Bridge Building for Christ... requires a Break-Through Attitude

____________________________________________________________

Imagine receiving a phone call informing you that you'd been chosen to become the American Ambassador to China. You'd consider that quite an honor! How would you prepare for your task? You'd want to do a thorough study of Chinese culture and customs. If you simply said, "No problem, I'm an American!" and neglected this study, you'd find yourself very ineffective as an ambassador.

Now imagine if Christ were to call you, as an American, to be His ambassador to America. How would you prepare for that? Well, in fact this is what Christ has called us to (2 Cor. 5:20). But what if we were to say, "No problem, I'm a Christian!" but neglected any attempt to understand our own culture? Just because you are a native born American, you cannot assume you truly understand the culture even though you are living surrounded by it and probably even immersed in it.

Surprisingly this is what many people in the church today have done. Some believers have actually managed to construct lives that avoid any connection with the world. Christians leave their safe surroundings, go to work, scurry home to their families and then off to their Churches and Bible studies, and finally end the day praying for the unbelievers they safely avoid interacting with in the normal course of a day-to-day living.

In early America, Christians enjoyed discussing philosophy and theology with believers and nonbelievers alike. America was a collection of diverse communities that fostered intellectual pursuit and understanding. Today's Christians however, are often viewed by the world as anti-intellectuals, as people who have neglected their minds in order to become "spiritual." But with this mentality, we are unable to address the critical issues of our day, and so our culture begins to look elsewhere for answers... to secular humanism, for example.

What is the root of this separation mindset? Well, many believers today hold to a pietistic view of the Christian life. Pietism is essentially 'platonic' in that it makes a sharp division between the 'spiritual' world and the 'material' world. The realities of human experiences are not afforded a proper balance.

This pietistic view of Christian living, has sapped the real life out of the Christian experience for many people. That's because one's spirituality never quite comes "down" far enough to integrate with the real world. We still end up trying to be nice Christians, but too many areas of our humanity get left out of the experience. Being Christian no longer looks very attractive to those first investigating the faith. In fact, some nonbelievers are scared away because of the disconnect from the realities of the world!

How can we change this pattern? We must remove this "sharp division" by finding out how our spiritual life works in the physical world, by developing a practical biblical world view.

As we learn to apply the Christian faith in our own life and world we become able to tell nonbelievers how it applies to theirs also, and this opens doors for the gospel. But without a well-thought-out faith we don't feel comfortable taking our message into the middle of the marketplace of modern ideas, and so we stay insulated and isolated.

What we actually need is a model for building bridges within the complexity of today's culture, one that makes Christianity relevant to the lives of real people. Christ Himself has provided this model in a absolutely amazing way.

Christ's Model is simple
The model is based on the character of God. The Bible presents to us a God who continually seeks man by interacting within man's cultural environments. In the New Testament we first find God seeking man by becoming a flesh and blood human. Adapting to the environment means becoming identified with the opposing party. It requires breaking through cultural barriers in order to establish useful and effective communication.

Through the incarnation of Christ, God crossed a rather large "cultural gap" to adapt to and identify with humanity, by actually becoming a man. In doing so, he broke through two important barriers that kept man from having a relationship with Him. What were these?

First Christ broke through our humanity barrier. Christ took on the flesh, cultural patterns, thought patterns, practices, and frailties associated with humanity. He left His world and entered into our world. Secondly, Christ broke through the sin barrier. He went to the cross and became sin on our behalf so we could be forgiven of our sins and come to know God personally and have intimate fellowship with Him.

Not only did Christ make it possible for us to seek him by “becoming a man and living among us”, His death and resurrection established another form for communication. His communication model, is accomplished through us... through His people.

In 2 Corinthians 5:20 tells us that God has called every believer to be an ambassador for Christ. How do we go about this task? By following Christ's model, and breaking through the same two barriers He did. First, we need to break through the humanity barrier. Motivated by His love, we also need to enter into the world of nonbelievers, seeking to understand their environment, and finding areas of common ground. This means that, without compromising, we are to get involved with real people and their needs, struggles, and intellectual doubts. Second, we need to help people overcome the sin barrier. We do this by sharing the gospel in a way that relates to their worldview, in a way that "makes sense" within another person's cultural and intellectual makeup.

The Church Christ built must be perceived as culturally relevant to the nonbelievers we seek to share the gospel with. Our responsibility is not only to hold to the basic, scriptural principles of the Christian faith, but to communicate these unchanging truths to every generation until God says His work is finished. If we can see ourselves in this essential and vital role then we can become effective at building bridges for the gospel that Christ has given us.