Storying to Postmoderns: Defining Postmodernity…

May 27, 2007 | 8:00 AM

Lesslie Newbigin, former English missionary to India, and author of Foolishness to the Greeks: the Gospel and Western Culture, explains that modern scientific thought and reason has shifted the scriptures from a sacred text to classical literature. [1] The Bible is subjected to contemporary scientific understanding and architectural evidence. Eddie Gibbs and Ryan Bolger document the church’s response to postmodernity in their book Emerging Churches: Creating Christian Community in Postmodern Cultures. They explain that “this shift represents a challenge to the main assertions of modernity, with its pursuit of order, the loss of tradition, and the separation of the different spheres of reality, expressed, for example, in the separation of the sacred and the profane at every level.” [2]

Elmer Towns and Ed Stetzer, authors of Perimeters of Light: Biblical Boundaries for the Emerging Church, explain the change from modern to postmodern thought. “In the previous world of Western civilization, we responded with argument absurdium. Either you believe the truth of Christianity, or you must accept the opposite alternative of atheism and/or agnosticism. But in today’s society, postmodernity has challenged the basis of the way we think and the way we argue. They say both are true at the same time.” [3] Under modern thought the scriptures were once viewed through the lens of science and reason. The postmodern lens sees the scriptures as just another religious text with some truth, but not the truth.

What is interesting about the postmodern shift is the trend toward relativism. Newbigin discusses the effect of pluralism on the concept of truth. “With respect to what are called ‘the facts’ … a statement is either right or wrong, true or false. But with respect to values, and supremely with respect to the religious beliefs on which these values ultimately rest, one does not use this kind of language. Value systems embodied in styles of living are not right or wrong, true or false. They are matters of personal choice. Here the operative principle is pluralism, respect for the freedom of each person to choose the values that he or she will live by.” [4]

Stetzer, in Planting New Churches in a Postmodern Age, explains another aspect to postmodern thought.

Jean-Francois Lyotard, a well-known postmodern leader, defined postmodernism as disbelief toward universal worldviews. “Simplifying to the extreme, I define postmodern as incredulity toward meta-narratives.” He believed that the point of this new movement was to help liberate men and women from the idea that there was a universal point or reason for existence. The universal values, whether they are the American dream, Christianity, or capitalism, are called meta-narratives.

A meta-narrative is a unifying cultural value that explains and gives purpose to life, meaning, and existence. It is the reason people go to work and live their lives. [5]

Stetzer continues his analysis of postmodern culture. “If all the ‘big truths’ are not true and are really there to control the people, where do we find the Truth? People are still looking for truth, meaning, and existence. However, now they are finding it in ‘little’ stories that do not claim to be universal. For example, rather than proclaiming the universal value of the American dream, a postmodern might say, ‘I can instead find truth, meaning, and existence in the writings of Deepak Chopra, and I would not dare claim that this truth would be something that I would try to apply to you. It is my mini-narrative—my personal story that gives me personal peace.’” [6]

The postmodern enmity toward meta-narratives leads to the postmodern embracing of local or mini-narratives. These mini-narratives are the individual stories of each life. Often pluralism is at the root a postmodern’s story, because an individual’s experience informs the mini-narrative. Therefore, context is the key to understanding an individual’s personal story.

Towns and Stetzer offer six propositions regarding the values of postmodernity and modernity using keywords for each worldview. Postmoderns value “relationship over task, journey over destination, authenticity over excellence, experience over proposition, mystery over solution, and diversity over uniformity.” [7] This is important in understanding the postmodern worldview and in the transmission of the gospel.

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[1] Lesslie Newbigin, Foolishness to the Greeks: The Gospel and Western Culture (Grand Rapids, Michigan: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1986), 16.

[2] Eddie Gibbs and Ryan Bolger, Emerging Churches: Creating Christian Community in Postmodern Cultures (Grand Rapids, Michigan: BakerAcademic, 2005), 18.

[3] Elmer L. Towns and Ed Stetzer, Perimeters of Light: Biblical Boundaries for the Emerging Church (Chicago, Illinois: Moody Publishers, 2004), 134.

[4] Newbigin, 17.

[5] Ed Stetzer, Planting New Churches in a Postmodern Age (Nashville, Tennessee: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 2003), 124.

[6] Ibid., 125.

[7] Towns/Stetzer, 156.
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Part 1 [05.26.07]: Introduction…
Part 2 [05.27.07]: Defining Postmodernity…
Part 3 [05.29.07]: The Gospel We Preach…
Part 4 [05.30.07]: The Story of the Gospel…
Part 5 [05.31.07]: The Celtic Way…
Part 6 [06.04.07]: Story Living…
Part 7 [06.06.07]: Bibliography…

Posted in Life, Missional, Missions, Pomo Storying Series