About Owen Strachan

Owen Strachan is instructor of Christian theology and church history at Boyce College in Louisville, Kentucky, and a PhD candidate in theological studies (historical theology) at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in Deerfield, Illinois. Strachan is the author, with Doug Sweeney, of the five-volume work, The Essential Edwards Collection.

Is it right for Christians to Find a Spouse Through the Internet?

Owen Strachan | August 16, 2011 | Culture, Current Events, Scripture

A recent story in the New Yorker leads to questions like this for committed evangelicals. “Looking for Someone” by Nick Paumgarten paces through the recent explosion of online dating, a phenomenon that has led to real-life marriage for many couples. One selection from the piece shows the complexity of the new romantic landscape:

[T]he fastest-growing online-dating demographic is people over fifty—a function perhaps of expanding computer literacy and diminished opportunity. I recently got to know a woman I’ll call Mary Taft, who is seventy-six, has a doctorate in education, and has been married and divorced twice. She lives outside Boston. As a single mother, in her forties, she gave up men for a while….In 2000, she put an ad in Harvard Magazine. “This seemed horrible to me, but I got all kinds of responses. A nice guy from Vermont drove all the way down to see me.” And then, when she was almost seventy, she discovered Internet dating, and the frequency and variety of her assignations intensified.

The essay traces new developments in romance, but the broader reality behind the piece is ages-old: how to find someone to spend the rest of one’s life with. Civilizations and societies have offered different answers to this quandary with varying results. Whatever one thinks about arranged marriage, for example, it certainly offered a straightforward solution to the question of whom to marry. Though many choice-driven westerners would balk at such an arrangement, we cannot conclude that it does not offer a solution.

This is a matter that requires the attention of pastors and churches. How are we to help singles find spouses in our day? Do we leave them to the wilds of the Internet? I might suggest that the church take an active role in caring for its single members by stressing the essential goodness of the community of Christ. Online dating may not be wrong–it may well led to marriage in some cases–but it seems deficient in comparison to the real-life interaction and experience that the congregation creates and allows. As Paumgarten brings out, one’s “profile” is customizable, allowing people to make themselves “deficiency proof” and, furthermore, to expect nothing less in return. Marriage becomes rather transactional, as people may expect their online “match” to meet the needs they’ve listed–long walks, scorching romance, exhaustive emotional support–rather than seeking mutual sanctification in Christ.

We might also suggest that the elders and pastors of evangelical churches take note of developments like online dating and shepherd, in even a basic way, the romantic culture of their churches. Is clear from books like 1 Corinthians that church leaders like Paul involved themselves in questions of marriage and romance (chapter seven, for example). Paumgarten’s piece helps us to see that ours is simultaneously a sex-crazed but intimacy-lacking world. Can we form a culture of purity that is also a culture of meaningful connection?

Our churches have an opportunity to show the world a better way to marriage. Perhaps, in an isolary, lonely world, we can image, however imperfectly, a greater union, the covenant of love shared between Christ the pursuer and his radiant bride, the church (Ephesians 5).

We’re All Academic All-stars: Why Grade Inflation Matters to Christians

Owen Strachan | July 19, 2011 | Culture

Why should you care about grade inflation? First, because it’s happening en masse.

In a post entitled “A History of College Grade Inflation” on the New York Times Economix blog, Catherine Rampell recently drew attention to the work of Stuart Rojstaczer, formerly a Duke professor of geophysics, and Christopher Healy, a computer science professor at Furman University. According to Rampell, “The researchers collected historical data on letter grades awarded by more than 200 four-year colleges and universities. Their analysis (published in the Teachers College Record) confirm that the share of A grades awarded has skyrocketed over the years.” Here’s the central finding of the study:

Most recently, about 43 percent of all letter grades given were A’s, an increase of 28 percentage points since 1960 and 12 percentage points since 1988. The distribution of B’s has stayed relatively constant; the growing share of A’s instead comes at the expense of a shrinking share of C’s, D’s and F’s. In fact, only about 10 percent of grades awarded are D’s and F’s.

What does this mean in the aggregate? ”By the end of the last decade, A’s and B’s represented 73 percent of all grades awarded at public schools, and 86 percent of all grades awarded at private schools,” Rampell notes.

These are stunning findings. Consider those two data points once more:

43% of all grades are A’s. (This despite the fact that students spend less time studying today than they did in the past–27 hours per week instead of 40.)
Secondly, 86% of all grades given at private schools are A’s and B’s. (Garrison Keillor’s vision of America as populated exclusively by “above-average” children is realized!)

