Walking the Fine Line Between Christ and Culture

“What Christ-follower wouldn’t want to be relevant? Yet some Christians fear that relevant is just a synonym for sin while others mistake trendy haircuts and worship styles for real connection with hurting people. It seems clear that Christians need to be - are commanded to be - relevant so long as it is understood as having a significant, godly impact on the surrounding world.” - The Fine Line

I’ve been reading through a pre-release copy of The Fine Line: Re-Envisioning the Gap Between Christ and Culture by Kary Oberbrunner. Really good book. Not quite finished with it yet, but I’ve been enjoying it thus far. The Fine Line takes a new look at what is, perhaps, one of the most asked questions by Christians: “How can I impact culture while remaining true to Christ? How can I be in, but not of the world?”

Whether you’re a seasoned Christian or someone who has just started a faith journey, I think this is probably a more relevant question than ever for us to be asking. While we’re facing a world that is longing for something fresh and different, and is more open to spiritual things than it has been in my lifetime, it is not necessarily looking at Christians or the Church as holding anything of true consequence or weight. We have all to often come across as either building ‘Christian’ walls around ourselves to ‘protect’ us from the world, or we have too closely meshed with those around us that there is hardly a difference to be found.

I had a chance to email back and forth with Kary and asked him what prompted him to write the book. This is what he said:

I grew up in a Christian home. I did the whole Christian school, Christian college, and Christian seminary gig. One day I guess I woke up and said, gee, I have nothing in common with anyone in the world. In fact, I don’t even know many unbelievers. I found myself extremely judgmental toward culture and I knew God wasn’t impressed. Jesus told his followers he wanted them to be in the world and not of it. But here I was, removed from the world, isolated in my little Christian subculture.

I knew my problem, but I didn’t have a solution. And believe me I looked. Everywhere! CD’s, seminars, conferences, you name it. Sure there was the book Christ and Culture by Richard Niebuhr, but that was written well over fifty years ago when times were different.

Niebuhr, a genius faculty member of Yale Divinity School, named the Sterling Professor of Theology and Christian Ethics, attempted to describe the variety of ways in which Christians interact with culture, and make sense of it. His book was profound, for its time. Many classify it as one of the most influential Christian books of the past century. No other book has dominated an entire theological conversation for so long.

But as a twenty-something at the time, I wasn’t impressed. It’s not that I didn’t like the topic of a believer’s role with culture– I was fascinated by it - but I couldn’t understand Niebuhr’s book. Even though I’d been a pastor for years, graduated from two seminaries, and have a doctorate in ministry, I couldn’t grasp Niebuhr’s style. It’s written for the elite within the academy not for the masses within the church.

You see, in 1951 the world was very different. Homosexuality was considered a mental illness. The divorce rate was less than 1/2 of what it is today. Prayer was still allowed in school. Abortion was illegal. There was no internet or cell phones. And attending movies was considered a sin by many.

A book about Christians transforming that type of culture is a little bit different than today. One might argue that our culture back then was much more Christian. On some levels it was easier.

Even though culture has changed God hasn’t. And our generation needs to re-envision what it means to live in the world and not of it. Christians today want to know how they can transform culture not separate from it or conform to it. We need a new paradigm for a new time.

You can download a sample chapter on Kary’s website or pre-order it from Amazon (it’s discounted 32% during the pre-sale). The Fine Line releases on December 5th.

Posted 11.14.2008

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