Rev. Steve's Cougar Blog

Well, I was just thinking about what it means to be relevant as a follower of Jesus in our world today. Can we truly be "relevant?" Is that just a catch word for being "of the world?" or is is a way of saying that my desire is to make Jesus known to a lost world in a way that they can understand? I'm sure that it can mean both, but what I want it to mean is the latter. Obviously the gospel is relevant, human beings have not changed that much over the last 2000 years. But, our way of defining truth has. We have invented more ways of denying God's existence and our need for him, but we have not outgrown our actual need.

To be relevant means that we need to speak their language, not change the content of the message. When I was in Haiti last summer, it was difficult to share my faith with Haitians, because I didn't speak Creole, not because the concepts were difficult to understand. When I had an interpreter it was much easier. But, even when I did have an interpreter I was at time culturally ignorant. So relevance is more than just understanding language it is understnding how people percieve the world around them.>