Yesterday’s devotional about Gen Alpha lingo got me thinking that we needed another devotional on the subject. As I get older, I’m horrified some days to hear the thoughts of a grumpy old man emanating from my brain. All I’m missing is a rocking chair on a porch and a scowl on my face as I gripe. Why do they have to talk like that? Why can’t they just use good ol’ plain English? If they only knew how dumb they sounded!
I wonder how many grumpy people sounded off when I was a kid. Every generation has had their idioms, phrases, and words that were unique and specific to their generation. I’m sure that the 80s got on the nerves of many. We would say, “Yo. Try not to wig out and go all mental when you get your new ghetto blaster. I know it’s schweet and stellar. Take it with you cruisin’. Just don’t peel out when you dip or someone will think you’re a spaz. Word.”
In the 1950s, the conversation might have sounded like this. “Don’t flip your lid when I tell you the news. Let’s bash ears on the horn and I’ll tell you all about it. Or you can hop over to my pad and we’ll have a nifty time.” See? EVERY generation talked funny, and the older generations wrinkled up their collective disgruntled noses.
Keelan Cook, writing for the Center for Faith and Culture, wrote, “Christians, we have a responsibility to understand culture and how it works, so we can contextualize the gospel. Contextualization is fancy-speak for the process of adapting a message to a particular culture (or context) so people in that culture can understand it. Now, this is an important task for a church that has been told to make disciples of all nations, all ethne, all cultures. Understanding culture is important because sharing the gospel with people is important…
“Culture … runs deep. It is like an iceberg with much more under the surface than above. Understanding this truth is important for two reasons. First, Christians need to actively learn the culture of others… Our neighbors are increasingly different than us, and it is our gospel responsibility to understand them so we can clearly communicate the good news of Christ to them.
“Secondly, culture runs deep in us, too. Our culture subtly influences our foundational beliefs about life, family, faith and society. Often, we are unaware of how much this affects the way we communicate with others — including how we communicate the gospel.
“If our culture so affects our communication, how will the gospel make sense to our neighbors who are different than us?”1
This was the point Paul was making in 1 Corinthians 9:19-23. “For though I be free from all men, yet have I made myself servant unto all, that I might gain the more. (20) And unto the Jews I became as a Jew, that I might gain the Jews; to them that are under the law, as under the law, that I might gain them that are under the law; (21) To them that are without law, as without law, (being not without law to God, but under the law to Christ,) that I might gain them that are without law. (22) To the weak became I as weak, that I might gain the weak: I am made all things to all men, that I might by all means save some. (23) And this I do for the gospel’s sake, that I might be partaker thereof with you.”
Understanding and becoming a part of the culture you are trying to reach does not mean doing anything sinful. There is never justification for that. Nor does it mean changing the Gospel message to make it socially acceptable to a culture. There is only one Gospel message and that NEVER changes. If it does change, then it is no longer the Gospel according to Galatians 1:6-9.
I invite you to join me in adjusting to Gen Alpha – and any other generation or culture we don’t understand – for the sake of sharing the Gospel with them. May God grant us a patience to endure a culture we can’t comprehend, wisdom in how to reach it, cautious sensitivity that we may not insult it, and a love for those who are in it.
“For though I preach the gospel, I have nothing to glory of: for necessity is laid upon me; yea, woe is unto me, if I preach not the gospel!” (1 Corinthians 9:16)
1https://cfc.sebts.edu/faith-and-culture/understanding-culture-helps-fulfill-great-commission/
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