The Church's Particularity

“Each church…reflects a distinctive culture or cultures…Regardless of its relationship to the prevailing culture around it, a given church is itself a cultural community with its own language, spoken or unspoken rules of conduct, expectations, and the like. While it is possible to discern authentic and inauthentic expressions of the gospel and church in a given culture, it is impossible to separate the gospel and the church from culture….As Newbigin sees it, ‘The idea that one can or could at any time separate out by some process of distillation a pure gospel unadulterated by any cultural accretions is an illusion’” (Exploring Ecclesiology, by Harper and Metzger, p. 275).

The Western, White Cultural Captivity of the Church

Soong-Chan Rah has written an important book, The Next Evangelicalism: Freeing the Church from Western Cultural Captivity. It has an edge; it is a bit redundant, but it is an important book. If you are interested in the church and its cultural instantiation, this is a must read. Part of what it reveals is how far behind many of us (read "white cultural Christians") are with regard to the whole question of "race" and diversity, especially as it is impacting the church. Perhaps growing up in Asia and then working with the church there for so many years has biased my view. But I felt embarrased as I read this work: embarrased at our own cultural blindness. May the Lord use this volume to help open our eyes.