I knew of a Christian radio station once that had as its policy to never mention the name of “Jesus” on the air. Rather than delve into the controversial world of who Jesus is, they decided to offer a “positive message” with helpful tips on “how to get the most out of life.” They claimed that they did not want to scare people away from Christianity by proclaiming Jesus, but hoped that people would be drawn into a church because their “non-threatening” message. In a sense, without mentioning Jesus they were hoping that people would be indirectly drawn to him. Without seeing the irony of such a perspective they filled their programming with helpful tips on time management, useful trivia and clean jokes in place of any preaching, testimonies or discussion about Jesus.
It all came to a head for me when they started their jokes and jabs at political leaders of the day. Blatantly siding with one political party they started to shade the listener’s perspective of who should be in charge of this country. It was here where I saw an obvious discrepancy. They are willing to make comments about who should be in charge of this country but not of who is in charge of everything? They willingly delve into the controversial world of secular politics but never the controversial person of Jesus?
I read this book recently called Proclamation and Theology by William Willimon. In it, the he claims, “Faithful preaching is always more than respectful conversation between the gospel and the world as we have received it. Though it is that, preaching is also confrontation, assault, announcement, and collision with the received world, all of which is painful.” He goes on to say “All faithful Christian preaching is in this sense “political,” because it is always involves a dispute over just who is in charge of our world and therefore our lives.”
Although a Christian radio station may not serve the same purpose as a Sunday morning church service, perhaps there are similar blind spots that the modern church has in regard to its own proclamation of the gospel. Can claiming to be Christian without ever broaching the subject of Jesus ever happen?
In an attempt to become relevant, approachable and non-confrontational like this radio station, perhaps the church’s proclamation has denied its life changing power. Granted, Paul in Acts 17 does spend time building rapport with the Athenians when he talks about their “idol to the unknown God.” But, he moves on from there to talk about the resurrection of Jesus and thus calls people to make a choice between Jesus and this world. It is also easy to see the political overtones with Paul’s use of the term “good news” or “gospel.” He borrows this term from the Roman world where they used it to describe the works of Caesar. When he uses the term Paul is in effect saying that “Jesus is Lord and Caesar is not!”
If all proclamation of the gospel is always a political challenge, can proclamation that doesn’t involve a challenge to “who is really in charge” ever be considered preaching? Is there ever a place for respectful dialog without arriving at Jesus? Can we preach without conflict? While I’m not advocating burning Korans or picketing abortion clinics, perhaps there needs to be more of an edge to our proclamation. Perhaps there needs to be more of a call to come and die.
And perhaps our proclamation of the gospel must be willing to assert that the powers are not in power and Jesus is Lord over all. And maybe I should stop saying “perhaps” and just tell you how it is…
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