Hidden Faithlessness

Jeremiah 37-39, records the fall of Jerusalem to Babylon, and the burning of the city. In chapters 37-38, just prior to the fall, Jeremiah is imprisoned for speaking the Word of the Lord. He told the people judgment was coming and the only way to avoid such destruction was to surrender to Babylon. Neither the people nor their leaders heeded Jeremiah's words and judgment came upon Judah. From the greatest to the least, Judah could no longer deny that Jeremiah's word was true. Their imprisonment and persecution of him accomplished nothing for them except to give evidence of their continued rebellion. The remarkable thing I noticed in these chapters is the continued denial of the truth of Jeremiah's prophecies by Zedekiah and other leaders even as they seen them being fulfilled in front of their eyes.

In the world of psychology, such denial is called the "normalcy bias." In short: People believe that since something has never happened before, it never will. People have a really hard time preparing for and dealing with something they have never experienced. The normalcy bias causes smart people to underestimate the possibility of a disaster and its effects.

A great example is found in Barton Biggs' book, Wealth, War, and Wisdom:

"By the end of 1935, 100,000 Jews had left Germany, but 450,000 still [remained]. Wealthy Jewish families... kept thinking and hoping that the worst was over...

Many of the German Jews, brilliant, cultured, and cosmopolitan as they were, were too complacent. They had been in Germany so long and were so well established, they simply couldn't believe there was going to be a crisis that would endanger them. They were too comfortable. They believed the Nazi's anti-Semitism was an episodic event and that Hitler's bark was worse than his bite. [They] reacted sluggishly to the rise of Hitler for completely understandable but tragically erroneous reasons. Events moved much faster than they could imagine."

This is one of the most tragic examples of the devastating effects of the "normalcy bias" the world has ever seen. Just think about what was going on at the time. Jews were arrested, beaten, taxed, robbed, and jailed for no reason other than the fact that they practiced a particular religion. As a result, they were shipped off to concentration camps. Their houses and businesses were seized. Yet most Jews Still didn't leave Nazi Germany, because they simply couldn't believe that things would get as bad as they did.

Whether you call it, "normalcy bias" or just good old fashion stick your head in the sand Denial. The bottom line is such acts of denial that disregard the word of God are nothing more than pure faithlessness. It is a dangerous thing to believe that just because you have never experienced it means it does not happen. Such denial is a façade, a thin layer of pretense that can blind us from the truth.

The normalcy bias pops up in many areas of our faith. We may have never experienced a miracle but it does not mean they never happen. We may have never heard God's voice but we should always believe he is a living speaking God. We may have never, "done church that way" but we know if Scripture affirms it then we can't deny a new wine skin on the grounds of the normalcy bias.

The opposite of the normalcy bias is Situational awareness. It involves having a real perception of your environment and a comprehension of what realistically may transpire in the near future. A Christian's situational awareness is guided by the word of God. We have assurance of our long term future so we can act courageously to respond to situations in the short term. Generally, scripture requires us to be watchful, vigilant in prayer, and always open hearted to God's lead and clear thinking about the facts of a situation. So if judgment comes we can respond in faith and obedience and even if you don't like to hear it, we can hear clearly and respond rightly when God says “surrender to Babylon”

May God give us a love for His truth that imparts the courage to not fall into such traps.

Civil Disobedience and the challenge to Islamic Nationalism in Turkey

Did you know, Turkey has been a secular republic for almost a century? Governmentally, they are a Republic ruled by the people. Nevertheless, the country is being pulled in opposite directions by powerful forces. On one side are secularizing pressures, which have led many in Turkey to look increasingly westward toward Europe. When I was in Adana the cultural divide was visually represented by Nike hats and blue jean skirts sported by the young and older women still sporting the enveloping outer garment called a ‘burka’. Only, five years ago (2005), Turkey formally applied for full membership in the European Union, a process that has still to run its course. As one would expect the EU is calling for Turkey to liberalize many of its political, social, and economic policies, including full implementation of freedom of religion among Turkish citizens. Strangely religious freedom is a concept enshrined in the Turkish Constitution but has yet to take root in the minds and heart of the public.