This plays out, of course, in real life, in classrooms in which many students expect at the very least a B for even marginal effort. Completing the paper, successfully double-spacing it, plopping together a bibliography–this is the material of outstanding work today in many of our schools. Professors who dare to touch this emotional live-wire risk criticism, low class enrollment, or the fate worse than death, damning reviews on online “rate-my-professor” sites. Call this the Self-esteem Code.

Beyond an entitlement mentality–driven by often-unseen narcissism–many students approach college transactionally. They give the college their money, the professor teaches them, they earn the degree. Writing in The New Yorker, Louis Menand has commented on this trend:

They attend either because the degree is a job requirement or because they’ve been seduced by the siren song “college for everyone.”…the situation [is] analogous to the real-estate bubble: Americans are being urged to invest in something they can’t afford and don’t need. Why should you have to pass a college-level literature class if you want to be a state trooper? To show that you can tough it out with Henry James?

In other words, a good number of students enter college viewing the professor as a kind of job-partner. The person up front teaching the class has some kind of unspoken requirement to pass all of his students; call it the Competency Code.

What has resulted from pressure from these students (in addition to other factors)? Harvard University professor Harvey Mansfield caused a stir some years when he published a piece in The Chronicle of Higher Education that publicized his practice of awarding students two grades: the grade they deserved and the grade they actually received. Other professors simply swallow hard and pass out the A’s like candy. The trend continues with no end in sight. Actually, scratch that last sentence; at this rate, in a few decades, every student will receive a 4.0. That is the terminus of this trajectory.

Why do Christians care about this? Because we believe that intellectual study is not a means to an end, but is an end in itself. It fundamentally glorifies the Lord when done from a posture of worship (1 Cor. 10:31). Furthermore, we believe in fairness and justice, in workers who earn their wages, so to speak (cf. Prov. 11:18). Grades, as with all forms of assessment, are no less a spiritual matter than our quiet time or prayer walk.

Christians involved in higher education–whether professors or parents or students or the pastors who counsel these folks–will have to carefully discern how they personally respond to grade inflation. Some instructors will have a hard-line response, while others (junior professors, perhaps) will find it necessary to walk carefully so as not to scare off undergrads like so many deer stepping gingerly through the academic forest.

At every level of our institutions, however, Christians are called to stand for truth and oppose falsehood, whether in worldview conflict or classroom exams. In a culture that sets low expectations and rewards them, believers will stand out by prizing hard work, fairness, and a more principled approach to teaching and instruction. We do not preach cheap grace, after all, but costly grace; we do not proclaim a gospel of easy-believism, but one that calls us, like Christ, to take up our cross and follow him, embracing a life of cruciform determination and focused labor.

Where Law and Grace Kiss: Evangelical Struggles in Parenting

Owen Strachan | June 27, 2011 | Ethics

A just-published story in The Atlantic by Lori Gottlieb entitled “How to Land Your Kid in Therapy” raises some helpful questions about modern parenting and how it is stimulating narcissism. There is some strong language in the piece, so I’m not linking to it. I will, however, quote a section to show the strength of the ideas in the article:

Another teacher I spoke with, a 58-year-old mother of grown children who has been teaching kindergarten for 17 years, told me she feels that parents are increasingly getting in the way of their children’s development. “I see the way their parents treat them,” she said, “and there’s a big adjustment when they get into my class. It’s good for them to realize that they aren’t the center of the world, that sometimes other people’s feelings matter more than theirs at a particular moment—but it only helps if they’re getting the same limit-setting at home. If not, they become impulsive, because they’re not thinking about anybody else.”

The point continues:

This same teacher—who asked not to be identified, for fear of losing her job—says she sees many parents who think they’re setting limits, when actually, they’re just being wishy-washy. “A kid will say, ‘Can we get ice cream on the way home?’ And the parent will say, ‘No, it’s not our day. Ice-cream day is Friday.’ Then the child will push and negotiate, and the parent, who probably thinks negotiating is ‘honoring her child’s opinion,’ will say, ‘Fine, we’ll get ice cream today, but don’t ask me tomorrow, because the answer is no!’” The teacher laughed. “Every year, parents come to me and say, ‘Why won’t my child listen to me? Why won’t she take no for an answer?’ And I say, ‘Your child won’t take no for an answer, because the answer is never no!’”

