A couple of years ago, conservative evangelicals seemed to go crazy for two prominent secular authors/speakers operating at a popular level, Jordan Peterson and Tom Holland. Peterson’s star seems to have waned somewhat but Tom Holland remains popular and has been invited onto podcasts and to speak at evangelistic events, usually with a format that enables some conversation and discussion with Holland before an evangelistic talk.
The primary interest in Holland comes from a book he wrote a few years back called “Dominion” which traced the history of Christianity. The attraction was his thesis that our culture and ethics have been fundamentally shaped by the influence of Judaeo-Christianity. This means that even when people seek to subvert and undermine the values and principles of our society, they are often themselves relying on the very same Judaeo-Christian values to make their argument.
Now, don’t get me wrong, I enjoy Tom’s writing and whilst I’ve never met him in person, from reading stuff by him, listening to some podcasts and seeing him engage on social media, he comes across as a knowledgeable, engaging and likable person. I for one would enjoy an evening listening to him talk and having the opportunity to ask questions. I suspect that a non-Christian version of me would be the target audience for such an event.
However, just as I raised concerned about over-reliance of Peterson a few years back, I would put a note of caution on becoming dependent upon Tom Holland. First of all, we want to be careful that we don’t present the impression that Holland is the draw, that we get people to come along who would not otherwise come to a Gospel event. Or at least if we are going down that route, we must make sure that we don’t show a different attitude to inviting an interesting secular historian along to open for us than we would to say a singer, comedian or artist.
Secondly, we need to be careful that we are not relying on these people and their message to lend credibility to our own. This can happen through name recognition. “If Tom Holland is happy to be involved in such and such an event then the message at the end must have some validity.”
There is another way in which we can depend on someone for credibility. We can give the impression that the credibility of the Gospel is dependent upon their hypothesis.. Now, here I the crucial point. Whilst Holland’s argument is a refusal rebuttal to certain debates, it does not and in fact cannot lend credibility to the Gospel. If Holland’s hypothesis turned out to be wronf, then would this invalidate the Gospel? Of course not.
Indeed, it works the other way. As far as I’m aware, Holland’s assessment of the influence of Christianity on contemporary culture does not involve an assessment of whether or not it is true, nor has it led Holland himself to faith in Christ.
Now, there will be differences of opinion about Gospel strategy. Some of you will happily run special events with music, art, comedy or an interesting speaker as means to draw people in. I’m personally not keen on that approach, however, I think it is something we can agree to differ on. I also accept that there is context. Even if I was comfortable with such an approach, most of us would not have access to the likes of Tom Holland and even if we did, I don’t think that such events would work in the majority of UK contexts.
However, whatever our approach, the important thing is that somehow we make it clear that our confidence lies in the Gospel itself.
Faithroots 