The need of the hour

You need a reason to start a blog at this time of verbal cacophony. We are surrounded by a storm of words, more than ever before - anyone can write an article, publish it, see it read, shared, tweeted and retweeted. Controversy and argument, radical idea and reactionary answer are the stuff of life. We align ourselves a dozen times a day - we like, we share, we comment, we refute.

This is the case in general conversation, but also within the church. Exactly the same patterns of divisive argument, of side-taking, of aggressive stances, lack of patience, kindness, self-control pervade in our discussions. 

I don't want to write a simply controversial and argumentative blog. I know that topical and provocative articles generate a lot of hits, but I want to be content to write without pretension to greatness, for whoever may happen to find a few words useful. 

And I think that the need of the hour is to hear Christian truth spoken quietly. To refamiliarise with the basic biblical message, the Bible's main themes. This may at times be prompted by a topical or current theme - last week's atrocity in Paris, for instance. And to state Christian truth is hardly to avoid controversy, in this day and age! But my starting place and basic mentality is to talk about Jesus and his love. 

I have not lost my courage or withdrawn from battle. It is my conviction that the only reason why anyone gives houseroom to so much of the wave of trendy, deconstructionalist, totally-committed-to-vagueness material currently popular, in the SA in particular, is simply unfamiliarity with the Gospel. The gurus of postmodernism have entered the church and found that no one knows enough Bible to spot what is actually poison. They have found seats and tables to sit at and a chance to even make a bob or two. 

And only the real Jesus will have the guts to oppose them. And only his gospel of grace will have the truth-power to throw them out. The church needs to be filled again with truth on fire, with the message of the Cross.