These provocative insights, of course, are really just good old-fashioned common sense. Saying no to a child–what an idea! This is the stuff of ground-breaking, cover-making wisdom at present.

I’d like to use this piece to offer a few thoughts on the current state of evangelical parenting. Many of us do focus on developing self-esteem in our children, which has a few positive and many negative effects–good because our children know we love them and are interested in what they do, bad because they can all too easily learn self-centeredness instead of God-centeredness. That, to say the very least, is a problem, as is the practice of rewarding children for mediocrity and even failure.

But there’s a parallel issue that concerns me about the “parenting style” of many of us today. It is theological: we love grace. We so exult in God’s lavish grace–and nothing is so worthy of exulting in, or exalting–that we lose sight of other important biblical-theological concepts. Like what, you say? Like the law. The law does not and cannot save. Only the gospel can. But the law is nonetheless of great value to us in forming character, understanding God’s nature, and driving us to the mercy offered us in Christ (see Galatians 3:24).

How does this apply to modern evangelical parenting? I’m concerned that many evangelicals who prize God’s sovereign goodness as I do are diminishing the importance of rules, morals, and appropriate behavior. Let’s be clear–I’m not advocating moralism. I don’t want kids to grow up with hard-and-fast ethical boundaries but no grace, no love, no affection. I guess I’m theologically greedy. I want both. I want a home that is driven by and centered in and soaked through with grace. God-rooted grace should drive the life of a family such that love, not law, is the dominant trait one picks up about a Christian family when one spends time with it. ”What was it about the Harpers? They interact with one another in such a loving way. Why?” That’s the kind of question people should ask after being around our godly families.

I don’t think that we can achieve such a culture, however, if we don’t prioritize rules, morals, and boundaries. All these should be driven by grace. But they should very much exist in the life of the Christian family. We do not advocate a formless, spineless kind of love as so many do today, after all. We teach and preach a cruciform love, Christocentric in nature, which involves conformity to God’s holy will. Love in the actual biblical sense does not mean “accepting someone no matter what,” it means “graciously caring for another in a self-sacrificial way that calls them to the kind ways of God demonstrated in the gospel.” When Jesus loves a person, he calls them to himself; when he calls them to himself, he bids them die, and leave all, and follow him (Luke 9:23). Love does not mean letting go of responsibility; it means, through the Spirit’s power, living the most passionate, holy, involved life one can lead.

In our parenting, we need to exhibit this kind of love and point our children to it. The way to do this? Hold out grace to our children. Teach them the gospel of Christ. Also, establish rules. Morals. Boundaries. Precepts. Commands. Non-negotiables. And so on, all in a grace-driven way. The gospel is not the enemy of morality, after all, but moralism.

What might a healthy evangelical home look like?

1) Orderly and controlled. Christian parents should be able to take their children to a restaurant, friend’s home, or ballgame and have them behave. Children shouldn’t terrorize their surroundings. Much bad behavior has been rebranded today as “just boys being boys” or “kids being kids” or “our children are in a wild mood today.” No, not usually. Usually, your children are just badly behaved. That is not really on them (when they’re little, especially)–that’s on you, parents, and especially you, Dad.

2) Ruled. Homes should have plenty of rules and maxims to follow. Children thrive in structure. Everybody likes a fun afternoon, an unplanned ice cream run, a day at the beach, but even fun activities need some guidance and structure. Remember, it’s not “graceless” or moralistic to have rules and guidelines. The gospel saves us from the law, but what does it make us? Slaves to righteousness (Romans 6:18). The Spirit leads our obedience, a good portion of which comes in response to still-active biblical commands. You can say you’re free in Christ, but if your freedom leads you to sleep with someone else’s husband, you have fundamentally misunderstood the doctrine. Grace creates godliness; justification drives sanctification; the gospel creates holiness. Homes with rules and boundaries along with a love for the gospel reflect the ideal shape of the Christian life.

What does this mean practically? It means that when you say “Stop,” your kids should stop. When you say “Please wait,” they should wait. When you tell them to do something, they should respond immediately. This kind of behavior requires constant attention, firm discipline for disobedience, and lots of good, clear communication. It’s especially helpful and needful to plan ahead and set expectations: “We’re going to the mall, which means that you will need to walk beside Daddy and Mommy. The other children may run around shrieking, but we’ll stay together and have fun.” Are parents doing these things nowadays? Or do most of us parent without rules in place, fail to set expectations (which hugely benefits kids), and then get angry in a Zeusian manner? Then we grumble afterwards about the behavior of our children, making little jokes about them that demean them, never realizing that really, in the end, we are to blame.

