There are a lot of ways to start a Gospel conversation, not the least of which is reflecting on the ideas referenced in pop culture. Jeremy Halcrow describes Talking Point, a new Southern Cross resource which will help readers use reviews to question their friends’ assumptions on life, the universe and everything…
There is a lot of confusion about the place of movie and TV "reviews' in a Christian paper. So let me begin by saying that Southern Cross is definitely not in business of promoting secular entertainment.
Southern Cross has never included pop culture reviews because we want to recommend them to our readers. The idea has always been to help you, our Christian readers, understand the mindset or "worldview' of your non-Christian friends, neighbours and work-mates. The theory goes: it is much easier to answer someone's objections to the gospel, if we understand their point of view. Our hope was that by providing this information we would help spark opportunities for gospel conversations.
Our recent comprehensive survey of clergy and lay leaders made it clear to the SC team that we were not being directive enough. People want more assistance to see how to build the bridge between the worldviews promoted by pop culture and the Bible's gospel concepts.
Furthermore, some critics of this sort of cultural apologetics will say, "We should just be preaching the gospel."
My answer is, "Of course!".
Apologetics is not a replacement for proclaiming the gospel. Rather it is a starting point. Pop culture can provide the conversation starter that allows us to create further opportunities to explain the gospel.
In fact when we explain the gospel to someone we inevitably do apologetics as well. (Its the bit where we answer their objections!) You see, apologetics includes defending the Christian belief, explaining that it is true and that it makes sense.
As Dr Greg Clarke, director of CASE, explains more eloquently than me:
"To take just one example, the view that God dwelt in human form in Jesus Christ might now be considered quaint. People still sing "Veiled in flesh the Godhead see/Hail the incarnate Deity" at Christmas, but they might as well be singing "Shoop Shoop Diddy Wop Cumma Cumma Wang Dang" such is its meaninglessness.
"To many, it seems like an illogical and redundant idea. And yet this doctrine is central to understanding who Jesus is and why his death matters. There would seem to be a long bridge from a Christian worldview to a common worldview today. So, where does someone who is concerned to reconnect the world of today with the world of Christianity, begin?"
This is where Southern Cross' new Talking Point section can help. We do the apologetics thinking for you. We show you we where to build the bridge from and then how then to lead your non-Christian friend to the gospel.
In the next issue of Southern Cross, Dr Clarke has written a back page feature explaining the worldview of Bono from U2. He then includes a few "talking point' questions you could ask a non-Christian friend as a way of initiating a gospel conversation. We’ll be taking a similar approach to all sorts of reviews, including film and television.
We trust Sydney Anglicans find Talking Point a helpful ministry resource.
