Faith on the Frontlines of Culture: A Missional Journey
As we press through this last weekend before we leave for our trek across the desert to Burning Man once again, our hearts and minds go to thinking about what God is doing, why He has us in this ministry, and where it will go.
The answer to the first 2 questions are fairly discernible; however, the 3rd question is very open-ended.
Ultimately, our pursuit, call, ministry focus, whatever is the best way to call it, has certain features which become more clear and evident by the day. As we follow deeper and deeper into understanding the social, cultural, technological, and geopolitical changes underway in the world around us, while the world is in crisis, we see 4 categories emerging to the ministry God has called us to:
Our ministry is about reaching the lost, so it is missional and evangelical. When we go to events like Burning Man or Paganicon, or attend NATO events like the Dayton Dialog, we go with the mindset that we carry the light of the Gospel to the lost. This has given us opportunities to share in all of these places, and it is exciting to see the way God moves when we go.
Our ministry is about understanding the way people think, so it is research oriented and apologetics oriented. We conduct "boots on the ground" research in order to best understand the way people think, and the way things truly are.
Our ministry research reveals underlying worldview trends, which reflect how policy makers and politicians implement ideas. Therefore, it is ministry security focused. The geopolitical imperatives that drive nation states are based on the underlying thinking of those nations' leaders. The nations' leaders are driven by the underlying thinking of their populations. All of these things feed into a construct that helps us understand what the risks are to gospel workers going overseas, as well as the risks to the churches back home.
It is in this 3rd area that we have bridged from where we were focused previously, which was only on security, to this more broad based pursuit of understanding worldview trends, which incorporates security, but also includes these broader objectives.
In light of this, I was asked this week to speak at a military veterans group on worldview trends, the cycles of history, our trip to Burning Man, and how it represents the changes that we are seeing in society all around us. Not everyone in the seminar was an evangelical Christian, but many were, so the responses were quite interesting.
Some of the comments and questions from the participants of the meeting were these:
"I would like to thank you for your insight into, you know, you talked a lot about Burning Man, but giving perspective, and history and your own passion for understanding and relaying knowledge."
"When you look at, you know, most individuals and groups of people are just trying to, they're just trying to have a reasonable life. They're just trying to live in this world and find meaning. And some people can be selfish. Some people like yourself are very giving and and looking out beyond themselves and what can they do to make things better for them. And this was very important information. I found it very valuable."
"Well, you have added a little bit of understanding. And of course, it's in our own internal experiences, whether we believe it or not. I found it very stimulating and It moves me to go find out what's about Burning Man. I can't really tell. I don't know. It's not really a vacation. Some people make it like a pilgrim. Like you're going to Mecca."
"Is there much interest in Christianity during your outreaches?"
