“And half of their children spoke the language of Ashdod” Nehemiah 13:24Back in the 1990s I remember reading William Willimon’s Peculiar Speech: Preaching to the Baptized along with his The Intrusive Word: Preaching to the Unbaptized. What I most remember from reading those two collections of Willimon sermons is that language is important. Greatly gifted in the use of sarcasm, Willimon says, “Forgive Christians for wanting to name the world as something other than K-Mart.” (Peculiar Speech, page 78) More recently, Willimon’s colleague at Duke, Stanley Hauerwas, has published his newest book The Work of Theology. There is a whole chapter on “How to Write a Theological Sentence.” Hauerwas uses one of his own theological sentences to frame the discussion. “The first task of the church is not to make the world more just; the first task of the church is to make the world the world.” (page 138) He then says “The sentence does not imply that Christians have no interest in justice, but it does mean that Christians have no idea what justice may entail unless we first know what it means to be ‘the world.’ In fact, the world cannot know it is the world unless there is an alternative to the world.” (page 138) In Tim Keller’s excellent book, Center Church, the sections on contextualization and learning how to be distinctively Christian without being viewed as “anti-cultural” are outstanding and thought provoking. One of my favorite principles he notes is “Actively engage the city/culture, while avoiding cultural captivity in all its forms (cultural fundamentalism and withdrawal; cultural relativism and syncretism).” (page 247) Neither withdrawal nor syncretism are good options for those who follow Jesus and whose hope it is to make a difference in the world in which we live. Yet both exist. Each of us have likely been guilty of withdrawal or syncretism at least a time or two in our lives. Awareness that there are some guilty of syncretism causes those who prefer withdrawal to an even deeper sense of withdrawal; and the fact that there are those comfortable in withdrawing from culture tempts to a level of cultural relativism that makes it difficult to distinguish between the gospel and culture. To use Nehemiah’s language noted above, those who would withdraw hardly know there is a language of Ashdod – an issue fraught with its own unique challenges; and those who would practice syncretism have somehow come to think that the language of Ashdod is so much better than the language of their own faith. If Hauerwas is correct – the world can’t know it is the world until it knows there is an alternative to the world – can the church risk hiding its vocabulary from the world (withdrawal) or giving up its vocabulary for the vocabulary of the world (syncretism)? I can’t imagine a context in which either of those options makes a lot of senses. Yet we are surrounded by those who are so rigidly biblical that no one will listen to them on the one hand; and those who are so culturally relevant on the other hand they have nothing to say. In both cases, the gospel goes unheard. As ironic as it may be, Nehemiah’s concern about the language of Ashdod is expressed in the context of his concern about marriage. Nehemiah and Ezra (9, 10) have been seriously concerned about Jews marrying non-Jews. Apparently their concerns have gone unnoticed by at least some of the people, and now Israel’s children are speaking the language of Ashdod and not Israel. Would it be too much of a stretch to suggest that in the era of Nehemiah and Ezra, Israel’s refusal to accept God’s definition of marriage created a world where “half of their children spoke the language of Ashdod?” And if that is true, then is it fair to suggest that the issue on both sides of this equation is one of language? On the one hand, a redefinition of marriage; on the other, leaving the language that identifies them as God’s people behind. For me, the issue with same-sex marriage is not so much that out of nowhere same-sex individuals are having sexual relations with one another. That’s not a new phenomenon. I would doubt that there are more same-sex couples today than there were before the Supreme Court ruling of June 2015. The issue for me is that if we change the definition of marriage, will we soon be speaking the language of Ashdod. When we change languages, do we change allegiance? In Peculiar Speech, Willimon – while not talking about same-sex marriage in any way – says “When a preacher disposes of baptismal speech in favor of psychological speech (Robert Schuller’s ‘Be Happy Attitudes’ or ‘Self-Esteem’), or secular politicized speech (mainline Protestantism’s ‘Peace with Justice’), the preacher has not thereby transcended the community-bound nature of language. The preacher has merely moved, in speech, from one community to another.” (page 79) On a broader plane, I wonder what sort of impact our tendency to adopt the world’s vocabulary – whether “psychological speech” or “secular politicized speech” – will have on our identity as the community of God’s people. I am not fond of the rigid “secular v. sacred” distinctions that some (withdrawal) wish to make; but neither am I fond of the idea that there isn’t a unique Christian vocabulary (syncretism) that should be at the heart of how we describe our faith, our worship of God, and our relationship to the world around us. For example, I’ve been to more than a few weddings – Christian ones, they said – where if you threw out a prayer or two and didn’t tell the Jesus at the wedding in Cana of Galilee story, you would not know it was any different than a courthouse wedding performed by a justice of the peace. Genesis 1 says that God spoke the world into existence, and from that moment forward it seems language has been important. Our ability to use language is a uniquely human gift. Our commitment to use it well may very well speak to our willingness to love God with all of our mind. If my prayer language sounds more like a poorly written Facebook post than it does a conversation with the God who made the world and everything in it (Acts 17), maybe I need to stop and think for a moment. If my favorite way of describing deeply spiritual values is to use the language of the world over God’s language, maybe I need to stop and think for a moment. If I’m willing to redefine important spiritual words in the name of spiritual relevance, then maybe I need to stop for a while, not just a moment! Most importantly, can we make “the world the