Self-will vs Surrender: Gospel Language for Postmoderns - Brad Jersak with Laurence Singlehurst

“For if Christ’s love compels us, because we are convinced that one died for all, and therefore, all died. And he died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for them and was raised again” (2 Corinthians 5:14-15).

 

I had the great privilege of chatting with Laurence Singlehurst, a seasoned British missiologist who has thought deeply about the language we use to share the Good News in our postmodern era. He’s addressed the problem of our lingo for years, in such books as The Gospel Message Today: Language That Connects in Communicating the Gospel.

 

What follows are my notes and reflections on what I heard him saying on that topic, in which I will propose employing the language of self-will and surrender for postmodern gospeling.

 

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Comments

[Florian Berndt]

YES!!! What a great article. I was just this morning talking to my wife about this very same issue. Just read an article on the growing trend of narcissistic tendencies in the workplace and where it comes from. This phenonemon can become so exaggerated and the ego so inflated, that one conceives True Love as a threat to one's very existence. Made me think of the many passages that speak of the Consuming Fire of Divine Love.

It also seems to me that this is the major problem with our superficial pop-spiritualities, that are not grounded in a relational model of reality. Often this can be due to the religious surpression of one's personality and the the lack of a healthy sense of self. Yet, as the article so wonderfully describes, feeding into our ego when only furhter alienate us and create more shame.

And it is here where I think a Trinitarian understanding of reality can help to lay a foundation of healthy self-awarenss, coupled with the joy of surrendering this very same self in love to Another, and thus to other's. Without this, I wonder how one can really effectively convey the Gospel in our generation. But then again, the early church seems to have been already very much aware of this as well...