Grand Illusions: Too many suburban Christians are in the worldâand also of it.
This is a great little article at Christianity Today…..
Quote:
In his telling, suburban life revolves around competing for what Goetz calls “immortality symbols”–“the four-bedroom home with the Pottery Barn colors, the L.L. Bean underwear and outerwear, the fuel-guzzling truck, the purebred dog, the family pilgrimage to Disney World, and the athletic and scholarship-bedecked college-bound freshman.”
For Goetz, the defining ethos of suburbia is catering to “the overindulged self” in an “environment of security, efficiency, and opportunities,” all of which create a faux spirituality among Christians who live there. According to Goetz, their faith is really little more than busy avoidance of reality. The false image of the “good life” offered by the suburbs creates what Goetz calls a “bloated, tiny soul.” Goetz’s harsh judgment is tempered by his admission of his own acute sensitivity to what others think of him and his guilty joy in finally getting that SUV.
I so identify…I so see these things in myself. The home, with the right furnishings, the right clothes, degrees on the wall….I am so guilty of all of this, and so wanting to fight it as well….Reminds me of Paul’s words in Romans 7:
15 I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. 16 And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. 17 As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me. 18 I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature.[c] For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. 19 For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do–this I keep on doing. 20 Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it.
Ugghhhhh. The struggle. I don’t think that these things in and of themselves are bad….but when they become our identity and what we strive for, especially over and against Christ…..major problems ahead. I just know that I’m quick to jump on suburban life, though I live there…I know I’m quick to jump on materialism, though I’m materialistic.
Can anyone relate?
