On the weekend we were invited to our friends' BBQ locally. I was standing around chatting to three guys when someone asked me a question: ’You’re a theologian, sum up what the message of Christianity is in three words?’
Slurping on my beer and without much thought I casually replied: ‘God is love’.
The other two took two steps back from me. You could almost see the blue neon sign light up around me saying, ‘Nice guy, but a religious simpleton’.
However, my questioner seemed quite satisfied with the answer. He went to say that he thought forgiveness was an attribute of love. The other two fellow BBQ-ers were not too sure. One of them wanted to redeem ‘love’ from Christianity and give it a more subjective context.
He declared he was an atheist and preceded to tell us all how the Bible had some pretty good stories, but that’s all they were. He then moved on to blame ‘religion’ for all the world’s woes. Quite sweeping statements, I thought. Though, to be honest nothing I hadn’t heard before.
At that point, the other chap outed himself as an atheist too, but to his credit he took a more considered position and said religion rarely had anything to do directly with human suffering and generally, if not always, had a economic-driven interest at the heart of the problem.
At this point I was itching to get out my 'church history' and 'philosophical' answers and start unpacking what I meant by saying God is love.
But, almost perversely, the discussion then moved on to the talk of ‘women bishops’ and we all had to stop to agree it was about time. Then the moment passed. It was back over to the drinks table to grab another warm Boddingtons.
The next day I shared a picnic with a very nice lady who is a senior figure in a major overseas charity who told me her job was all about bridge-building. It entailed building better understandings between our country and others. Invaluable work.
This sparked a thought. I remembered reading a book on Christian apologetics called Bridge-Building by Oxford theologian Alister McGrath. By apologetics I means being able to reason the gospel with philosophical, literary, social and historical answers.
Which then lead me onto the well-known verse in the second part of the Bible that talks about being ‘prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect’ (1 Peter 3.15).
This weekend I felt 'the tap on the shoulder' that Christians need to become bridge-builders, not map-readers (i.e. Christians you tell others what the Bible says without any further interaction).
Christians need to bridge the cultural gap between church and society. This, perhaps, starts by wanting to mix with an indifferent or opinionated society, listening to their views respectfully, while holding our own set of values and waiting for the invitation to give a reason for the hope that is in us.
It will come. It always does. Just be prepared to get your words in before the next round comes along.
ASD
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