The Rush for Change

The Rush for Change

You would suspect that people running for president know very well how they plan to achieve their hopes and what they intend to change. But that information apparently won’t be disseminated until after the swearing-in ceremony. All too evident--and distressing--is the naiveté of the masses who buy the idea that torching the past and hoping for something better will sprout miraculous things from the ashes. However, change for the sake of change is a dangerous game.

The current political maelstrom of undefined rhetoric reflects the general condition of the culture. Otto Von Bismarck, the Prussian politician of the 1800s, is credited with coining the phrase “Politics is the art of the possible.“ In other words, it is the art of the attainable.

Today, it seems, Bismarck’s astute thought has been materially altered. Politics has too often become the art of the “promiseable.” Even more to the contemporary point is the statement of the late economist John Kenneth Galbraith who said, “Politics is not the art of the possible. It consists in choosing between the disastrous and the unpalatable.”

Unfortunately, the rush to change for change’s sake is not confined to the secular arena. It is much in vogue in the evangelical Christian camp as well. There is no better example than the emerging church phenomenon that has enamored so many. At this point it is a movement without definition or clue as to what we are supposed to be emerging into. It is, however, becoming abundantly clear what we are asked to emerge from: virtually anything associated with traditional forms and worship styles and standards of preaching and teaching that rise above my-guess-is-as-good-as-yours interactive discussion groups.

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