Christian culture, life, what is it?

[Ian Gentles]

I follow on from my thread on "Christian Socialism".

We are members of God's family, kingdom. How does the culture of God's Kingdom differ from that of the world? Do we live in Kingdom culture? or are we no different from others in the world?

In which ways should the culture of God's Kingdom show in our lives, our fellowships?

The old songs says "They will know we are christians by our love"......Really, do they?? How does that love show?

In Acts they had all things in commen, in Jerusalem that is. How do we, if we ever really do, show the love culture of God's Kingdom in our churches?

We all agree as christians we are to be different, but are we?
What makes me, you, us, stand out from the world?

Surely its more than christians not cussing, smoking, drinking, spitting? Yes, we turn away from sin, but to what? and how is it shown in everyday christian fellowship?

[Diane Likens]

Ian -- these are really good questions. I'd need to do a great deal of soul-searching before I could answer even one. Thanks for that challenge. Looks like I'm in for some hard work.

[Sarah Smith]

In our town, individually and collectively across denom lines, we feed the hungry, clothe the poor, help with housing, provide a free medical clinic, visit those in prison or jail, help find jobs, teach canning/gardening/auto care/life skills/job skills, help on utilities, and still send help to the rez and around the world.

We aren't perfect--far from it--but we are not sitting on our tukases just enjoying being well off (which we aren't anyway.)

I think the church as a whole does far better than her detractors think she does. In my as usual less humble than it should be opinion.

Oh--and thanks to the RCC we also have medical care for the rest of us, a hospital, drs, etc. Rural health initiative.

[Craig Laughlin]

I would shy away from the use of the word culture to describe the Kingdom. I would tend to use the word values. We value the poor, the lost etc. The difficulty with talking about Kingdom culture is that most people can not distinguish their own culture from the Kingdom. While I was pastoring in a multicultural urban (not just bi-cultural) environmental I read some authors that argued strongly for a Kingdom culture. The problem was when I read thier description is sounded a lot like cleaned up middle to upper middle class american culture.

During that time I saw the dangers of this lived out in a very sad way. During a district function I was sitting next to a Samoan pastor and had build enough relationship for him to be pretty frank with me. The speaker was going on about how we all need to adopt a "Kingdom culture" that put community ahead of individual. (true enough in white middle class culture that is hyper-individualistic) This Samoan pastor leaned over to me and said really? Am I misunderstanding? I am supposed to tell my people to obey the chief over the pastor?

Unfortunately, a large group of people had just left his church who wanted to stay and were excited about what God was doing in their life. -- The reason they left? The tribal chief got mad at the pastor and was leaving the church (and probably the faith). Their culture demanded of them that they be obedient to the community over the individual pastor who did not have the status of chief in his culture. Sadly, last I knew they were not attending church.

Culture is something created by humans to form our world views and guide us. In and of itself it is neither bad nor good, but it is not the Kingdom. In the Kingdom of God, the values of the Kingdom find expression in individual cultures. Sometimes those values work well in the particular culture sometimes they do not and the Kingdom becomes critic of the culture. The church (Not to be confused with the Kingdom of God) exist inside individual cultures and communicates the Good News contextualized to that community. In my opinion it brings together the values of the Kingdom and the culture of a people to form the Kingdom of God on earth... the church.

[Ian Gentles]

Its good that we help the poor etc, but so does the world. I totaly beleive helping the needy is part of the Kingdoms work, but there has to be more. In our lives, in our interactions in our fellowships, does the world truely see a better way? What does the world see when it looks at me I wonder?