When we were in high school we didn’t fit in. I’m not saying
that we were members of a group that could have been labeled “the outcasts;”
I’m saying that we crossed so many social categories and boundaries that we
were un-categorize-able. We were all strong academic performers, but we also
played on many of the school’s athletic teams. We were deeply involved in the
NJROTC program, but we made time for other activities like SGA, mentoring, and
Quiz Bowl, and church life. We were weird in that we couldn’t be pigeonholed
into what have become the standard categories for high school society (i.e. the
nerds, the jocks, the freaks, the goths/emos, etc.).
Thanks be to God that we weren’t categorized as any of those
things. We were able to see that friends could be made of all types of people,
and that we could all work independently of a social group to succeed in school
and society. We avoided, for the most part, what could be called the “usual
high school drama.”
High school ended, and we went our separate ways. The men my
friends have become, I think, have reflected their ability to not be
pigeonholed; they have adapted, transitioned, and thrived in just about every
way. (Can you tell I’m proud of them?)
I’m so thankful for the experiences that I had in high
school, but I’m also thankful for my time at Mississippi College and at Baylor
University. The point is that my friends and I have all grown up and left
behind the would-be drama of high school to embrace the fullness of life. Since
we largely avoided that drama to begin with, the growing up was perhaps less
shocking and painful than it could have been.
Now consider a recent post[1] by
Lutheran pastor the Rev. Erik Parker in which he likens Evangelicalism to a
high school. He calls Driscoll, Piper, and Eldridge the “football team” because
“the crowds love them, but most cannot see that they are also the bullies.”
Myer and Osteen are the “rich kids,” and Rachel Held Evans is the
valedictorian. In Parker’s metaphor the Mainline denominations are the
“parents” and “teachers” who “brought them into the world.”
Parker’s central point is that Evangelicalism “needs” the Mainline
denominations for their experience and wisdom. The Mainline needs
Evangelicalism for its “drama to remind us how important this faith business”
is.
Likening the Evangelical milieu to high school, especially
when the Mainline is cast as the teachers and parents, is disingenuous and
anachronistic. To do so is to portray the Evangelical movement as young,
immature, and under the tutelage of the Mainline “adults” who try to mold the
students into their own image. Evangelicals are not in the midst of some
maturation process that will eventually graduate them to Mainline status; the
Evangelical movement is not the Mainline precisely because it cannot become the
Mainline.
The Rev. Parker wants to argue that the Evangelicals need
the Mainline and vice-versa, but calling those same Evangelicals the students
while his own tradition is the great teacher and parent causes “Evangelical” to
lose its historical meaning completely.[2]
His metaphor assumes that if Evangelicals would just grow up a little bit they
would see their “drama” for what it is and merge with the other sober-minded Mainline
Christians in our culture.
Further, Rev. Parker misses the irony that one cannot so
easily stereotype Evangelicals into his or any other category. There are not
“bullies” or “nerds” or “valedictorians” in the Evangelical camp; these
believers flow into and out of and among any categories. The Mainline thinks in
categories because it has, in many cases, an ordered hierarchy to clearly
define those categories. Baptists, at least, have no such hierarchy and
therefore are incapable of categorization. If a specific preacher, author, or
believer acts in a way that resembles the jock, the nerd, or the freak, then so
be it. Trying to cast the entire Evangelical movement as the children in a
school with its drama, though, just doesn’t work.
One final note: the Evangelicals don’t need the Mainline in
the way that Rev. Parker thinks. The Evangelical movement has been doing its
own thing for enough generations now to understand that wisdom and calmness can
be euphemisms for apathy and hollow spirituality. Evangelicals are also not
blind to the “grey areas of faith,” nor are Evangelicals ignorant of the
tensions these grey areas produce. Evangelicals live in these areas every day,
just like Mainline believers.
In my own context of teaching high school students and
witnessing their drama, I’ve come to understand that “the struggle is real.” More
specifically, I’ve learned that the best teacher I can be is the one who
invests in the drama, not to chide, criticize, or tell the students to grow up,
but because the love of God in Jesus Christ is found in how I respond to that
struggle, that drama.
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