On the other hand, the historic orientation towards the Muslim Middle East, facilitated by Turkey’s 99% Islamic population and the influence of Turkey’s Ottoman past, has provided a competing set of pressures, especially over the last two decades. In November 2002 the Islamist-based Justice and Development Party won a landslide election victory, cooling interest among some Turks in the European connection and reinforcing ties with certain Muslim nations of the Middle East.The Turkish government officially recognizes three minority religions: Greek Orthodox, Armenian Orthodox, and Judaism. Western Christianity (Protestantism and Catholicism) is not considered a religion but a state recognized sect with even less freedoms and more restrictions. To understand how western Christianity can be considered a sect you have to understand their cultural bias formed by the crusades. This is a powerful cultural image that can turn people against W.C. and form their thought around the idea of a cultural jihad. The rise in Islamic consciousness has led to an increase in discrimination and persecution directed against religious minorities. Here are several manifestations of that problem:



1. Turkish identity cards, a government prescription, stipulate the religious affiliation of each citizen of the state. These expose individual non-Muslims to discrimination and harassment, including lack of access to careers in state institutions.(1)



2. “Religious minorities [report] difficulties opening, maintaining, and operating houses of worship.”(2) Unfortunately, this accords with public sentiment: In a 2009 survey of a sample of Turks, 59% of respondents considered that non-Muslims should not be allowed to hold open meetings where they can discuss their ideas. Furthermore, 54% of respondents believed that non-Muslims should not be allowed to publish literature that describes their faith. (3)



3. Violence against Western Christians is on the rise. In 2006, a Catholic priest was shot and killed in Trabzon, Turkey. That same year, five assailants knocked unconscious and severely beat Protestant church leader Kamil Kiroglu (my old roommate when I lived in Adana). One attacker with a knife threatened to kill Kiroglu unless he renounced Christianity. Kamil was hospitalized as a result of his injuries. In April 2007, three Christians were bound, tortured, and killed by young Muslim radicals at a Christian publishing house at Malatya in southeastern Turkey. (4)



4. In August 2009, a Muslim held a knife to the throat of a convert to Christianity, denouncing him as a “missionary dog,” who had betrayed Turkey by leaving Islam and evangelizing others.(5)



This 2009 incident perfectly represents the mindset described by Ziya Meral, a London-based Turkish scholar and activist: “To be a Turk is to be a Muslim, thus to leave Islam is to betray the Turkish nation.”(6) This same mindset prompted retired Turkish general Veli Kucuk to observe, in testimony at the Malatya trial, that the state lumped Christian missionary activity in with Muslim extremism, both seen as a threat to the nation.(7)



How sad and strange that Christians are abused today in Turkey. It is the homeland of the gospel. Most of the New Testament was written within the borders of this great country. It is the land of Paul’s first missionary journey, of his epistles to Galatians and Ephesians, of Peter’s letter to the saints in “Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia”(1 Peter 1:1), of Revelation’s letters to the seven churches, and of early Church councils in Nicaea, Ephesus, and Chalcedon. The rolling hills of Turkey have seen much light and yet now it is dark. The darkness of the western American Pop-culture is crashing into the deeply entrenched Muslim ideology.



In Greek there is a word for a moment in time that is fated, a moment of opportunity, a time the Greeks called “Kairos”. Turkey is clearly at a hinge point in its history, with the next decade likely to reveal whether the country moves closer to Western Europe or the Muslim world to the east. Turkey is in a Kairos moment. The culture will go the way of the west or fall back into the ways of its Islamic past. That decision will significantly impact Turkey’s fledgling and beleaguered Christian community.



Out of such tension life can spring forth. One career missionary told me that the only action necessary to shift the balance is for Turkish believers to challenge the cultural taboos infecting turkey. They must stand on the Turkish Constitution calling the government to make real concessions and bringing awareness to the real laws of Turkey. I agree with his wisdom. Turkey needs it’s on “Martin Luther King”, it needs people who will take off their shoes and make a street corner into a pulpit; Bold ones invoking a holy moment of civil disobedience. Only when an army of saints call the government to obey its fundamental principles will the people take notice of the freedom afforded them under their own constitution. Only then will “Joe Turk” in Istanbul see past Islamic taboos. The culture war between Islam and western culture will make a distinctive shift towards the west. Such action is not just for the sake of political freedom but given the influential nature of Turkey as a flag ship of Islamic democracy such a little shift may hide within it the fate of the future global conflicts. In the clash between the secular western culture and traditional Turkish Islamic culture, the decay of Turkish social morality could be blamed on a Christian influence. If such a distinctive step is not taken by the Turkish church, nationalism will take the unholy aspects of western culture and call those cancerous lesions the fruit of a Christian culture. This is why a clear sound and radical measures must be undertaken in the next five years. We cannot miss the opportunity!



For the Turkish church, this Kairos moment, this specially ordered time means opportunity through suffering. But through it humble greatness is incarnated into the world and radical examples of grace and truth will bring forth light. The cost will be high but the gain will be a nation set free – to live by the freedoms it already possesses.– Pray for Turkey – Pray for the believers within its borders. Pray God would rise up preachers willing to invoke moments of holy “civil disobedience” for the sake of the religious freedom and the glory of God’s gospel.



