I have been reading a book called “Pop Goes The Church: Should the Church Engage Pop Culture” by Tim Stevens. I’m reading this book with three other guys…. all of whom are pastors and much wiser than I…. and we’re going to record our thoughts about each chapter on our respective blogs. The other bloggers/readers are: Dan Hudson, Nate Liston and Mike Demastus.
This is my fifth and final post about the book covering chapters 5 through the end.
Overall, I enjoyed this book. It opened my eyes to some new ways to look at how and why we should engage pop culture in the church. Pop culture is the voice of our society today and we must use it to reach those who do not know Jesus Christ. That does not mean, however, that we should water down the message of the Gospel in any way.
Some takeaways for me from the book:
* The church needs to focus more on what we’re for rather than what we’re against.
* We need to put more effort into being the light in a dark world, instead of trying to keep the “dirt” of the world from getting on us.
* We have separated ourselves from the secular world by having “Christian music,” “Christian movies” and “Christian books”. We can use pop culture to bridge the gap that we’ve created with a secular society.
* Finding God in pop culture is easier than you think. Look at movies like “It’s a Wonderful Life”, or “Spider-man”, or many popular songs.
* There are many examples in Scripture where a teacher (Paul, for example) uses pop culture of his day to reach people. See Acts 17 or Titus. Even Jesus used pop culture of the day.
* We can use pop culture to raise questions…. questions addressing morality, finances, lust, greed, etc., and we can use Scripture to answer these questions.
* Never stop learning. Lifelong learners have a spirit of humility.
* Sometimes it is appropriate for us to disengage from the culture so that we can re-focus our hearts and our minds on Jesus Christ. Pop culture can distract us from God’s purposes.
It’s been an interesting study and I hope you found some value in my posts.
