Colson’s ‘legacy’ urges Church to confront culture
Religion Today, August 24, 1999
Christianity is a “Jesus and me” relationship – but that’s just part of it, Chuck Colson says. It also is a way to look at all of life and talk to non-Christians about any number of things, including education, business, abortion and euthanasia, politics, the economy, films, and television, he says.
Colson has published that idea in How Now Shall We Live? (Tyndale House Publishers). The prominent evangelical and founder of Prison Fellowship spent two and a half years researching and writing the 500-plus page book, which is coming out in stores this summer. He refers to it as his “legacy.”
A practical guide
How Now Shall We Live is meant to be a practical, easy-to-understand guide for Christians to analyze and respond to the issues that people talk about. Rather than hiding from the secular culture, bringing Christian truth to bear on every aspect of life will necessarily transform the culture, Colson says.
“We shortchange Christianity by making it simply a relationship with Jesus,” Colson said recently. “Christianity is much more than that. The Bible doesn’t begin with John 3:16. To make John 3:16 the centerpiece of the biblical message is like opening a great novel in the middle. This has been the limitation of the evangelical church.”
Saving souls is the first purpose of Christians, but another responsibility is the “cultural commission given to us at the time of creation,” he said. “We are to cultivate, and to till, and to subdue creation.” …The book provides a philosophical basis for answering four basic questions: Who are we and where did we come from? (creation) What went wrong and why are we in the trouble we’re in? (the fall) Is there a way out? (redemption), and Can we rebuild a society when it has been damaged? (restoration). Without answers from the Bible, Christians don’t have much to say to non-Christians, Colson says. With the answers, Christianity can be practiced “to its fullness in all areas of life.”
There’s more to Christianity
Too often Christians “simply say Christianity is good for me, it’s helped my family, I’m living happily, I know I’m saved and I’m going to heaven, and that’s all I need to know,” Colson said. “That’s not all you need to know. Number one, you can’t defend your faith. Number two, you can’t live in a rational way in the world without understanding God’s physical and moral order for the universe.”
Evangelicals are somewhat pessimistic because “they have tried to come out of their Christian ghettos by being politically active” but have been disillusioned by events such as the “failed impeachment hearings,” Nancy Pearcey, the book’s co-author and Colson’s colleague at Prison Fellowship, told Religion Today. “With a Christian world view we realize we have put too great a burden on politics. We need to work from a broader set of operatives. Our book is a good antidote to the current pessimism and discouragement.”
Christians can be God’s agents in “building a new Christian culture,” Colson and Pearcey write. To “re-Christianize the culture” would mean “being salt and light and bringing Christian truth back into a dominant role in the culture.”
Which way will church go?
Colson tells the story about “how the Irish saved civilization.” In the Dark Ages, when Christianity had been driven off the European mainland by the barbarians, Irish monks preserved great literature, learning from the Greeks, philosophy, and music. They built schools that were outposts of civilization. Then as the barbarians’ hold on Europe weakened, the monks sent missionaries to Scotland, then to the continent to re-Christianize Europe.
“The church can go one of two ways in the next millennium,” Colson said. “It can become very seeker-sensitive, recruit people and help them weather the storms of life, give them basic survival tools” such as going to church and Bible study. Meanwhile, “the world decays around you.” Or Christians can decide that they want to be like the Irish monks and “take Christian truths into every area of life until we make a difference for Christ and see the culture transformed.”