave him the answer he wanted--you know, the stuff about Jesus dying on the cross for my sins, and if I believe in Him, I'll go to heaven when I die. That answer was fine with him, and he invited me to come to his church. I politely refused and thought to myself, I want to go to a church where people are more interested in conversations than they are about having me give them the answers they want to hear so that they can decide whether or not they should give me their sales pitch for Jesus.

You won't find any sales pitches in this book. Interspersed within each chapter is an ongoing converation that Brian had with a musician that came to one of his events. He shares his ongoing conversation. He desires to know her, to engage in discussion with her real questions and with her real objections, not so much to Jesus, but to the Church. Being a pastor, he doesn't get on the defensive; he listens to her and walks with her on her journey. That's what evangelism is all about. This book helps readers, particularly those who have become dissatisfied with "modern" Christianity, recognize that they are more ready than they thought to engage in this dance with unbelievers.

Yet this book is not without its flaws. As is so common in books such as this, the way to show that your version of "postmodern" Christianity is superior to "modern" Christianity is to caricaturize the latter to stack the deck in favor of the former. A favorite tactic is to take negative aspects that were true in some versions of modern Christianity and assert that they were true accross the board throuhout the modern era. McLaren characterizes modern Christianity between the years 1500 and 2000 as operating under a principle of "motivation by exclusion," which he says, looks like this: "We're on the inside, but you're on the outside. We're right, and you're wrong. If you want to come inside, then you need to be right. So, just believe right, think right, speak right, and act right, and we'll let you in" (p. 84). One wonders how anyone was "let in" in the modern era. Nevermind that this flies right in the face of the reformer's insistance that one is saved by grace through faith alone. That cardinal doctrine of sola fide has generated churches that recognize it's impossible to "believer right, think right, speak right, and act right" unless the Holy Spirit transforms us by His regenerating work. He then sanctifies us that we may gradually learn to "act right." Now to be sure, you can find many fundamentalistic churches that turn that doctrine on its head and use the gospel as a fence of exclusion for those who aren't like them. You can also perhaps say that that's a temptation that the church has fallen pray to throughout its history, including postmodern churches. But to toss that out as a general critique of 500 years of protestant church history is unfair, needlessly prejorative and historically naive. McLaren does this a number of times throughout his book, and it strikes me that the very quote proves that "motivation by exclusion" continues in some way in the postmodern church as well--that is, the modern church is "excluded" because it operates under the principle of movivation by exclusion.

This is not to say that the modern era does not deserve to be criticized, nor is it to deny that the church has capitulated to modernism in extensive, deep and profound ways. It is rather to wonder why it is, when modern Christianity is so open to critique, that we have to resort to caricatures? McLaren's book is an exciting and encouraging book encouraging us to truly engage with those in the postmodern matrix with the hope of the gospel. Despite its flaws, I would highly encourage you to let this book help us along way.