Are We The New Freaks?
I don't know anything about Carl Trueman, but JT (Justin Taylor) from Between Two Worlds has highlighted a couple of his posts these past few days.Here's what's scary...
It appears Mr. Trueman and I were watching the same edition of the Rachel Maddow Show and it stirred both of us the same way. He wrote this piece after watching that show. I wrote my own "Troubled" parts 1 and 2 after I saw the show.
I have been really thinking about what I see because of this incident and lo and behold Mr. Trueman has another post, Goodbye Larry King and Hello Jerry Springer, and it is exactly what I've been thinking. He words it so well. I wish I could have done the same. Here are a couple of quotes...
What is becoming increasingly clear is that the day is probably not far off when those who regard homosexual practice as wrong will be consistently presented as the moral, cultural and intellectual equivalents of white supremacists...
You can have the hippest soul patch in town, and quote Coldplay lyrics till the cows come home; but oppose homosexuality and the only television program interested in having you appear will soon be The Jerry Springer Show when the audience has become bored of baiting the Klan crazies. Indeed, evangelicals will be the new freaks.
I think he makes a good case for our response. Be sure to read the end of the article. Basically, we must hold firm to the scriptures and also look at people as people, not labels. Don't become the "hatemongers" that some claim we are.
I hope I'm not depressing some of you out there. I see some great opportunities ahead for the church. I appreciate all of the comments reminding us that we aren't here to please people or put on a nice PR campaign. I am in total agreement.
But what I think we are seeing right before our eyes is the beginning of the "freakization" of evangelical, dare I say biblical, Christianity. We are going to need to prepare our churches for living in this new world.
Comments
I believe your thoughts here will be reality within the next generation. There will always be a segment of the population that believes homosexuality is wrong but our schools, higher education, the media, and constant but steady plodding by the GLBT community have eroded society's mindset on this. I took a college sociology class on Deviant Behavior this fall and a full week of the class was dedicated to this issue and how society has come so far in advances towards homosexuals. To say the least, I was the only one to speak out against the act itself but NOT the people. I told my wife it scared me to see the mind numbness in the students who just nodded along (we had a gay student who passionately tried to debate me...I use the word "tried" loosely!) as the issue was presented as so much of nothing. They were already schooled on their response from years of having it put down their throats.
It will be interesting to see how the TRUE Christ followers respond in the years ahead.
...Oh and as for COLDPLAY...They ripped off Joe Satriani so I have no use for them! *G*
Scott Cheatham
www.scottcheatham.com
I think we're still a generation away from truly being considered the freaks, but that doesn't comfort me. It makes me all the more concerned to prepare our children and grandchildren for what they're likely to face.
By the way, I like Mohler's statement that evangelicals can forget being considered cool. I've been saying for quite some time that Christians who seek to be cool are misguided. No one is cool in the presence of God.
Thanks for a great post!