3) Polite. There’s a jarring lack of attention to authority, respect and decorum today, and many of our homes display such a spirit. Now, just so you know, I’m no Victorian (though I might be better off if I was). My home is pretty modern, and we are a relaxed family. But I’m concerned that we often fail to teach our children to respect others. It’s as if we think that loving our kids and making sure they’re happy is all we’re supposed to do. But that’s not the case. We need to train our children not to slavishly serve ruling interests but to respectfully submit to them. That will mean training children to respect adults, to think of others before themselves, and to show honor to whom it is due (veterans, teachers, elders, etc). Going back to the first point, our children should be quiet in public, kind to their peers, and respectful to adults. They’re not being cute, after all, when they’re waging war with the booth next to yours at the Macaroni Grill; they’re being brats. The fact that you love them unconditionally doesn’t change that.

I’ll leave off at this point. I’ve only just scratched the surface of this topic. There’s much more to be said here. Hopefully, evangelical homes will prioritize both the law and grace, with grace winning the day by a mile. Unfortunately, I think too many evangelical homes have one without the other. May our children be well-behaved, kind, controlled, and utterly in love with the grace of God shown abroad in his gospel.

Anthony Weiner and Gospel Apologies

Owen Strachan | June 14, 2011 | Politics

You have likely heard of the Anthony Weiner scandal and his ensuing apology. A married man, Weiner “sexted” with several women until he posted a salacious photo intended for private viewing to his public Twitter account. Those who still doubt the utility of Twitter, take note. It now accounts for the loss of a shamed public servant.

With many others, I followed these developments with interest. I wanted to see how Weiner apologized. There have been a spate of these kind of men-behaving-badly fiascos and the inevitable apology often sounds like a remixed personal pep talk. ”I see now that I acted out of line with my personal convictions, and I am determined to do my very best to live up to all that my thousands of fans expect of me.” You hear this sort of shlock all the time.

As far as public confessions of shame by disgraced men go, this one was actually pretty good. Here’s a snippet:

I have exchanged messages and photos of an explicit nature with about six women over the last three years. For the most part, these relation– communications took place before my marriage, though some have sadly took place after.

To be clear, I have never met these any of these women or had physical relationships at any time. I haven’t told the truth, and I’ve done things I deeply regret.

I brought pain to people I care about the most and the people who believed in me, and for that I’m deeply sorry. I apologize to my wife and our families, as well as to our friends and supporters.

I’m deeply ashamed of my terrible judgment and actions.

Here’s the whole transcript.

As I said, this apology was solid–maybe a six out of ten. Of course, Weiner stopped short of giving his apology backbone. He has vowed to stay in office. An apology is not enough. Egregious actions should have serious consequences. It’s not sufficient to stand in front of some cameras and confess. Confession should bring contrition–expressed in the form of action like, say, resigning.

But that’s a matter for another message-board discussion. All of this hubbub had me thinking about apologies. Apologies are not just pro forma statements of contritive fact. They are utterances from the core of our being that we are in the wrong. Apologies are a form of common grace. In a world ruled by Satan, not by God, no one would apologize. Everyone would excuse their actions or ignore them. When we fail to apologize to our spouse or roommate or employer, we are picturing a little bit of a world order ruled by vicious principalities and powers.

But when, because we have been transformed by Christ, make regular apologies as we necessarily must, we are giving the world a glimpse of a much greater realm and a much greater king. We are, in fact, acting out the core of faith. To follow God is to say, at the core, “You are right and I am wrong.” That is the essence of conversion. The Holy Spirit births this kind of instinct in us at the moment when we are converted and he relentlessly and graciously animates that instinct in us whenever we say we are sorry, whether for lying about taking out the trash or ruining our marriage.

The gospel activates and propels numerous virtues–courage, self-awareness, humility, and more–but they nowhere cohere more beautifully than in a simple apology. The person who hates the gospel–and this is all of us naturally–may apologize, but does so from a heart that hates doing so. The Christian, on the other hand, recognizes that he or she is continually in the wrong and exposed as a sinner before a holy, majestic God. This produces a life of confession, of humility. Though it’s still difficult as a Christian to say, “I’m sorry,” there is a joy in doing so, for we are acting in distinctly Christocentric ways.

