You don't have to be a Republican to know that a fist fight is simmering in the GOP. Republicans have been talking about "big tent politics" for years, but after last year's election losses, what was once a suggestion has become a battle cry. Leading voices are demanding that the party must become a Big Tent and make room for more people. Some would-be GOP candidates have recently launched a "Listening Tour" in order hear the voices of America and discover what potential voters really want.
Let's not be so PC for a moment. When it comes to shaping your identity, listening tours are a silly idea. For the most part, people don't really know what they want. Rather, most people know what they like when they see it. Consumers weren't demanding Ipods or until Apple invented one. Then the world beat a path to buy them in five colors and three sizes. Politicians need to be less sensitive and more centered. A group seeking to cast a vision for people ought to begin by drawing a red circle around their moral center. Once folks know what you truly stand for, they can make in intelligent choice about whether it makes sense to them or not. If political ideas don't matter anyway, why bother with politics?
I happen to be a political conservative, but that's not why I find this particular debate so interesting. Rather, I've been fascinated by this movement because it feels so familiar. Perhaps you've realized that this is the same Happy Meal that was sold to the American Church about 20 years ago. Loud voices insisted we were too narrow and too shrill, and that our tent was too small. Trend setters insisted we should listen to the voices of the culture and discover what Americans really wanted. Once we identified what our communities really wanted, we could shape our "ministry" to scratch whatever itches in their lives.
Now after more than two decades of "Big Tent" church, we are shocked to learn that the American church has grown much smaller and the American public is much less Christian. No matter how hard we tried to be edgy, youth-oriented, self-centered, psychology-oriented, sexually frank and non-judgmental, most churches found it didn't work. Apparently, people could get all those things without coming to church. And the ones who really wanted to worship required more than cultural vomit with artificial spiritual sweeteners. The tent got bigger but the American church got smaller.
So it's interesting US Republicans are now salivating over a strategy that has failed miserably for US Christians. Rather than looking for the Big Tent, we should have dug deeply to find the Big T: Truth. What is it that Jesus died for so that we could live for it? What is our biblical center of gravity? How does the Cross of Christ honestly challenge our narcissistic, over-sexed culture?
The people of Athens overwhelmingly wanted idols, but Paul refused to embrace idolatry in his preaching. Rather, he used the Word of God to show Greeks how their idol-mania revealed a deeper hunger they had never addressed- their yearning for the One True Creator behind the universe. The people of America are obsessed with sex, but I doubt Paul would have sat on a bed to preach about hooking up with hotties at work- or with your spouse, for that matter. Rather, he would have used this obvious lust to point us to a deeper yearning- for divine love, consuming purpose and intimacy with God. When it comes to philosophical tents, size doesn't matter. Go for Big Truth. As Jesus taught us,if the Truth is big enough, people of faith will force themselves inside, no matter how small the tent seems: even if they have to cut a whole in the roof to get in.
Just imagine that!
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