Wednesday, March 03, 2010

Another reason people leave the Church?

Take a look at this bit copied by Terry at Breathing Grace; what is described is to a great extent what I desire for my family--modest attire, good music, homeschooling, mother at home, and more. There is one big exception, however; the person writing it obviously sees these as externals unmotivated by a coherent theological argument.

And though I disagree with portions of the original writer's application, having seen a few of the books in which this lifestyle is presented to women, I can't blame her. Many of them do fall into the "I don't drink and I don't chew, and I don't go with girls that do" category. There is also the curious exhibit of women writing books encouraging--in the name of Biblical femininity--women to disregard their husbands' tastes and convictions in various areas.

Unfortunately, far too much "Biblical" advice falls into this category, especially that in areas like relationships, parenting, and stewardship. There are a lot of good ideas, and some of them are even Biblical. However, in failing to connect behavior and motivations with the Gospel and the character of God, the church may too often be generating that most terrifying of infidels; the one inside the church, whose external behavior may be good enough to convince others that he should be a deacon or elder.

3 comments:

pentamom said...

So boiling it down, a reason people leave the church is because we can too often be much, much better at talking about how we should act and what rules we should follow to be good Christians, than at communicating the gospel as a reason for everything?

Yeah, I can see where that would be. ;-)

Bike Bubba said...

Good summary of my summary.

Elspeth said...

Interestingly enough, I didn't necessarily agree with everything in this author's post, either.

However, the overarching theme, her husband's rejection of the direction she was steering the family with no regard for his preferences or positions, struck a cord with me.

So I thought it was worth sharing.