Too often, and for too long, American “Christianity” has been a political agenda in search of a gospel useful enough to accommodate it. There is a liberation theology of the Left, and there is also a liberation theology of the Right, and both are at heart mammon worship. The liberation theology of the Left often wants a Barabbas, to fight off the oppressors as though our ultimate problem were the reign of Rome and not the reign of death. The liberation theology of the Right wants a golden calf, to represent religion and to remind us of all the economic security we had in Egypt. Both want a Caesar or a Pharaoh, not a Messiah.

Leaders will always be tempted to bypass the problem behind the problems: captivity to sin, bondage to the accusations of the demonic powers, the sentence of death. That’s why so many of our Christian superstars smile at crowds of thousands, reassuring them that they don’t like to talk about sin. That’s why other Christian celebrities are seen to be courageous for fighting their culture wars, while they carefully leave out the sins most likely to be endemic to the people paying the bills in their movements.

Where there is no gospel, something else will fill the void: therapy, consumerism, racial or class resentment, utopian politics, crazy conspiracy theories of the left, crazy conspiracy theories of the right; anything will do. The prophet Isaiah warned us of such conspiracies replacing the Word of God centuries ago (Is. 8:12–20). As long as the Serpent’s voice is heard, “You shall not surely die,” the powers are comfortable.
Russell Moore, “God, the Gospel, and Glenn Beck”.

Consuming News, Consuming God

USA Today announced recently they’re significantly restructuring of their newsroom, starting with a big layoff. Underlying the physical effects are real changes in their business of journalism. As newspapers and magazines continue their sprint away from physical towards digitally distributed content, we gain some helpful visibility into how Americans consume news and, far more importantly, how and what news is reported on. Fundamental shifts in how Americans produce and consume news are happening quickly, and, rather subtly. We’ll take a look at why this matters to you, but first, some brief background.

“That’s the way it was.”

It’s no surprise that news outlets are tied to advertising. A recent article in the Atlantic explained that, in a typical newspaper’s business model, 80% of their revenue came from ads and 20% from subscriptions. As people started getting their news online, the number of subscriptions, viewers, and therefore advertising dollars tanked. Outlets had to become more targeted to sell more advertising and they essentially became advertising-delivery vehicles. T. David Gordon has helpfully shown that as that happened, important shifts happened in how the news is being reported:

  • Popularity became more important than consequence, and readers’ tastes (invariably sensational) began to dictate media coverage, rather than editors’ perspicacity.
  • Speed became more important than accuracy, which is how debacles like the Shirley Sherrod case happen.
  • People began to look to news organizations, not for objective information, but for argument and opinion as to how to interpret the news, hence Keith Olbermann, Glenn Beck, or even Jon Stewart. This recent PEW report helpfully illustrates this.

The most convicting and revealing finding though, is that people have started going to news outlets to reinforce their view of reality and their preconceived opinions, not for information or education. Why do you watch or read the news you do? Let’s look at USA Today’s recent announcement in light of those trends:

What are they doing?

  • De-emphasizing their print edition and ramping up efforts to reach more readers and advertisers on mobile devices
  • Laying off 130 people, or 9% of their workforce
  • They will no longer have separate managing editors overseeing its News, Sports, Money and Life sections
  • Instead, the newsroom will be broken up into “content rings”
  • The “content rings” will be “Your Life,” “Travel,” “Breaking News,” “Investigative,” “National,” “Washington/Economy,” “World,” Environment/Science,” “Aviation,” “Personal Finance,” “Autos,” “Entertainment” and “Tech.”
  • The executive editor of content will have a “collaborative relationship” with the vice president of business development
  • USA Today is looking at how to “usher in a new way of doing business that aligns sales efforts with the content we produce.”

It appears that the “content rings” will act to narrow the editorial focus in those areas to aid in attracting advertisers to more targeted segments.

Why are they doing it?

  • Less advertisers are buying ads (580 advertising pages sold in its most recent quarter ending in June, a 50% drop from the 1,098 pages sold at the same time in 2006)
  • Shrinking print circulation (1.83 million, down from 2.3 million)
  • Parent company’s stock price down 78% in four years.
  • “We have to go where the audience is,” Hillkirk said. “If people are hitting the iPad like crazy, or the iPhone or other mobile devices, we’ve got to be there with the content they want, when they want it.” [Emphasis mine.]

News & God Consumption

Why is this important on a church blog? Because it is partially illustrative of how Christians approach reading their Bibles or listening to sermons, not to mention really formulating right thinking about God, Christianity, or the Christian life. When 23% of Christians believe that there is spiritual energy in trees and in reincarnation, when 15% of Evangelicals and 30% of mainline Christians ages 18-29 don’t believe in hell, and when 52% of Evangelicals believe that there is more than one way to heaven - each related to tenets of the Christian faith - American Christians are consuming God, the Bible, and orthodox Christianity the same way they consume the news: to take only the bits they want to reinforce what they already believe, but not to challenge or inform those views.

See the Trends, Preach the Gospel

Enough ink and pixels have cataloged the ways the American Church has fed itself on convenience, comfort, and distraction to produce numbers like that so I’d rather give examples of how we’ve tried to not to fall into the same diet at Mars Hill Church. I don’t advocate following USA Today’s example but I do suggest we watch and listen to the results as they unfurl their new organization. I am challenging churches to see the cultural trends, but not to bow to them, and to communicate the glorious, transcendent, eternal message of the Gospel in its fullness, and with clarity and power, no matter the medium.

  • Consequence over popularity. It is all about Jesus. We believe Jesus is the most consequential person who exists. We believe that the good news of His story, as revealed in the Bible, is the most significant truth anyone can know and be a part of. This is why our pastors preach through books of the Bible and for over an hour on Sundays. This is why we try to make even small differentiations, such as between testimonies and biographies. This is why we just did two series on the Mars Hill blog about Biblical manhood and Biblical womanhood. Jesus, the good news of the reconciliation offered through His death on the cross for our sins, and God’s revelation in the Bible may not always be the most popular but they are always consequential.
  • Accuracy over speed. Most practically, we try to make sure every blog, video, printed resource, or piece of media points to Jesus and is theologically accurate. The majority of our content is written by our pastors, and the pieces that aren’t are checked for the same theological accuracy and applicability as a sermon. It is easy to fall into the trap of having to feed the Facebook/Twitter/Tumblr/Blog/YouTube/Vimeo machine and to compromise the content because it needs to get out instead of checking it with a shepherd-like intentionality.
  • Information over argument and opinion. Most practically, this comes back to our view of the primacy of Jesus, the gospel, and the Bible. If we put out a piece of content, we don’t want it to be our words or our opinions. It should seem obvious but we believe that ultimately people long for, and are truly changed by, Jesus and His word. Practically, on the Mars Hill blog, we try to take a journalistic tone; we try to source theological statements and let people tell their stories rather than running with journal-like, first person tomes.

The good news of reconciliation, salvation, adoption, and redemption offered to sinners through Jesus’ death on the cross is the most consequential truth that anyone can hear. It is something that everyone needs and never grows beyond. As a church it is our only message and mission, and it should be conveyed in its totality, centrality, and accurately and not traded for popularity, recognition, or personal opinion.