The negative responses were multiple. We had the president of a national fellowship cancel speaking at BJU and wrote every pastor on his board explaining why he canceled. A pastors' network of 1,600 pastors received the pictures and began to ask questions. Multiple grads were shocked at what they saw with no explanation.
So this is why BJU really said something. Kevin Schaal, president of the FBFI or Foundations Bible Fellowship International (recently named Fundamentalist Bible Fellowship. Cute how they changed that, right?), spoke up. Eventually he posted on his own blog here:
Bible verses, in and of themselves, are a good thing. What about printing them on t-shirts, bumper stickers, fast drink cups, socks, underwear, or baby diapers?
“Now,” you say, “not all of those are the same!”
I agree with you, but can you articulate why?
Practices that seem like a good idea up close can look very different when you step back and look at them in the sunlight. That which is intended to be cool Christianity (or maybe popular) can look irreverent or even blasphemous very quickly.
This has been the core issue with the music debate over the last 60 years. A music genre that was born of irreverence, sexual innuendo, and rebellion hardly seems like an appropriate form to communicate the deep and glorious messages of the great transactions of the faith. But it was reasoned that the new medium was cool, and maybe the kids would stay in the faith because they liked it. All we have done with that is to promote a consumer attitude toward worship, and many of them left the faith anyway. However, these questions apply equally to the arts and all forms of culture.
This from Kenneth Myers addresses the issue.
Overstated? I don’t think so. But is it really wrong? After all, there is nothing new about stealing useful cultural forms and artifacts to serve the interests of the gospel . . . .
But the key word in this business is useful. How useful is it to borrow a cultural form if that form effectively cancels the content you’re using it to communicate? There are many instances of some very dubious borrowings in the history of the Church. As missionaries have taken the gospel to new cultures, it has always been tempting to recast the message of redemption in familiar forms. But some of those forms have been inappropriate as vehicles of holy truth, either because they introduced fatal distortion or misunderstanding, or because they were so intertwined with ungodly practices that their affiliation with the gospel seemed to sanction the very behavior the gospel should have challenged.
Such a strategy is a sad reminder that most of the Christian criticism of popular culture has focused on the content while ignoring the form.
. . . the church still behaves as if to forms of culture, especially the forms of mass media and the role they play in our lives are value-neutral.[i]
You cannot promote Jesus or the gospel in any ol’ way you want without the danger of damaging the message itself.
This applies not only to music but all of the arts and to every way in which we seek to co-opt popular culture to accomplish some spiritual purpose. If your approach to culture or fine arts starts with the assumption that the forms are value-neutral (or amoral) you are headed for trouble.
We even have to think through how we use Christian symbols. The cross is a symbol of death, sacrifice, and victory. It has also been an identifying mark of Christianity. However, it must not ever be considered cool or a matter of style.
The intersection of Christianity, art, and pop culture has profound challenges associated with it. The primary identity and worldview of every believer must flow from the word of God first. Artist expression must not rule, but be subject to it.
Christians must think clearly. Rules won’t fix this problem. Dumping the rules won’t fix it either. This requires wisdom, discernment, a willingness to learn, a willingness to disciple, and above all, Spirit-filled sensibilities.
The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom (Proverbs 9:10)
All the usual players had jumped on the bandwagon, of course: Sharper Iron, Lou Martuneac.
Pettit's statement ends with:
This is not our message; this is not what we believe. We say what we believe every day. We didn't have a choice, we had to say this is not what we believe. So how do the crisis communication people say it? How do we answer something started on social media? How do you say enough to say that this is not what we believe, make an appropriate apology, say this is not going to happen again by the grace of God, give enough information to acknowledge the problem, and don't throw anybody under the bus?
We didn't have the luxury of time, yet students and faculty were returning and were largely unaware of the situation. Who is our audience? It's not easy to know. Do we wait for people to contact us and then we communicate back to them? That would be nice and the easiest, but it wasn't reality. Will a statement do more harm than good? It's a fair question which depends on your audience.
So, it was decided to release the statement to achieve the purpose of clearly stating what we believe and to reassure our friends and to begin to regain some credibility that we had lost. This was not a perfect approach--Dr. Pettit is not sure that one exists.
The big question is what are we going to do to be reassured that this is not going to happen again?
Obviously, this is a flawed group of people, and it is understood that mistakes will happen. The process was started with the public statement. But this issue is also seen as a tremendous opportunity to work through biblical worldview within this area. This is precisely why the Center for Biblical Worldview was started. This is the reason for it, and it has been embraced by the department; so that although it is painful, Dr. Pettit views it as a very positive thing with incredible potential as moving forward.
What is our ultimate goal? We want to give our students a tremendous education with a biblical worldview that they can go out and impact the world. We have to continually upgrade and work through and do our best in working with our students.
Dr. Pettit appreciates the humility of those who have been affected by this. Everyone has been humbled, and God is thanked for that. Please pray for God's grace to be poured out over all of us who are flawed and yet we are responsible and want to do our very best in this particular situation. That's why the statement was published.
Yes, Social Media made them say something. Social media is the problem. Social Media is the devil. Poor, poor Steve.
But there are a few more facts you should know....