The next time we speak unkindly to our husband or wife; the next time we lust after someone who is not ours; the next time we self-justify our actions for the thousandth time; the next time we fail to care well for our children and leave them to flounder; the next time we act selfishly and do not care for the needy among us; in all of these instances, we can take joy in knowing that we are freed by grace to apologize. The gospel has come, and it has struck. We are transformed. Our sin resides, but grace is greater. We are no longer trapped in prisons of our delusional making that keep us thinking that we aren’t wrong–everyone else is! We are freed to live holy lives and when we do not to make atonement.

The reason we can do this? Because atonement has been made for us. May we show the world a better way. May we apologize freely and quickly, knowing that there is nothing more impressive and more God-given than this. Then, trusting in a sovereign God, we can take steps toward restitution, witnessing as we do to housewives, mechanics, college professors and shamed congressmen that there is a better world, a more perfect place, than the one we know.

Atheist Chaplains in Foxholes?

Owen Strachan | May 24, 2011 | Culture, Worldview

Over at the Christianity Today Theology in the News column, I have published a piece entitled “Atheists in the Foxholes–as Chaplains” which draws off of the strange but true reality that atheists are currently lobbying for the right to serve as military chaplains. You can’t make this stuff up.

Here is the essay’s teaser:

The military chaplain is a staple of the armed forces. Many have suggested that the sense of mortality that one feels as bullets fly and bombs explode lends itself naturally to prayer and supplication of a divine being. The axiom “there are no atheists in foxholes” emerged based on battlefield scenarios.

There may soon be atheist chaplains in foxholes, however. A recent story in The New York Times, titled “Atheists Seek Chaplain Role in the Military,” covered recent efforts by atheist members of the armed forces to secure chaplaincy positions for atheists. More than 9,000 military personnel self identify as atheist or agnostic, the Times reports, and some claim that many more members of the military adhere to these camps without reporting their preference. Conversely, about 1 million troops say they are Christians. They represent roughly 70 percent of troops and about 90 percent of chaplains.

Read the whole thing.

Toward the close, I wonder out loud whether atheism possesses the resources to tolerate, even respect, other faiths. Christianity surely does. But if theism is merely a crutch for the weak, the drug of choice for the masses, how can atheists respect Christians and minister to them in a meaningful way?

Leading atheists are on record as arguing that “religion poisons everything,” as our own Mark Coppenger has shown. Can an atheist chaplain following the lead of a figure like Christopher Hitchens meaningfully minister to a theist if that contention is true (and it most assuredly is not)? It seems to me that atheists are often better than their beliefs. It’s a good thing. If atheists acted more consistently upon their beliefs, they would seek to accelerate the weeding out of the weak, the pruning of the pitiful. If they truly believe that the strong have a genetic right–or obligation!–to advance, they ought to act on their belief.

Thankfully, many do not. Why? Well, for at least one reason. Atheism does not work well. It is not functional for rational people. We are all created in the image of God (Gen. 1:27), and as a result we care for others, we love, we seek however haltingly the betterment of the weak. We naturally want to hope, to believe that things will go well. We do not, many of us, incline toward despair. Atheism leads easily, effortlessly even, to nihilism. But life in our fallen world is filled with wonder and discovery and purpose and growth and happiness. So most atheists are not consistent. Atheism, we see, is basically unliveable.

This will surely prove true when in the heat of battle. It is not natural for a human being created in the image of God to think of a fellow human being as but a clump of atoms. It is natural to treat humanity with dignity and respect, to see life as purposeful and good. Atheism cannot fund such a worldview–or such a chaplaincy–but Christianity can. Jesus Christ has embodied nothing less than this sort of perspective. So should we.

The Gay Basketball Star and an Emerging Cultural Narrative

Owen Strachan | May 18, 2011 | Culture, Current Events, Theology

If you’re a sports fan, did you see the news about former Villanova Wildcats basketball player Will Sheridan coming out of the closet? And the stories about Phoenix Suns President and CEO Rick Welts revealing the same? Whether you like basketball or not, you should care about these stories as a Christian. The way each narrative has unfolded in the press shows the direction our culture is traveling on the issue of homosexuality.

Christians need to be very aware of the way the mainstream media is treating these kind of stories. For the broader culture, homosexuality is the new civil rights cause–and just like the civil rights cause, homosexuality is entering the cultural mainstream at least in part through sports. Reporters are treating gay athletes like heroes, praising their “courage” and “authenticity.” Read the stories I’ve linked to above, and do a Google search on each topic to find more coverage if you like. You will find this narrative in spades. The (religious) parents of Sheridan and other athletes making headlines (like the mother of “Kye Allums,” the first transgender woman’s basketball player) have had a terrible time accepting the newfound orientation of their children. The writers interviewing these parents treat them with empathy–but take great pains to show how they have accepted this shift and continue to grant “unconditional love” to their children. The rightness of homosexuality is a given, while opposition to it is a clear transgression.

