More on Percy's The Message in the Bottle

“The American Christian novelist faces a peculiar dilemma today. (I speak, of course, of a dilemma of the times and not of his own personal malaise, neuroses, failures, to which he is at least as subject as his good heathen colleagues, sometimes I think more so.) His dilemma is that though he professes a belief which he holds saves himself and the world and nourishes his art besides, it is also true that Christendom seems in some sense to have failed. Its vocabulary is worn out. This twin failure raises problems for a man who is a Christian and whose trade is with words.”
- Walker Percy, The Message in the Bottle

These profound words from Walker Percy articulate what I believe to be one of the deepest truths of our time: Christianity has in many ways failed, and its vocabulary is worn out. As someone who has functioned as an ordained pastor for nearly twenty years and who has also written books about Christian faith, I have become acutely aware of these dual failings.

Words have been my currency, my means to every end. Virtually all the leading I’ve ever done in my adult life has been through words. And as I tried to say in my last sermon (see my blog entry from December of 2009) I can’t lead that way anymore. The words I’ve always relied on, the stories I’ve always told don’t convey what they once did. Even as I hear them coming out of my mouth, I’m aware of a certain hollowness, an emptiness, a missing of the mark.

It’s not that Jesus has somehow changed or that his path or teachings are somehow less true or even less profound than they once were – not at all. But rather the ground beneath them has shifted. The context into which this message must meld is oil to the gospel’s water. Percy puts it this way: “The question is not whether the Good News is no longer relevant, but rather whether it is possible that man is presently undergoing a tempestuous restructuring of his consciousness which does not presently allow him to take account of the Good News. For what has happened is not merely the technological transformation of the world but something psychologically even more portentous…”

This shifting, this tempestuous restructuring, this peculiar dilemma is what has called me or even yanked me out of the church and out of organized religion. It’s like God has gifted/cursed me with the ability to hear his gospel words with the ears of post-modernity. I want to offer the world – or at least my little corner of it – a radically different way into this Jesus, this Way. I want to begin with actions, with a community, and then, if necessary, we’ll work toward a new language, a new form of story. When I’m ready to open my mouth again, I want to do so knowing that the words and stories won’t ring hollow, that the community I’m a part of has authenticity, traction, and credibility in the postmodern world.

Please, if this kind of conversation interests you – especially if you are anywhere in Northern Michigan – please leave me a comment on this blog or email me at tobyjones@booksandbridges.com. I invite you to be a part of a conversation that is getting started around my new book The Way of Jesus: Re-Forming Spiritual Communities in a Post-Church Age. And wherever you are, get a hold of Walker Percy’s The Message in the Bottle. It is profoundly important and well worth the trouble.