Last week, I spent a bit of time unpacking a quote from Sam Allberry’s sermon at Tim Keller’s memorial service. The quote was “Jesus is the true and better Tim Keller.” The reason I wrote about this is that there were a few people having a dig about the quote. Comments included
“Wow” (I don’t get the impression it was a positive wow.”
“I don’t know what to make of this.”
“I hope there’s some context to make sense of it.”
Now, before we go down the “isn’t Twitter terrible” rabbit hole, it’s worth noting that the comments were mainly on the new, shiny “nicer” alternative to Twitter. It seems that it is what comes out of our hearts that matters, not what platform we say it on.
If those concerned had looked only a little bit further, then they would have found the context. They would have seen that the quote was from a memorial service, that it was based on something Tim Keller had said, an adaption of his quote “Jesus is the true and better Adam” and that the talk was all about pointing us to how wonderful and lovely and brilliant Jesus is. You’d think from the responses that Sam had put it the other way round, that it was Tim Keller who was true and better. He didn’t.
Even without the context, I think that the quote is fairly obvious and as I’ve argued, makes a powerful, theologically sound, pastorally sensitive, emotionally aware point. Our identity and meaning is found in Christ. He is the true and better man. Yet, the context was available and when I pointed this out, I did get one begrudging acknowledgement that perhaps that person should leave it at that. Though they still left their original digs to stand.
The thing is this. When I provided context, I also asked people to identify what exactly was wrong with the quote from their perspective. Yet, so far, to date, no-one has been willing to explain to me where Sam went wrong theologically.
Here is the issue. We live in the world of the eye roll, the knowing look and the snide, subtle dig. Those things have replaced debate and discussion. When that happens, we lose so much. The snide dig is a way of virtue signalling to our supporters that we are in the right tribe, that we get it, that we are in the know. However, it doesn’t show any love, it doesn’t help anyone else. It may also prevent us from learning too. So, if you find yourself taking issue with something someone else says or does, don’t just make a little snide dig or roll your eyes. Be ready to challenge, question, explain. And be ready to listen too.
Faithroots 