All of life – meaning what?

TROWEL & SWORD

Resources - Leadership

April 2000

SWORD - DEFENDING

All of life – meaning what?

David Groenenboom

The phrase “Christianity in all of life” has become a reformed cliché. It is the regular bouquet garni in many a reformed sermon, the quasi-theological name dropping we use to convince others that we know what it means to be reformed.

My guess is, however, that we’re not really clear at all on what we mean by “all of life”. Worse: we are still largely stuck in pre-reformational faith and life expressions. In this we are not alone, our culture is one than drives a wedge between “secular” and “sacred” at every level of consciousness, and we can hardly be blamed for seeing things like everyone else. Scripture, however, challenges us to cease imposing Christless philosophies on the Kingdom. How might we be doing this? Think of a few examples:

Lord’s Day: We have one day for spiritual things, it’s the Lord’s Day. But what does this say about the other six days? Who do they belong to? What of all the activities we do on those days? Not spiritual?

Tithing: We all give a proportion of our income and set it aside for the Lord’s work. What about the rest of our income? To whom does it belong? Us? The Lord? Peter Costello, our Federal Treasurer? The bank?
Devotional time: We are sent on regular trips to the guilt factory for not having enough devotional time. How long should it be? How long in prayer? And when? Morning? Evening? What will become of us if we don’t have time “with the Lord”. What about the other 23½ hours of the day? Who owns them?

The problem is that when we use our rational scalpel to carve our reality into “secular” and “sacred” chunks we end up, as Gordon Spykman reminds us, having “...some callings higher and holier than others. Celibacy is purer than marriage; theology is more honourable than philosophy or the other sciences; evangelism is more saintly than social work.”

The distinction we make between secular and sacred, and the opposition between them is seen as going back to the very structure of creation. The end result is that only some parts of reality are redeemable, while others aren’t. Further, the implication is that a large part of what the Triune God created is unredeemable and/or only worthy of destruction.

So, what’s the alternative? Are we saying that everything is holy, and we’re just fooling ourselves about sin and evil? Not at all! An informed reformed response is that grace is not opposed to nature, but only to sin. The purpose of living as Christians in the world is, through Christ’s Word and Spirit, to banish only that which is impure. We are not seeking to supplement secular with spiritual (that’s what Catholic and a lot of Pentecostal theology does); we are not seeking to leave nature alone (as Luther’s two kingdom view does); we are not avoiding the issue and simply waiting for heaven (like the Anabaptists and many evangelicals do).

Instead, our desire is to live and proclaim the good news of Christ renewing all creation through Gospel and Kingdom. Christ is Lord of all life, even of those areas that are opposed to His rule. Our task is to bring His Kingdom rule to bear on all these areas, so that evil, ungrace, and sin are conquered by His grace.

The Lord’s Day, then is just like every other day except that we gather to celebrate the Lord’s resurrection victory. Sunday and every other day we are seeking to live and proclaim that sin and fallenness are conquered in the Gospel.

Tithing makes no distinction between the 90% which is “ours” and the measly 10% which is “God’s”. Tithes and gifts are there to directly support the church’s ministry and mission, all our other wealth is equally devoted to Kingdom living to Christ’s glory.

Devotional time does not indicate time “with God”. Every second of every day in the life of every human being is lived in God’s presence. Christians set aside some time to be nourished with Scripture and to focus on prayer. This time is not more spiritual than any other, but it does have a different focus. All day, every day they seek to commune with God in prayer and fellowship.

To be Christian is not to deny humanity, it is to be human in the fullest sense. To live for Christ in all of life is to live to the full (John 10:10), proclaiming and modelling His renewal in all times and places.

Further reading

Gordon Spykman, Reformational Theology, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1992 p.66-70

Jan Veenhof, nature and Grace in Bavinck, Toronto: Institute for Christian Studies

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