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Footnotes



1.)“Turkey: International Religious Freedom Report 2009,” United States Department of State Website, October 26, 2009, http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/irf/2009/130299.htm (accessed May 14, 2010).

2.) Ibid.

3.) “More than Half in Turkey Oppose Non-Muslim Religious Meetings,” Compass Direct News Website, December 4, 2009, http://www.compassdirect.org/english/country/turkey/12322/ (accessed May 14, 2010).

4.) Tony Carnes, “Jesus in Turkey: After 550 Years of Decline, a Bloodied Church Is Being Reborn,” Christianity Today Website, January 3, 2008, http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2008/january/12.25.html (accessed May 14, 2010).

5.)“Assailant in Street Attack in Turkey Ordered Released,” Compass Direct, February 12, 2010, http://www.compassdirect.org/english/country/turkey/15153/ (accessed May 14, 2010).

6.) Ziya Meral, “Muslim-Majority States and Human Rights: From the UDHR to Durban Conference”, Religion Compass 3/5 (2009): 879.

7.) “Turkey”, International Religious Freedom Report 2009, US Department of State Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, And Labor, http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/irf/2009/130299.htm (accessed May 14, 2010).

Contextualization and Cultural Analysis

Geert Hofstede is a leading organizational sociologist. He studied the interactions between cultures and the way people interact. Hofstede’s has found five dimensions of culture in his study of national work related values. Further studies have supported his dimensions to be very stabile over time. The dimensions give a stable way of comparing and organizing cultures, thus disclosing the practical relational dynamics of different cultures. The dimensions are a great diagnostic tool for understanding a culture and help a Christian to contextualize the gospel to any culture.

For those not familiar with cultural analysis a few words are in order. One, the categories of cultural differences describes averages or tendencies and not characteristics of individuals. Two, Hofstede’s dimensions are helpful paradigms of analysis of culture not the gospel. We need not confuse cultures ultimate cure and its diagnosis. Such confusion puts us at risk deluding or misrepresenting the gospel.

The dimensions are:
• Small vs. large power distance
• Individualism vs. collectivism
• Masculinity vs. femininity
• Weak vs. strong uncertainty avoidance
• Long vs. short term orientation

Small vs. large power distance

Small vs. large power distance is the paradigm describing how a culture relates to authority and social position. The paradigm is based on how much the less powerful members of institutions and organizations expect and accept that power is distributed unequally. It shows the way people perceive power differences. In cultures with small power distance people are more democratic. People relate to one another more as equals regardless of formal positions. Subordinates feel they have the obligation to contribute and the right to critique those in power. In cultures with large power distance the less powerful accept power relations in more formal ways. Subordinates acknowledge the power of positions.

Individualism vs. collectivism

This dimension is based on how much members of the culture define themselves apart from their group memberships. In individualist cultures, people are expected to develop and display their individual personalities and to choose their own affiliations. “I have to be me,” is a common slogan of such cultures. In collectivist cultures, people are defined and act mostly as a member of a long-term group, such as the family, a religious group, an age cohort, a town, or a profession, among others. Hofstede notes that this dimension seems to be sliding scale. It moves towards the individualist end of the spectrum with the increase of national wealth.

Masculinity vs. femininity (Quantity of Life vs. Quality of Life)

This is a tricky one given the use of the masculine and feminine metaphor. It is really a paradigm of relational tendencies and values. Use could use quantity of life vs. quality of life to extract the gender metaphor. In so-called 'masculine' cultures, (Quantity of Life) people (whether male or female) value competitiveness, assertiveness, ambition, and the accumulation of wealth and material possessions. In so-called 'feminine' cultures, people (male or female) value relationships and quality of life over things.

Weak vs. strong uncertainty avoidance

Here we have the dimension based on how much members of a society are anxious about the unknown and attempt to cope by minimizing uncertainty. In cultures with strong uncertainty avoidance, people prefer rigidity. They like explicit rules and formally structured activities, and show a high value given to loyalty. In cultures with weak uncertainty avoidance, people prefer guidelines to rules to have some flexibility and go with the flow informal activities. This side of the scale tends towards being open to risk and high in courage to act on an idea.

Long vs. short term orientation

This last dimension is one of vision. How much members of society values forward thinking verses thinking rooted in past and present. It is the importance attached to the future versus the past and present. In long term oriented societies, people value actions and attitudes that affect the future: persistence, perseverance, thrift, shame, and hope. In short term oriented societies, people value actions and attitudes that are affected by the past or the present such as immediate stability and respect for tradition. Other values of the short term are the value of reciprocation and saving face. In reciprocation such action like greetings, favors, and gifts are thought of as honorable. Social posturing like protecting ones owns reputation or the reputation of family or religious tradition are also considered honorable way of acting in society.

