Disintegration

Everyone wants to be happy.

We all spend our time doing the things we believe will make us happy. The religious person believes he will be happier if he attends worship services and does what is right. The workaholic believes his life will be better if he has financial security. The socialite believes she will be happier if she is popular, respected, and influential. The transgender person believes he will be happier if his body matches his chosen gender identity.

Another way of saying this is that we do what we want to do. Our desires control the choices we make. We work because having a house to live in and food on the table is preferable to the other options. We gravitate toward comfort and away from suffering because we don’t like being in pain. Even a perceived negative choice like suicide seems attractive because the pain of death seems less than the pain of living.

But what determines what we want? Why do the religious person, the workaholic, the socialite, and the transgender person believe the things they are pursuing will make them happy? These pursuits are motivated by desires, and under those desires are fundamental beliefs about good and evil. If we go even deeper we find that under those beliefs are the influences which have shaped their beliefs. To understand the choices people make, we need to drill all the way to the bottom to discover the things which have shaped their fundamental perception of reality. We need to think about epistemology.

Chaos

Why are we talking about this? Because I think the visible chaos in the broader Western culture and that within Anabaptism is symptomatic. I don’t think chaos is too strong a word. In broader Western culture, individual autonomy reigns supreme. If I can have whatever I want (house, car, kids, or a surgically altered body), I will be happy. The result of this self-interest is an increasingly divided and disintegrating culture.

Within our Anabaptist culture, it seems that traditionalism (in the older generation) and authenticity (in the younger generation) are deadlocked against each other. We are experiencing frictions and fractions, leadership failures, and spiritually malnourished church members. I believe good things are happening too, but I’ve seen and heard enough from those who come to the counseling center I’m involved with to know that not all is right in our world. Church leaders have let God’s gracious gospel slip into the background, and the church community has in many cases become merely a monochromatic social club. Our churches are not producing gospel-loving, Christ-exalting believers.

What is under this disintegration? From my perspective it seems that the foundation of our beliefs has been collapsing for some time now, and now the cracks in the drywall are starting to show. Under the disintegrating social, moral, and theological norms are faulty ideas. We have tried to maintain our Christianity by naked tradition, by pragmatism, by a strong heritage, by emotionalism, or by revivalism instead of by careful, rich, and warm biblicism. If we want to restabilize our Anabaptist movement, we are going to need to go deep into the Bible to recover sound, graciously-powerful doctrine. We will need to build our beliefs and our practices squarely on God’s word—and reject everything that compromises its absolute authority.

Underneath our desires and our beliefs are the influences which shape our view of reality. We need to start assessing those foundational influences in order to recover the integrity of the entire Anabaptist structure. We need to know what we’re standing on.

What Are You Standing On?

In that interest, the next few editorials will explore the question, “What are you standing on?” This question draws on the origin of the word epistemology. Behind this word is the Greek ephistēmi, which literally means “to stand upon.” Epistemology is a discussion about what you are standing on. What’s at the bottom, under it all, that is holding up the entire structure of your beliefs?

This is the study of knowledge, a discussion about the things that undergird everything you know and believe. In epistemology we ask (and try to answer), “Why do we know what we know?” This includes thinking about our views of right and wrong, truth and error, good and evil, and joy and pain? What kinds of things have shaped us, are shaping us, and ought to shape us if we want to be faithful Christians?

It’s my conviction that we need to ask these questions (and find good answers to them) if we want to find a way forward to rebuild biblically-robust, Spirit-dependent, God-glorifying churches.

In the following articles, we will explore different spheres of epistemology. If you are thinking, “this is too heady for me” I want to assure you that I intend to keep the discussion as earthy as possible. I want to show you some of the categories that influence the way you and I think in the daily milieu. I don’t think you’ll find it difficult to identify these things in your life.

Below you’ll find a list of spheres of epistemology. Each definition includes the words “ideas” and “values.” What we think (ideas) and what we want based on those beliefs (values) are essential to our view of reality. And since each sphere is communicating ideas and values, each definition includes those terms.

I would also like to note that these terms (“ideas” and “values”) are not equal to each other. Both are essential to our view of reality (and thus come to us through these epistemological spheres), but one shapes the other. Ideas shape our values. What we think about reality (even if we haven’t consciously thought about it) shapes what we value. Another way to put this is that each sphere is telling us what to think, and based on those thoughts, is telling us what to love.

Here’s a summary of the spheres we will explore in future editorials:

• Tradition – ideas and values embedded in our history
• Culture – ideas and values embedded in our current cultural moment
• Philosophy – ideas and values formed by rational thought
• Experience – ideas and values formed by what we have seen, heard, tasted, smelled, and touched
• Technological Media – ideas and values formed by the shape and structure of the internet
• Social Media – ideas and values formed by the shape and structure of social media platforms
• Scripture – ideas and values shaped by God’s inspired, inerrant word

All of these except the last one are extra-biblical (though not necessarily un-biblical). Scripture is categorically distinct. All other spheres originate in man; Scripture originates in God. So we not only want to look at these spheres side-by-side but we also want to explore how Scripture—as the superior revelation—norms our interaction with all other spheres.

I don’t think this is merely philosophical speculation. I am digging into this because I want to help Christians understand why we are where we are as an Anabaptist movement. I don’t think the death-knell is ringing yet, but I am concerned that we will continue to deteriorate unless something changes. We need to dig deep to discover the foundational issues, to answer the question, “What’s at the bottom of it all?”