Revisiting COVID-19 as the End of the Modern World
Photo by Tim Mossholder on Unsplash
As a team, one of our great hopes is to make everything accessible to our readers. Yet, good content sometimes requires a more in-depth look with more precise and “deeper” language. While we encourage all our readers to read Clement’s article, below are some general ideas his article covers and ways they might affect you. We hope this helps give more clarity to your understanding of what he wrote. Special thanks to our team and Clement for reviewing and providing some valuable suggestions and feedback to this summary.
Idea #1: Context and culture shape our expressions of Christianity.
Example: Worship. In some cultures, worship is seen in reverence and formality. This might play itself out in hymnals and quiet kneeling before God. In other cultures, worship might be seen in celebration and freedom. This may play out through dancing and upbeat music. Some may view worship as hymns while another service, art, or silence. Those are more obvious examples. In even deeper levels, you might see leaders as only being male or the elderly.
Idea #2: Big events can disturb us and show us what we value.
Example: You are caught cheating on a test. What do you do? Or maybe you must choose between disappointing your father or doing what you feel is right. These reveal our values.
Idea #3: COVID-19 is a marker of some kind of end to the modern world.
Example & Definitions: The world is both similar and different. Before COVID-19, we saw work and education more geographically based but now work teams can be from different geographic regions and education can be seen as synchronous (instructor and learner in the same place at the same time) and asynchronous (instructor and learner in different places, i.e. online course with pre-recorded lectures) on a larger scale.
Idea #4: True theology should be able to face ALL realities.
Example: If something is true, in this case Christianity, then it should stand up to any challenges it faces. During World War II, Protestant and Roman Catholic ministers worked together in Germany to help bury those who died from the war (regardless of Christian confession), but also served communion to brothers and sisters from other Christian confessions (i.e. denominations) on the grounds that the “emergency situation” allowed for this. However, if theology allowed for this during war, what made non-war situations different? In the same way, in a “post-COVID” world, our witness and testimony should reflect a theology that stands true regardless of circumstance.
Idea #5: There are three themes that COVID-19 has revealed in western Evangelicalism that appear to fail to stand to challenges in today’s world (i.e. COVID-19, racial tensions, etc.):
An individualistically-oriented legal way of understanding of salvation has been overemphasized and overshadows arguably more important aspects of the gospel.
Church as an “enterprise” breaks us away from relational and personal discipleship and pastoral ministry.
The above two ideas shape how we understand what matters as human beings.
Evangelicalism: David Bebbington, British Historian, observes evangelicalism’s tendencies to be focused in four main areas:
Conversionism: Jesus is the only way for salvation.
Biblicism: The Bible is true and reliable as God’s Word.
Activism: Christians are called to share the gospel with the world.
Crucicentrism: Jesus’s death opened up a way for us to have a personal relationship with God.
Note: John Stackhouse, Canadian scholar of religion, adds that there is a fifth observation called “Transdenominationalism” where if churches agree on the above four parts, then they would be willing to work together for evangelical goals.
Idea #6: Western Evangelicalism focuses on atonement and a legal, formulaic payment for “broken laws”: i.e. “Jesus died for my sins”, but does so at the cost of a positive view of what we have gained in “union with Christ”, a relational acceptance and continued work of redemption in this life. Failure to adjust course will affect our relationships and witness in the world, especially in an increasingly post-COVID world.
Example: We often see being “born again” (sinner’s prayer) as the ultimate point but fail to see that there is more beyond this moment. Guilt means breaking a law. This is how we often see Christianity: Jesus paid the price for my sin. Often, this leads to a theology, and hence actions, that focus solely on this point in time in someone’s life. This focus is also on what someone does.
However, shame, a focus on what someone feels they are, is an understanding of one’s own unacceptability which Jesus provides covering for through his life, death, and resurrection (see https://www.ccef.org/shame/). Whereas justification by faith is mentioned sometimes by Paul, adoption by God is a theme throughout the New Testament.
Summary:
Our world is changing. The way we interact with one another is changing and our current assumptions of Christianity appear to be disconnected from what’s going on. We treat people legalistically but fail to see the acceptance, adoption, and joy found through Christ’s death AND resurrection. IF Christianity is true, then this failure of our faith is not a failure of God, but reveals assumptions that need to be confronted in our own theology (which we see reflected in how we act, think, and speak).
The sun shines on us whether we do good or evil and in the same way, our faith should shine regardless of the situation. May we examine ourselves, seek God, and learn to see the fuller gospel, one which speaks to guilt and legal requirements but also speaks to a joy found in resurrection, adoption, and restoration through Christ, a renewed identity that has often been ignored by an assumption of our beliefs and values.