For the Missional Christian, His dimensions help to recognize three points of contact between the Gospel and a given culture: tension points, doughnut holes and common ground.

First, Common ground is any idea of human experience that harmonizes (analogically or propositionally) with the gospel. In so far as they are in harmony with the gospel they add in some understanding the truth. When Paul preached to the Jews he began with the history of Israel. He used the common ground of a shared history to explain the Messiah. In a post-Christian culture such common ground are places where the culture has not rebelliously rejected the gospel value for some contrary value. Paul used common ground when he preached at Mar’s Hill. He used their religious experience and worked from their “here and now” to move to God’s “way back when”. He did this to create a baseline from which to build an understanding of the gospel. He began with the common grace that the Greeks understood the need to be religious (devoted to a higher power).

Second, tension points are points of conflict between the ideas of a culture and the gospel. The culture holds an opposite view and thus opposition can be assumed. Theologically, we could say these points are where the veil of common grace is thin and the distance between the fallen human nature and the gospel narrows to the point of touching. The kind of touching that cause spars.

Third, a doughnut hole is not much of anything. Confusion can happen when a culture has little to no understanding of a gospel idea. The culture has no common ground nor does it hold some opposing view that brings conflict. It is just ignorant. They have no practical category from understanding of the culture. When Paul preached to pagans he began with nature and worked back to the one behind nature, God (Act 14).

Incarnational ministry or Attractional ministry.

I have been thinking about the call on the church in this day. (thanks Teri) How a church should ministry to those around it. This line of thinking is often called a philosophy of church ministry.

I have found two ways churchs goes about reaching the world: Incarnational or Attritional ministry.

Attractional ministry
The most popular in modern evangelicalism is the attractional ministry model. Growing up in the church I have seen much of this model. Here is the basic rundown as I see it.

• The foundational principle is gospelized, baptized, pragmatism.
• The aim of church ministry is to attract people. So the Church’s get cultural face lifts every few years to remain current.
• Ministry values consist of growing wide before growing deep this meeting the needs of the people is highly valued. Thus regrettably catering to our cultures sense of entitlement.
• The ministry methods function much like commercialism. The will use mass media marketing ploys and trendy advertising to draw people to the services in the hopes that they might get saved while they drink there non-fat mocha latté. In this way, they seek to make the church name like a brand name, and if they’re successful the pastor may get a book deal out of it.
• Ministry structure is segregated. The segregated groups are often based on age and sex to better meet their need. But cut off the life and generational impartation that happens when we all do life together. Such structure is like ministry Prozac; it cuts the highs and lows out of life together.

The over al theme of this model is its man-centered mode of operation.

The other can be called incarnational ministry

• The foundational principle is theological. The incarnation of Christ as the model for ministry understood to operate in the power and passion of the Holy Spirit.
• The aim of church ministry is to go to people. The gospel is a Go forth Gospel. God is understood to be pushing people out towards the masses.
• Ministry values are spiritual depth over Congregation size. The church is not structured to meet people’s needs people are equipped to meet people where they are.
• The ministry methods rise from worship and fellowship. Small groups, bible studies, and training courses and pastoral counseling and life-couching are aimed at growth Christians for the mission of Going out to the world. Such methods place service over publicity, character over style and honesty over pretension. The individual Christian is to serve other, use their spiritual gifts and deepen relationships as part of being a part of the church. The preaching and teaching of the church is to seek those ends.
• Ministry structure is life together but segregated. The structure of the church is to equip people to do the work of the ministry. Character is developed in community so Worship, Education and life in community are especial structural elements of a churches ministry to make us missional.

As you can see I favor the later only because I love the church and desire to see the church fulfill its mission. Incarnational ministry means being the body of Christ. It is people of God knowing who they are in christ and living as vesicles of God turned to the world. We are to all to incarnate Jesus in T-shirt and jeans, being real before looking cool. Attritional ministry would tell you be cool, look trendy, image is everything, and then you can minister, incarnational encourages you to be yourself but with the hope of glory on the inside. This clip is helpful to show what I am getting at.

As Keven Deyoung reminds us to be real before being trendy,

“…so much that passes for spirituality these days is nothing more than middle class, 20something coffee culture. If you like jazz, soul patches, earth tone furniture, and lattes, that’s cool. But this culture is no holier than the McNugget, Hi-C, Value City, football culture that most people live in... Jesus came to save Grimace and Hamburglar too.”

Chruch minisrty is simple. We make it complicated. So Go get out of yourself, and get out of your life and get into what God is doing. Go be incarnational, be missionally and by all means Just Be You!