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The Jonah Syndrome
Reflections on Modern Attitudes in the Church
Dennis Bratcher
A growing concern I have about modern holiness groups, and indeed about
many evangelical groups in general, is that we seem to have developed a
tendency to accept almost anything negative we hear about other people,
groups, or churches if it fits our own agenda or touches on issues that we
have declared to be important. We seem to have developed certain litmus
tests of orthodoxy or ethical correctness or righteousness, and then draw
conclusions about other people or groups based on how they rate against our
test-list of concerns. So when we hear something negative reported about
others, whether through the media or by conversation, we tend to react on
the basis of our test. And that is often done blindly, without taking the
time to find out if we are being manipulated, whether we have the facts
straight, whether there is even any basis to what we have heard, or whether
we are only doing a knee jerk reaction because it is what we want and expect
to hear.
How and why have we come to the point that we are driven more by fear and
negativity than we are by hope and the possibility of renewal and
transformation? I think we have come a long ways from the optimism of grace
that characterized not only Wesley, but the American Holiness Movement as
well!
I have heard a lot lately about the role of the media in affecting how
people think and react. For example, in light of growing school disorder
many have argued that a steady diet of violence via the media promotes a
tendency to act violently. If that is at all true, then
what does a steady diet of negative reporting and talk about the world and
the church do to us as Christians? And that is compounded many
fold if what is being repeated as negative is nowhere close to the facts or
the actual situation. That not only becomes a problem with how we see the
world, it becomes a problem of rumor and gossip, of self-centeredness and
sin. I have a great deal of personal experience with this very scenario
working out in the context of church educational institutions, as well as in
local churches and on district and denominational levels. It is extremely
destructive in the church.
It seems to me that too many Christians cruise the media looking for bad
news to confirm their worst views of the world. They seem to want to find
the worst that goes on, the most outrageous acts of sin or stupidity, and
then present them to the rest of us as reflective of what is happening in
the world. At best I think that is imbalanced and imprudent; at worst it is
an addiction. They tend to ignore all the positive things going on around
them and, I suspect due to a certain view of the world or theology or
reading of Scripture, think that it is their task to paint a totally
negative picture of the world as on a downhill slide. In fact, I suspect
that some people actually enjoy picking out the negative, because it makes
their own lives look so much more righteous. Yet, I think a steady diet of
such negative views of the world will begin to erode our sense of who we are
as Christians, just as a steady diet of violence will erode a sense of
well-being and purpose in life.
I simply think that the message of the Gospel, and therefore the message
that we as Christians are called to proclaim to the world is Good News. I
think to the degree that we take so much delight in finding all the bad
news, we have diminished our capacity to see, and hear, and speak the
Good News. Perhaps it is time that we began training ourselves to see
the world in terms of the Gospel and not just in terms of sin, that we learn
to view people and society in terms of what can be instead of what our
greatest fears think already is. Maybe it is time we began to focus on the
transforming power of God’s love and grace, on the reality of the present
and coming Kingdom of God at work in the world, rather than allowing the
evil in the world to confirm that we are really failing rather badly in
doing what we have been called to do as God’s people. Maybe it is time we
let more light shine rather than searching for the darkness so that we can
share it with each other.
Should we ignore the sin and evil in the world? Of course not. It is not
a matter of either/or. But that is the point. I hear very little of the good
that God is doing in the world beyond our own personal experience of God
that makes us feel good. I believe that the evil and sin and ignorance in
the world should not be a cause for rejoicing at sinners’ folly because we
are "not like other men." Yet, I fear we have been infected with the "Jonah
syndrome." We sit aloof on the hillside waiting for God to rain down fire
and destruction on all the evil so that we can be vindicated as righteous,
instead of rolling up our sleeves and wading into the swirling darkness
around us so that by all means we might save some!
The sin and evil in the world should be an occasion for calling us again
to the task of proclaiming the Good News as a way to reach out to the world
that we so easily despise. Unless we train ourselves to react to sin and
evil in the world first by weeping along with Jeremiah, and Jesus, and Paul,
I think we have misunderstood the Christian Gospel.
-Dennis Bratcher, Copyright ©
2006, Dennis
Bratcher, All Rights Reserved
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Related pages
A World Parish
A Catholic Spirit
Doomsday Prophets
Bible in the Church
Christians and Urban Legends
See
comments on the weeping prophet Jeremiah and the theology of Jeremiah 8:18-9:1 |