world” if we give up on God’s vocabulary?Back in the 1990s I remember reading William Willimon’s Peculiar Speech: Preaching to the Baptized along with his The Intrusive Word: Preaching to the Unbaptized. What I most remember from reading those two collections of Willimon sermons is that language is important. Greatly gifted in the use of sarcasm, Willimon says, “Forgive Christians for wanting to name the world as something other than K-Mart.” (Peculiar Speech, page 78) More recently, Willimon’s colleague at Duke, Stanley Hauerwas, has published his newest book The Work of Theology. There is a whole chapter on “How to Write a Theological Sentence.” Hauerwas uses one of his own theological sentences to frame the discussion. “The first task of the church is not to make the world more just; the first task of the church is to make the world the world.” (page 138) He then says “The sentence does not imply that Christians have no interest in justice, but it does mean that Christians have no idea what justice may entail unless we first know what it means to be ‘the world.’ In fact, the world cannot know it is the world unless there is an alternative to the world.” (page 138) In Tim Keller’s excellent book, Center Church, the sections on contextualization and learning how to be distinctively Christian without being viewed as “anti-cultural” are outstanding and thought provoking. One of my favorite principles he notes is “Actively engage the city/culture, while avoiding cultural captivity in all its forms (cultural fundamentalism and withdrawal; cultural relativism and syncretism).” (page 247) Neither withdrawal nor syncretism are good options for those who follow Jesus and whose hope it is to make a difference in the world in which we live. Yet both exist. Each of us have likely been guilty of withdrawal or syncretism at least a time or two in our lives. Awareness that there are some guilty of syncretism causes those who prefer withdrawal to an even deeper sense of withdrawal; and the fact that there are those comfortable in withdrawing from culture tempts to a level of cultural relativism that makes it difficult to distinguish between the gospel and culture. To use Nehemiah’s language noted above, those who would withdraw hardly know there is a language of Ashdod – an issue fraught with its own unique challenges; and those who would practice syncretism have somehow come to think that the language of Ashdod is so much better than the language of their own faith. If Hauerwas is correct – the world can’t know it is the world until it knows there is an alternative to the world – can the church risk hiding its vocabulary from the world (withdrawal) or giving up its vocabulary for the vocabulary of the world (syncretism)? I can’t imagine a context in which either of those options makes a lot of senses. Yet we are surrounded by those who are so rigidly biblical that no one will listen to them on the one hand; and those who are so culturally relevant on the other hand they have nothing to say. In both cases, the gospel goes unheard. As ironic as it may be, Nehemiah’s concern about the language of Ashdod is expressed in the context of his concern about marriage. Nehemiah and Ezra (9, 10) have been seriously concerned about Jews marrying non-Jews. Apparently their concerns have gone unnoticed by at least some of the people, and now Israel’s children are speaking the language of Ashdod and not Israel. Would it be too much of a stretch to suggest that in the era of Nehemiah and Ezra, Israel’s refusal to accept God’s definition of marriage created a world where “half of their children spoke the language of Ashdod?” And if that is true, then is it fair to suggest that the issue on both sides of this equation is one of language? On the one hand, a redefinition of marriage; on the other, leaving the language that identifies them as God’s people behind. For me, the issue with same-sex marriage is not so much that out of nowhere same-sex individuals are having sexual relations with one another. That’s not a new phenomenon. I would doubt that there are more same-sex couples today than there were before the Supreme Court ruling of June 2015. The issue for me is that if we change the definition of marriage, will we soon be speaking the language of Ashdod. When we change languages, do we change allegiance? In Peculiar Speech, Willimon – while not talking about same-sex marriage in any way – says “When a preacher disposes of baptismal speech in favor of psychological speech (Robert Schuller’s ‘Be Happy Attitudes’ or ‘Self-Esteem’), or secular politicized speech (mainline Protestantism’s ‘Peace with Justice’), the preacher has not thereby transcended the community-bound nature of language. The preacher has merely moved, in speech, from one community to another.” (page 79) On a broader plane, I wonder what sort of impact our tendency to adopt the world’s vocabulary – whether “psychological speech” or “secular politicized speech” – will have on our identity as the community of God’s people. I am not fond of the rigid “secular v. sacred” distinctions that some (withdrawal) wish to make; but neither am I fond of the idea that there isn’t a unique Christian vocabulary (syncretism) that should be at the heart of how we describe our faith, our worship of God, and our relationship to the world around us. For example, I’ve been to more than a few weddings – Christian ones, they said – where if you threw out a prayer or two and didn’t tell the Jesus at the wedding in Cana of Galilee story, you would not know it was any different than a courthouse wedding performed by a justice of the peace. Genesis 1 says that God spoke the world into existence, and from that moment forward it seems language has been important. Our ability to use language is a uniquely human gift. Our commitment to use it well may very well speak to our willingness to love God with all of our mind. If my prayer language sounds more like a poorly written Facebook post than it does a conversation with the God who made the world and everything in it (Acts 17), maybe I need to stop and think for a moment. If my favorite way of describing deeply spiritual values is to use the language of the world over God’s language, maybe I need to stop and think for a moment. If I’m willing to redefine important spiritual words in the name of spiritual relevance, then maybe I need to stop for a while, not just a moment! Most importantly, can we make “the world the world” if we give up on God’s vocabulary?