The Times Have Changed

We can no longer, not that we ever could, count on culture to carry us forward in our faith.  There was a time when it might have seemed that way to many of us.  Many of us remember a time when the life of the community in which we lived as well as our own was centered around the community of the church.  We were shaped by its presence, by its teachings, and the people who were within it.  The church community was where we were baptized, indoctrinated with the values of decency, moral living, and most importantly, the teachings of Jesus.   

As Bob Dylan sings in one of his older songs, "...the times are a'changing..."  Actually, they are not just changing, they have changed.  Today's culture is not the culture of our memory.  It is one where culture itself has become more the center of influence than that small church on the corner.  There are many who count themselves among believers today who believe not so much in the personal Jesus we talked about, but who see Christianity as a good choice among many other choices.  A recent read entitled "The Holy Longing," by Ronald Rolheiser says, "...it is easier to have faith in Christianity, in a code of ethics, in Jesus' moral teaching, in God's call for justice, and in the human value of gathering in community, than it is to have personal faith in a living God."  

Though Rolheiser is a Roman Catholic, he sounds a bit Wesleyan in what he has to say.  A personal experience with Christ and the living God He enabled us to see through the Incarnation is not something which can be discarded if a sustainable faith is what we seek.  We will inevitably grow weary in our well doing and we will finally become discouraged and disheartened unless the faith we profess has as its core a personal relationship with the living risen Jesus Christ.