Saturday, July 25, 1998

Overthrowing 'bar-code Christianity'

By Dale Hanson Bourke

Religion News Service

(Dale Hanson Bourke is publisher of RNS.)

Having successfully packaged deodorants, cereals and shampoos, some Americans have moved on to marketing God.

Bumper stickers reduce the gospel to a clever phrase. T-shirts offer glow in the dark solutions to life's deepest questions. Mugs bear evangelical mantras to sanctify caffeine addictions.

Most see this trend as just another manifestation of an overheated consumer economy. But Dallas Willard sees it as something much more destructive: the undermining of true Christianity.

Willard, a theologian, author, and philosophy professor at the University of Southern California, is deeply concerned about what he says is happening in American churches. He believes Christianity has caved to popular culture to such a degree that the faith is more obsessed with surface-level marketing than a rich, life-changing message.

Willard calls it "bar-code Christianity."

"Some ritual, some belief, or some association with a group affects God the way the bar code affects the scanner ..." he writes in his latest book "The Divine Conspiracy" (HarperSanFrancisco). "God 'scans' it, and forgiveness floods forth."

It comes as little surprise, then, that people feel unsatisfied with this imitation of God's grace.

Willard says more and more thoughtful Christians are leaving churches because the churches lack depth. And he is especially saddened by the terrible timing.

"Just as there is an increasing interest in God and a realization that secular humanism does not have satisfying answers, the church has lost much of its ability to offer truth," he says.

Neither liberals nor conservatives get it right, says Willard, who sees conservatives obsessing about political and legalistic issues and spending far more energy deciding who is not their neighbor than who is.

" 'Who is my neighbor' is one of the central teachings of the Bible," says Willard. "As a Christian I am first called to love those who are not like me, not criticize them."

Controversies, such as those over homosexuality and abortion, are consuming Christians in a way that Willard says are unhealthy and unbiblical.

And he believes liberals have become too caught up in social action, forgetting the true motivation for their work. And, too often, liberals ignore the saving, life-changing power of faith in Jesus, instead giving in to a "gospel of sin management," he says.

Willard understands both camps and sees the good intentions on both sides. But he believes "God wants us to live in ambiguity," a state of dependence and discipleship that tends to work against legalism and creeds.

Willard believes faith should be far more concerned about living in relationship to Jesus than buying a ticket to heaven.

"Apprenticeship to Jesus" is what a Christian's life is all about, he says. Once we understand that, all the pieces begin to fall into place.

Willard is a Southern Baptist who now attends one of the Vineyard churches, a group of nondenominational, charismatic fellowships. He doesn't like to call himself an evangelical - "Jesus is bigger than that" - but is often quoted in the pages of Christianity Today and Christian Century and he is considered one of the greatest theologians of our time by a broad range of Christians.

His books never make the best-seller lists - even the religion best-seller lists - but his "The Spirit of the Disciplines" (HarperSanFrancisco) is one of those titles that shows up on many "the most important books I ever read" lists of theologians and thoughtful Christians. He is a humble man who thinks it is probably not good for the soul to seek publicity and believes a "discipline of secrecy" should surround the good we do.

And he is a man who appears to be more grieved than angry over the turn American Christianity has taken.

"The Divine Conspiracy" is not a beach book and Dallas Willard is not given to idle chatter. But both his writing and demeanor suggest Willard is not just a philosopher but also a poet. Willard's unabashed love of God comes through whenever he talks or writes.

He seems to live in joyful ambiguity between a faith of the heart and the mind. And he offers a tantalizing invitation to participate in a divine conspiracy that is far richer than a bumper sticker can describe.