Here’s a snippet from the ESPN story on Sheridan that backs up this claim:

Josie Sheridan always preached unconditional love, and she meant it.

And when the test came — when her son, whom she calls her best friend, sat her down — loving him wasn’t hard. But accepting the news was.

“Devastated. I was devastated,” she said. “I mean, I was disappointed. Not in him, but in things that were taken away — not having a daughter-in-law, grandchildren, things like that.”

But after the initial shock wore away, Josie looked at her son and saw something that had been missing — happiness. He was always a good child (“too good to be true,” his high school coach once told her), but a tickle in the back of her mind, a mother’s instinct, told her he should have been happier….”Once I saw him, so happy and content, that’s all I needed,” Josie said. “I never loved him any less. In fact, I think I love him more. I’ve always been so proud of him, but he has such courage. This takes courage.”

Christians need to sort through this narrative carefully. We are those who tout the cosmos-shaking love of a magnificent God, after all. We have a stake in love. But our understanding of God’s grace–the channel of His love–differs markedly from that of our culture. God fully accepts all who are His children, and he never lets them go (John 10:27). Yet this does not mean that God approves of sin. Those who choose an evil path will not meet with God’s love, but his justice. We will taste his wrath. The only way to escape this wrath is through a complete heart change, full repentance, a renunciation of all our sin. Only when we have repented of sin and turned completely from it may we experience God’s salvific love.

So the love of God is not a contentless love, an actionless love. It is the polar opposite of love as culture defines it. Cultural love requires no change. In fact, man-centered love requires that no change be required. Biblical love calls for the reverse. Wherever love is, change is. That is, when God loves a person, he profoundly changes them, whether they are gay (contra Romans 1), vainglorious (contra James 3), an adulterer (contra Proverbs 2), or caught in any number of other sins. He does not accept their prior orientation; in order to meet his holy standards, he requires a new orientation. He actually makes the sinner “a new creation” in Christ (2 Cor. 5:17). True love, God’s love, is transformative, not static; active, not passive. This is because in the Christian concept of salvation, love and holiness work together. God’s love shed abroad in our hearts does not compromise God’s holiness. Love enables us to meet God’s holy standards, to stand pure before him.

Tragically, our culture believes the opposite. Many people, of course, believe in only the vaguest, weakest sort of God to begin with. In their understanding, God enfranchises and approves of their authentic selves. The person they believe they need to be–this is the person God wants them to be. He (or she, in cultural understanding) acts as the Great Actualizer, the One who Makes All Dreams Come True. This excellent article about celebrities and spirituality in the Wall Street Journal makes this quite clear. God is like the supportive friend in a rom-com: always there, always rooting you on, never confronting you or making you feel bad, perpetually guiding you ever so gingerly to your best self. It is this deity, not the Lord of heaven and earth, who stands behind us today, urging us onward.

All these things are in play in the cultural homosexual narrative. There is not to be any pushback for those who come out of the closet or wish to change their gender. Like God himself, we are to accept in full the natural orientation of those around us. Those of the broader culture who disagree with this idea generally have very little moral foundation from which to respond to this narrative. Robby George and the Catholic natural law school have mounted their arguments, and bravely so; evangelicals are declaring their biblical convictions on the matter, calling the culture to biblical truth. These and other efforts are salutary, but outside the gracious intervention of God, we should not expect some sort of radical embrace of them by the gatekeepers of western thought. Such is surely possible, but this is a strong narrative. To those who have no biblical understanding of morality, it is the new civil rights cause. Those who stand against homosexuality today will increasingly be equated with those who accomplished the hateful subordination of African-Americans in this country.

None of this means that we should run to the hills. We should stay right where we are. We should contend for truth. We should befriend and show the most genuine kind of love to all kinds of people who are sinners just like we are and lost just like we were. We should not shrink back, but should declare a far more magnificent brand of love than the culture knows, a strong love, a transformative love, a judgment-killing love. Lost and hopeless, the culture will offer its narrative of acceptance. We, in turn, will offer a greater narrative of salvation. In prayer, we will never stop asking the Lord to do great work in our day to turn the hearts of the people to him (1 Kings 18:36-37).