by Warren Baldwin

"God said it, I believe it, that settles it." That saying was posted on the office door of one of my college professors in 1976. Later, I saw a simplified version of that which simply read, "God said it, that settles it." The author of the shorter version was simply trying to say, "It doesn't matter whether I believe it or not, what God says is truth."

Such a confidence in the truth of God's Word is commendable and certainly is to be expected of all who are Christians.

But such confidence is also waning in our society. Not just confidence in the Bible, but confidence in anything that poses itself as a standard of thought or behavior. Replacing confidence in the Bible or some other authority is an attitude of relativism. Relativism is "the doctrine that knowledge, truth, and morality exist in relation to culture, society, or historical context, and are not absolute." In other words, there is no standard of right or wrong that is true for all people at all times. Society determines what is right or wrong.

Relativism has been identified as one of the traits of current thinking referred to as postmodernism. Postmodernism is the rejection of Enlightenment thought which elevated human reason over other aspects of life. Enlightenment thought believed in human goodness and progress. Man could do anything, including ending war, defeating disease, and figuring out God. And we tried, with science, technology, and increased learning. But we failed, didn't we?

After several hundred years of rather futile efforts in ending war, defeating disease, and figuring out God, a new generation of people grew up who "knew not the god of the Enlightenment." This generation tends to reject the conclusions of preceding generations about the goodness of man and inevitable progress. They look around and say, "Your technology, science, and religion have not dealt adequately with the problems of war, disease, or hunger. There has to be a better way." And what previous generations held dear as valid solutions to all problems current generations reject. And they often reject religion with it. God, Bible, church.

This is a problem, isn't it? Yes and no. I prefer to call it a challenge.

Postmodernism is a challenge because it forces those of us who believe "God said it, that settles it" to think seriously about how we can reach this current generation of thinkers with the Gospel. Even though relativism may characterize postmodern thinking, I believe many postmoderns are on a search for truth. They want something stable to hold on to. What will we offer them? We can reject them as being uncaring and unspiritual, but that is certainly not what God calls for us to do. We can also scold them for not listening to us, but that won't accomplish anything except to further alienate them.

What insight has God given us into how to reach out to people who might at first tend to reject the spoken or written Word? What did Jesus say we should hold out to people to attract them to Him? How will people know that we are legitimate disciples of Jesus and not just phony copies? The answers to these questions might give us some insight into how to reach the young person living next door to us. Or even the young person living in our own homes.