I got to hear Eric Mason from Epiphany Fellowship preach tonight (he’s filling in for Matt this week while he’s in Asia) – he brought it. He preached on brokenness, which I don’t think anybody can really get enough of. What really got me thinking – aside from his sermon – was the mission of Epiphany Fellowship: to reach the Hip Hop generation. He described this generation as one who since birth has been exposed if not engulfed in the hip hop culture. This made me wonder, are we (the Church) just selling a brand of name or are we reaching people where they are at with the Gospel? Are we engaging culture or just trying to make “them” more like “us”? A guy in my home group that used to go to Fellowship Church was telling me about their Miami, FL church plant and how it wasn’t going over very well. They are trying to push alternative rock, white American contemporary Christianity to a culture that sees no relevance in our tight fitting rock-star jeans.

While Paul was waiting for them in Athens, he was greatly distressed to see that the city was full of idols. So he reasoned in the synagogue with the Jews and the God-fearing Greeks, as well as in the marketplace day by day with those who happened to be there.
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Paul then stood up in the meeting of the Areopagus and said: “Men of Athens! I see that in every way you are very religious. For as I walked around and looked carefully at your objects of worship, I even found an altar with this inscription: TO AN UNKNOWN GOD. Now what you worship as something unknown I am going to proclaim to you. – Acts 17: 16-17; 22-23

To engage a culture you have to get in it, walk around, get to know it. Maybe it means hanging out with the guys from work instead of going to ANOTHER bible study. Maybe it means joining a non Christian group in college (and not lamenting over how pagan they are). Maybe it means loving our neighbor IN their neighborhood.