Right around the seven minute mark of this video, Kevin DeYoung says something that I would like to take note of. There are many good things said in the course of this clip, especially about the necessity of basic gospel proclamation, and basic disciple-making. That really is foundational. It is fundamental. But I think Kevin …
Win Win
James K.A. Smith interviews James Davison Hunter here, and then writes about him here. Let me give you a sec to get those read. The same sorts of things that I have raised in my reviews of both Smith and Hunter could be said again here, but let’s not. Suffice it to say that after …
The Rough Edges of Nebuchadnezzar, Darius, and Constantine
In his last chapter, “Toward a New City Commons,” Hunter takes Jer. 29:4-7 as his key text, wherein the Jews in exile were told to seek the peace of the city they would inhabit for a time. “Clearly it would have been justifiable for the Jews to be hostile to their captors. It also would …
Plays Well With Others Leadership
Hunter says many things that sound quite good, and it is not surprising that he has gotten good reviews from around the Reformed and evangelical world. After all, what Kuyperian could take issue with this? “In short, faithful presence in practice is the exercise of leadership in all spheres and all levels of life and …
Getting a Little Constantinian Shalom Going
In his next chapter, Hunter sketches his theology of “faithful presence.” He begins by making a strong connection between presence and place. “Rather, in every instance, God’s word was enacted and enacted in a particular place and time in history. In all, presence and place mattered decisively. Nowhere is this more evident than in the …
Crossing That Temptation Bridge When We Get to It
In his next chapter, James Davison Hunter sets the stage for his alternative approach to our cultural engagement in the late modern world, which may be described as faithful presence within. “Over against the ‘Defensive Against,’ ‘Relevance To’ and ‘Purity From’ paradigms, I would offer an alternative: ‘Faithful Presence Within'” (p. 237). He has a …
Standing There In My Smarty Pants
Many questions were generated when I wrote that Christians were in the process of going liberal if they gallop after every trend that was likely to show up over at Stuff White People Like.Or try Unhappy Hipsters. So allow me to address some of those questions now. This whole point seems to me to be …
Why Wear the Uniform of Liberals if You Aren’t Marching With Them?
As I have noted before, a worldview consists of far more than the thoughts that you think. A worldview consists of more than just one man’s opinions, dogmatically held. In short, a worldview is not an individual event but rather a social reality. And that social reality consists of four basic components, two of which …
Throwing Their Virgins Into the Volcano of the State
As all the different forms of Christian engagement with the world have gathered on our front lawn, we see the conservatives on the right side, the progressives on the left side, and the anabaptists off in the bushes. In this next chapter, Hunter helpfully discusses the respective forms of engagement advocated by each. As Hunter …
The Black Swan of Revival
Hunter’s next chapter, “The Challenge of Faithfulness,” was quite good, and was a helpful way to see the ways in which modernity is falling apart. (Modernity falling apart is called postmodernity.) The place where I would take issue with Hunter is over how permanent this pluralistic and confused situation is. The house of cards has …